Imagine yourself as a would-be dental patient. You have a toothache and want to see a dentist immediately. You went on Google, typed in dentist near me on the search bar, and were immediately welcomed by a list of dentists near your actual location. Pretty neat, right? It’s spectacular dental marketing because of what might happen next.
You called in for an appointment and as you were driving on your way to the clinic, you noticed that there is another dental clinic just outside your street. Why didn’t you notice that? And more importantly, why didn’t Google come up with that name. It would have been much easier for you to go there instead of to the other side of the town. But you’ve already made your appointment and you know better than to cancel a dental appointment and try to set another one.
In that scenario, the dentist near the location of the patient has already lost an opportunity. That’s all because his name didn’t appear on Google’s search engine. Why is that? That dentist didn’t bother himself with using local SEO, which is what you need if you want to appear on top of Google’s search results. Remember that the search engine is geo-based now? This means that when you search for banks, restaurants, or in this case, a dentist, the search engine will come up with a result based on your location.
Yes, even if you have the location services turned off, Google will make the recommendations based on your last known location. That’s how the search engine works right now.
How can you improve your local SEO? There are two things you have to do: make a separate landing page for each of your branches (of different locations) and link to that when you post a blog and claim your Google My Business page. While the first strategy is quite popular with internet marketers, it is the second one that mostly falls on deaf ears. It is interesting to see how many businesses have yet to claim their GMB profiles when it is so easy and so needed by any business, retail- or service-oriented.
Make sure to maximize your local SEO by optimizing your GMB profiles and adding as much information as you can. Similar to a social media account, the GMB will show your business name, location, contact numbers, FAQs, menu, and other information. It’s the most effective dental marketing strategy as of now.