Your new and regular patients will always have an opinion about your medical practice whenever they visit. They often talk to their friends, family or post online on their social media sites. Whatever they say about you can either make or break your medical practice. Therefore, you should always be concerned and aim to create a good reputation, after which you should put more effort into maintaining it.
It can be challenging to control what someone would say about your medical practice. However, you can look through what they say and work to minimize the negative comments. That said, let us look at some of the ways you can create and maintain a 5-star reputation for a more prosperous medical practice.
Importance of a 5-star reputation
A good reputation is vital for the success of your medical practice in the following ways:
- It helps you attract new patients – According to Google, 84% of patients search for medical practice before visiting it. They use online reviews to determine if they should visit or not. In addition, out of all these patients, 44% of them used their mobile devices to book an appointment.
- It makes marketing easier –Your medical practice will enjoy free press articles, online reviews, and word-of-mouth marketing. Moreover, the more you pop up in people’s conversations or appear in their eyes, the more they are likely to trust you and visit you.
- It increases profits – A good reputation instills value in your brand and services. Even if you offer your services at a higher price than your competitors, people will still come to you because of your reputation.
- It attracts better employees – A good reputation will attract better, more qualified employees. People tend to feel more satisfied when working with healthcare facilities that have a good name.
Creating a 5-star Reputation
Start with an online presence
As mentioned earlier, 84% of patients run an online search for a healthcare facility before they even consider it. So, it would help if you aimed to be present in their search results to increase visibility. You could start with a website if you don’t already have one. And remember to invest in your website. Make it search engine friendly and also make it very easy for people to navigate through it.
Create a Google My Business account. This account shows your location, operating hours, an overview of your medical practice, any updates, reviews, photos, contacts. It also makes it easier for people to share more about your medical practice, your general rating, and more.
Afterward, create accounts in almost all the social media sites, including Facebook, LinkedIn, Q&A forums like Quora and Reddit, etc. It would be best to research to find out which site your potential and regular patients use more and maximize on it.
Work on your medical team
Good staff equals good reputation. Train or encourage your team to be open-minded, responsive, and engaged with the patients. They should practice good patient relations to increase customer satisfaction and consequently improve your reputation.
Experts also say that when your employees are satisfied, they tend to be more dedicated and committed to their work, resulting in better communication and patient relations. So, it would be best if you also worked to keep your employees motivated and excited about their jobs. They will ultimately project that happiness and good spirit onto patients.
Have a great medical quality
Good medical quality also helps to create a 5-star reputation for your facility. You should produce fast and accurate results for your patients, great time management by making sure the schedules and appointments are adhered to as promised, have a smooth IT-based data exchange that follows HIPAA rules, and so much more.
In addition, your financial situation could also affect your reputation. For instance, if your patients see that you are using outdated medical equipment or one that is in bad condition, they may view your facility negatively. So, it would be advisable to invest in modern equipment that creates a smooth workflow, improves result outcome, reduces waiting times, and improves treatment. All of these will increase patient satisfaction and thus help with a better review.
Maintaining a good reputation
Improve your search engine rankings
It would be best to continually optimize your website and social media sites to rank highly on the search engine results page. The simplest way to do this is by creating a good website and constantly updating it to the current Google requirements. You can go further by using paid search engine marketing (SEM) tools to rank higher.
Post blogs on your website
Post blogs to increase your online visibility. You can educate patients or keep them aware of anything related to the field. The reason for doing this is to have an authoritative online presence that Google and other search engines will notice, and it will also help build trust in your audience. So, keep a posting schedule and create positive content for your potential and regular patients, and anyone else browsing the internet.
Be active on social media
Always keep your potential and regular patients engaged on social media. In fact, this is where you will get most of your reviews from. So, take time to go through your different online platforms, respond to any patient request on time and post relevant content that they will find helpful.
Read and timely respond to patient reviews
First of all, encourage your patients to leave reviews on all your online platforms. And whenever you get a negative review, don’t deny or come out harsh. Instead, acknowledge it, try to understand why that patient has given a negative review, and address the problem as soon as possible.
Encourage your staff to strive to give excellent services
Train your staff to provide superb care to patients. Also, ensure that they are well satisfied with their jobs for a healthier working environment.
Building a reputation and maintaining it is something that won’t happen overnight. It takes time and great effort. And once, made it doesn’t take much to ruin it. So, always work on improving yourself, your staff, and your facilities to provide the best possible service to your patients. And continue working on other strategies of building a 5-star reputation.
