Content is Still King

[Steve Leibforth]

In the new world of online marketing, significant attention has been given to social media tools such as Facebook and Twitter and the role of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). While our hospitals have spent a considerable amount of time developing our social media presence, we’ve recently refocused our attention to the content on our sites.

If thousands of visitors are sent to our web sites from Google, Facebook and Twitter and we do not answer their questions or provide them with valuable information once they get to our site, then we have failed them.

Content must be consumer focused – Developing consumer focused content for the web can be extremely difficult for marketers and clinical staff. The focus is often on the silos that exist within an organization and it is very difficult to put yourself in the consumers’ shoes and have an understanding of the type of information that they will be looking for on your web site.

When working with marketing and/or clinical staff recently, we’ve developed an exercise that has worked quite well. We begin by ignoring the current web site and have our experts talk as they would to someone they met in a waiting room or hallway. I typically close the computer and try to play the role of a consumer by asking pointed questions. While working on the Birthing Suites content for one of our hospitals recently I asked many of the same questions I asked prior to my daughters being born and ask the staff to talk about what separates our Birthing Suites from our competitors. I was then able to develop an outline for our content that was both consumer focused and user friendly.

It is also important to ensure consumers can get all relevant information in one location on your site as consumers are not likely to click around to other sections of your site to find related classes, maps to a clinic, or accepted insurance plans. As we reviewed our sleep apnea content it was discovered that there were no links to the 360 degree virtual tours from our sleep lab pages. This oversight caused the user to have to know to click the “Virtual Tours” section to find the tour and prevented many viewers from seeing an online tour of the sleep labs and assist in the decision making process.

Actionable/Measureable Content – Determining the goal or purpose of your web page is the first question that should be answered when developing new content. Once you’ve determined that goal it is important to tie that goal to a measureable task on your web site. The goal of our sleep apnea content is to drive consumers to complete our online assessment tool which drives business to our sleep labs and also captures demographic information that feeds our CRM systems.

The online assessment is a great example that is both actionable for the consumer and allows for measuring successes. Consumers are not likely to fill out forms or assessments on every page of your web site but it is imperative that you give them a next step in the process. Tell them in simple terms to call to schedule their appointment today, sign up for your E-Newsletter, or register for a pertinent class.

Search Engine Optimized Content – While SEO can be covered in much greater detail there are some basic changes you can make when reviewing your content that will help your SEO rankings. For example, on our medical group web pages the word physician was used numerous times on the page but we never referred to them as doctors within the content. When we reviewed our search logs there were more searches for doctor than physician so we adjusted our content accordingly. Also look at seasonal trends and adjust your content by adding information to your physician pages about strep throat in the spring, school physicals in the summer and the H1N1 virus this fall as these are the types of searches with intent that consumers are typically performing throughout the year.

Building a well rounded content team
In order to build consumer focused content a well rounded content team is recommended. The marketing and web roles defined below may in many cases be a single individual.

Clinical or Department Expertise –These individuals are experts at the subject matter that you are focusing on and can provide you detailed answers to consumer focused questions you may have. They are typically individuals that interact with consumers within a department or clinic.

Marketing Expertise – These are the experts on the goals and messages of the organization and will assist in writing the content provided by the department experts in a fashion that is user friendly and consistent across the web site.

Web/Usability Expertise – The web team member can assist in organizing the content in a user friendly fashion and ensure that content is linked together from all areas of the web site.

Successful Results
While strategically reviewing your content frequently is a great long term strategy to make your web site more user friendly you may also see quick gains in the number of page views as well.

The sleep apnea section of our web site was recently updated to be more consumer focused and web friendly. Previously the page was essentially brochure ware (long paragraphs and a few highlights of our sleep labs). In the two months after the content changes were made there was an increase of over 500% in visits to the page compared to the two months prior to the content changes.


Steve Leibforth is a Senior Web Developer at Provena Health. Provena Health is a six hospital system that includes 16 long-term care facilities that operates throughout the state of Illinois. (www.provena.org)

Steve can be found on twitter @sleibforth.

[Tom Stitt]

Steve - I think your observations, recommendations and story are great. But I'd disagree that Content is King. I think your post conclusively proves that Context is the real King when it comes to online Content. Sounds like you had all the right Content. But once the Content was organized around a taxonomy that was relevant to patients, the Context (search, navigation, target outcome) was the real driver of increased visits.