Telehealth currently accounts for 38% of healthcare appointments in the United States. That is a massive rise from the roughly 1% telehealth represented before covid. With this staggering increase in business, there’s more market competition than ever before.
For telehealth service providers looking to stand out from the saturated market, sound marketing strategies may be the deciding factor to help them get a leg up from the competition.
Here’s what you need to know when it comes to marketing your telehealth business.
Best Marketing Strategies for Telehealth Companies
1. Keep Your Website, and Your Business, Up-to-date
So much has changed when it comes to telehealth over the last few years. Not only have covid regulations shifted, but there are new frontiers of healthcare including medical cannabis. Incorporating advanced solutions from a leading medical technology company can further enhance the quality and range of telehealth services offered.
Statistics show that 86 % of one-time customers turn into long-brand champions – as long as customer service is shown to be a priority within the company. That’s why it’s pretty important to make sure you are able to answer any questions that customers may have – even if it’s only partially related to the service that you’re providing. Remember, it’s a value game – the more value you can bring, the happier your customers will be.
These are just two quick examples of ongoing changes that your telehealth business will need to address. Remember to keep your website fresh with blogs, informative content, and your company policies and services. This ensures that your business always looks modern and doesn’t start to lag behind the competition.
2. Get Social
There are so many reasons why modern businesses need a mobile app, but one of the biggest is that all of our customers are already using social media apps on their phones.
You need to meet your demographic where they are. Consider the social media sites that not only your current demographic uses, but that demographics you might want to expand into are using as well.
Your company needs to build up a strong social media presence that offers informative, quality posts. This is also a great opportunity to engage with your community and create new contact lines to answer basic questions like hours of operations and costs.
3. Create Informative Blogs for SEO
If your telehealth business doesn’t have a blog, you’re leaving money on the table.
A blog serves two major purposes for your company.
The first is that this creates a way for your business to offer informative and valuable content to your audience. Not only will they visit your website to find answers to their questions, but they’ll share your blogs with friends and family who might have similar needs.
This is also one of your most powerful tools when it comes to search engine optimization. This is how Google and other search engines know which content to rank higher than others. Using keywords, backlinks, and other powerful SEO tools, you can improve the ranking for your website.
4. Don’t Forget Email Marketing
Plenty of businesses lose sight of classic digital marketing techniques and wind up missing out on valuable opportunities.
Email marketing is still one of the most effective ways to reach your audience. There are a few tips for making the most of your telehealth email marketing strategy.
You never want to spam advertisements with your email marketing. Your emails should offer valuable content as well as promoting your business. Emails can advertise new features, let people know about important changes to public health care policy, and remind them about any specials or promotions that your company is running.
5. Be Smart About Paid Advertising
Paid advertising can be an incredibly rewarding investment for your marketing, but you need to be smart about how you utilize it.
One of the most clever ways to use paid advertising is to shore up a deficiency in your SEO while you are building up an organic online presence.
You can use paid advertising, such as pay-per-click to boost the ranking of your business on search engines. This will help get you more visibility while you are working on organically ranking above your competition.
It also pays to do a lot of A and B testing when it comes to paid advertising. Diversify your strategies and prune the marketing tactics that don’t work as well as others. This will improve your marketing efficiency as well as give you insight into what works best for your telehealth business.
6. Design for Your Community
This tip is much more data-intensive, but it can also yield some of the most powerful results.
You should consider the needs of your patients, customers, and community when coming up with new marketing strategies.
What are they looking for when it comes to their interactions with your business, and how can you help them connect with those services? The answer to this question is going to depend on the research that you can conduct on your core demographics.
This is one area where you can really feel the benefits of having a project manager.
7. Be Ready for Change
There are always new features, regulations, and standards changing the telehealth landscape. Things aren’t the same as they were one year ago let alone three or four years prior. Your marketing strategy needs to be ready for that change.
Here’s a powerful example.
Telehealth companies walked a tightrope when it came to HIPAA legislation. However, there are now HIPAA-compliant online chat features that allow patients to directly connect to providers from their home.
Is your company ready to onboard HIPAA-compliant chat? What about the next feature that will change telehealth services? Your business needs to be ready to shift to new standards whether it’s about your services or marketing.
Telehealth Marketing: The Big Takeaway
You have plenty of options when it comes to marketing your telehealth company. You can get started by making sure you keep your website up-to-date, building up your social media presence, and generating buzz through SEO blogging.
The telehealth industry is rapidly evolving, and the most long-lasting companies are going to be the ones that can adapt to new marketing strategies as this business continues to grow.
