In our digitally driven economy, a businesses’ success and growth potential are defined by their online presence. How often can your practice be found in online search? What does your brand convey once you’re found? How easy is it for patients to interact with your website?
Optimizing online performance and visibility is a must for business. Yet many practices don’t know where to begin — and don’t know how to gauge their online performance to find which areas need the most work.
In just a minute or two, the PatientPop competitive scanner shows medical and dental practices how they compare with other practices in their geographic area and specialty. The detailed competitive analysis quickly identifies your practice strengths and areas of need, powerful insights that help drive long-term success.
Where do you rank?
Instantly see how you compare to other practices in your local area and specialty.
Four online factors that drive patient acquisition for healthcare practices
The PatientPop competitive scanner analyzes healthcare practice performance in four key areas of online activity: Google ranking, overall web presence, website performance, and online reputation. Reflecting search engine optimization (SEO), reputation, and response to patient preference, these four factors have proven essential to drive patient acquisition and long-term practice growth.
The PatientPop competitive scanner determines a score up to 100 for each of the four components, with a detailed look at top-performing competitors.
Practice performance factor No. 1: Google ranking
In the PatientPop 2021 patient perspective survey, 3 out of 4 patients said they’ve searched online to find a healthcare provider or care information. More than 60 percent do so with some frequency.
What happens when your practice doesn’t show up toward the top of search results? Prospective patients will choose another practice. In fact, 75 percent of all clicks come from just the top three organic results.
Knowing where your practice website ranks is important, particularly for keywords specific to your specialty. It’s also necessary to regularly keep an eye on rankings because patient searches and your results will change over time based on a variety of factors.
The PatientPop scanner delivers a precise look at where your practice falls in Google rankings. With this information, practices can better define and refine a comprehensive search engine optimization (SEO) strategy that’s sure to drive new patient growth.
Practice performance factor No. 2: Web presence
Online directories such as Google My Business, Yelp, Vitals, WebMD, and Citysearch give your practice more opportunities to get found online, expanding your presence beyond your website. However, to positively affect search engine rankings and the patient experience, the information across these profiles must be accurate and consistent. (Imagine Googling your doctors’ office, finding the wrong address, and missing an appointment!)
The PatientPop scanner reviews your practice performance across 49 popular web profile directories, flagging any profiles that are incomplete or inaccurate. Practices that take the time to claim, update, and maintain these profiles can significantly improve their web presence — important for an effective patient acquisition strategy.
Practice performance factor No. 3: Website performance
Having the snazziest, most eye-catching website design isn’t enough to attract new patients. Your practice website has to perform well, as measured by page loading speeds (on both desktop and mobile), security, and searchability. These factors signal to Google whether a site is a good, credible, accessible source of information which, in turn, impacts search engine rankings.
Page load times, for example, can have a significant impact on the user experience and therefore, website traffic volume. As a web page load time goes from one to five seconds, the chance of the user leaving the site increases by 90 percent.
By providing an overview of a practice’s website loading speeds and a pass/fail grade for security and searchability, the PatientPop competitive scanner tool offers practices a clear look at their website performance.
Practice performance factor No. 4: Online reputation
Seventy-three percent of patients in the 2021 PatientPop survey say that positive reviews are very or extremely important when choosing a healthcare provider. The internet is the new word of mouth at digital scale, and savvy consumers pay close attention to a practice’s online reviews and a star rating before making their decision.
By checking a practice’s total number of reviews and average star rating across Google, Yelp, and Facebook, the PatientPop competitive scanner tool gives practices a clear picture of how their online reputation stacks up against other local providers.
The key to practice growth is measurement and performance improvement
The old adage says “What can’t be measured can’t be managed.” That’s why good healthcare practice management and growth planning must begin with measurement. Providers and practice owners agree, having used the scanner tool more than 100,000 times to date. The results provide a quick measure of online performance, with details that can help practice owners identify which digital marketing tactics can foster continuous improvement across the four key areas.
