SEO and Pay Per Click (PPC) for Hospital Service Line Marketers

SEO AND PPC FOR SERVICE LINE MARKETERS

Brian Bierbaum, Vice President of Digital Strategy and SalesJason Douglas, Interactive Marketing Strategist

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WHY IS SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING (SEM) IMPORTANT TO HOSPITALS?

YOUR HOSPITAL WEBSITE SHOULD BE A KEY DRIVER IN YOUR PATIENT ACQUISITION

EFFORTS

Organic SEO ContentPPCSocial MediaPhysician RelationshipManagementTraditional Marketing

Events/Classes

SeminarsHealth

Assessment Tools

Attract Engage

Convert

QUICK CHECK: WHAT IS SEM, PPC AND ORGANIC SEO

OrganicSEO

Results

PPCResults

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

RELATIONSHIP OF SEO AND PPC

Image Source: The Technology Studio

WHY ORGANIC IS GOOD IN THE LONGRUN

TRACKING SUCCESS

Awareness: Impressions: easy to obtain in SEM

Interest: The first action: clicking on the ad

Desire: The level of interest in what you are offering

Action: What you want the visitor to do

Some metrics of note:– Traffic Source/Medium– Time on page/site– Bounce rate– New visitor percentage– Conversions/goals

.

TRACKING SUCCESS

Multi-channel funnels

TRACKING SUCCESS - CRM

“ROI is best measured by tracking early and for a longer period of time, and CRM databases are a great tool for this. While many of your conversations may not yet bepatients, if they are engaging with your hospital, we can still gather valuable data about their behavior.“

- Chris Boyer – Inova Health Systems, Thought Leaders Project : Hospital Marketing

Lord William Thompson Kelvin

Quick Poll: How many of you have access to CRM (consumer focused) or PRM (physician focused) data in your marketing?

“To measure is to know. If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it.”

SEM CHALLENGES IN HEALTHCARE (AND HOW TO OVERCOME THEM)

Recency– More frequently updated sites rank better– Long approval processes are common in hospitals

Content challenges– Physicians and legal often use/require medical jargon in copy

• PPC has character limits. May not fit official medical jargon in ad copy

– Real people use other words in search. i.e. coronary heart disease, cardiac arrest = heart disease• PPC: Bid on all variations of terms. Learn about how your visitors

search.

Discomfort with social media– Start simple– Make sure user guidelines are established

PPC: Must be careful with your message– What is your conversion point?

• Newsletter sign up• Survey• Schedule an appointment www.shsmd.org

WHAT A SUCCESSFUL ONLINE MARKETING PROGRAM LOOKS LIKE

Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota

Objectives: Increase awareness of Children’s; Social Media fan/following; increase online giving

Tactics: – Facebook Advertising – Google AdWords (grant and

paid) – LinkedIn Advertising – Dedicated landing pages– Microsites


Facebook Ad Strategy: target men and women, 22+, college graduates within five state area.

Results: – Facebook:

• 110M impressions• 15K clicks• 4,200 fans• CPM: Eleven cents


LinkedIn Ad Strategy: Use compelling images of children, copy to promote Children’s Annual Gala. Target business managers and higher to buy individual seats or tables at gala. Land people on event microsite.

Results: – LinkedIn Advertising:

• Sold 900 total seats, resulting in a sold-out event raising $1.3 million, 160% above the target goal.

• 172K targeted impressions to high-level decision makers, age 35+ in Minneapolis/St. Paul


Google AdWords Strategy: Use Google Paid to aggressively bid on service keywords above $1.00 per click. Land visitors to condition or service line specific pages. Use Google Grant to bid on low-cost keywords such as brand and geo-qualified words.

Results: – Google AdWords: Used grant money to help Children’s reach goal on GiveMN day;

placed in top 1% of total dollars– Google AdWords: Top positioning for all service based keywords; accounted for

15% of site traffic. Focused bid strategy on all seasonal giving keywords resulted in Children’s reaching their online giving goal of $800K

LOCAL?

Localizing search is becoming a focal point for searchers. It is easier to relate to an ad that speaks to their area.

Facebook ads allow the use of images and more copy. Highlight a doctor and clinic at the same time.

LOCAL?

Jason,

Any thoughts on a slide about importance of local search for finding hospital locations, services, and physicians that work out of a particular hospital?

Could we pull visuals from Northfield’s FB ads?

LOCAL?

HOW MARKETING MANAGERS CAN IMPROVE SEM

Make sure departments are linking whenever they can. Give them a guide to provide accurate anchor links

Become good friends with your web development team. Ask them for help making the site more “search friendly”

Work with your CMO to get a CRM in place that ties to your web analytics. The data will be invaluable to you and your search team

Working closely with PR and social media teams to coordinate content

Develop an SEM content strategy to support overall content plan

Ensure your keyword strategy is being used by all departments when communicating about your service line

Spearhead social media initiatives that include social media optimization

CONTENT AS A LINK BUILDING STRATEGY

Two off-page keyword-optimized articles ...

… linked to landing page

OVERALL RESULTS

Non-branded inbound keyword traffic to the targeted page increased by 376% in the 8 weeks following the implementation of the test.

ROI FOR SEM MADE EASY

Traditional Marketing Channel

Number of pieces sent: 200Cost for printing and postage: $1.44Total cost to send 200 pieces: $288Response rate: 0.5%Patients acquired: 200 pieces mailed x 0.5% response rate = 1 new patient

SEM Pilot Program

• Carve out 10% of your total budget

for an SEM pilot program

• Ensure each channel in the strategy drives to a landing page with a call to action and goal tracking in place

• Compare cost per patient acquired

VS.

QUESTIONS?The presentation and highlights of the presentation will be available

on our blog.

priorityresults.com/blogBrian Bierbaum

www.linkedin.com/in/brianbierbaumTwitter: @BrianBierbaum

[email protected]

Jason Douglaswww.linkedin.com/in/jasonmichaeldouglas

Twitter: @[email protected]

952-852-1150

Priorityresults.com

SEO and Pay Per Click (PPC) for Hospital Service Line Marketers

Technology

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