When a person needs a dentist, they search the internet and start looking for reviews and websites of local businesses. Wouldn't it be nice if your dental office was easily found online? To appear in search results, especially for local searches, search engine optimization (SEO) is a must. And keywords are an important part of any successful SEO strategy. Click here to know more information about this article.
Local SEO for dentists
People most frequently visit dentists in their immediate area. Focusing your SEO efforts on target neighborhoods or zip codes is known as local SEO. Creating content specific to your website and inserting keywords that reflect what potential customers near you are searching for will help your website get found.
To appear in Google search results (where most searches are done), it's important to start searching for keywords onGoogle. The process is simple:
Make a list of any terms you can think of that people might use to find your dental office online
Group related terms
Use keyword tools to refine your list
Work to build a list of mostly long-tail terms that focus on local traffic. Long-tail keywords are those that contain at least three words, so the longer, the more specific the search becomes.
Here is a list of keywords to help you get started:
- Dentists near me
- Dentists in (city name)
- Best dentists in (city name)
- Dentists near me that accept (insurance name)
- Emergency dentist (city name)
- Affordable dental cleaning near me
Discover dental keywords with Keyword Tools
To make your keyword list as specific as possible, there are many free online tools you can use.
Google autocomplete
When you find a word in the Google search bar, a dropdown menu with suggestions appears. These suggestions are based on actual user searches, so this is a simple and effective way to find new keywords and will help you understand how people search.
Google related searches
Have you ever scrolled to the bottom of a search page? If you do, you'll find a list of blue links showing related terms. They usually have more than three words. Basically a long-tail keyword gold mine.
keyword planner
Another wonderful free tool from Google, Keyword Planner, provides data on each keyword so you can see if it has high search volume and competition. You will need a Google Adwords account to access Keyword Planner. From there, just type in a few sentences and you'll see a wealth of useful data along with keyword suggestions.
Find the best keywords
Now that you have the tools to refine your list, here are some suggestions for choosing the best keywords.
Do not immediately choose the highest search volume
The keywords with the highest search volumes often have the highest competition. If you want to do paid marketing, high search keywords can easily drain your budget. Since you're trying to target local traffic, look for keywords with low to medium search volume. And if you find one with little competition, all the better.
Geolocation
Focus on keywords that have specific local terms, like the name of your city. This will attract customers who are actually close to you rather than someone who is not in your city and searched for a broad term.
long tail keywords
As mentioned, keywords longer than three words will help target people who are close to using your services, so make sure your keyword list is full of these beneficial terms.
How to use your keyword list
Once you've perfected your list, it's time to take action. Start by putting the keywords on the pages of your website. The main headings are where you want to use your most important keywords and you can sprinkle the rest throughout any blog post or text that describes your services.
Here are some other places to use keywords to drive organic traffic:
Meta-descriptions
Alternative tags for images
urls
Subtitle
Image names and captions
A word of warning though: you never want to “stuff” your website with keywords. Using too many could bookmark your page and actually lower your search rank. The idea is to “spray” terms so that your text reads well and provides quality information for visitors.
0
0
