subject: Essential Features for a Dental Website [print this page] Essential Features for a Dental Website Essential Features for a Dental Website
An affordable and effective way to market your dental practice online is to purchase and develop a website. Through your website you can advertise your services, office hours, educate patients and encourage potential patients to book an appointment.
A professionally designed dental practice website that focuses on your patients, their interests, and considers what is best in terms of navigational structure will set you apart from your colleagues. It will also communicate more effectively to new and existing patients.
Create an effective dental practice website by considering the following features:
Simplicity and Clarity
Potential patients prefer websites that are stylish and simple to navigate. Your patients should find the information on your dental website that is:
easy to find
in a style of writing that communicates ideas quickly and easily
providing 'solutions or answers' to their questions. This may be in the form of multi-media videos that break down and more easily describe complex dental procedures, or simply being able to find your hours of operation and location to your dental practice.
Search Engine Friendly
Your website ranking on popular search engines is one of the key factors to establishing the success of your web presence. Creating a search engine friendly site is relatively easy, but requires some time to help bump your name to the first page of search ranking.
Online Appointment System
This feature allows patients to request an appointment time conveniently through your website. Phones lines can be tied up on busy days, or a patient may have a desire to communicate with your office during off hours. Rather than feeling frustrated that they cannot get through to your office, the prospective or existing patient can simply request a time using any mobile device or computer. A simple email to your receptionist from an online appointment request is a quick and convenient method of communication, and one that can be readily followed up with an e-mail or a phone call. If a patient is new, you may even have them fill out online forms at their leisure before their arrival, further reducing administrative resources.
Patient Education
A well designed dental website should not only inform patients about your qualifications and services, but should also educate them. Libraries of videos, literature and photos depicting simple explanations and practical steps to achieving optimum oral health will help to reduce confusion, assist patients into feeling more comfortable during a procedure, and ease their decision about booking an appointment with your practice.
Content Management System
Design, update your own content, edit, and publish your own website, newsletters, testimonials, blogs and videos without any extra expense paying a web master to do it for you. Reduce time and money using simple easy to use content management software for your dental practice website. If you have multiple practice websites, content management software keeps all the important information in one place, making it easy to publish changes to your website.
Dental websites are targeted to a specific market of people (patients). Purchasing and developing a website by a company that specializes in your field will produce much better results. These types of companies understand your user (potential patient), their needs, how they navigate the site, and the criteria being used to find you on search engines. Help your practice grow by choosing a professional dental website developer.
