Lure Creative is a digital marketing company specializing in helping private practices, physician groups, and health systems drive new patient visits and overall awareness. For over 15 years we have helped companies Get Found and Be Known. In our adventures, we’ve found that many healthcare company owners have questions about marketing, marketing budgets, and just what it takes to grow their business in this digital/online world. We have answers! So we decided to try to answer some of those questions in an ongoing series of blog posts. Part 2 of our Healthcare Marketing Questions Answered series focuses on a common question: Is SEO (Search Engine Optimization) worth it?
Is SEO Worth It?
The Importance of a Website
Of all the tools healthcare businesses need today to succeed, a website and good SEO are probably the top two on the list. That’s because almost everyone uses the internet. It is one of the first places prospective patients go for information. Your website is your online practice. People search the internet for something as simple as your phone number to in-depth information about conditions and treatments and everything in between. Your goal is to increase traffic and leads from the top search engine in the world – Google – to your website. Once they get there, it had better do what you want it to do – convert those visitors to patients.
The Importance of Search
According to a 2021 study by Intergrowth, 68% of online experiences begin with a search engine. Then know that Google currently holds 92.27% of the total search engine market share. Your prospects are searching first, then hopefully, finding your website. So obviously, having a website is paramount. But just because you have a website doesn’t mean your prospective patients will be able to find you. That’s where SEO comes in.
The Importance of SEO
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the science of improving your search rankings to make your business appear at the top of page one on Google. How important is Google ranking? According to research by online ad network Chitika, page one results on Google get 95% of all search traffic. The very first result gets about 32.5% of clicks, the second spot gets 17.6% all the way down to the 7th spot which only sees 3.5% of all clicks. So you can see why ranking higher on a search engine results page (SERP) is extremely important. Here’s the bad news…it’s extremely difficult as well. A bit of good news, though, is that the total average click-through-rate (CTR) for the top 10 queries is 208% which means that users click more than twice on the first result page.
SEO Is a Science
Unfortunately, there’s no magic button that ranks your website #1 without fail. SEO is a very complicated discipline due to the constantly-changing nature of Google’s algorithm. It takes resourcefulness, dedication, persistence, and creativity. It’s not something most healthcare business owners have time to delve into and understand. There are many moving parts to an SEO strategy. That’s why we have experts. Our Kansas City SEO Service, which is conducted by our Google Certified Search Experts, includes:
- Review of your current search rankings across your most important keywords
- Analysis of top keywords in your industry, competitors, etc. to identify additional opportunities for you
- Optimization of your website – fixing any technical performance issues or broken links
- On-page optimization of content
- Create a linking strategy for both onsite and offsite links
- Improving offsite SEO including Google Map rankings, online directories, Google My Business, and more
- Monthly reports that include our SEO activities and results
Whether you choose to hire a professional or a marketing agency, we recommend you don’t rely on yourself or someone who “knows a little bit about SEO”. You will not get the results you want and it will probably be a waste of your money. In today’s online world, you have to invest in a website and SEO to help your practice, medical group or health system grow.
We hope this helps you see the importance of creating a strong website and the value of making sure it is found through SEO. If you have questions, please feel free to contact us at Lure Creative. We’d like to be your marketing partner and help you Get Found and Be Known.
