Should Healthcare Practices Utilize Local SEO?

With the widespread use of the internet and smartphones, medical practices are relying on digital marketing nowadays to promote their services. As compared to more traditional forms of marketing, digital marketing is a cost-effective way to increase customer base. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is an important component of digital marketing and should be used in the marketing of products. 

Understanding What SEO is

Many of us use search engines in finding out about products, services and businesses. SEO is a marketing discipline that focuses on increasing the number of visitors to a website by improving a webpage’s ranking on search engines. It is essentially a series of rules for websites to improve their rankings on search engines. One of the most essential rules of SEO is having a site that is easy to navigate and is optimized for mobile devices.

It is good to take advantage of SEO and apply them to your websites. There are two types of SEO-related principles – local SEO and organic SEO.

Difference Between Local SEO and Organic SEO

Organic SEO is a marketing principle of optimizing your website to rank higher on search engine results and getting websites ranked for relevant keywords. Local SEO focuses more on building relevance of their webpages to specific locations. Organic SEO is heavily used in online services, whereas local SEO is used by brick and mortar businesses. So, what is the difference between the two?

Organic SEO works on improving its ranking on search results based on having excellent content, whereas local SEO works on improving its ranking by having relevant and trusted location. 

Importance of Local SEO

The number of internet searches on health-related information continues to increase. According to a study by Pew Internet and American Life Project, 80% of American internet users have searched for a health-related topic online. The study seems to suggest as well that medical practices can gain more customers by using the internet to market their services.

Local SEO can help introduce more patients to your services by increasing the rank of your website on search engines. Increased traffic to your website can help to boost your customer base and thus, this increases profits. According to Google, 46% of all google search results are determined by the geographical location of the user, which is huge! Many people are searching for local businesses online, Apply SEO to increase website traffic today.

Attract New Patients by Using SEO today

All medical practices want to have a strong customer base and have a stream of patients. Employ SEO strategies, both local and organic SEO, to boost your website’s overall traffic. However, since medical practices are mostly brick and mortar establishments, it is essential that your website shows up on search engine results of people who live in the vicinity. According to a study by Google, local searches result in more purchases than non-local ones.

Simple Healthcare SEO Tips

Here are some simple tips you could use to ensure that your website can be found by local patients.

• Include your city’s name and relevant keywords in your content
• Every page of your website should contain the full address of your practice
• You could place your Google Maps listing on your website
• Use local keywords in your headings, titles and content

Give us a call at 201-448-9010 to speak to one of SmartSites’ digital marketing experts to find out how we could help you get the most out of local SEO. Learn more about SmartSites by visiting our website here.