Digital Marketing That Provides Profitable Growth in Optometry
Today’s Covid news indicates “Thousands of Flights Are Canceled as Omicron Spreads”. The new variant spreads so quickly that its social crippling effect might be the greatest so far. Telehealth and telemedicine are currently the most employed information technology tools in an Optometry practice since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. As Omicron spreads more providers will surely embrace telehealth and telemedicine like no time before. Last week I came across an article by Ajay Prasad, the Chief Executive Officer of GMR Web Team, a full-service healthcare digital marketing agency focused on patient acquisition and retention. Ajay wrote about the importance of reaching out to patients, impressing and retaining their loyalty in this digital world where all the health information is a click away from them. “Google Health” empowers patients to select their eye care professional and even decide on procedures and eyeglasses.
Ajay is famously known for developing the “three pillars of healthcare marketing success” concept. It consists of a framework that every healthcare provider is required to follow in order to have a successful healthcare marketing campaign. The three pillars are A growing loyal patient base, A stellar online reputation, and A strong online visibility.
By strengthening these three pillars in their healthcare digital marketing plan, various small and medium-sized medical practices Ajay and his team have worked with have witnessed firsthand impressive growth outcomes.
As telehealth and telemedicine are becoming among the core technologies in the practice, it is crucial that every optometrist revisits his strategy and unique selling proposition taking into consideration the changing behavior of patients in the digital world. By looking at the three pillars of healthcare marketing success concept the unique selling proposition needs to be crafted in a way that strengthens all three pillars.
1st Pillar: A Growing Loyal Patient Base is obtained and maintained by increasing patient satisfaction rates. Satisfied patients lead to increased patient loyalty, retention, referrals, and profitability growth. This can be achieved by improving the patient experience. a great patient experience goes beyond telemedicine and teleconsultation, it includes sending personalized emails or keeping patients up to date with newsletters. Birthday or national holiday wishes, such as Independence Day or Thanksgiving are ideas to strengthen the digital experience. Keeping in touch with your patients and providing great care helps increase their satisfaction and loyalty.
2nd Pillar: A Stellar Online Reputation consists of expanding the patient experience to improve your brand recognition and propagating an online reputation. Staying on top of online patient reviews is a crucial component of building a positive image to attract more patients. Encourage reviews both positive and negative. Praise positive reviews and respond to negative reviews with care and attention protecting your online image.
3rd Pillar: A Strong Online Visibility goes beyond patients’ reviews and ratings to include relevant searchable eye health information and digital content helping patients in their eye health decisions. A recent study showed that up to 81.5% of the population researches health insights online. To increase the practice’s visibility to patients looking up medical help online, optometrists can employ search engine optimized (SEO) content, paid ads, Facebook ads, as well as host mobile-friendly website design and apps to make the website accessible across multiple platforms, increasing the practice’s web visibility and traffic.
To conclude, the digitalization of eye care requires optometrists to revisit the patient’s experience every step of the way. Digital marketing goes beyond providing and servicing a product, it plays an important role in building customer satisfaction and profitable growth through providing exceptional experiences and delivering helpful digital content.