As an orthopedic surgeon, you’ve spent years investing in your career and mastering your specialty. Whether you’ve been practicing as a surgeon for months or decades, going the extra mile to market yourself can help you grow your practice and reach more patients in need of orthopedic care.
Digital marketing is an essential strategy for reaching more people in less time. Below, learn more about marketing for orthopedic surgeons, and how you can grow your practice using cost-effective digital strategies.
Marketing basics for orthopedic surgeons
As an orthopedic surgeon, it’s important to establish a network of clinicians who can refer patients to you. But even if you’ve got a great reputation as an orthopedic surgeon, you may be missing opportunities to care for more patients. Not all patients who need orthopedic care ask their doctors for referrals.
Investing in digital marketing can help you reach other types of patients, whether it’s those searching for care online or people who may not be actively seeking care but might have to in the future. Online platforms such as your website, social media, and email can help you establish yourself as a trusted expert in your specialty.
What goes into a great digital marketing strategy?
Like other forms of advertising, the best digital marketing strategy is a multi-faceted one. Depending on who you want to reach, you can use different channels to promote yourself and your practice. Then, as you measure which channels are most effective in bringing you patients, you can choose where you want to invest the most money and time.
Website
Your website is the first place you can introduce yourself to potential patients. Focus on creating a visually appealing, easy-to-navigate site that helps people get to know who you are and all your practice has to offer. You can also publish blog content on your website that further establishes you as an expert in orthopedics, all the while taking advantage of search engine optimization, or SEO. (Read more on that below.)
Online services
These days, more and more patients are searching for doctors and booking appointments online. They often don’t want to pick up the phone. If you’re hoping to grow your practice, then it’s your job to make that process as easy as possible. Services like Zocdoc can help you gain visibility as an orthopedic surgeon and make it seamless for patients to book appointments with you.
Reviews
Using reviews can also be really helpful towards building an online presence. The more positive feedback people can find, the more likely they’ll be to trust you as an orthopedic surgeon. Zocdoc can help you streamline the review process by encouraging existing patients to share their positive experience after a visit or procedure, and displaying these reviews on your booking page.
Benefits of digital advertising and marketing
With traditional advertising methods, it’s hard, time-consuming, and sometimes, expensive, to measure exactly how well you’re reaching patients. Digital marketing is an effective alternative that can help you reach more people for a lower cost. Plus, you’re able to better pinpoint how patients have discovered you, so you know the best channels to invest in going forward.
The keys to connecting with orthopedic patients
As a specialist, it may take a bit of extra work to connect with potential patients. Consider the below strategies to reach more people, so you can meet your goals as you seek to grow your practice.
Invest in search engine marketing
Investing in SEO can help position your website at the top of the search results so it’s easier for people to find you. One way to boost your ranking is to incorporate the right keywords into your website copy. Regularly updating your website also enhances your search results, so it can be helpful to add more keywords to regularly published blog content.
(As a bonus, publishing content on orthopedic surgery topics can help establish you as a trusted expert in your field.)
Use content marketing
Content marketing uses video, graphic, or written content to connect with consumers. Keyword-rich blog content is one way to sell your practice using content marketing.
You can also start social media accounts on sites like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, featuring content that both enhances your reputation as an orthopedic surgeon and leads patients to book an appointment with your practice.
Before choosing which social media sites to invest in, do a bit of research on your preferred demographic and determine which channel will be most effective. For example, older people tend to spend more time on Facebook, while younger people typically prefer TikTok.
Reviews
As mentioned above, glowing patient reviews are a great (and inexpensive) way to build your reputation as an orthopedic surgeon. Make it easy for satisfied patients to rate your practice and leave positive reviews, so more people will be likely to trust you with their orthopedic care. Sites like Zocdoc automate the review process, aggregating your ratings in one spot.
Convenience
More and more health care consumers are going online to find care and book appointments, so cultivating a culture of convenience is more important than ever. Signing up for Zocdoc can make finding you, and booking an appointment, easier for potential patients, so you can grow your practice. That way, you can focus more on what matters most: providing the best orthopedic care possible.