These days, reputation is based on more than just positive word of mouth among friends. One of the first things many patients do when considering whether to visit a particular doctor is to type the name into Google or another search engine.
Do you know what will appear in connection with your name?
MetaMed's online reputation management (ORM) service is built directly into our proprietary MetaMetrics system, available to our clients for tracking the success of their marketing efforts month to month. The ORM service allows you to see, at a glance, ratings from a range of online review sites—as well as to respond to negative reviews (if any) and reach out to satisfied patients to encourage them to share their experience.
To attract patients, you must stand out in a sea of competitors. Yes, your quality work can speak for itself, but in today's connected society, you also need people to be speaking for you.
To succeed, it is truly critical to collect a solid base of numerous highly scoring reviews posted on trusted online review platforms. Having the weight of a significant number of positive ratings and reviews behind you can be a key factor that drives patients toward choosing you.
Then, to continue to succeed, you must continue to grow that collection to keep it current and consistently high.
Consider online shopping. Two factors—the average rating for a product, and the number of reviews and ratings it has—impact sales. Are you more likely to buy something that has 10 five-star reviews, 50 three-star reviews, or 200 four-star reviews?
Not all review and ratings platforms are created equal. Quality online reputation management requires a focus on high-quality, broadly trusted sites, such as Google and Facebook. MetaMed's ORM services help you to give attention to the platforms that matter, while avoiding others that, for instance, bury or even remove positive reviews unless you pay up.
Google, in particular, is a heavyweight when it comes to your online reputation. Each review posted on this globally popular search engine accounts for a percentage of your SEO ranking. The number of reviews focused on you, as well as your average rating, will eventually be a large factor in relation to keywords like "best"—such as "best dermatologist in Santa Barbara."
We're also increasingly seeing clients' review statuses showing up in Google SERPs!
In addition to collecting positive reviews, it's also important to handle the occasional negative comment. Yes, they happen—and MetaMed's online reputation management services make it easy to address them. One click can allow you to respond and seek resolution with the unhappy reviewer: Perhaps there was a misunderstanding, or it was simply a bad day, and follow-up can turn their attitude around. People can be willing to change or delete negative reviews when they feel truly heard.
Your ORM dashboard is directly connected to Facebook and Google, so you have constant eyes on your current average ranking, as well as the number of ratings and reviews linked to you and your practice. Search reviews by name, rating, date, or platform, and analyze the data month to month.
For convenience and speed, the dashboard also allows you to respond directly to both the negative and positive reviews as the practice without having to login to your Google profile.
When it comes to acquiring new reviews and ratings, you can request responses via SMS/text message. This phone-based strategy has a greater probability of return than similar requests sent by email. These requests can be sent to anyone who originally sent an inquiry to your practice via the website, or patients can be manually entered into the system.
You may be an amazing physician, but to many of your prospective patients, you're only as good as what they see when they research you. Don't leave your online reputation to chance.
I recently switched website management and internet marketing companies (again) because the previous one simply wasn't keeping their word. I discovered MetaMed marketing. For the first time, I found a company that listened to my needs...