Websites Work:
Building Trust with Your Patients
Outside Your Practice Walls
Pediatric Healthcare Associates of Fairfield, Connecticut is the region’s largest independently owned pediatric practice, providing collaborative, compassionate care to 35,000 patients ranging in age from infancy to young adulthood. The practice is a recognized NCQA patient-centered medical home located along Connecticut’s Gold Coast, with four locations, 23 pediatricians, 11 mid-level providers, and a variety of pediatric specialists on staff.
As is common with most aging websites, PHA’s patients were having difficulty finding information and educational materials, and a lack of customization prevented the practice from creating the website they had envisioned. Marketing Manager Cindi Caputo decided that a refresh was in order. She wanted the site to be helpful for their existing patients, but she also wanted to find a way to attract new patients.
After several setbacks, staffing changes, extensive research, and inquiries to other pediatric practices about their own experiences with various website developers, Cindi was ready for a change. She found RemedyConnect’s suite of practice marketing solutions to be the perfect fit.
The Importance of Partnering with Pediatric Experts
Other website designers that Cindi interviewed used mostly preset templates that don’t allow for customization, which PHA desperately needed. Because the practice provides extensive resources specific to their pediatric population, she needed to find a better solution if she wanted to make their dream a reality. After meeting with Remedy, she realized she could get the creative design she desired and a custom-built site that made the practice’s personality shine. “I interviewed RemedyConnect, and I just knew right away that this was the company we wanted to work with. I was blown away from the very first meeting”, said Cindi. “I used to fight all the time with our previous website developer. With Remedy, they just
give you exactly what you want.”
The transition from their previous website was seamless and easy. “The RemedyConnect team makes everything so simple”, Cindi notes. “They give you an entire plan ahead of time, they worked within our schedule, and the dashboard they provided made it so easy to manage the implementation.” Because Remedy has vast experience building medical practice websites, with a focus on pediatrics and HIPAA compliance, everything came together just as the practice had imagined. “I had a vision, and the website designer just helped take it in a very creative direction. Our website has so much information, but it doesn’t feel congested. It’s user-friendly and extremely informative. It’s a combination of what the clinicians and I had in mind and we’re ecstatic with the results.”
Designing a User-friendly Website for Pediatric Practices
A beautiful website can be created by anyone, but most people overlook the fact that a website must also be patient-intuitive and provide positive outcomes for the practice. It doesn’t help if your website looks nice but isn’t functional for the families who rely on your practice for credible information. Offering materials and advice from trusted resources adds a level of comfort that keeps patients engaged in a long-term relationship, and Remedy’s extensive patient education library provides everything a pediatric practice needs.
Two of the most common items that parents look for on a pediatrician’s website are information about the practice’s healthcare team and knowing what to do when their child is sick. With this in mind, PHA set out to make it simple for patients to find pediatric resources like Is Your Child Sick?TM and the OTC medicine dosage information to help families understand when they should bring their child in for a visit or how to care for them at home. It’s been a game changer for the entire PHA team.
“The triage nurses refer parents to the website a lot and it has cut down on our triage calls significantly. Patients are now visiting the website first to use our symptom checker, as opposed to calling our office right away”, says Cindi. “I’ve gotten very positive feedback from our parents and our staff” Another advantage of the new website customization is the ability to post notifications such as weather emergencies or revised holiday hours directly to the home page. “It has cut down on the number of non-medical calls our practice receives and it’s been such a timesaver,” according to Cindi.
The new website also creates a strong connection with the practice’s social media pages. “We could go on Facebook or Instagram during flu season and say, ‘Hey, it’s flu season.’ If you have any concerns about your child, visit our website and check Is Your Child Sick?TM to see if you need to come in for an office visit,” Cindi says. It made it easier for parents to get quick, reliable answers and freed up the triage lines for calls that did require an office visit.
Using Your Website to Market Your Pediatric Practice
A website can be an extremely valuable tool when it comes to attracting new patients and growing your business. Strong search engine optimization (SEO) is driven by the use of relevant keywords on web pages that helps you rank higher in Google searches and makes it easier for parents to find your practice.
Promoting a variety of services and classes on PHA’s website has also paid off. One example is a new parenting class that’s managed with Remedy’s Scheduling Events Calendar integrated into their website. “Having an automated class schedule for first-time parent meetings is such a huge timesaver for me,” Cindi notes. “It’s taken away the manual scheduling process and has saved me countless hours.”
It’s also attracting more new patients to their practice. “I’ve been here since 2011 and I keep my eye on the new babies in the practice. “In 2022, we had 170 more babies than any other previous year and I know that the website had a role. Because I always ask a parent for their referral source when they sign up for a class, and I get a lot of people who say, ‘You know, I did a Google search and found you and came across your website.”
Mobile-Friendly Websites for Tech-Savvy Parents
Having a mobile-friendly site has also helped increase traffic to PHA’s website. Cindi points out, “Our previous website wasn’t mobile-friendly, and now having one that is has made a big difference. Parents are searching for healthcare providers online, and most are using their cell phones when they do.” You need to meet younger families where they’re at, and these days, that means you must be mobile-friendly. To make things easier on tech-savvy parents, Cindi uses QR codes on flyers that point back to the practice website for patient education materials. That way, they can just scan it on their phone and get what they need. “The staff hears the parents commenting that they’re really happy they can get everything they need right there on their phone,” Cindi says. Their semi-custom mobile app is yielding similar results.
Websites Work: The Proof is in the Pudding
With a comprehensive, user-friendly website in place, PHA has increased its patient volume and grown its business significantly. Since the new website was launched, they have experienced a 16% increase in new users and engagement. Seventy percent of their new sessions are the result of organic searches using keyword phrases related to their practice. They have almost 3,000 backlinks that help with SEO and findability, and they rank on the first page for some of their most sought- after keyword phrases like “pediatrician Fairfield”, “pediatrician near me”, “local pediatrician”, and “baby doctor”.
The outcome is everything the practice had hoped for when they decided to partner with RemedyConnect for their new custom website and patient engagement solutions. Cindi sums up her partnership with Remedy by sharing, “You’re guaranteed a finished product that you’re going to love because that’s what they strive for…to make you happy with all the features that you want – and then some. They really go above and beyond. It’s just been a wonderful experience.”
