What Goes Wrong in Healthcare Web Design — And How to Fix It

Winona Cruzan

Winona Cruzan

Posted on January 06, 2017

Healthcare Web Design

In today’s healthcare world, a website isn’t just a check on a marketing to-do list. It’s an essential tool for maintaining a solid patient base while providing those patients with in-demand online services. Hospitals, outpatient groups, pharmacies, health IT vendors, and laboratories are all facing new challenges and opportunities in the digital media space. Hospital website design is a specialized field that focuses on creating highly usable, patient-centered, HIPAA-compliant sites. Both prospective and current patients are always evaluating your services against competitors based upon your online presence, so their experience matters.

With over 13 years in the industry building healthcare websites, we’ve seen every possible pitfall, and have developed thorough solutions.

Problem: Site is Not HIPAA-Compliant

Solution: Specialized, HIPAA-Compliant Healthcare Web Design

Failure to comply with HIPAA can be very costly. So when your healthcare organization is designing a website, you need to be confident that the appropriate HIPAA compliance measures are in place. This includes compliant medical application development — the forms and portals on your site need to be built in a way that ensures secure transmission of inquiries and data — and HIPAA-compliant web hosting. Comprehensive HIPAA-compliant website design means that careful consideration of HIPAA is integral at every step of the development life cycle for your site.
If you’ve already built your website and it doesn’t comply with HIPAA, it’s not too late to work towards compliance. A healthcare website design company can audit your website for HIPAA compliance and security holes, and work with you on implementing a reasonable, multi-phase approach to making the necessary changes.

Problem: Poor Search Ranking

Solution: Quality Hospital Website Design Showcases Content that Resonates with Patients.

A poor search ranking can be caused by many factors, so this isn’t a fix-all solution. However, time and time again we see websites implementing every SEO tactic they can and miss focusing on the key issue: their content.
Many healthcare organizations don’t realize that search engines are finely tuned to detect good content. Even though it’s resource intensive and time consuming, having a website that clearly shows your expertise is a benefit to the extended community — and your search ranking with reflect that. Content writing by experts in the healthcare field is a must for valued content. Meanwhile, excellent healthcare website design focuses not only on site functionality, but also on the way that your content is showcased.  Analytics showing user engagement are a great tool to gauge whether your website is effective and provides a resource to your community.

Problem: High Bounce Rate

Solution: Ongoing Analytics, Testing, & Website Optimization

The bounce rate is the percentage of visitors clicking off your website after only viewing one page. A high bounce rate can mean a variety of things, but in general the higher it is, the worse off your site is. And reducing your bounce rate helps to boost your conversions.
So many healthcare organizations launch a website and believe it’s finished, then keep it static for years. When they finally measure the bounce rate, they’re surprised to see it’s higher than expected.
When a website is launched, it isn’t finished. It requires constant testing, maintenance, and analytics. Getting set up with Google analytics provides you with an opportunity to see detailed reports on site traffic, giving you insights on how to improve site messaging, user pathways, navigation, and the overall performance of the healthcare website. Testing and optimization are necessary to see what works and what doesn’t. With these tools, you’re able to stay on top of your site and create the best user experience possible.

See How One Hospital Did It

Health organizations want a company they can trust to provide them with an effective web presence and HIPAA compliant website design. To see how we worked with one of our clients to come up with a patient-centered, mobile-friendly website design, please read our Platte Valley Medical Center Case Study.


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