When you consider search engine optimization (SEO) and improving your dental practice’s ranking on the search engine results page (SERP), what do you think about? Many marketers focus solely on their homepage, and never ask why their dental service pages aren’t ranking.
Overlooking your services pages and focusing solely on your website’s homepage is a mistake that too many dental marketers make. Every page on your website is an opportunity to rank higher, attract site visitors, and convert new patients.
Top-rated dental websites have anywhere from 30 to 400 pages1—although the best performing sites usually have between 70 and 90 pages. These websites rank well not only because of their fantastic homepage with top-notch copy and great user experience, but also because they maximize the SEO value of every page.
You may find yourself in a position where your homepage ranks in the top three on the SERP, but your service pages are nowhere to be found. You know you’re missing meaningful opportunities to attract your ideal patients to your website with the value of your services, but how do you improve those individual pages to get them ranking and driving traffic to your site?
My Dental Service Pages Aren’t Ranking
Sometimes there are factors beyond your control. For example, domain age and backlink profiles both affect page rank, so if you have a newer website with fewer backlinks competing against older, more established sites you’ll likely need a serious investment in time and strategy to start outranking those.
But often there’s other reasons why your pages aren’t delivering the SEO returns they could be. Here’s a few other issues that could be negatively impacting your rankings and hurting your website’s overall performance and ROI.
1. Poor Content
As Google’s intelligence has increased, so has the value of quality content. As a result, well-written content has emerged as a top ranking factor, while sites that keyword stuff their sub-par copy have been bumped to the end of the SERP.
But what is “quality content?” There are several ingredients to quality content, but Google describes what they’re looking for as “compelling and useful.”2 Your goal has to be relevant and credible content that provides value to the user.
When organizing your website, you should include a separate page for every topic, service, or product. While it may feel more efficient to “streamline” your page and combine all of these into one long overview, you’re actually working against your own SEO opportunities. As long as the content is high-quality, you can’t have too many pages on your website. Keep your content sharp and to the point, weaving in SEO—specifically local SEO—throughout.
2. Not Enough Photos and Videos
Adding images to your pages will help you rank, but only if having them on your site doesn’t detract from the user experience and your site’s functionality. For example, make sure your photos are in either JPEG or PNG format and compressed so they don’t take too long to load. Your website needs to be mobile-friendly, so it’s important to make sure all media on your website is mobile-responsive and looks as good on a smartphone or tablet as it does on a desktop computer.
And avoid using stock photos! Instead, Use original, interesting images that accurately reflect your practice wherever possible. Potential patients want authenticity. That’s why your own photos convert up to 35% better than stock images.3
Adding videos boosts your page’s SEO potential and increases the likelihood of a first-page rank by 53 times.4 That’s a considerable uplift.
3. Too Slow
Users expect speed. If your website takes more than two seconds to load, your bounce rate can increase up to 103%.5 As bounce rates go up, conversions go down by 7% for every added second your website takes to load.
4. Outperformed by the Competition
To stake your claim at the top of the SERP, you need data. You need to know how your SEO compares to your competitors’. Remember, you don’t need to be the best—you just need to be better than the other guy.
Research the competition using a Google search. Play around with your keywords to see whose pages rank for terms like, “dental cleanings in [your area]” or “teeth whitening.”
Once you know who your digital competition is, determine what they’re doing better than you. Is their content more relevant or better written? Do they have more photos and videos? Whatever the difference is, take note, and take action.
Any or all of these issues could be the answer to your question “why aren’t my service pages ranking?” You won’t know until you investigate and solve the mystery.
A Good Website Makes a Great First Impression
Interested in learning more about how you can improve your dental website’s performance? Our dental industry strategists can help. Call Dreamscape Marketing at 888.307.7304 to schedule your strategy session today.
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