Marketing a physical therapy clinic is not an easy task. It takes effort to stand out in the crowd and gain the attention of clients. If you are tasked with the mighty endeavour of marketing your clinic, this article will help you have a better understanding of the SEO strategies you can use.
Before you can effectively position your marketing and SEO strategies you first need to identify the challenges that you are likely facing. Some of the marketing hurdles that you may face are:
- Fierce competition
In any given town, city, province, or territory, there will always be competition among PT clinics and practitioners. You can visit a nearby hospital and find that there are a handful of outpatient rehabilitation facilities close to each other. Unfortunately, most patients cannot identify the best facility among these options. Their choices would involve factors like their budget, recommendations from doctors, family members, and friends, or the wait time to get seen.
- Shrinking funding models
There was a time when physical therapy was a part of health care plans so physio in Whitby had plenty of clients coming in. The time came when plans became more flexible with allocations across a variety of health specialities.
- Higher consumer demands
Healthcare consumers these days are more involved with the options and treatments they want. It can be challenging to market your clinic when competitors would give in to the whims of the patients.
How to Make SEO Policies Effective for Marketing Your Practice
Physical therapy is an essential service. In tandem with the right marketing techniques and the help of a digital marketing company for local SEO packages, it can be a lucrative practice. Here are some of the search engine optimization (SEO) strategies you can implement for your online marketing campaign:
SEO Basics
To incorporate the right SEO techniques, you have to first understand how it works and how it can affect your online presence. Almost every person in Canada has access to the Internet which means there is a chance that they can stumble upon your website or social media account. To increase the chances of them visiting your site, your website should have the keywords that they use in their Google searches. Increase the quantity and invest in good quality traffic to see conversions in your SEO efforts.
On-page SEO for your website
On-page SEO ranking factors include different strategies for writing, coding, and other particulars of your website. You need to set these up for every individual page to get the best results:
- Title tags – This refers to the page name that shows up as big, bold, and blue texts. It tells Google what the page is about and captures the attention of the searcher.
- H1 tags – These are the first headings used on a page. Only one of it is used for each page. It helps Google understand what the page is about.
- Quality content – the pages should be thoroughly-written, helpful, and informative. You should do this by offering in-depth insights on certain topics that are relevant to your practice.
- Images and alt attributes – These include images on long posts. Make sure to add “alt” attributes to help the search engine understand the photo.
If you have to make changes to on-page elements, make sure to do the changes quickly.
Off-page SEO
Off-page SEO refers to the ranking factors outside of your site. You cannot directly control it but these are important for ranking. There are two important parts of off-page SEO strategies:
- Links – You need to have links to reputable physical therapy websites so Google will identify your business as reputable and trustworthy. Google wants the users to have the best possible search results so having your PT community website and other health institution links can speak volumes about your practice.
- Social media profiles – Interact with your potential client base, discuss current issues, and promote new content using free social platforms. You can also use it as the face of your business online.
Discover and monitor keywords
The keywords are the terms that you use in your contents for search engines to learn about your physical therapy practice. You need to have the keywords that your clients are talking about or are curious about. These days, using long-tail keywords rank higher on search engine return pages (SERPs) because they reflect customer intent.
You can also use keywords to introduce new information. For instance, you recently acquired machines to help with spine decompression treatment in a physiotherapy in North York, you can add these so anyone who searches for this on Google will find you.
Publish high-authority content
Physical therapy has always been associated with rehabilitation. It can be boring to read an article about which quadrant of the body should be focused on in various health conditions that hinder ease of movement. However, if you have engaging, well-written, researched, and understandable content then you will get more people to visit your site.
Content is not just limited to texts because you can add a few more materials to your content like the following:
- Blog posts
- Informational articles that you can publish on your site or submit to others
- Checklists
- Infographics
- White papers
- Videos
Gather as many reviews as you can manage
Word of mouth marketing is still deemed the most effective way to get people to come to you. At this point when people are more bonded with their smartphones and computers so you need to gain reviews from previous clients.
Reviews are like testimonies where customers or patients would talk about their experience in doing business. These can either be good or bad experiences that serve as a warning to anyone looking at booking the business for services or products. Your goal then is to get as many positive reviews as you can to convince onlookers that you are a physical therapist that helped many patients.
Gaining the trust of people and entrusting you with their physical therapy treatments is more than a marketing effort. You can direct your efforts to SEO to boost your online presence and back this up with excellent service to get more clients.