Across industries, the COVID pandemic situation has changed the way we work, as well as the operational aspects of how things work. Earlier, working from home was allowed to only a selected few, but now this is a new normal. Every industry has evolved and has developed new ways to stay relevant; the same goes for healthcare. Gone are the days when you had to physically go to the doctor to get an appointment, get a diagnostic test done at the clinic, or go to the chemist to buy your medicines. Today everything can be and is being done with the click of a few buttons; Want an appointment with the doctor? Go to their website or app and book an appointment; nowadays, doctors give online consultations as well. Want to get some particular test done? Raise an online request, and the executive from the clinic or the lab will come to your house to get the sample. You can get your medicines delivered or dispatched at your doorsteps by ordering them online.

Everything has become virtual, and thereby, it has become necessary for healthcare providers to stay proactive and improve their online presence as this online trend is here to stay. It means that all your digital marketing strategies have to be impeccable, so here are some digital marketing trends in healthcare that one needs to be well-versed with to stay relevant.

The influx of Telehealth Providers

The pandemic has changed the working of the healthcare sector. Earlier, you have to be physically present for any consultation with the doctor. But now telehealth is gaining momentum, wherein patients consult the doctors through a mobile phone or a computer, get a diagnosis, and get medicines prescribed. Digital marketers have an excellent opportunity to assist the telehealth services or telemedicine providers with various marketing strategies that will help them gain traffic to their websites and get new patients on board. More people are finding it convenient to use telehealth services for non-emergency situations as it saves their time and they get treated from the comfort of their homes.

The Importance of Social Proof has Increased.

In the past, people relied on the recommendations of family or friends to get acquainted with a good healthcare provider, be it a doctor, a chemist, or a lab. But today, if we want to know how the doctor is, we straight away check their online reviews and other social proof to know how credible they are. Social proof gives the viewer evidence of how trustworthy the healthcare provider is through customer feedback, affiliation with the reliable and responsible party, engagement with their followers, and much more. Through various healthcare marketing services, digital marketing agencies have proved to be an essential part of improving healthcare providers’ social proof. For instance, instead of using a simple testimonial for the website, digital marketers use the customer experience and develop a story around it and shoot an engaging video or publish an Instagram story or post that has helped increase the website’s engagement, thereby increasing the traffic.

Personalizing the Healthcare Journey

A personal touch is always welcome with people, and as a marketing strategy, it has proven to have a positive effect. As a result, personalization is one of the important marketing trends in healthcare that is here to stay. For example, healthcare providers can send specific e-mails to patients suffering from certain conditions. The content is concentrated mainly on condition-specific or treatment-specific or a recommendation of appointment or some distinguishing services that will help the patient with their condition. Another way that will help personalize is by developing content or strategies around the specific wants of patients. For instance, through the analytics, you become aware that most of the searches came from particular keywords, then you can develop more content around that and adapt your website page to it. Care is taken that personalization is done in compliance with the healthcare privacy laws of the country.

Better Responsive and Interactive Websites

Most healthcare providers’ websites, tend to contain too much non-essential and scientific content that is hard for a layperson to understand. As a result, the websites have an overload of information but zero engagement, thereby providing a mediocre user experience. Today, many healthcare providers realize that their website is the face of their business and services and they need to do more than slapping content onto the site in order to drive more traffic and eventually get more conversions. With the help of a professional digital marketing agency, they can make a good site structure with easy navigation make the content more valuable, and the whole website more interactive, and increase engagement with tools such as text, e-mail support, or chatbots for users’ convenience. Apart from this, implementing various SEO strategies can also help optimize the website and get improved results.

Implementation of Location-based SEO

The recent trends in digital marketing have shown that search results are getting more localized. The Google algorithm is designed so that the top ranks or results are based on the proximity of the person searching, the search term relevance, amount of the reviews the search got, and the uniformity of the address across all the websites. In addition, digital marketers regularly check and refresh the website’s content to ensure the accuracy of the content provided. Keeping the website’s content accurate and real-time will help the audience get the right information, especially in case of any emergency, and help them to get a prompt response. One should ensure that they get the patient’s reviews online about the healthcare provider. Google gives preferences to those websites that have a review of four and above stars, and hence these websites are shown within the local search pack at the top of the Search Engine Result Pages (SERP).

In today’s intensely competitive world, it is vital to be aware of the latest trends to stay relevant to your patients and be ahead of your competition. To be conversant and actioning the latest market trends in healthcare, it is vital to hire an experienced digital marketing agency specializing in the healthcare sector.