Local SEO for Medical & Healthcare Professionals

Local SEO is crucial for medical & healthcare brands aiming to attract more patients from their local area and can become a key part of your healthcare online marketing activity. Local SEO can help any medical & healthcare brands appear in search results when potential patients search for medical services nearby.

Whether you are a doctors, dentists, or dermatologists you can benefit from implementing certain techniques. With that in mind, here we look at the strategies in local SEO for medical practices that can be used to improve local SEO for your GP practice, dental surgery or any other medical business.

What is local SEO?

Firstly, let’s understand just what we mean when we discuss ‘Local SEO’. 

Here we discuss ways to improve local SEO for medical practices like GP offices, dental clinics, and other healthcare businesses.

Local SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is the process of optimising your medical website to improve visibility in your local area’s search engine results. This is particularly important for businesses that serve specific geographical areas, such as independent opticians, dentists and any other medical practice. By using local profiles, keywords and NAP consistency, you can ensure your business stands out locally.

Local SEO aims to ensure that when potential customers search for services or products in their vicinity, your business appears prominently in the search results. More imporntalt,y when they click through to your website it is imporntat to ensure they see content that matches their needs. Let them find what they are looking for. In fact healthcare SEO is the way to go if you're looking to attract more customers. In fact, don't just take our work for it. Neil Patel is quoted as saying;

"Healthcare SEO is not just about optimising content for search engines; it's about providing valuable and accurate information to patients and improving their overall experience."

What actions can help with local SEO for medical & Healthcare Businesses?

There are numerous strategies that medical practices & healthcare brands can implement to enhance their local SEO. These actions can significantly improve online visibility, attract more local patients, and ensure that your medical practice thrives in your community, whilst establishing a stronger presence in local search results. Key strategies include:

1. Website Optimisation for Local Search

Your website is the cornerstone of your online presence. As such, it is vital to optimise it for local search. To do this you must:

• Include NAP Details: Make sure your name, address, and phone number are prominently displayed and consistent across your website (and other online listings).
• Local Keywords: Incorporate local keywords in your content, meta descriptions, and titles. For example, use phrases like “dentist in London” or “GP in Manchester”.
• Local Content: Create blog posts or articles that focus on local health issues, events, or news to attract local traffic.

As well as ensuring your website is targeting local search, we strongly advise it is ‘mobile-friendly’ (adapts to different screen sizes and devices) so that people can find you when searching for you on a mobile device.

Using Schema markup can also help search engines understand your website’s content. By implementing local business schema markup, you can enhance your local SEO by providing search engines with detailed information about your practice.

2. Google My Business Optimisation

Google My Business (GMB) is a crucial tool for local SEO. Google GMB is a free service that allows businesses to claim a profile which can get listed as a knowledge graph in local SERPs as well as getting a Google Maps listing. 

GMB can help businesses improve their local SEO ranking, reach out to customers, and monitor how people interact with their business online. GMB listings can include a business's location, photos, services, and products. Here’s how to optimise your GMB profile:

• Claim and Verify: First, claim your GMB listing and verify it to gain control over the information displayed about your practice.
• Complete Your Profile: Ensure all details, including your practice’s name, address, phone number (NAP), website, hours of operation, and services offered, are accurately filled in.
• Add Photos: Upload high-quality images of your practice, staff, and facilities to create a welcoming impression.
• Encourage Reviews: Ask satisfied patients to leave positive reviews and respond to all reviews, both positive and negative, professionally.

3. Get listed on local citations

Local citations are excellent options for using in local SEO for medical websites and are simply online mentions of your practice’s NAP (name, address and phone) details on local websites. There are many opportunities to utilise local citations - from local directory listings to review platforms. To utilise this opportunity correctly, you must ensure that you are: 

• Entering Consistent Data: Ensure your NAP details are consistent across all online directories, including health-specific ones like Healthgrades and Vitals.
• Using Quality Listings: List your practice in reputable local and national medical (and non-medical) directories such as Yell.com and thomsonlocal.com.

4. Backlink Building

Quality backlinks can improve your site’s authority and search ranking. By acquiring hyperlinks from other websites to your own, backlinks act as endorsement signals to search engines that your website is a credible and authoritative source of information - and thus should be shown prominently in SERPS 

To build backlinks, you can look to secure either:

• Local Backlinks: Backlinks from local businesses, news websites, and organisations.
• Citation/Directory Listings: As discussed above, getting listed on local directories can help with local SEO
• Guest Posting: Write guest posts for local blogs and health websites to gain quality backlinks.

5.  Patient Reviews and Testimonials

Encourage and secure reviews and testimonials from patients about their experiences with your medical professional or healthcare practice. These reviews and testimonials, often found on platforms such as Google, Yelp or healthcare-specific sites like Healthgrades, offer insights into the quality of care, professionalism, and overall patient satisfaction. 

Positive reviews and testimonials can enhance a practice’s reputation, attract new patients, and improve local SEO for medical practices by signalling trustworthiness and reliability to search engines and prospective patients. To make the most of reviews in local SEO for medical websites, you should:

• Ask Regularly for Reviews: Regularly ask patients to leave reviews on Google and other relevant review sites. By introducing this as part of your customer interaction processes, you should expect to see review numbers increase continuously.
• Showcase Testimonials: Display patient testimonials prominently on your website.

While implementing local SEO strategies requires ongoing effort and updates, the long-term benefits are well worth the investment. By implementing these local SEO strategies, medical professionals can significantly enhance their online visibility, attract more local patients, and grow their practice. As mentioned, local SEO is not a short-term option for any business, but the benefits from it, mean it is well worth the effort and can help a business grow.

How We Help MEdical & Healthcare Brands

Our team of local SEO optimisation service experts based in Leeds can help you understand how your medical website is currently performing and how you can further optimise your website to ensure optimum performance. Contact us to discuss how our SEO for medical practices service option could help you conquer your local search results and beyond.

Additional Reading: Read our detailed guide about the importance of local SEO for businesses.

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