Dental website SEO is an increasingly important part of any dental marketing plan. As more patients turn to the internet to find a dentist, an excellent dental SEO strategy is vital if you want to land a steady stream of new patients. Even those dental clinics without websites will want to have a Google My Business page plus other local listings to ensure patients can find them easily online and that all starts with dental SEO.
SEO for the dental market isn’t always easy, but it’s incredibly effective if done right. The key point to take away here is that effective SEO only needs to be implemented once. Once the initial grunt-work is done, dental website SEO will continue to attract visitors to your site for many years at no extra cost.
This post will look at what makes for an effective dental SEO strategy and how to implement it to achieve your goals.
Step #1 – Think local
The vast majority of dentists and dental practice owners will attract local visitors. So you’ll want to rank well in local search engine results. Local SEO is different from traditional dental SEO in that it aims to attract localised visitor footfall rather than worldwide traffic. After all, it’s no good to attract a ton of traffic from the US, Canada, or other territories in Australia, as they are doubtful to book an appointment. Localised dental SEO aims to get your practice high up in the local search engines.
Best dental website SEO practices include:
Creating a Google My Business Listing – This is a great place to start for dentists who are brand new to dental SEO. GMB listings are free to use and optimise, so it’s well worth the effort to do so.
Top tips include:
- Ensuring all contact information is correct and up to date
- Include important details like business opening hours and a detailed description of your services
- Have pictures and ensure your cover picture is appealing
- Include a short video where possible
#2 – Utilise other local listings
It isn’t a good dental marketing strategy to put all your eggs into one basket, so to speak. So you should also utilise other local listings like Yelp, for example. It may be a good idea to be visible in other popular healthcare directories, including WhiteCoat. Perhaps find two or three of the most popular and update your profile as per the various instructions. Do make sure, where possible; your listings remain consistent.
#3 – Design a dental website for users and SEO
Google says that websites should be designed to enhance the user experience, which is a crucial part of any dental marketing strategy. If the visitor feels your website is clear, concise, and easy to navigate, it’s far more likely that they will stick around. However, they have to find you first, and that’s where dental SEO comes into play.
Include location-specific keywords throughout your text and other relevant words that will enhance the theme of your web page. For instance, if you’re a dental implant dentist in Sydney, you may want to include key phrases like ‘implant dentist Sydney’ or ‘Sydney implant dentist. But also, don’t forget to include relevant key terms like ‘dental implants,’ ‘dental implant treatment,’ etc. This is dental SEO 101!
Do this throughout your website, and you should have a good chance of being found when someone puts in a relative search term. Be careful not to keyword stuff. A good dental SEO strategy would be around one main keyword for every 100-200 words.
Another way to adapt your dental website for SEO is to improve your on-page location signals. In essence, you want every single page to contain your contact information. Patients need or want to get in touch with you, so why not make it easy for them. Include your phone number and email address in the dental website header where possible, but if not, include them in the footer
Also, don’t forget to embed a Google map of your current clinic location so visitors can find you easily. This is an excellent way of enhancing the user experience while developing your dental SEO strategy.
#4 – Managing your reputation
Did you know that one of the elements that can propel you up the rankings in Google My Business is stellar reviews?
Search engines like Google will not showcase businesses with average or poor reviews but will reward those with positive reviews. Therefore, a good dental marketing strategy would encourage patients to leave a review.
According to research, 77% of consumers will happily leave a review if asked. So it’s well worth training your team to ask patients if they would mind leaving a review on GMB or Yelp if they have experienced first-class service.
Another good dental SEO strategy is to set up friendly reminders like follow-up emails etc. Give people ample opportunity to leave a review.
#5 – Look to rank in organic search results
Now that you know how to rank for local search, an ideal dental marketing scenario would be to rank organically in the search engines. Kind of like a two-pronged attack; you can double your chances of being found.
This way of promoting dental website SEO utilises more traditional but equally effective methods of dental SEO.
So how do you outrank other local dentists in your area?
Of course, the above tips for localised dental SEO will already help your ranking efforts, but in addition, you should consider factors like
- Backlinking – Links from authority sites and other sites in your industry are essential. The higher the quality of the link, the bigger boost your domain will get. A healthy backlink profile will help your dental website SEO and should improve your rankings over your competitors.
- Include Geo-Tags – Geo-targeted key phrases should also be included in meta titles and descriptions, H1/H2 tags, and alt tags where effectively possible
- Ensure your site is well designed and structured. This is a fundamental dental marketing strategy. Make sure your site is easy to navigate with a clean design.
Hopefully, this article has given you some tips on dental website SEO and how to do it effectively. Although outsourcing your dental SEO isn’t always necessary, it may be wise.
At Mediboost, we specialise in dental marketing and dental SEO strategies for dental practices. If you would like to learn more about how we can help you, call for a strategy consultation today.
Are you ready to take the next step? Contact us on 1300 163 058 or book a meeting online.
References
Review 42 – Fascinating Facts and Small Business Statistics
https://review42.com/resources/what-percentage-of-small-businesses-have-a-website
Google.Com – Create A GMB Listing
https://www.google.com/intl/en/business
User Testing – What’s A Good Website Experience According To Google
https://www.usertesting.com/blog/good-user-experience-according-to-google
Google.com – How To Improve My Local Ranking On Google
https://support.google.com/business/answer/7091?hl=en#zippy=%2Cprominence
Word Stream – Keyword Frequency – How Often Is It And Why It Matters
https://www.wordstream.com/keyword-frequency
Podium.com – State Of Online Reviews
https://www.podium.com/state-of-online-reviews/#:~:text=Reviews%20Are%20a%20Two%2DWay%20Street&text=Many%20businesses%20struggle%20to%20find,asked%20by%20a%20local%20business
