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Quality content and search engine optimization (SEO) go hand in hand. SEO is the process of maximizing the number of visitors to your dental website by ensuring the site appears high on the list of results returned by a search engine. So how do you master SEO for your dental practice? The ever-changing rules and algorithms of search engines makes it imperative that dental practices hire and retain the right search engine optimizers (SEOs) to maximize their online presence and help drive patients to their practice. This monthly column in Efficiency in Group Practice will cover critical areas in the process of augmenting your dental business through today’s new yellow pages – search engines: where quality content is king.
Creating quality content sounds challenging. What is it? How do we create a comprehensive content strategy that includes topics our audiences want to hear or read? In his book “They Ask You Answer,” author and web marketing guru Marcus Sheridan presents a simple idea – when building your content strategy, create content based on the questions your customers ask.
This easy premise of answering questions helped Sheridan save his swimming pool business during the economic and housing crash of 2008. Yet many businesses, including dental practices, neglect the best resource available to them, the Internet. Quality content is the key to success. Today’s search engines recognize keyword cram and link boosting, which can move your content to the bottom of their lists.
However, people ask search engines questions and your answers can provide the quality content that search engines are seeking when ranking your website. Think about who, what, which and how much when building your website’s content strategy. Dental practices need to address what their potential customers are asking. Your content should not shy away from problem solving, market comparisons, reviews, and pricing and cost.
Throughout 2020, this column will focus on growing your dental business through SEO best practices, ranking websites, citations, listings, consumer reviews, tracking, local search, building better websites, improving responsive design for mobile and more. What worked in the 2010s won’t work in the 2020s. Your quality content is king. You are an expert in the dental space and your potential customers want answers to the dental questions that they’re asking search engines.
Understanding the difference between a customer’s hiring intent keywords, like your provided services such as fillings, crowns and teeth cleaning, and research intent keywords, which help position your dental practice as a leader in the field through your blog articles and FAQ pages, can help place content in its proper place on your site. Sharing your industry knowledge provides the best traffic to your site, better conversion rates and boosts your authority in the industry.
