11 Online Performance Metrics That Every Medical Practice Should Be Measuring in 2023

KPI monitoring is vital for gauging your marketing success. But with so many practice performance metrics to track, it can be overwhelming to know which ones truly matter.

Relying on best guesses and gut instincts won’t get you far. To stay competitive and maximize your ROI, you need real, data-driven insights. When tracked and analyzed properly, online metrics for medical practices guide smarter marketing initiatives.

Here are the top 11 performance metrics medical practices should measure regularly. We’ll make sure you know exactly why they matter and how to monitor them the right way.

Let’s dive in!

1. Website traffic

Your website traffic shows how many people visit and use your site.

Is your content and search engine optimization (SEO) strategy driving new visitors?

Are people coming back for more of your awesome resources and offers?

Use Google Analytics to track helpful data like:

• Unique visitors: How many new people find your site each month

• Page views: Total number of pages viewed across your site

• Bounce rate: Visitors who leave right away

• Pages per session: Average pages viewed per visit

• Time on site: How long visitors spend interacting with your site

Tracking traffic patterns will let you know whether your content and campaigns are driving engagement effectively.

Are certain blog posts driving more visitors? Try to publish more valuable content like those. Or, write new posts expanding on existing high-performing content.  

Lower traffic on certain blog posts may signal stale content. Make it a habit to review blog post performance every quarter. This way, you’ll know which ones could use some refreshing.

2. Unique visitors

Tracking unique visitors shows whether your marketing is reaching new prospects. This metric counts new people finding your website for the first time. A drop here means it’s time for some changes!

For example, your medical practice may see fewer unique visitors if its blog lacks new, valuable content that would attract organic searchers.

A drop in new visitors signals deeper issues like outdated website content, technical problems, or ineffective marketing campaigns.

Improve performance and get visitor counts back on track by:

• Auditing SEO and content

• Fixing technical speed issues

• Evaluating campaign targeting

3. Brand health

How do people perceive and interact with your brand online?

Brand monitoring tools like Mention, Hootsuite, and Google Alerts show what people say about your practice on the Internet.

Use them to track:

• Sentiment: Do people say positive or negative things?

• Share of voice: How often is your brand mentioned versus competitors?

• Reach: How many see your brand mentions?

4. Conversion rate

Conversion rate shows how well your site convinces visitors to convert as leads.

It's the percentage who take key actions like:

• Booking appointments

• Downloading resources

• Signing up for email lists

A high, steady rate means your content compels visitors.

Conversion rate dipping? Revise your CTAs to pump it back up.

5. Online reviews and ratings

Reviews can make or break whether people choose your practice. Monitor your ratings and reviews on sites like Google, Yelp, and HealthGrades to ensure patient satisfaction. 

Watch for:

• Sentiment: Are most reviews positive?

• Common feedback: What do reviews often mention?

• Response rate: Do you reply to feedback enough?

Remember: Responding shows you care about patient outcomes and their well-being.

Address issues promptly and thank raving fans.

Seemingly small gestures like these are what make people trust you for patient care.

6. Search engine ranking

High search rankings help patients find your thriving practice online. Check where you rank for key terms patients search like, “Mommy makeover Los Angeles.”

Aim for the top 5 organic results.

Not ranking as high as you’d like? It’s time to optimize pages for those keywords.

Pro tip: Use tools like SEMrush or Ahrefs to track rankings for terms patients use to find you.

7. Click-through rate (CTR)

The click-through rate shows how well your titles and content get clicks. Divide clicks by impressions to determine yours.

Watch CTR for:

• Blog headlines

• Paid ads

• Social media posts

• Email subject lines

A low CTR signals it’s time to punch up those elements for improvement.

8. Cost to acquire customer (CAC)/cost per acquisition (CPA)

Cost per patient acquisition shows how much you spend on marketing to gain each new patient on average.

To find it, add up all marketing costs over a period. This includes expenses like ads, emails, billing staff time, etc. Then, divide this total by the number of new patients you got in that period.

Here’s an example scenario:

Your clinic spent $5,000 on marketing last month and gained 15 new patients.

Your CAC would be $333 ($5,000/15).

Monitor CAC on a monthly basis. The lower this number, the better. Rising CAC may signal certain campaigns are less effective. Once you identify those, you can allocate more of your marketing budget to tactics that convert patients for less cost.

Reminder: While it’s important to gradually reduce CAC over time through testing and optimization, be careful not to cut back too far. Marketing drives increased patient volume and medical practice revenue!

9. Social media engagement

Social media lets your medical group engage patients, build a memorable brand, and drive website traffic.

Keep an eye on:

• Follower growth: Are you gaining followers monthly?

• Click-through rate: How often do followers click your posts or links?

• Shares, comments, and reactions: Do they react and comment on posts?

• Overall reach and impressions: How many see your content?

Studying these metrics will show you:

• Who is resonating with your content

• What kind of posts are performing the best

Share posts that get high engagement and drive your desired actions. Suppose you see an informative infographic about “What is included in a mommy makeover?” getting a ton of views and clicks. A photo post related to this one like “mommy makeover before and after” showing real-life patient transformations may likely generate similar engagement.

10. Email marketing metrics

Email is a vital digital touchpoint for patient retention and reactivation.

Track email metrics to improve performance through:

• Open rate: What percent open your emails?

• Click-through rate: How often do they click links?

• Bounce rate: How many emails don’t send?

• List growth: How many new subscribers do you get each month?

Boost deliverability, open rates, and engagement by reviewing these monthly.

11. Return on investment (ROI)

Ultimately, you want to know your return from digital marketing spend. Track ROI by dividing revenue and value gained by the cost of investment.

Monitor ROI across channels like paid ads, email, and social. Then, double down on high-performing platforms.

Why it’s important to measure these online performance metrics

Tracking metrics alone isn’t enough for practice growth. Having consistent benchmarking and comparison of performance metrics is where the real value comes in.

Here’s why your medical practice should monitor core metrics often:

Performance evaluation

Get concrete data to objectively see what marketing efforts and campaigns are working well (and which ones aren't).

Rather than guessing, use hard metrics to identify declining numbers. From there, course-correct campaigns that aren’t delivering results.

Decision making

Performance data enables informed decisions on where to allocate marketing resources and budget to maximize results.

See a specific channel like paid search delivering a high ROI? Now, you can justify spending more on that platform.

Email open rates declining? Perhaps it’s time to shift your budget to your top-performing social platforms instead.

Return on investment (ROI)

Monitoring ROI metrics helps assess the overall profitability and value derived from your digital marketing investments.

By tracking performance across channels like pay-per-click, SEO, email, and social, you can identify the tactics that deliver the highest returns. Focusing your budget on high-ROI areas ensures cost-efficient allocation of your marketing dollars.

Optimization opportunities

When you notice a metric declining, you can dig deeper into the data to identify the root cause and opportunities to optimize specific elements.

For example, a drop in website sessions could mean you need to create new, fresh content or address site speed issues. Lower email CTRs may signal it’s time to A/B test new email subject lines or content formats.

Customer insights

Digital metrics reveal visitor behavior patterns and customer preferences that you can use to better cater to their needs.

For instance, you may find blog content about certain health topics gets more traffic and shares. This indicates readers want more content on those problems.

Higher conversions from SMS vs. email could suggest customers prefer more direct and casual communication.

Reputation management

Monitoring online reviews and brand mentions allows you to proactively manage your online reputation. 

Set up alerts to get notified when patients mention your private practice so you can promptly respond. Tracking your review volume and sentiment lets you detect and resolve reputation issues early.

Competitor analysis

Digital metrics help you measure how your practice stacks up against competitors.

Compare traffic, backlinks, domain authority, social followers, reviews, and more to get a sense of your competitive positioning. Keep pace with competitors by uncovering your strengths and weaknesses.

Goal tracking

With consistent metrics, it’s much easier to track progress toward the goals set for marketing activities and campaigns.

Set specific targets for the year related to metrics, like website traffic, conversion rate, email subscribers, etc. Then, monitoring dashboards will show if you’re on track to hit those goals. It’ll also show if you need to optimize further to achieve targets.

Budget optimization

Monitoring the ROI of each marketing channel helps you allocate budget to the platforms and tactics getting you the best return at the lowest cost.

For instance, you may discover that paid search ads have a higher conversion rate than Facebook ads. In this case, you’d shift more spending to paid search ads.

How to monitor performance metrics successfully

Monitoring metrics won’t magically make your numbers improve. You need to take the right approach to make good use of the performance data.

Follow these best practices to monitor, analyze, and act on your medical practice’s digital marketing metrics successfully:

Define clear objectives

First, align your team with clear SMART goals for your digital marketing efforts:

• Specific: Be clear about what you want to achieve. Your practice might want to “Generate 50 new patient inquiries this revenue cycle,” for example.

• Measurable: Your goals need ways to track progress. An example of this is “Increase website traffic by 10% month-over-month.”

• Achievable: Goals should be challenging but within reach. A realistic example could be “Launch one new service by the end of Q2.”

• Relevant: Goals should tie directly to business growth. For example, “Improve our click-through rate by 25%.”

• Time-bound: Set a deadline to accomplish the goal. A good example is “Boost keyword ranking to top 3 in 120 days.”

Having SMART digital marketing goals keeps you focused on metrics that align with real business outcomes. This means tracking website traffic, leads, rankings, and other key performance indicators tied to those specific targets.

Identify relevant metrics

A common mistake many physician practices make is trying to track every metric out there. Don’t be one of them — being selective matters. Pick relevant, quality measures to focus on consistently.

Start by listing your goals — like increasing conversions or boosting traffic. Then, map metrics to each goal that will give insights into achieving it.

For example, if your goal is to increase website conversions, the KPIs to track would be:

• Click-through rate: How often do visitors click your CTAs?

• Time on page: Do they spend time reading content?

• Bounce rate: How many leave right away?

Higher CTR and time on site, and lower bounce rate signal better engagement.

If you want to grow organic traffic, quality metrics would be:

• Keyword rankings: How visible are you for searches?

• Backlinks: How many authoritative sites link to yours?

• Site speed: Does your site load fast?

Implement analytics tools

Use free tools like Google Analytics, Search Console, and social media analytics to collect performance data in one centralized location. Make sure they’re properly set up and integrated for accurate tracking. Turn on features like campaign tagging to segment data.

Set up conversion tracking

Since conversions are a key goal, implement tracking pixels, goals, and UTM parameters to accurately measure desired actions taken after visiting your site.

This could include:

• Online booking forms

• Resource downloads

• Email sign-ups

• Contact requests

• Purchases

• Patient appointments

Regularly monitor metrics

Designate a practice manager responsible for compiling reports on a consistent schedule. Monthly analysis is best for spotting macro trends; weekly checks allow for reacting faster to issues.

Consider automating metrics monitoring to streamline your workflow here. Many analytics platforms and business intelligence tools have dashboard features to schedule automatic metric reports.

For example, Google Data Studio can pull data from Google Analytics, Google Ads, social platforms, etc. It’ll email automated dashboards on a frequency you set. This allows you to detect any major key metric spikes or dips right away without manual reporting. 

Analyze and interpret data

Many providers are busy collecting metrics, but they don't set aside time to study their reports. 

Look beyond the surface-level statistics and spot trends in performance over time.

Is something steadily increasing or decreasing each month?

Try to identify the root causes driving metrics up or down.

Did a seasonal factor like summer impact website traffic?

Are delays in new content publishing slowing lead growth?

Examine how specific pages, posts, or campaigns influence metrics. For example, see which blog posts or email nurture tracks drive the most conversions.

Look for patterns in the data that reveal deeper insights about your audience and business. This additional analysis and interpretation is what transforms simple metrics into impactful, actionable improvements.

Take action and optimize

Apply insights you get from metrics analysis to create targeted optimization plans. 

Optimization actions may include:

• Improving underperforming content

• Fixing technical issues causing drops

• Strengthening campaigns generating more conversions

Monitor competitors

Lean into tools like SEMrush and Ahrefs to benchmark your performance against competitors. Compare search rankings, website traffic, social followers, and backlinks on a regular basis.

Review and adjust metrics

Audit your metrics every 6-12 months to help ensure you’re tracking the right KPIs.

First, check that they still align with your latest business goals. Eliminate any that don’t provide actionable data or insights.

Next, consider adding emerging metrics that may be relevant to the healthcare landscape. For example, voice search usage is rising. Chat Meter found that “88% of consumers are likely to use driving directions (to see a provider) after a voice search.” It’s no secret that more patients are using voice assistants like Alexa or Siri to find local medical providers.

Tracking metrics like voice search impressions and search rankings can reveal new patient acquisition and engagement opportunities.

Seek expert assistance

KPIs are important to track. But it can be a lot of work, especially when you have other critical practice operations to juggle.

Consider partnering with a digital marketing specialist if you need help with:

• Setting up and configuring analytics

• Interpreting data

• Identifying benchmarks

• Creating optimization plans

• Writing high-quality SEO content

Bottom line: Use data from performance metrics to grow your medical practice

Staying on top of the many performance metrics needed to monitor the financial health of your practice is tough. While tracking this data provides helpful insights, constant analysis can drain your precious time and mental bandwidth.

You and your team devote enough energy to caring for patients. Marketing shouldn't zap you. Bring in specialists who can turn these metrics into sustainable cashflow.

Our experts at MD Logica understand healthcare practice needs. We know how to analyze metrics and transform the numbers into more patients and revenue.

Ready to offload marketing so you can focus on patient care? Let's connect to discuss how our data-driven solutions can ease the burden while accelerating your practice success.

Frequently asked questions (FAQs)

How can I track the number of visitors to my website and understand their behavior?

Google Analytics will give insights into your website visitors including traffic volume, location, pages visited, time on site, and more. Features like Cohort Analysis show behavior over time. Enable eCommerce tracking to see patient actions taken.

What are the key metrics I should monitor to assess the effectiveness of my digital marketing campaigns?

Key medical practice metrics include paid search (CTR, CPC, conversion rate), SEO (organic traffic, rankings, backlinks), email (open rate, CTR, bounce rate), and social (engagement, click-through rate, follower growth).

How can I measure the ROI of my digital marketing efforts?

Calculate your practice's financial performance by dividing the value gained from campaigns by the costs. Track conversions to assign values and measure performance across your digital marketing efforts.

Are there any tools or platforms I can use to track and analyze my online reviews and ratings?

Tools like Birdeye, ReviewTrackers, and Grade.US help gather online reviews from multiple sites. They provide sentiment analysis, benchmarks, alerts, and reporting.

What are the best practices for tracking conversions and measuring the success of appointment bookings or patient inquiries?

First, activate eCommerce tracking in Google Analytics. This will allow you to see patient actions taken on your website. Then, add tracking codes to your lead and inquiry forms to match submissions to patients in your CRM. Phone call volume tracking provides another helpful data point.

How can I improve my search engine ranking and visibility in online search results?

Start by optimizing pages for relevant keywords. Craft compelling title tags and meta descriptions, as these can impact click-throughs. Finally, publish fresh and valuable content regularly to signal relevance to search engines.

What are the benchmarks or industry standards for the metrics I’m monitoring, and how do I compare to them?

Use reports in marketing tools and services like SEMrush and Google Analytics to see competitive benchmarks for your niche. Analyze competitor sites to compare traffic, rankings, backlinks, and engagement metrics.

Are there any specific metrics I should focus on to enhance patient engagement and satisfaction through my digital presence?

Important KPIs for medical practice include repeat website visitors, email click-through and open rates, patient reviews, website pages per session, and positive social mentions.