Guide

Healthcare specialist, local web designer, or general marketing agency: which should your practice choose?

Written by Arash Pourzare, Pharm.D., a practising pharmacist in British Columbia. Reviewed by Behnaz Alijani, Pharm.D. Published 30 September 2026. Reviewed 30 September 2026. Next review 30 September 2027.

A practice that has to satisfy a regulatory College and privacy law should choose whichever provider can show reviewed work in that profession, name the standard it reviewed against, and put ownership in writing. This guide gives a decision table and nine questions to ask.

Disclosure. Monograph sells this service, so read this guide as a vendor's view and check it against others. No provider is named or rated here.

Three kinds of provider

Each is good at something, and the mistake is usually hiring one kind for the other kind's job.

A local web designer

Good at a brochure site: hours, address, services, a map, a contact form, done well and quickly at a fair price. The design is often the strongest of the three. Where it runs out is the content: a local designer will usually ask you to write or approve the clinical text yourself, and will not know which sentence your regulatory College would object to.

A general marketing agency

Good at campaigns: paid search, social media, email, landing pages that convert. The website is a tool for the campaign. Where it runs out is the regulated part: health advertising rules limit what a campaign may say about a prescription medicine or a treatment, and a general agency may not know that the rules exist until a complaint arrives.

A health care specialist

Good at the site that has to do work: intake and refill forms that route into your system without carrying personal health information by email, service pages written to the advertising standard of your profession and province, a dated record of what was reviewed, and integrations with the booking, EMR or pharmacy systems you already run. Where it runs out is scale and breadth: a specialist may not run your paid campaigns, and there are fewer of them to choose from.

The decision table

What to expect from each kind of provider on the criteria that matter to a regulated practice. Descriptions, not scores.

Criterion	Local web designer	General marketing agency	Health care specialist
Privacy and forms	A contact form that emails you; ask where health information would go	Lead forms built for volume; ask the same question	Forms that collect contact details only and route requests into your own system
College advertising review	Usually none; you proofread your own claims	Usually none, and campaign copy raises the risk	Each page checked against the named standard, with a dated record
Integrations	A link or an embed of your booking tool	Campaign tracking; booking as a link	Link, embed, routed request or direct connection, scoped per system
Ownership terms	Varies; often the domain is in the designer's account	Varies; ask about campaign accounts and landing pages	Should be in writing: domain, content, code and accounts in your name
Reporting	Rarely, beyond hosting is up	Campaign metrics: impressions, clicks, cost per lead	Enquiries by source, search performance, Business Profile actions, monthly
Accessibility	Depends on the designer; ask for the standard used	Rarely a deliverable	Should be a deliverable, with the standard named and re checked
References	Local businesses of many kinds	Clients in many industries	Practices in your profession you can call

Nine questions to ask, and the answers that should worry you

Who reviews the clinical and regulatory claims on our pages?Worrying answer: "the client proofreads". You are the client.
Which standard did you review the last health site you built against, and can we see the record?Worrying answer: a pause, or "we follow best practice".
Where does a form submission go, and who can read it?Worrying answer: "it emails the office". A refill request is personal health information.
Who will be the registrant of our domain, and in whose account?Worrying answer: "we handle all that for you".
Who owns the text, images and code when the project ends?Worrying answer: a licence rather than an assignment, or "it stays on our platform".
Which booking, EMR or pharmacy systems have you connected, and how?Worrying answer: "we integrate with everything".
What does the monthly report show?Worrying answer: pageviews and a ranking position, with no enquiries.
Is the site checked for accessibility, against which standard, and how often?Worrying answer: "the theme is accessible".
Can we speak to two practices in our profession you have built for?Worrying answer: no.

References

Ask for two practices in your profession, not two clients in general, and call them. Ask what changed after launch, how long a content change takes, what happened the last time something broke, and whether they would sign again. A provider who has done this work will have the names ready.

What this page does not decide

Your regulatory College decides what your website may say, and privacy law decides how your forms must handle information. This page describes what to ask a provider; it does not rate any provider, and it does not replace the standards themselves. The federal rule on advertising prescription drugs to the public and the federal privacy law are listed under Sources below; your regulatory College's advertising standard and your province's privacy law are listed on the compliance register.

Questions practices ask

Does a pharmacy or clinic need a specialist web agency?

Not always. If your site is a few pages of hours, address and services with no forms and no claims, a good local designer will do it well. The case for a specialist is a site with intake, refill or booking forms, service pages that make claims a regulatory College reads, and privacy law that applies to what the forms collect.

What should we ask any web agency before we sign?

Who reviews the clinical and regulatory claims, and against which standard. Where form submissions go. Who owns the domain, the content and the code. Which booking, EMR or pharmacy systems they have connected and how. What the monthly report shows. Whether the site is checked for accessibility. And for two practices in your profession you can call.

Is a bigger agency safer?

Size does not decide it. What matters is whether the people who write your pages know your profession's advertising standard, whether the forms are built for personal health information, and whether the terms leave you owning everything. A small specialist and a large agency can both meet or fail that test.

Applies to: Pharmacies, clinics and allied health practices in Canada choosing a website provider
Primary source: The advertising standards of the regulatory Colleges named on the compliance register, PIPEDA and provincial privacy law, and Monograph's own engagement checklist
Source date: 30 September 2026
Last reviewed: 30 September 2026
Reviewer: Behnaz Alijani, Pharm.D.
Disclosure: Monograph is a health care web agency. This guide is written by a vendor of the service it describes.
What this page does not cover: Named providers or their prices. No competitor is named or rated.