SEO For Medical Practice

Paging Doctor SEO! Paging Doctor SEO!


Local SEO for medical practice is essential digital marketing for building a robust and consistent pipeline of leads for your medical practice to optimize new patient acquisition.

Medical search engine optimization provides greater online visibility, brand awareness, useful information for prospective patients and excellent ROI.

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Physician SEO for Local Search Engine Results Is Crucial for A Thriving Medical Practice

To outrank your competition and optimize patient acquisition, you need to fully optimize all your essential digital assets. These assets include:


• SEO For Medical Practice: Website

• SEO For Medical Practice: Business Listing

• SEO For Medical Practice: Business Citations

• SEO For Medical Practice: Backlinks

• SEO For Medical Practice: Social Media

Why are these essential? The short answer is that they create the constellation of medical practice ranking factors for local search results.

Before we explore each of these digital assets, let’s take a look at what are the top local ranking factors.

According to MOZ, Local Search Ranking Factors are surveyed using the opinions of local practice SEO professionals to determine which factors have the most impact on search engine rankings.

There is no one answer as to which factors are most important because Google uses different results for different markets, industries and platforms.
This means that a local SEO who specializes in working with cafes might realize that Google heavily weights a factor such as “popular times” for this sector, while a colleague who handles personal injury cases may think this factor is less important than the authority of links doctors earn.


There is no universal way to determine the exact influence each factor has on a market or industry. Each factor has a different influence depending on which search engine result pages are being searched.

Google Maps listing local search results may show a different ranking for the same business than it does in Local Finder. 
The organic results, however, are governed entirely by a separate set of calculations known as an ‘algorithm’. Organic rankings may not be affected by factors that help a business rank highly in a local pack.

Backlino studied over 4 million websites to gauge their website traffic based on click-through rates (CTR) and ranking position on Google’s Page 1. Take a look at the image below.

This shows the percentage of website traffic that you can anticipate from ranking on Page 1 of Google. Rankings translates to conversions, revenue, profit and ROI. The higher the ranking, obviously, the greater the gain. Local SEO increases your rankings and with consistent, diligent effort, your website traffic increases which facilitates business growth.

Google Business Profile Factors For Local Physician SEO

The primary goal of local SEO for doctors is to rank “above the fold” for your medical practice markets on Google Business Profile (GBP) and on Google Maps listing which can lead to increased visibility and potential customers.

Of all the local SEO ranking factors on a medical practice’s business profile, the 4 most important are: The medical practice’s name; the categories listed; location and the medical practice website URL.

Medical Practice Name

The inclusion or exclusion of a search phrase within the business name can impact rank. Google might favor a medical practice with the type of medical practiced within the name.  For example, Simon Medical Practice – San Mateo Podiatrist might rank higher than a Simon Medical Practice if someone searches for “san mateo podiatrist”.


Yet, keyword rich medical practice name’s (without a valid DBA) are somewhat in flux given the 2021 Google Vicinity update. Many medical practices who used the above tactic saw their rankings evaporate overnight as Google appeared to prioritize proximity over keyword in order to flush out spammy, lead-generation websites.


Various testing has shown that proximity cues now favor rankings based on the web searcher’s location. This is not to say that a keyword-rich name is not effective; rather it’s significance has now been mitigated.

Categories

Businesses can select up to ten categories to be included in their Google Business Profile. The most important thing that you can do on your Google Business Profile is to see which practices rank for your keywords and then identify their primary and additional categories and match them.  

Getting categories right is probably one of the most important adjustments that you can make on your Google Business Profile for proper optimization.

Website URL

The website page to which you link from your Google Business Profile can have an impact on your listing’s rank. If a medical practice links their listing to their homepage and has accumulated a lot of authority and links, it may rank higher than if they point to a page with less authority.  

Many practices choose to link to their homepage, or even to another page on the same domain.
There is no one right answer as to what you should do, but there are some factors to consider:

• Do you want people to be able to find you through a Google search or do you want people to see a specific page?
• If you want people to visit a specific page, that page should have a lot of authority (lots of links).
• If you want people to find you through a Google search, it doesn’t matter where you point them because Google will still be able to find you. Even if you point to a page that has no authority, Google will still be able to find you by looking at your website.


If you don’t care about Google visitors, pointing to your homepage is fine. However, if you want more targeted visitors, then you should point to a page with authority (lots of links). 


If you have a page that has a lot of authority, then Google is already showing you what they deem as authoritative and you will want to take advantage of a strong web-page to attach to your GBP if it is relevant and makes sense to do so. You can also add contact buttons or a special offer to that page to make it convert better.

Location

As stated, the Vicinity update increased the significance of proximity cues. Location is now one of the most important factor that helps a practice rank in the Local Pack. The closer your practice is to the searcher, the more likely you are to be ranked.


The searcher’s location is determined by their IP address and reported to Google. If the searcher is in your incorporated area, you should be ranked. If the searcher does not fall within your incorporated area, you should not be ranked unless your practice has a physical address in that location (it could be a satellite office location) or within 25 miles of it. 


There are some exceptions to this rule. For instance, if a searcher is searching for a medical practice that is not located nearby, you may still be ranked in the Local Pack if you have a physical presence in that area. For example, if a searcher from San Francisco searches for “san francisco pediatrician”, a Los Angeles based practice could be ranked.

In order for this to happen, Google would have to know that someone from San Francisco is searching for a medical practice with a physical presence in Los Angeles. This can happen if that practice has a website with a physical address in Los Angeles, and someone from San Francisco has linked to it.


Claiming your business location on Google Maps is the primary goal of doing local SEO for doctors. By displaying your business information on your Google Maps listing, you can increase awareness and traffic to your practice. You can also use this visibility to attract new patients and boost brand recognition.

On-Page Factors for Local SEO Doctors

On-Page Factors refers to your website’s content. The critical Local SEO on-page factors include the following.

NAP is for Name, Address and Phone Number

The idea behind NAP is that a local business’s NAP should be prominently displayed on its website and should match the NAP published on Google Business Profile.

Optimized Content For Local SEO Doctors

Local business websites should be optimized to reflect the keywords that searchers use when searching for the products and services they offer. If a searcher searches for “family medical practice”, then a local family medical practice should rank higher than a competitor who does not have a page optimized for this keyword phrase.

Expertise-Authority-Trust (EAT)

A local business that publishes website content of an authoritative quality may rank higher than one with low-quality content. Moreover, every medical practice should strive to clearly establish that it is a legitimate business by incorporating best practices to meet Google’s guidelines for EAT. Website content should show the practice’s expertise in its field and location to establish authority and engender trust.

Technical and Security Factors


To remove ranking barriers, local businesses should ensure their website is mobile-friendly, secure and renders correctly across multiple devices. It is important to take care with elements such as the robots.txt configuration or page redirection in order for search engines to crawl, index, and trust a website.

Review Factors

Google is believed to pay attention to three types reviews, which include:


• Google Business Profile reviews – These are star ratings and reviews that are likely the most important of all reviews for ranking purposes.
• 
Third-Party Review Sites – These are reviews that people leave on sites such as Yelp. However, they could also include professional reviews on websites like ZocDoc or WebMD.

• First-Party Review on Your Website – These are testimonials and reviews that local businesses facilitate publication on their website.


Moreover, the quality of reviews also has influence on rankings. Review qualities might include:

1. 
Recency: Are a business’s reviews from the most recent dates or are they outdated and out of date?

2. Velocity: How often does a business receive new reviews?

3. Diversity: Are there reviews of the business on multiple platforms?

4. Authority: Could a review by a professional reviewer, or a member in good standing of a program such as Google’s Local Guides have more weight than a review written by a random member of the public?

5. Format: Do text-based reviews have a greater impact than star ratings without text?

Citation Factors

Citations are a great way to boost your business’ credibility and visibility. By using reliable business directories, you can easily find relevant information about your company, such as its address and phone number. This information can help potential customers research your business before making a purchase.


Google is always looking for ways to improve its search results, and one way it does this is by discovering businesses that are popular on other websites. By linking to these sites, you can show Google that your business is reputable and worth considering for future searches.


There are many online sources of information that can help you get quality citations. These include web directories, maps, review sites, apps, and GPS navigation tools.

Link Factors

When used with money keywords and branded keywords, Inbound links from authoritative websites will help to achieve better search engine ranking for local search queries.

Additionally, internal links from other pages or articles within your medical practice can be beneficial for expanding your reach online.

Behavioral Factors

Google is always looking to improve their local search results, so they take into account the click-through rate of maps when ranking medical practices. They monitor how many mobile users are calling your office location asking for directions and compare that number to the competition. If your ranking higher than your competitors, it’s likely due to more mobile users contacting you for help.


Additionally, Google may also be interested in other behavior, such as how long a person stays on your webpage or website which is known as dwell time.

Another behavioral clue is how many people click on your listing’s “call” button to call your practice which is known as clicks-to–call or how many people click the directions button on your listing to get driving directions.


They also factor in how people interact with your photos, reviews and posts, menus, menus, books, products, or Q&A.


Google may also be interested in other aspects of your website such as how people interact with it after they click through, whether they visit other pages or bounce off to another site.

Although many of these factors don’t have an immediate impact on organic and local rankings, they are still important.

Negative Factors

The preceding covered the 7 major types of ranking factors which positively impact local businesses. Medical practices should also be mindful of negative circumstances that impact rankings. Essentially, violations of Google policies on these ranking factors can negatively impact search engine visibility.

Negative factors are too numerous to list but some of the more egregious types include: Fake reviews, toxic backlinks, etc.


A holistic local SEO approach looks at all of the above ranking factors. These ranking factors influence a medical practice’s local SEO which includes Google’s Local Pack and Local Organic search results.

Now that we’ve reviewed local SEO for physician ranking factors, let’s move on to what constitutes best practices for local SEO for doctors.

Your Google Business Profile may rank above your website in search results if it has all the right information, so take steps to make sure your medical practice’s business profile is set up correctly to optimize your Google Business Profile.

Google Business Profile Description

Prepare a short description of your medical practice’s offering that includes medical practice name, name of lead physician, years of operation, medical practice practice areas, locations served, medical awards and recognition.

Here’s an example:
”Our medical practice, The Medical Offices of Meredith Grey, is a premier medical practice focused on family medicine and neurosurgery. We offer our patients unparalleled experience and expertise. Our physicians have years of experience practicing in various areas of medical and are highly respected within their community for their dedication to exceptional results. We provide medical services to residents throughout King County, Washington.”

Choosing The Right Categories For Better Ranking

Always start by looking to see which category terms are winning the SERPs. Usually, the more niche the better. For example, if you’re a chiropractor, use “Chiropractor” rather than “Doctor” depending on which term is ranking for your key term in your area. Then use the other medical categories for your remaining categories.

Add Plenty of Pictures & Videos To Your Listing

Be sure to add plenty of photos of the exterior and interior of your medical practice. Also add team photos, individual doctor photos, special events, etc.  Prospective patients want to know more about your practice and what your office looks like before coming to your office.

Adding Google Business Profile images is a great way to make you and your medical practice stand out from the rest in search results rankings.

Post Useful Content Regularly

Use Google Business Profile to increase user engagement with your posts which also helps  increase local search rankings. Useful posts can be about local events, medical information, recent medical guidance (i.e. COVID vaccinations), new services offered, charitable events, etc. 

Questions and Answers

Use the Questions & Answers feature!  Post frequently asked questions regarding your practice and provide responses that are helpful to patients and prospective patients. Aim for 2-4 Q&A per month.

Positive Reviews Drive Higher Local Rankings

Request patients provide your practice with reviews.  Avoid incentivizing reviews as that conflicts with Google’s guidelines. Be sure to respond to every review and use your keywords in your responses. 


Bad Reviews: Don’t Add Fuel To The Flamer

Everyone gets bad reviews. How you handle it can minimize the impact or make it go from bad to worse.

⭐️ Avoid unprofessional communication with anyone who leaves a bad review. You don’t want to further aggravate a negative review. Be polite and respectful at all times.

⭐️ Offer to help them with a solution.

⭐️ Remember to focus your response on a how a prospective patient reading your response might evaluate your approach. Write for them.

⭐️ If possible, reach out to some of your 5-star reviewers and request that they slightly update their reviews. This will help push down your negative review so it’s not prominent.

For some additional great guidance, check out this article on how to respond to a bad review.

If you get a fake review or one done in bad-faith, contact Google and request removal. It’ll help your position to provide evidence to justify removal.

Keep Your Business’ Name-Address-Phone-Website (NAP-W) Information Correct.

According to the BrightLocal Business Listings 2021 trust report, 83% of consumers found incorrect or incomplete information about a business, while 63% said finding such incorrect info would stop them from using your services.


To avoid consumer confusion and keep your search engine ranking high, make sure all citations online match what’s shown on your website. For example, if you have a medical practice with multiple locations, Google the old address and phone number to make sure it doesn’t appear on any listings online. 

Common Medical Practice Citations 

A few medical directories that you might find useful include: ZocDoc, WebMD, Medical Line Plus, Health Grades, etc.. All of these directories offer medical practices information on a variety of medical topics, so they can be a great lead generation tool for local SEO for physicians.


Be sure your American Medical Association AMA citation, State medical board information & medical practice specialty associations are up-to-date along with a valid link to your medical practice website.

Link-Building for Physician Search Engine Optimization

To rank locally, medical practices should get local and niche-specific links. Link-building will be particular to your practice area and local market.


If you’re targeting “San Francisco internist”, you’ll want to Google that term and analyze the backlinks for the top 3 – 5 competitors. From there, you want to match and exceed those links in terms of link quality.  Avoid getting a ton of spammy or garbage links which can negatively affect your rankings.

Anchor Text –  For Medical SEO Strategy

Research top practices’ backlinks, and typically, what you’ll find is that the top results have a combination of different anchor texts. Anchor texts pointing to their site usually include some combination of the following:


NAKED URL: The medical practice’s website URL is used as the anchor text.


BRAND: The medical practice’s brand name is the anchor text.


MISC: Miscellaneous anchor text will include verbage such as: “click here”, “find out more”, etc.


Exact Match Anchor (EMA): EMA anchors are the exact search term a medical practice is typically trying to rank for like “San Jose ENT.” 


Partial Match Anchor (PMA):  The PMA anchor has some of the keywords, i.e., “cosmetic surgeon Bob Smith.” 


In most competitive markets, most top-ranked physician websites have about 3% – 5% EMA/PMA. 

Love it or hate it, social media is necessary to establish your medical practice’s brand and reach potential patients. It’s also a great opportunity to rank well locally, as long as you keep your posts useful, informative and engaging as social signals are important to local rankings.


When someone links to your medical practices website on Twitter or Facebook, Google will see that as a positive indicator of your site’s popularity. Google considers Facebook likes, shares and comments to be a positive ranking factor. 



LinkedIn is another great social media profile for medical practices because it allows you to connect with prospects and other business professionals.  
We particularly like video because of how effective it is for lead generation and its versatility.

Video can be repurposed for search and social. You can use one video on numerous platforms, and chop it up and make “shorts” for YouTube and TikTok.  
Video also helps reduce the intimidation factor that some might have regarding meeting a new physician. You can present your medical practice, your expertise, values, recent results, and respond to frequently asked questions. Using before and after images is an excellent use of video. Video is an excellent way to post on social to drive brand awareness. A buyer’s journey always involves the process of Know to Like to Trust; so video can help accelerate that process exponentially.


Another great option for medical practices is advertising through social media marketing to a targeted audience search. Social media is far less expensive than paid search. You can narrow down the demographics to your local region and identify the exact ages, gender, and keywords that you are seeking to provide a “freemium” and start an email nurturing sequence for lead generation.

Hopefully this guide helps you in your pursuit of Local SEO excellence. If you’d like to learn more about our Local SEO for medical practices, search engine optimization strategy and how our physician SEO services can help you, contact us.


We would be delighted to provide you with a complimentary audit of your local search rankings and web audit regarding your web presence.

Learn more about our search engine marketing for doctors. Contact us today!