SEO 101 For Health Practitioners

When you venture into the online world, SEO is one of the first unfamilar terms to turn up on your radar. But what is SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation, and why should you care about it? Let’s go over the basics of what you need to know.

What is SEO?

Put simply, SEO is how people find you via search engines such as Google. When someone types in ‘naturopath Perth’ - who pops up for that search? It’s usually someone who has worked on SEO for those keywords. It also call be Adwords but thats a whole other topic.

Why health practitioners need SEO

Basically, every health practitioner needs their SEO to be in order. It allows you to look professional when you share your content.

For example, have you ever seen someone who has shared a link, and it’s had either a keyword-packed description or a missing image? That’s a problem with SEO.

It’s also important to remember that people don’t know your business name. What they know is where they are, and what kind of practitioner they might want to see. So that is what they are looking for.

So basically, if you want ANYONE to trip across your website on Google, you need to sort your SEO out.

Steps to get your SEO right

SEO can be super-complex – but there are basic steps to take to get you started. Here are a few things that will help you get on track to good SEO.

Figure out your keywords – you can’t do good SEO without knowing these! It can be simple – your modality, your suburb, and your area of interest. But these are the keywords that you want all of your pages to be based on.

Get your business set up with Google My Business – this is what lets Google register you on the map, and it makes you a lot more Google-friendly. For some people, this is the difference between being on page 6 and page 1 for their area.

Get a copywriter – once you know your keywords, reach out to a copywriter who can sprinkle them everywhere in a natural way. A copywriter knows how to optimise a page for both SEO and readability – aka, make it easy for potential clients to know what you mean. Samantha Gemmell is my go-to, as she works specifically with health practitioners.

Produce regular content – every time someone is on your website, it gets a little more Internet friendly. Google likes people reading your stuff! Your blog, links from your social media page, click-throughs from your newsletter – it all adds up. But make sure your keywords are spread through your content as well. If you hate writing content, talk to Sam about outsourcing