Website user engagement

Why you need it to help boost enquiries *and* for SEO.

It’s no secret that you need to capture a website user’s attention within just a few short seconds of them landing on your page. It’s also no secret that you then need to provide engaging information to encourage them to read more and to get in touch.

Some dental marketing companies spin “engagement” as though it’s a revolutionary new technique to make your website more effective, but in fact it’s common sense and nothing new at all. There are numerous books and studies about website usability and engagement spanning back nearly ten years and all good designers should have this firmly in mind when developing a new dental website.

Another “buzz” word in the world of dental website design is “storytelling”. This is another technique which has been around for a long time but seems to be resurfacing again as marketers try to convince you that they are inventing new methods to help your website work better than the dentist’s just down the road. Here you use images and narrative to tell the user how your services have made a dramatic difference to someone’s life – this is an important technique but again, not revolutionary.

However, there is another facet to user engagement and experience which is equally important but less well understood. In fact you won’t hear many marketers talk about it because they aren’t aware. This additional, critical aspect is all about SEO benefit i.e. how a website which holds a user’s attention can actually fare better in Google search rankings.

User engagement and SEO

You may wonder how this can be related? How exactly does Google know if a user interacted with your web page, how long they stayed there and if it actually met their needs? You may also wonder why they actually care?

Well it’s probably just worth recapping on how Google determines which websites should rise to the top of their search index and how all this links together with user experience. Basically their stated aim is to deliver the best search experience and information for their users – so what better way to determine this than to measure how effective individual websites are when it comes to answering a user’s query?

It’s pretty easy to see that a website which does not engage a user is almost certainly not meeting their needs. Similarly, if you can see that a user is interacting with a website, so staying a while to read your text, watching your video and surfing through several pages, then chances are that they got what they were looking for. And Google can actually measure all of these interactions.

So now we can see just why Google is so interested in how websites perform and how well they meet their user’s needs – simply because they can use this to help determine the overall quality of a website and consequently how they should rank it.

How does Google measure user interactions with dentist’s websites?

If you have Google Analytics installed on your site, and many do, then Google knows pretty much everything about how your site is working. Even if you don’t have Analytics installed, then Google still knows quite a lot. For example, if your website was found in a Google search, the user visited, didn’t like it and returned straight back to the search results, Google knows this. This type of “bounce” straight back to the search results is a negative quality signal and indicative of the fact that the user didn’t get what they were looking for. Lots of negative signals of this nature will likely lead to your site being demoted in the ranking results.

Improving your website engagement

This article is not intended to provide an exhaustive review of how to optimise your website content for best user engagement as we cover it elsewhere; however here are the key elements to consider:

• ensure the site is technically excellent – this includes the basics such as fast load-time, no broken links, easy-to-use navigation etc.
• balance form with function – lots of modern dental websites are going over the top with fancy effects which are confusing and actually detract from the user experience. Lots of “bells and whistles” usually doesn’t lend itself to a good user experience. It must be pleasing to the eye but simple and clear too.
• make sure it’s mobile and tablet friendly using responsive design
• keep your information logical and differentiated – i.e. don’t talk about veneers on your implants page. This is obviously not clever from a user perspective but it will confuse Google too.
• use empathetic language – unless you are targeting referring dentists, keep the language you use at a level which the general public will appreciate. Professional but not too technical.
• personalise it – use photographs of the practice and the team where you can. Stock images are OK in moderation but personal shots work a lot better. It’s simple stuff – most people want to see who they are dealing with and real cases, not lots of smiley model shots.
• tell stories – as mentioned earlier, this is important. Use case histories accompanied by images and video to showcase what you did and how it changed someone’s life for the better. Keep it real and not over-the-top.
• use treatment animations and videos on the site. For your video, don’t just include the interview with the principal and overview of the facilities. Most powerful are the short patient video testimonials.
• Make sure your images and video are professional – too many are trying the DIY route and it just looks poor.
• Keep the content fresh – add regular new updates via a practice blog and revisit the text on your pages at least once a year.

Remember that a website is not a “fire and forget” process. Even if it’s a good one, you need to check back periodically to make sure it’s still performing and delivering that all-important excellent user experience. It’s not just for your users but for Google too!

Summary

In this article I’ve tried to illustrate how an excellent dental practice website is essential not just for ensuring good user engagement but also how this spins off to improved Google ranking too. None of the techniques are rocket science or revolutionary and any experienced, conscientious web designer should have them at heart when developing your new site. Hopefully this article will give you a decent working knowledge of what to look for when your project is underway.

If you are worried that your current website isn’t meeting the above criteria and isn’t delivering the results you expected, please call the Dental Media design team on 01332 672548 for a complimentary review.