Going from word of mouth to cyber savvy

How online marketing transformed one ophthalmology practice.

By Naren Arulrajah

Cornea specialist George M. Salib, MD, now runs a successful private practice, called Orange County Eye Institute in Laguna Hills, Calif. It wasn’t always so. He had acquired the practice from a doctor with an excellent reputation in the community, so initially he relied on word-of-mouth and referrals to promote his practice — otherwise, his marketing efforts consisted mostly of a basic website, with an “under construction” landing page for his practice that featured his photo and phone number (Figure 1). After about a year of less-than-satisfying results from these strategies, Dr. Salib chose a new course of action: He decided to build a professionally designed, content-rich and search engine-optimized (SEO) website to win new patients for his practice. He also would have a sustained online marketing and SEO campaign that would run in his practice area.

Figure 1. Dr. Salib’s under construction page, January 2011.

Dr. Salib approached Ekwa.com, a website development, online marketing and SEO firm for physicians in the United States, after being referred to the company by an existing client (Full disclosure: I’m the president and chief executive officer). Together with the team of professionals here, Dr. Salib created a focused strategy to build and promote his new practice brand online. Here is a review of the steps we took to make it happen.

The multi-pronged attack

Over the next three months, we created a uniquely designed website, OCEyeInstitute.com (Figure 2), for Dr. Salib, along with a customized strategy to achieve top search rankings on Google, Bing and other search engines for a variety of localized search terms.

Figure 2. Dr. Salib’s new website, January 2012

Additionally, we devised an online marketing campaign to support the SEO efforts and dominate the competitive local market. The campaign included building a strong online reputation for Dr. Salib via article marketing, blogging, e-newsletters, online press releases, and engagement through discussion forums, blogs and patient reviews on the Internet.

A proactive social media strategy promoted the practice on popular social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+, YouTube and Pinterest. We interlinked Dr. Salib’s website with his various social networks. Additionally, the website prominently showcased patient testimonials and provided regularly updated site content, which was interspersed with images, infographics, and videos designed by our staff’s graphic and video teams.

The elements of this overall strategy did not happen overnight. Dr. Salib shared some existing photos and written testimonials with our staff, but he needed an improved system for obtaining them from patients. We assigned to him a personal marketing coach who worked with him and his staff to identify photo and testimonial opportunities and capture those written, spoken and video testimonials efficiently. To maximize his opportunities and streamline the testimonial process, Ekwa provided Dr. Salib with online recording widgets and in-house graphic design and video services.

Search engine success

Localized web presence and localized search engine rankings for Dr. Salib’s website OCEyeInstitute.com have been consistently impressive. (Online marketers focus their attention to their clients’ area, so searches elsewhere will not necessarily produce the same results.¹)

» For prominent search terms such as “Eye Doctor Laguna Hills” on Google.com, Dr. Salib’s ranks on top on Google Page One in search results.

» For the search term “Ophthalmologist in Laguna Hills,” the top search result on Google page one shows Yelp.com, which, according to a recent Nielsen survey, is the most trusted consumer review site in the country. The number one result on Yelp.com shows Dr. Salib’s listing.

» In addition to Yelp, Dr. Salib’s website is also prominently featured in specialized health-care review sites such as ZocDoc.com, Vitals.com and HealthGrades.com.

As the figures in Table 1 demonstrate, month after month, Dr. Salib’s website is showcased before hundreds of unique, first-time visitors drawn from surrounding areas. The impact of this sustained and targeted Internet exposure reflects in the bottom line of Dr. Salib’s practice, which he says continues to receive new patients every month (See Figure 3).

Figure 3. Impact to practice from internet marketing.

No shortcuts

Regardless of what some marketing companies might say, there is no insider secret to achieving these types of results online. Showing up in search results for hundreds of keywords requires an in-depth understanding of Google’s official Webmaster Guidelines and implementing them diligently on all technical and content quality parameters. It requires putting in the hours, month after month, and doing things exactly the way Google says to do them. And because SEO is not a “one and done” deal, a marketing firm must continue to do this work to keep its clients in the top search rankings. This bears repeating: To reach the top — and stay there — requires an ongoing effort.

Google and Bing increasingly favor websites that provide professional design and navigation, and outstanding content quality, which includes original, accurate, relevant and regularly updated content, and most importantly, content that addresses the potential queries of the search engine users in the most effective way. Additionally, organic link building continues to play a vital role; it is important for the website to attract high quality links to rank well in search engine results.

Staying the course

For nearly three years, Dr. Salib has maintained this success with an unwavering focus on expanding the scope of his practice using cutting-edge online marketing and SEO strategies.

The dividends for Dr. Salib, in terms of increased local awareness about his practice, an incremental growth in the traffic of local patients, a positive reputation and word-of-mouth publicity, and sustainable brand building have been remarkable.

Dr. Salib now aspires to take his eye-care practice to the next level. Being one of the few surgeons in his area who specializes in laser-assisted cataract surgery, he is working with us to dominate the market space for this advanced method of cataract surgery. Toward that end, Dr. Salib has approved a new website design to go live by summer 2015. It targets what matters most to Dr. Salib and helps align him with his goal to grow his practice so that eventually he may bring in additional support staff. Online marketing has helped Dr. Salib realize his business goals, and has encouraged him to develop even greater aspirations for his eye-care practice. OM

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About the Author
	Naren Arulrajah is president and CEO of Ekwa Marketing, an Internet marketing company that focuses on SEO, social media, marketing education and the online reputations of eye care providers. If you have questions about marketing your practice online, call Naren direct at 877-249-9666 or go to www.ekwa.com.