Branding and marketing are as crucial to the highly personal, service-based healthcare sector as they are to any other industry.
Regardless of a physician’s specialty, a branding strategy allows that individual to maintain a considerable amount of control over how patients perceive and interact with his or her practice.
Nowadays, the internet is the most important place a healthcare professional must focus his or her branding efforts on.
To do so effectively, you need to consider three important aspects of healthcare branding:
- The value that online branding holds for modern practices.
- How healthcare professionals should approach brand-building in the digital space.
- The most effective ways to reinforce the online reputation one cultivates, in-person.
Let’s dive deeper into why it’s important and how to do it.
Why an online brand is important for healthcare providers
It sets you apart from the competition
In every discipline, trained healthcare professionals are typically recognized as experts by the people who come to them for treatment.
While this is undeniably beneficial, it can also pose a problem if you want to differentiate yourself from other doctors who share your specialty.
This is because prospective patients are likely to consider your abilities and those of your competition as being on an equal level, which can make it difficult to set your skills apart to draw in clients.
Branding is one of the best tools you have to distinguish yourself from other doctors and show your patients why you are better suited to meet their needs.
Beyond logos and marketing, it’s also one of the better ways to forge a stronger relationship with patients interested in your service.
It establishes clear, consistent expectations for patients
When patients choose you as a provider, they are not just concerned about the quality of your services—they are also concerned about how their overall experience with your practice will make them feel.
Developing a well-defined brand that extends beyond your online persona and into the workplace culture of your practice can help set patient expectations before their first visit.
When you follow through in-office with the promises you make via branding, patients feel that their expectations have been met, which lays the foundation for a positive, trustworthy reputation. Your patients might also discuss their experience within their social circle, which can lead to attracting and retaining more patients.
Let’s be more specific.
It builds loyalty
Repeated patient satisfaction can breed feelings of loyalty, which can bring long-term stability to your practice. According to research done by Accenture, “patients are six times more likely to stay with their providers if they trust them[JB1] .” This study also contains the five aspects of a healthcare practice that predict a high degree of patient loyalty:
- Satisfaction
- Reputation
- Effective problem resolution
- Staff follow-through
- Trust in the provider
It’s vital that your staff treats patients with respect and dignity.
Branding is the first step you can take toward establishing a healthcare business capable of offering its clientele each of these things.
How to build your professional brand online
Evaluate your current online brand
Begin building your brand by researching where your brand currently stands. Run your name through search engines and identify any potential content that might be damaging your reputation and driving business away, paying special attention to your patient reviews.
Consumers place a great deal of trust in online reviews, so what your patients say about you on the internet matters.
Many healthcare professionals are surprised by what’s being said about them online, whether it’s positive or negative, and want to weigh in.
However, it’s important to keep patient confidentiality foremost in mind when looking through your search results.
There are situations in which you’ll have to accept you can’t tell your side of the story.
Showcase your professional philosophy online
Effectively showcasing your professional philosophy online is an essential part of building a distinct brand that will set you apart from your competition.
To do this, you must evaluate what your values are as a doctor as well as the approach you prefer to take to provide patients with the best possible care.
For example:
- Do you treat patients narrowly, targeting the symptoms, or do you look at their whole lifestyle to determine what the problem might be?
- Are there particular methods you prefer when treating a chronic illness? If yes, why do you prefer them?
- What role do you see yourself playing in a patient’s health? (Are you a scold? A friend? A coach?)
Once you’ve determined your professional philosophy and values, let them inform your online reputation management strategy.
Consider your existing social media profiles, web pages, and blog sites and look for opportunities to display your chosen brand in subtle yet effective ways.
Make sure to use some portion of your websites and profiles to clearly outline and explain your professional approach, as well as emphasize the “why” behind your philosophy as a doctor.
You can further demonstrate your commitment to your philosophy by generating relevant content and linking to well-written pieces on reputable websites you consider to be in line with your approach to healthcare.
Proactively monitor and maintain your online reputation
No matter how dedicated and careful you are in your work, there are bound to be instances in which your brand is sullied by negative feedback from a patient.
It’s a reality of modern medicine that even the best doctors might have to face malpractice suits.
These suits can take on a life of their own far from the courtroom, often playing out publicly in the form of angry reviews that can taint your brand and significantly damage your overall online reputation.
When dealing with a disgruntled patient, doctors must respect doctor-patient confidentiality. However, the patient is under no such obligation.
Patients can choose to disclose their history and easily advertise their side of a story, but healthcare providers must limit what they say in these situations to avoid damaging their reputations further or winding up in court again.
This can make it difficult for physicians to respond to former patients airing grievances or to smear campaigns waged against them, especially if the anger of person in question has less to do with their treatment and more to do with the fact they didn’t win their malpractice lawsuit. This is one of the most common difficulties for doctors who are trying to build a personal brand.
The best way to deal with patient complaints while still protecting patient confidentiality is to implement an active and well-informed online strategy consisting of routinely maintained social media profiles and create relevant web content, such as blogs on topics related to your area of practice.
If you lack the time or resources to take on a major task like this while running a healthcare practice, firms like ReputationDefender provide services that can help you take control of your branding and internet presence.
What to avoid when building your brand online
Don’t waste your efforts by developing something generic
Building a strong online brand is a crucial part of being a successful healthcare professional.
However, the process of creating and maintaining your image online requires both time and dedicated effort.
Because you’re a doctor, your free time is likely in short supply. Therefore, you must not waste the work you do to promote your online brand by creating a generic web presence that fails to differentiate you from others who share your specialty.
There are different ways to approach displaying the unique aspects of your practice to patients online.
The method you choose will depend on your personal preferences. Some ways to distinguish your practice online include choosing a bold, somewhat provocative brand that challenges the norms of your industry or taking a community-centered approach by advertising your partnerships with local nonprofit organizations online.
Additionally, developing a schedule for posting branded content on all your social media profiles can help you stand out from the competition.
Doing so regularly exposes your patients to your professional philosophy and sets the stage for a sense of community among those who come to you for help with their health issues.
Whichever approach you take to develop an online brand, you must commit fully to advertising what makes you and your practice unique and create a meaningful online presence that will not become lost amidst the messaging of your competitors.
Use caution when responding to patient reviews
Unfortunately, an important yet delicate part of maintaining your brand online is responding to patient reviews—some of which may be unflattering.
Even the most technically proficient physicians are bound to incur their share of negative online reviews. But what separates the doctors who remain successful despite these reviews from those who develop a wholly negative online brand is how you respond to them.
The first thing to remember is that you should never ignore negative reviews or attempt to delete them.
Instead, try to respond to them promptly in a way that seeks to make poor experiences into positive ones.
Equally important is not responding to reviews in a way that violates HIPPA laws, even if it means that you are prevented from divulging your side of the story.
Never take reviews personally or let anger color your response. Instead, thank each poster for their feedback, remain empathetic to their experiences, and suggest a follow-up with disgruntled patients through a private, offline medium.
Another valuable way to maintain a positive online brand is to proactively ask for feedback from patients right after their appointments.
Research published by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) noted that a majority of online patient reviews are more likely to be positive than negative. Asking for reviews is a great way to help build a more comprehensive, positive picture of your practice online, which can benefit your brand.
Always keep your online and in-person brands consistent with one another
Reinforce your online brand by keeping your patients’ in-office experiences consistent with the persona and professional environment you advertise on the internet.
Your online brand helps patients develop an idea of what they can expect from your office before they ever visit it, and it’s important to deliver on that promise.
For example, if you market your office as friendly and fun online, then the actions of your office staff, as well as your bedside manner, should reflect these same values.
If your brand is more stately, sleek, and matter-of-fact, you should incorporate the same principles into your online marketing choices, as well as the behavior of your employees and yourself. Whichever brand you develop for your practice online, remaining consistent across all mediums is key to success.
For now, if you’re not sure what people can see online or what the consensus is regarding your reputation, your best resource is our free online reputation report card. It will instantly tell you how others view you or your practice across the internet.
Using this resource is a great way to discover a previously unknown negative reputation or misinformation about you or your practice online.
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