What Does a Medical Website Copywriting Project Actually Include?

What Medical Website Copywriting Is (And Where It Stops)

Simply put, copywriting is sales writing. Its job is to get a reader to do something. Medical copywriting keeps that job and piles two more on top of it... be accurate, and stay compliant. On a clinic website, every page has to survive your provider's red pen and still get a worried patient to book.

What it usually does not cover is web design, development, photography, or hosting. Those are separate line items. If a quote lumps them all together, ask who's doing which piece. You'd be surprised how often the answer starts with "uh..."

The 7 Phases of a Medical Website Copywriting Project

Almost every clinic project I run follows the same seven phases in the same order. Here's who does what in each one.

• Phase 1, Discovery. We talk about goals, services, ideal patients, and the competitor down the street. You send intake answers and your most common patient questions, and I send back a project scope and page list.

• Phase 2, Research. I dig into keywords, search intent, and clinical sources. You give me access to whatever materials you already have. You get a keyword map and a source list.

• Phase 3, Page plan. I build the sitemap and outline each page around one topic. Once you approve the plan, every page gets its own content brief.

• Phase 4, Drafting. The actual writing. Your job here is mostly patience.

• Phase 5, Review. A provider on your team checks medical accuracy while I chase down a source for every claim.

• Phase 6, Revisions. You send one combined set of notes per round, and I turn them into a final copy.

• Phase 7, SEO finishing. Meta tags, alt text, internal links, and a clean handoff file for your developer.

Phase 1: Discovery and Intake

This is a discovery call plus an intake questionnaire. I want to know which services keep the lights on and which competitor keeps winning the patients you should be getting.

For our burn clinic, the big question is the audience. Is the site for the person with a fresh kitchen burn at 9 p.m., or the patient six months out who's worried about scarring? Each one needs different pages. And if physician referrals matter to you, that's a whole other set.

Tip: Send me the ten questions your front desk answers most often. They turn into pages and FAQs almost word for word.

Phase 2: Research

This surprises a lot of people, but when you're a good copywriter, you don't spend most of your time writing. Research eats the biggest chunk of every project I run. I'm checking what patients type into Google and what your competitors already rank for. Then I track down a clinical source for every claim you want to make.

For the burn clinic, a search like "how long does a second-degree burn take to heal" is a patient education question. It belongs on a helpful article, not buried halfway down the scar treatment service page.

Phase 3: Page Plan and Content Brief

Before I write a single sentence, you approve a sitemap and an outline for each page. One main topic per page, with one clear call to action.

Why so strict? A page that tries to cover burns, chronic wounds, and skin grafts all at once usually ranks for none of them. Google and AI answer tools both favor pages that answer one question well.

Phase 4: Drafting the Copy

Now the writing. I write to one reader in plain words, and I lead with their worry instead of your credentials.

Here's a before and after from the burn clinic's "when to seek care" page:

• Before: "Our multidisciplinary burn team provides expert evaluation of thermal injuries of varying severity."

• After: "Not sure if your burn needs a doctor? If it's bigger than your palm, blistering badly, or on your face, hands, or joints, call us today."

The first one sounds like a brochure. The second sounds like a nurse on the phone, and it tells the reader exactly what to do next. (For the medical side of that question, this site's guide on when a second-degree burn needs the ER goes deeper.)

If you want the line-by-line habits behind a strong draft, I've collected my medical copywriting tips on plain language, proof, and HIPAA-safe testimonials in one post.

Phase 5: Medical and Compliance Review

I will write about it. A licensed provider on your team checks it. That split matters, because the clinic carries the liability for what goes live, not the writer.

During review, I flag every claim that needs a source. I soften or cut words like "guaranteed" and "pain-free." And any patient testimonial or before-and-after photo needs written HIPAA authorization before it touches your site. HIPAA is VERY important here, because regulators count fines per violation. 

Phase 6: Revisions

Most projects include two consolidated rounds of revisions. That word "consolidated" is doing a lot of heavy lifting.

Tip: Pick one person to collect everyone's notes. When the office manager, the medical director, and the owner's spouse all email separate edits, everybody pulls the copy in a different direction and the timeline doubles. (Ask me how I know.)

Phase 7: SEO Finishing and Handoff

The last stretch covers meta titles and descriptions, image alt text, internal links, and a tidy handoff file for whoever builds the site. After launch, plan to refresh your most important pages at least twice a year so the site doesn't go stale.

Medical Copywriting Tips for Getting More From Your Project

The practices that get the best results tend to do the same handful of things:

1. Name one decision-maker. Committees write brochures. One person can sign off on a website.

2. Answer intake questions within a week. Every week of delay at the start shows up again at the end.

3. Book review time up front. Two hours on your medical director's calendar keeps a project from stalling for a month.

4. Share your own photos. Stock images of grinning doctors undercut good copy faster than a typo.

5. Be honest about outcomes. A copy that can't overpromise reads as more trustworthy.

6. Ask for the source list. A good writer keeps one, and you should have a copy.

Red Flags When Hiring a Medical Copywriter

Walk away if a writer guarantees rankings or a set number of new patients. Same goes if they never ask who reviews for medical accuracy, or never once bring up HIPAA. In most industries those are small oversights. In healthcare, they're liabilities with your clinic's name on them.

 "Every clinic I work with expects the writing to be the hard part. It almost never is. The hard part is the week we spend deciding who a page is for and which claims we can prove. My favorite moment in any project is when a provider reads a draft and says, 'That's exactly what I tell patients in the exam room.' That's when I know the research paid off. And when a project stalls, it's almost always because nobody owns the review. Put one name on that job before we start, and a seven-week project stays a seven-week project."

Essential Resources

These are the seven I keep open in a browser tab during almost every clinic project. Skim the ones that match the phase you're in.

1. See What Plain Language Looks Like on a Page

Digital.gov's plain language series shows how to write, design, and test content so the people it's meant for can follow it. I lean on it every single time I start drafting.

Source: Digital.gov: Plain Language Guide Series

2. Plan Your Pages Around the Patients You Want

The NIH's Clear & Simple guide lays out five steps for building health materials, starting with defining and researching your audience. It lines up almost perfectly with the discovery and research phases.

Source: NIH: Clear & Simple

3. Write Pages a Patient Can Read on the First Try

MedlinePlus walks through planning, writing, and testing easy-to-read health materials, and suggests aiming for about a 7th or 8th grade reading level. Hand it to whoever on your team reviews drafts.

Source: MedlinePlus: How to Write Easy-to-Read Health Materials

4. Know Which Claims Need Proof Before You Make Them

The FTC says health claims have to be truthful, not misleading, and backed by competent and reliable scientific evidence. I treat this page as my checklist during compliance review.

Source: FTC: Health Products Compliance Guidance

5. Use Patient Stories Without Breaking HIPAA

HHS explains when a communication counts as marketing and when you need a patient's written authorization first. Read it before a single testimonial goes on your site.

Source: HHS: HIPAA Privacy Rule and Marketing

6. Make the Site Easy for Everyone to Use

The W3C's writing tips cover descriptive page titles, clear headings, meaningful link text, and alt text. Those same habits help search engines and AI tools figure out what each page is about.

Source: W3C: Writing for Web Accessibility

7. Find Out What Google Wants From a Clinic Site

Google's guide to people-first content explains how its systems weigh experience, expertise, and trust, and why health topics get extra scrutiny. It's the shortest honest answer I know to "what does Google want from us?"

Source: Google Search Central: Creating Helpful, Reliable, People-First Content

Supporting Statistics

Three numbers that explain why every phase above exists, pulled from U.S. government and National Academies sources. None of them repeat the resources above.

1. 58.5% of U.S. Adults Look Up Health Information Online

Between July and December 2022, 58.5% of U.S. adults used the internet to look for health or medical information. For a lot of future patients, your website is the first "appointment" they ever have with you. That's why I don't rush the research phase.

Source: CDC/NCHS Data Brief No. 482: Health Information Technology Use Among Adults

2. About 36% of U.S. Adults Have Basic or Below Basic Health Literacy

In the national health literacy assessment, about 22% of adults scored at the Basic level and another 14% scored Below Basic. Put those together and more than a third of your readers may struggle with a dense service page. On a clinic site, plain language is the whole job.

Source: NCES: The Health Literacy of America's Adults

3. Nearly 90 Million Americans Have Trouble Understanding and Using Health Information

The Institute of Medicine reported that nearly half of American adults have a hard time understanding and using health information. It also cited more than 300 studies showing that health materials are often too hard for the people they're written for. Good medical copy exists to close exactly that gap.

Source: National Academies: 90 Million Americans Are Burdened With Inadequate Health Literacy

With 58.5% of U.S. adults searching online for health information and millions struggling to understand complex medical content, a copywriter Spokane WA healthcare providers work with can help create clear, accurate, and accessible website copy that builds patient trust and makes health information easier to understand. 

Final Thoughts and Opinion

A medical website copywriting project is a decision-making project that happens to end in writing.

After years of doing this for clinics, I can usually tell by week two whether a project will run smoothly or turn into a slog. The smooth ones answer intake questions fast and put medical review on the calendar like a patient appointment. The slogs treat review as something to squeeze in between patients... and then wonder why the launch keeps sliding.

I'll be straight with you. If your site has fewer than five pages and your services haven't changed in years, you may not need a full project. A focused rewrite of your homepage and your top service page might do more for less money, and I'll tell you that on the first call.

But if you're adding services or losing patients to a competitor with a better site, a structured project pays for itself. Same goes if nobody remembers who wrote your current copy. You'll know exactly what you're getting and when it's done.

For the burn clinic in our example, the payoff is simple. Someone with a blistering burn at 9 p.m. finds a page that tells them, in plain words, whether to come in tonight. That's the point of the whole thing.