Annually, over 38.5 million (equivalent to roughly 15.4% of) adult Americans struggle with Substance-use Disorder (SUD), according to the latest National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) figures as reported by Forbes Magazine. That’s not the most shocking part; more than 90% of those affected don’t get the help or treatment they need.
As a drug rehab center, you must market your facility and services aggressively to help patients find and access necessary treatments. It all starts with attracting prospects to your website, which is where SEO for drug rehab centers comes into play.
Today, we’ll show you how to grow your treatment center clientele with a solid drug rehab SEO strategy so you can help more patients and respond to a deepening crisis.
First – What’s Drug Rehab SEO?
As the name suggests, drug rehab SEO encompasses a series of efforts, tactics, or strategies for boosting the visibility of drug rehab center websites in search engine results pages (SERPs). It’s a process of helping your drug rehab center website get a favorable organic search ranking on Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo, and other major search engines.
Why? Drug rehab center websites that rank high on Google page one enjoy more web traffic and attention from prospective patients. This matters because more patients are now turning to Google and other major search engines for health-related answers. Given that Google alone processes more than two trillion search queries annually, it’s tough to ignore SEO.
What’s more, Google Trends showed a sharp rise in interest in drug rehab and substance-use disorder topics over the past year. The trend also highlights the importance of crafting a well-thought-out drug rehab SEO strategy to improve your website’s search visibility. You’ll boost your online presence, present your services, and increase patient access to treatment. It’s a win-win.
Putting Your Best Foot Forward with Killer SEO for Drug Rehab Centers
As far as addiction recovery marketing goes, drug rehab SEO is still the most effective digital strategy. It’s a highly effective inbound marketing strategy for attracting, engaging, and converting prospects, beating out social media, email, and even influencer marketing.
Google and other search engines are much akin to librarians; they are custodians of and provide access to relevant, helpful, and often specific information. When a user searches, the Google algorithm seeks to give the query the highest-quality and most relevant results.
Of course, you want your drug rehab website to appear among those search results. Get this: the first three results on SERPs enjoy 60% of all the organic clicks on the page. 75% of online users never go beyond the first page of SERPs.
That’s why brilliant drug rehab marketers use an array of off-page, on-page, and technical SEO tactics to effectively tell Google and other search engines why your website should rank above the fold on SERPs. Of course, several factors play a significant role in determining which drug rehab websites will appear on top of SERPs:
Provide compelling content – Google wants to direct searchers to the most valuable content or resources for them. So, to get the attention of search engines and users, your addiction/recovery website has to provide relevant, helpful content worth reading. As noted by Business Insider, Google will soon start de-ranking unhelpful content.
It’s a no-brainer. People struggling with substance abuse and their loved ones search for answers online. Set your website, blog, and other digital assets to provide them with information about drug addiction, recovery, and treatment. The ultimate goal is to ensure that they find resources on your drug rehab website, with the hope that this will encourage them to consider your treatment services for themselves or someone they love.
More crucially, your ranking on SERPs will improve as you attract more traffic to your website.
Incorporating relevant keywords – Search engine algorithms use keywords to match the user’s search query with the most relevant content. The content you include in your web pages, blogs, etc., must be optimized for relevant and specific keywords for which your target audience is searching.
For instance, a service page about Relapse Prevention at your rehab center can rank for keywords such as “Where can I get ongoing drug rehab support?” Or, a blog post about the psychology behind drug addiction can rank for important keywords like “what’s substance-use disorder.”
As a drug rehab center, you want to have a wide range of relevant keywords on your radar. Use keyword research tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMRush, or Ahrefs Keyword Explorer to find and sift through these keywords. Moreover, creating more content allows you to cover more keywords, increasing your website’s visibility on SERPs.
Backlink building – Search engines are neither intuitive nor intelligent. They use links to establish relationships between articles, websites, and so on. Therefore, building good backlinks is vital if you want to tell search engines that your website/content is relevant.
Note that backlinks exist on other websites, blogs, or web pages. When they cite your content or link back to your web pages, search engines take notice. Think of backlinks as votes of confidence, which boost your drug rehab website’s authority, trust, and credibility.
The more backlinks you get, the more your website is regarded as valuable. Collaborate with other drug rehab organizations, network with brands, and provide genuinely helpful content to earn high-quality backlinks. Don’t forget that not all backlinks are created equal.
How to Take your Drug Rehab SEO to the Next Level
Let’s face it; there’s no magic bullet to nailing SEO for drug recovery centers. You have to provide powerful content, optimize it for relevant keywords, and earn backlinks — repeat. These strategies will take time to yield results, so you may not see immediate ROI.
Even so, here are hacks and tips you can use to supercharge your drug rehab SEO strategy.
– Create E-A-T Content
The best way to take advantage of your content is to include high-quality, relevant keywords. But that isn’t enough. According to Digitalauthority.me, you must also create content with an E-A-T strategy in mind. EAT is an abbreviation for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness, three essential guidelines for drug rehab marketing and search ranking.
Content (or health-related content, to be precise) that speaks to E-A-T will rank favorably on SERPs. Want to create valuable E-A-T-oriented content?
● Partner with drug rehab experts when planning, creating, and/or optimizing your content
● Cite or link to trusted sources, such as recent research and studies
● Ensure your content is up to date by checking stats, eliminating dead links, and reviewing best practices
● Use easy-to-understand headings and titles to provide purpose-driven content
● Include author bios, about us, and other pages to introduce your experts and company. These pages help paint your content as trustworthy, authoritative, and expert.
– Stay on top of on-page SEO for drug rehab facilities
On-page SEO focuses on optimizing elements you can control on your website. These include your website’s internal links, URLs, title tags, and content. Get a handle on your on-page SEO by:
● Conducting a website-wide on-page SEO audit
● Using a blend of imagery, video, and text content
● Updating your content’s keywords, URLs, META titles, and META descriptions
● Spreading keywords evenly across your content
● Optimizing your web pages for mobile
– Take advantage of the Google My Business (GMB) listing
GMB is a little-known secret that most drug recovery centers don’t know. It’s a free profile in Google listings, showcasing your center’s address, name, and phone. GMB is an essential part of local SEO and links to Google Maps, allowing prospects to easily find your drug recovery facility so they can just walk right in.
Beyond SEO, GMB provides more essential details about your drug rehab center, such as client reviews, videos, photos, website links, and operating hours. A brief but sweet description will help prospects and their loved ones understand what treatments you offer.
Ensure that:
● Your GMB profile is complete. 70% of prospects are more likely to visit businesses with complete profiles, according to Google.
● Your GMB profile features photos and videos of your center
● Your rehab center location is verified
● The business description is keyword-optimized
● It has a knowledge panel that encourages Q&A
● Past clients are encouraged to leave reviews
– Don’t ignore technical drug rehab SEO
Don’t forget to optimize the technical end of your site. Improve your website’s crawlability, load speed, and mobile readiness to help it rank high in SERPs. The overarching idea behind technical SEO is to ensure your web visitors get a pleasant browsing experience.
Site security is another crucial technical SEO ranking factor. Use HTTPS, SSL, and other encryption technologies to guarantee data integrity and privacy on your website.
Your visitor’s experience should be impressive and hassle-free from the get-go. Incorporate an XML sitemap to make your website easy to map, navigate, and use.
Wrapping It Up
If done by the book, SEO can work wonders for the visibility of your drug rehab center website in SERPs. It starts with well-planned keyword research, followed by creating relevant and valuable content. Don’t forget to work on your off-page, on-page, and technical SEO, plus optimize your Google My Business profile.
