Medical Marketing Enterprises, L.L.C.

Website Optimization, SEO, Reputation Management for Medical Practices

3 Reasons to Use Video to Expand Your Following

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YouTube Video to Improve Patient EducationVideo is quickly becoming a preferred medium for the Internet.  YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world.  Google is the largest.  YouTube is a search engine for video.

According to Fortunelords.com, YouTube:

  • 30,000,000 (million) visitors a day watch 5,000,000,000 (billion) videos a day
  • 300 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute
  • 1.3 billion people use YouTube
  • Mobile YouTube viewing sessions are > 40 minutes

Video has a lot of appeal.  Let’s see why you should consider adding video to your website.

Appealing and Practical

Video requires different skills compared to the written article.  Watching and listening to a video is easier and more practical than reading an article.  Watching and listening is more easily accomplished when driving, riding a subway or etc.  It is also easier to do on a larger variety of devices, i.e. it’s far easier to consume a video on a smartphone compared to reading a blogpost.

Because video requires the use of different skills, it appeals to different types of learners – those who prefer watching and listening compared to just reading.  This allows you to expand your reach and increase your followers by exposing yourself to a different pool of viewers.

Video is Better

Video is much better for certain subjects than a typical written article.  For instance, I upload many surgical videos to my YouTube channel (then embed them on my website).  Surgery is much better appreciated visually.  Effectively writing about surgery is very difficult and pales in comparison to the visual form.

Visitors can see and hear you with video and is, therefore, much more engaging than a simple article.  Video conveys more information about you as a person.

Video Should be Cheap

You do NOT need to use professionals for your videos, in fact, I recommend using your own equipment and production tools.  You probably already have everything you need to upload a video to YouTube.

Use a smartphone or computer camera.  The most important elements of your video are;

  • The content – what do you have to say?
  • Visually engage – your followers can see you
  • Audio awareness – your visitors can hear you
  • Transparency – what kind of person are you?

Professionally produced videos take away from your transparency and make you less credible.  These are two crucial elements to gaining a visitors trust.

I will share some nice tips and tools in an upcoming post.

All the best,

Randy

Web Hosting | Choosing Your Level of Service

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Web Hosting | Medical Marketing Enterprises | Bethesda MDWeb hosting plans differ in the level of service provided to maintain the servers needed to keep you website up and running and secure.  There are various levels of security, IT support and monitoring each company (such as GoDaddy, Bluehost, Rackspace, Synthesis) will provide.

With respect to services provided, here is a list of various types of hosting you can obtain:

  • Free
  • Shared/Self-Hosted
  • Managed
  • Dedicated

Free Hosting

This is absolutely free, but not recommended.

Free hosting (Wix, SquareSpace, Blogger, WordPress.com) provides hosting of your website and maintenance of their servers.  While attractive, you have no control over your files, have limited ability to rank your website (SEO) and are limited as to the functions you can install on your site.

Shared or Self-Hosting

This is probably the most common package and is what I actually use for most of our customers.  It requires a limited of technical know-how, but does not require actual IT experience.  You do not need to understand coding.

Every service you need such as monitoring, backup, malware protection, anti-virus scanning is available à la carte.  This obviously adds to the cheap monthly fee.

Any website problems you detect will be assisted by customer support, requiring your precious time on the phone.

Managed Hosting

Managed hosting provides all the services you will need to;

  • Monitor your website
  • Scan for malware
  • IT Support
  • Virus protection
  • Maintain Storage
  • Database management
  • Backup

For a slightly higher monthly fee, this may be the best value.  In essence, all the worrying is taken out of your hands, thus allowing you to spend your time growing and developing your website.

Dedicated Hosting

For most of us, this is too much.  Unless you are in a position to purchase or lease your own servers and provide IT support, this is an impractical hosting solution.

WordPress Revisited | Is Your Website Build on the Best Platform?

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Wordpress is best platform for building websitesThis post mirrors this weeks podcast on Russ and Randy where we discuss the advantages of WordPress.

For many reasons, WordPress.org is absolutely the best platform to use to build your website.

WordPress.org is the world’s most popular CMS sytem.  CMS stands for Content Management System and can be best thought of as “blogging software.”  There are other popular CMS systems such Joomla or Drupal, but WordPress is the best.

Not WordPress.com

There are two similar products names WordPress:  WordPress.org and WordPress.com.  They even share the same logo.  For the purposes of this post, I am not referring to the “.com” version and when using the term “WordPress,” I’m referring to WordPress.org.

WordPress.com is a completely free blogging system.  Suffice it to say that it has too many restrictions, can not add functionality nor can it be optimized compared to the WordPress.org version.  You also do not have control over you files (they reside on a server of which you have no control or access).

I do not recommend WordPress.com for any business.

13 Reasons to Use WordPress.org

  1. Best for SEO – this is the best platform which allows you to optimize your site and your content (articles, posts, pages, etc.).  It is also coded to be easily and efficiently crawled by the search engines.  Google loves WordPress (so I read).
  2. User Friendly – if you can use Microsoft Word, you can use and operate a WordPress.org website.  You do NOT need IT experience or even need to know how to code.  Keep in mind that this is my preferred platform – that means I have even learned how to use it!
  3. Open Source – this allows multitudes of 3rd party developers to enhance the basic product.  WordPress enjoys the largest selection of 3rd party themes, add-ons and plugins.  As it is the largest and most popular in the world, the WordPress community is always updating and improving.
  4. Most Popular Platform – as the largest and most popular system, it has millions of users.  This translates to unlimited forums and “resources” available to help you when you run into a problem.  Chances are high that many have faced the same problem as yours.
  5. Turn-key Design – WordPress themes can be installed or switched out with click.  No need for website designers.  This flexibility in design, the way your website looks, can save you literally thousands of dollars.
  6. Mobile Responsive – similar to #5, most current WordPress themes are mobile responsive – no need to waste time and money building a mobile responsive site.
  7. Server Based means that you can work on your site from any Internet connection, even your phone.
  8. “Self-Hosted” means that you need to purchase a hosting account (GoDaddy, Bluehost, Hostgator), but it also means you have complete control and ownership of your files.
  9. Free installation – any legitimate hosting company will offer installation for…free.
  10. Versatile – WordPress.org offers the most plugins which means that WordPress is more functional and versatile than any other system.  You can even do eCommerce easily!
  11. Best Blogging Software – this was built for blogging, for our purposes, this allows to easily add content.
  12. Sophistication – regardless of the what your needs are, this platform grows with you as your expertise improves.  For instance, maybe you are not ready to open up comments or blog.  You can easily do it later.
  13. Search Engine Friendly – It is also coded to be easily and efficiently crawled by the search engines.  This gives you an SEO edge.

If you have any reasons (for or against) you’d like to add, please comment below.

All the best!

Randy

Interview with Isaac Porter, M.D.

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Isaac Porter, M.D. | Ophthalmology | Raleigh NCEver wonder how to use YouTube to market yourself?

During the AAO 2016 in Chicago, I interviewed Isaac Porter, M.D. for my podcast “Russ and Randy.”  This post coincides with the podcast episode published today on iTunes.

Isaac Porter M.D. Gets 600k Views

Isaac and I have known each other for several years after we found similar interests in healthcare and medical Internet marketing.  Isaac owns Porter Ophthalmology, a solo ophthalmology practice in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Porter Ophthalmology has been very successful using a website and YouTube to market themselves.  Over the past 4 years, they have published over 130 videos on YouTube.  “A State of Sight,” the name the series of patient education videos has received almost 600,000 views in the last 4 years.

I would encourage you to listen to Isaac tell how us how he has done it.

I congratulate Dr. Porter for his success and want to highlight some of his notable achievements.

Self Publishing

The videos are created several times a month.  Isaac uses a Nikon 5000 DSLR for recording.  He does NOT edit the video and are 2-3 minutes in length.

Videos are uploaded to YouTube and embedded on his website.  Additionally, the audio is transcribed for publication on his blog.  The videos thus serve a dual purpose and he reduces the work and effort to update two platforms (website and YouTube).

A YouTube account is free.  There are no actual costs whatsoever.  Therefore, cost is never an issue to creating another video.

Also, self-published videos are better than professional versions – at least for our purposes.  Self-published videos convey more about you and your personality – you tend to speak and move more naturally compared to a rehearsed/memorized script.  Patients can hear your voice.  You offer some transparency regarding who you are.

Self-published videos are much more credible and believable.

Patient Education Videos Provide Value

This is a great example of how to provide value.  Over 4 years and 130 or so videos, Isaac Porter, M.D. provides tremendous value to his viewers by providing patient education.

To be successful with your healthcare and medical Internet marketing endeavors, you must provide value. With value comes trust.

He has done a great job.

Video Length and Consistency

The videos are also not too long.  3 minute videos are probably ideal – not too long to bore the viewer.  What’s even more important is that Porter Ophthalmology produces videos consistently over the past 4 years.

This consistency has two advantages; 1) tremendous SEO power and visibility and 2) he has engaged his viewer base routinely.

Team Approach

Perhaps the most unique aspect of Isaac Porter, M.D. and Porter Ophthalmology is that they approach their Internet marketing as a team.

Everyone in the practice plays a role in their digital efforts.

Isaac will tell you toward the end of the interview that he is most proud of his Google reviews and how they have helped grow his practice.  He, and his team, have a seamless method for gathering reviews.

Contact Information for Isaac Porter, M.D.:

Isaac Porter, M.D.
Porter Ophthalmology
Raleigh, North Carolina
www.EyePorter.com

Twitter:  @eyeporter

To Your Success!

Randy

 

Two Birds with One Click | Updating Your Digital Platforms Automatically

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Automatic Updates for your website and social media | Healthcare and Medical Internet MarketingWith one click you can update your website and your social media platforms.  Automating the process will streamline the process and make updating your entire digital presence easy…and fun!

Connect Website to Social Media

Most CMS (content management systems such as WordPress) can be automatically connected or linked to your social media accounts.  Once you publish a new article on your website, a plugin will automatically generate a link on your social media account notifying your followers of your article.

For instance, once an article is published on my retinaeyedoctor.com site, a link is automatically sent to Facebook and Twitter.  A link, not the article, is posted.

Connect Website to Email Handler

On websites with RSS (most, but especially WordPress), updates are sent to an email handler. Email handlers (email marketing, email autoresponder) take the RSS feed and generate emails to your followers, subscribers and patients with information about your new article.

So far you have automatically updated your entire following, subscribers to your website and followers on your social media platforms…with one click.

Other Time Savers

Re-purpose Your Content

Publishing the same content using audio files is a great time saver.  For instance, a video can be repurposed on a podcast.  The audio file can be easily converted to a podcast and also be transcribed for use on your website.

Editorial Calendars

These can save you time by developing a process to create articles from ideas/topics to actual publication.  It is a great way to keep track of the progress of your articles/content.

Templates and Blueprints

Developing a routine is crucial to producing content efficiently and decreasing the amount of work needed for each publication.  Whether you are writing an article, recording a video or podcast, templates and blueprints are terrific ways of keeping you organized and improving efficiency!

The more you can do to improve efficiency, reduce drudgery and make your digital efforts, the more you will enjoy your marketing project.

If you have questions or concerns, please leave a comment below!

All the best!

Randy

New Podcast!

In August 2016, Russell Faust, M.D. and I launch a new podcast on Healthcare and Medical Internet Marketing. I invite you to download on iTunes and subscribe to our blog, RussandRandy.com!

iTunes Cover Art

 

Healthcare and Medical Internet Marketing
Healthcare’s Rx for Web and Social
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