Dentists usually don’t have time to stay on top of the latest SEO news, so let me share with you some pertinent info. For the past six weeks, since mid-October, Google has been rolling out a Penguin update. At first, the update appeared to have some strange, negative effects on white-hat SEO-ers. On Thanksgiving 2014, however, reports came in that marketers were seeing more positive changes in their SEO results. Google has since confirmed that Thanksgiving Day changes were a part of the October Penguin project.
If you’re planning organic (that is non-Ad Words) internet marketing for your dental practice moving into 2015, you must consider a few key components. Based on what the experts have said and what I have personally seen in my clients’ ranking reports, here are the top five things you need to think about in 2015:
- Responsiveness: Is your website responsive? For a few years now, I’ve been praising the SEO benefits of responsive sites. If your site is not responsive, you need a new website. Contact me today for a quote on a responsive WordPress website, customized, and complete with original, SEO’d content for your dental practice. THIS IS A MUST HAVE IN 2015.
- Long-tail and less popular keyword integration: There are 131, 763, 950 websites on the Internet as of my writing this sentence, and the counter is increasing as I end this sentence. While dentists aren’t competing with all of these, competition is fierce, particularly for dentist offices in major metropolitan areas. Coming up organically on page one for “Chicago dental implants” or “San Francisco cosmetic dentist” is more than hard – it borders on impossible. Why? Because those who have been building a solid web presence for a decade have a huge advantage over the dentist with a new website. Your best bet for competing in a competitive are is to focus on long-tail keyword integration and…
- Original content: Nothing beats original, informative, fresh website content (including blogs). Think about it this way: search engines make money by providing good information to people who search. If your website’s pages and blogs answer the questions people search for, you’re providing good content for the search engines – and you will be rewarded with good rankings.
- Organic incoming links: DO NOT purchase links. Oh, the horror stories I’m hearing now about plummeting ranking for dentists who purchased links from link farms. While Google has warned against this for quite some time, the negative effects of such practices are just now becoming evident. If you want to include linking in your SEO strategy, look for ways to build organic links. You cannot purchase these kinds of links. You must build relationships with other business owners, websites, and bloggers who will include a link to your site/blog/article from their site/blog/article. That means getting social, which takes time and lots of effort. Is it worth it? Your guess is as good as mine.
- Get in the game with social: While Facebook won’t earn you a lot of new patients, if any, and Pinterest isn’t a grand marketing opportunity for dentists, you must, must, must claim your Google+ listing and optimize it! This will put you on Google’s map, give you access to Google reviews, and provide you with an opportunity to gain more credit with the largest search engine on the planet – Google.
If you need responsive dental practice websites, original blogs and articles, better SEO strategy, or help with your overall Internet marketing plan for 2015, call Identiwrite Creative, the expert in dental practice marketing. I’m Shauna Duty, owner of Identiwrite Creative, and I’ll be happy to personally discuss your 2015 marketing plan. Call me at 940-395-5115 or email me today.
