Having a website for your healthcare company has never been more essential. A website can help you reach potential patients and provide them with the important information they need in order to make informed decisions about their health. However, simply just having a website is not enough. A website must be well-designed, engaging and most importantly, easy to use in order to be effective.
At
SAASY CLOUD, we understand the key elements needed for a successful healthcare website design. In this blog post, we will explore some of the most important factors to consider when designing your healthcare website. Included will be some best practices to follow in order to ensure your website is engaging, effective and user-friendly for your patients. Furthermore, we will provide you with several examples of well-designed healthcare websites and what makes them stand out from their competitors. Let’s dive in!
Understanding Your Company's Needs and Goals
Before we dive into the specifics of good healthcare web design, it's important to take a step back and consider what your needs and goals are. What does your healthcare company specialize in? Who is your target audience/patients? What kind of information do you want to present to your website visitors?
Answering these types of questions will help you create a site that is tailored to your company’s specific needs and goals. For example, if you own a pediatric clinic, you would typically design your website using bright and playful colors. Also, you would present relevant information that is geared towards parents and children since they are your target audience. On the other hand, let’s say you are an orthopedic surgeon. Your website design would look much different than the pediatric clinic. Your website would include more in-depth information about your particular area of expertise, as well as utilize a more clinical and professional design.
Understanding the needs and goals of your business is a crucial step when you start thinking about the look and design of your website. Identifying your target audience and the specific type of information you want to present helps you tailor your site to meet the specific needs of your company. By doing so, you can start to design a site that not only looks great, but also serves as a valuable tool in reaching your business objectives.
Key Elements of Healthcare Website Design
After reviewing your company’s needs and goals, you can start to focus on the key elements of your healthcare web design. Let’s talk about some of the most important factors to consider when designing your healthcare website.
Clean and Simple Design:
One of the most common design tips can also relate to website design for healthcare: less is often more. We couldn’t agree more! When it comes to a good healthcare site design, clean and simple is the way to go. By going with a more simplistic design you can ensure that your website’s navigation is straightforward and easier to understand for your potential patients. You do not want to turn visitors off by having a website that looks complicated and unorganized. And remember, it is best to avoid designs with too much text, graphics, or animations, as these can be overwhelming for visitors. Proper whitespace can go a long way.
Easy Navigation:
We touched on the importance of easy navigation in the previous tip, but let’s go deeper. You want the visitors of your site to be able to find what they are looking for right away. If they have to spend a lot of time trying to find a simple answer to the question they have, they might get frustrated and go elsewhere. Make sure you take time to organize your navigation menus and search functionality to help your visitors find the information they need quickly. Ideally, the menu and search bar should be displayed in a consistent location across all pages of your website, typically at the top. Remember, easier navigation often equals higher engagement for your website.
Navigation Stats:
*According to
Forbes, users spend an average of 6.44 seconds looking at a website's main navigation before deciding whether to stay on the site or leave.
*In terms of website navigation, users prefer to have a clear and easy-to-use menu. According to a
survey by HubSpot, 76% of respondents said the most important element in website design is ease of navigation.
Mobile Responsiveness:
I think we all can admit we spend a lot of time on our mobile phones these days. How can we not when everything has become so much more convenient? That convenience has led mobile devices to become the primary method for browsing the internet for many people. This means that having a website that is optimized for mobile devices is essential for any business or organization, including healthcare providers.
Mobile responsiveness refers to the ability of a website to adapt its design and function to fit the screen size of the device it's being viewed on. In order for a website to have good mobile responsiveness, it has to be easily readable and navigable on any device. These devices can include tablets, desktop computers or smartphones.
A mobile responsive health care website design is extremely important in order for your patients to be able to access the information they need, no matter what device they are using. Mobile responsiveness also helps strengthen your user experience by making it easier for visitors to navigate and interact with your website on their mobile devices. This in turn helps improve your website’s search engine rankings on Google. It's a win-win!
Strong Calls to Action:
Calls to action (CTAs) are a necessary component of any website, as they encourage visitors to take specific actions that can benefit the business or organization. In the case of a healthcare website, these actions might include scheduling an appointment, signing up for a newsletter, or downloading a brochure.
Because a CTA wants your visitor to take a certain action, you want to make sure they are clear, prominent and strategically placed throughout your site. Ideally, you want your CTAs to be located in highly visible areas of your website, and it helps when they stand out a bit from the rest of the page.
When creating CTAs for a healthcare website, you want to think about your user’s needs and motivations. For instance, if the goal is to encourage your visitors to schedule an appointment, the CTA should focus on the benefits of scheduling that appointment. This could be an improvement in their health or gaining peace of mind. You also want to use clear and concise language in your CTA. Buttons should be labeled with action-oriented verbs as to what you want visitors to do, such as “Schedule Now” or “Book an Appointment.” As you can see in the example below, the CTAs are telling you exactly what you can do next, and will lead you to the correct area of the website.
It's also good practice to test and refine CTAs over time to see which ones are most effective. This can be done through A/B testing, where two versions of a CTA are tested against each other to see which one generates the most clicks or conversions. By continually refining and improving CTAs, healthcare providers can encourage more visitors to take action and ultimately improve their online presence and engagement with potential patients.
Trustworthy and Credible Content:
Best Practices for Healthcare Website Design
Now that you have a better understanding of the key elements of healthcare website design, let's take a look at some best practices to follow to ensure that your website is effective and engaging.
Use High Quality Images:
The images you use on your website are just as important as the content you are presenting. According to
Forbes, content with relevant images gets 94% more views than content without relevant images. This is why it's so important to use images that are high quality and relevant to the content you are presenting. If a visitor comes to your website and only sees blocks and blocks of text, they will most likely get intimidated and leave. Utilizing high quality pictures helps break up the text and gives your visitors’ eyes something exciting to look at.
Research has also shown that we process visuals 60,000 times faster than text. So if you want your visitors to have high engagement with your site, the use of high quality visuals will help you achieve that goal.
Include Patient Testimonials:
One of the key elements of web design we touched on earlier is building trust and credibility. By including patient testimonials you can further build that trust with your potential patients. Everyone loves to hear real life reviews of products/services etc. before they commit to purchasing or participating. Especially when it comes to healthcare, people want to know that other people have had great experiences with your company. Just make sure you include testimonials that are genuine and have specific details about the patient’s experience.
Testimonial/Review Stats
*The
top industries where consumers see business reviews as most important are:
Healthcare, Automotive Services, and Service Businesses/Tradespeople.
*76% of people “always” or “regularly” read online reviews for local businesses
Make Information Easy to Understand:
Making information easy to understand is important for every industry, especially healthcare. Healthcare content can be extremely complex and filled with medical jargon that may not be familiar to someone without a medical degree. As a result, being able to
present your content in a way so anyone can read and understand it is crucial.
One way to accomplish this is by eliminating medical jargon. Any technical terms or acronyms should be explained in a way that is simple for everyone to comprehend. Another helpful tool is to utilize visuals such as infographics, charts or diagrams to help explain complex information.
Another tip for presenting complex healthcare information is to organize it in a logical manner. Having your content written in a step-by-step or hierarchical format makes it easier for the reader to follow. Like mentioned earlier, it is essential that your website is user-friendly and easy to navigate. This way the user is able to find the information they are looking for quickly and easily.
Follow Accessibility Guidelines:
Examples of Healthcare Website Design Inspiration
The Smilist Dental Clinic:
The Smilist Dental Clinic’s website is bright and inviting upon first observations. Their homepage is full of useful information, without overloading the visitors. They did a great job with their color contrasts, engaging visuals and have great CTAs. Their website includes an easy-to-use appointment scheduling system that is so convenient for their patients. They also utilized several patient testimonials which is always welcomed in a great health care website design.
Natural Baby Doulas:
The Natural Baby Doulas’ website hits on a lot of the key elements of good healthcare web design. The site’s messaging is clear and concise, making it simple for the visitors to understand. Their layout is clean with consistent branding and high quality images that invoke a warm and inviting feeling for their patients. It is easy to navigate with their clear menu at the top of the page. And just like The Smilist Dental Clinic’s website, the Natural Baby Doulas also included a ton of great testimonials - helping increase their trustworthiness and credibility.
Mayo Clinic:
The Mayo Clinic's website is another great example of a well-designed healthcare website. The website's design is clean and professional, with easy-to-read fonts and high-quality images. The website's navigation menu is clear and concise, making it easy for patients to find the information they need. The website is also mobile-responsive, making it easily viewable on a variety of devices. Finally, The Mayo Clinic, as well as the other 2 websites we talked about above all have secure website hosting - a necessity in a good healthcare web design.
Conclusion
Good healthcare website design is critical today, as patients increasingly turn to the internet to find services or information about their health and medical conditions. A well-designed website can improve a patient’s experience by providing them with easy access to information, appointment scheduling and other important services. When designing your healthcare website make sure you consider these key elements: clean and professional design, easy navigation, mobile responsiveness, providing strong CTAs and trustworthy & credible content. Our expertise in this area has been recognized by
DesignRush, a leading industry platform. By incorporating these elements into your design, as well as following the best practices we laid out, you can create an effective website that your patients will love. If you need help with your website design, the experts at SAASY CLOUD are here to be a great resource for you!
