In 2022, if you have a dental surgery, and you are looking to attract new patients, you will need to invest in SEO and marketing. SEO, otherwise known as search engine optimisation, is a key part of any online marketing plan and is one of the most affordable and successful methods available to attract new patients to your dental surgery.
Want to know a bit more about SEO? Read on for answers to common questions about SEO.
Why does my surgery need SEO?
If you do not have SEO, your dental surgery is practically invisible on the internet. SEO is the method by which a search engine leads people to your surgery page. You will need some very specialised dental SEO techniques to get those patient numbers climbing, to ensure that your surgery is successful.
What does SEO involve?
SEO involves using some tricks to get the Google algorithm to notice your webpage; this is usually done by attracting the all-important Google bots.
SEO techniques involve the writing of a regular blog, a makeover of the dental surgery page as a whole and other aspects, such as making sure the website is accessible to mobiles and that it loads quickly. Depending on the marketing team that you hire, you may also be able to have your SEO progress tracked, so you can see which techniques are working and which ones are not.
How long will it take for my dental practice to rank on the first page?
If you are running a small independent dental surgery in a rural area, and you invest in SEO, you will likely reach the front page of Google faster than a chain dental surgery operating out of central London. There are other factors too, such as how regularly your website is updated and the interests that patients have in the services that you offer.
But for more information, it is worth talking to a marketing team about how long any marketing plan or SEO will take to get you onto the first page of a search engine.
Do I need to hire a marketing team?
This will depend on the level of SEO marketing that you want. Most people who run a dental surgery do not have the free time needed to run a successful webpage as well, so in most instances, it can be better to hire a marketing team. But that is not to say that you will not have any input into what goes onto your surgery page, and the majority of marketing teams will work with you to ensure that your needs are met when it comes to the page itself.
Is SEO expensive?
The cost of the SEO that you purchase will depend on multiple factors, such as the level of SEO that you want to have, other aspects of marketing such as a website makeover, the writing of blogs and how long you want the level of SEO that you have purchased to go on for.
But when you look at how successful SEO is at attracting customers and how much it costs compared to traditional advertising methods, no, in general, SEO is not considered to be expensive.
