How to measure your dental SEO (without measuring your dental SEO)
I’m sure that just about every article you’ve ever read about SEO for dentists recommends that you carefully track your analytics to get an accurate picture of its effectiveness.
While I agree with that, I also realize that most dentists aren’t marketing data geeks (like yours truly). Many of you would be satisfied to simply know if it’s working or not.
Well, it is possible to measure your dental SEO performance for possible red flags without looking at a single pie chart.
Are you ranking for your most essential keywords?
The number of keywords you target and how well you rank will depend on how ambitious your strategy is and how much time and resources you can devote to it. But even for the most basic dental SEO marketing strategy, you should be visible for your most essential local keywords. Pull up Google and see if you can easily find your dental website for searches like “dentists near me,” or “cosmetic dentists in Cleveland.” You may not be on the top of the list (and that’s okay), but hopefully, you are at least on page one or among the top Google map results. If not, it is definitely worth investigating. It’s entirely possible that you are just up against a lot of competing dentists, especially if you’re in a big metropolitan area. But it may also be something that can, and should, be corrected to help you rank higher.
Does your site load quickly?
When Google encounters a website that loads slowly, it can prevent its bots from crawling the site efficiently and gathering the information it needs to rank it properly. A slow loading site is also a red flag for a poor user experience, and Google just isn’t into sending people to bad websites. If you get frustrated with how long it takes your pages to load, you can bet that Google will as well.
Is your website secure?
A while back, Google started prioritizing websites that had security (SSL) certificates installed. It’s easy to spot whether or not your site has one. Simply look at your site’s URL in the browser address bar. If it begins with https: (and not http:), you’re all set. If not, talk to your webmaster about having an SSL certificate installed. A missing certificate can be a red flag that essential dental SEO steps were skipped or overlooked when your site was launched.
Are you getting new leads from your website?
The number of new patient leads you generate from your website may be the most important measure of your dental SEO. To get new leads, you need to get plenty of website visitors. And without good SEO, you will probably not get the amount of website traffic you need. If the well has run dry on new leads, it isn’t necessarily a problem with your dental SEO, but it certainly can be worth checking.
What’s the easiest way to check your website’s SEO?
Of course, the easiest and most accurate way to measure your dental SEO is to sign up for our FREE SEO Analysis. We’ll check all facets of your dental website SEO and give you a full report (pie charts included)!
