Just as there are things that you can do to make your medical website more appealing, there are also content and design decisions that can affect how well your site performs. In fact, making certain mistakes could prove extremely costly and undermine your website’s potential, resulting in low conversions, high bounce rates, and a poor user experience overall. Are you concerned about the effectiveness of your medical website? Here are four things you should definitely avoid:
1. Long, rambling content
People finding your medical website for the first time are most likely looking for information, and you need to make it easy for them to find it. This is why it is important for the content on your site to be direct and to-the-point. If you try to cram a lot of information in, whether for SEO or just to stay ahead of your competitors, you run the risk of people feeling overwhelmed and moving on. To keep prospective patients on your site, we recommend developing concise, easy-to-read content that tells people want they want to know.
For example, if you want to provide more comprehensive information about your services, you should create separate pages and link to them. The following website does this well:
Notice the “Read More” buttons that invite you to visit a different page.
2. Stock images
Using a stock image or two on your medical website is fine, as long as you don’t over-do it. Whenever possible, however, you should use pictures of real people, like your doctors, nurses and other staff. Spending a little money to get professional pictures taken of your office and employees can pay off by giving your website personality and giving people a better sense of who you are. The following image taken from the Cardiovascular Institute of Northwest Florida’s website, for example, shows two of their doctors in action and conveys trust:
Compare this to the stock image used by another cardiovascular group website:
Which healthcare organization do you think patients are more likely to trust?
3. Intrusive ads
Ads can be a great way to generate revenue from your website without lifting a finger. However, they can also give your site a spammy feel and drive people away. If you choose to monetize your site through an ad platform like Google AdSense, make sure you do so tastefully. Avoid distracting ads with video, as well as those that take up more space than your content. Ads might bring in money for your practice, after all, but a new patient will generate much more revenue.
4. Auto-play music
There isn’t much that needs to be said about auto-play music, as it’s obviously annoying and provides no real value to a website. If you want people to stay on your website longer and keep coming back, trust us on this one, don’t do it.
What other website elements have you found to negatively affect conversions?
Related article: Has Your Medical Website Reached the End of Its Life Cycle?
