Whether you’re using blogging software, designing your own site, or having your site custom made, a great deal of thought and strategy needs to go into what you put on your site and how it should be organized.

The way in which you organize and present your information speaks volumes to your patients and prospects

As I’ve stated in my book, eMarketing for Chiropractors, the purpose of your site is to do more than just inform: it should help you build community.  That is, it should be interactive, engaging, informational, and build trust and rapport.

So just having a list of services, a phone number, and a picture are not enough…  Any fly-by-night scam artist can throw together that kind of site in a few minutes.  Your site should help you build credibility, give the prospect and patient valuable information, and cause them to want to pick up the phone and give you a call.

To do that, your site doesn’t have to fancy or cutting-edge.  A simple site that you can easily maintain and that will grow with your practice is fine: you can always add to the site later.  Here are the six pages that you must have on your site (in no particular order).

About Us:  Some history of your company and what it is that you do.  A list of services, chiropractic philosophy, your Unique Selling Position, mission statement, etc…  Make it personal and unique—it should reflect the personality of your practice.  Non-formal pictures of you and your staff will help create a personal connection with your patients and prospects.

Contact Us:  This is a great place for a web-form to grab prospect and patient contact information.  Include a place on the form for text where they can ask a question.   Also be sure to put your mailing address, phone numbers, special certification/training, and licensing information (if applicable).  Consider putting Google Maps embed code on the site so that driving directions are readily available.

Blog:  This is where your posts (articles etc..) will go. This page generates a ton of fresh content for your site and will help your search rankings.

Ask The Expert:  Set up a page where you encourage (and maybe even reward) people for asking you questions.  Answer them quickly and avoid using medical or even chiropractic language and jargon.  Use everyday speech.  This page will help to establish you as the health and wellness expert and advocate to your patients and prospects.

Testimonials:  Have a dedicated page for testimonials.  Be sure to sprinkle your testimonials in every post on every page, but have one place where they are all listed.  If possible, include pictures of the patient to create a human face to the words (be sure to get written permission first!).

Privacy Policy:  You absolutely need to have a privacy policy clearly displayed on your website to ensure prospects that you will protect their information.  You can create a free policy to copy to your website from the following site: http://www.dmaresponsibility.org/PPG/

Other Page Ideas:

• Coupons and discounts
• Contests
• Google Maps ) directions to your practice
• Pricing Information (be careful here…)
• Employee and/or owner pictures and biographies (creates “community” with your prospects
• Practice highlights
• The list is endless – be creative!

Remember to set up your site from the perspective of someone who is not familiar with your practice—or even chiropractic for that matter.  Avoid medical and chiropractic jargon in your web pages.  Also, more is not necessarily better.  Edit ruthlessly.

One suggestion:  have a friend or colleague review your site and give you brutally honest answers.

Next newsletter, we’ll discuss how to put interactivity into your site.

This is highly recommended for several reasons:

First, it gives legitimacy to your business–a domain email address ties you to your practice.

Second, if gives you the ability to distinguish between your personal email and your professional email. At this stage of your practice it may not be an issue for you, but as your practice continues to grow, you may or may not want everyone to have your personal email address.

Third, it gives you the ability to hand “your” professional email address off to your CA at some point. Patients still feel as though they have “your” email address, but sorting, prioritizing, and perhaps even answering those emails can then be delegated as your practice grows.

Last, it gives you the ability to segregate and systematize your email follow up based on the source of the email–very powerful for marketing automation!

Don’t worry, most web hosts let you forward email addresses, so you can continue to use your personal account. Just have your business accounts forwarded to your personal email address. It will be seamless for everyone including you, your patients, and you prospects.

eMarketing for Chiropractors is now ePatientConnect!

We’re excited to announce that as of today, September 5, 2010, we have changed our name to ePatientConnect!

This is so much more than a simple name change… This is a major upgrade to all of our systems from the ground up!

• Email opening rates increased more than 400% on average!
• Three new rate plans to grow with your business
• Cusomizeable monthly Patient and Prospect e-Newsletter
• New online dashboard to manage your Internet marketing
• And much, much, more!

Check our our new site at: http://www.epatientconnect.com

Also, we have partnered with chiropractor and marketing expert Dr. Paul Hambrick to bring your a revolutionary new Social Media application called Social Tsunami that is sure to set your Internet marketing on fire!

Dr. Hambrick and I are hosting a free teleseminar on Thursday, September 9th at 7:00pm Eastern time.

Register now by clicking here: http://epatientconnect.com/seminar/

Slots are going fast, so register today!