Behavioral health services are always in great demand. That means your behavioral healthcare marketing strategy must be optimized so you can better reach people who need help.
Unfortunately, many in the behavioral health field rely far too much on referrals and informal word of mouth. That’s not an organized digital marketing strategy.
You need something better. One thing is certain: if you don’t adopt a smart behavioral health marketing strategy, prospective patients won’t be able to find you.
Elements of a Smart Behavioral Health Marketing Strategy
Digital marketing isn’t just one thing. It consists of many things working well together. That includes website design, pay-per-click (PPC), and search engine optimization (SEO).
Each component is important. However, none are a stand-alone guarantee of success. Let’s take a closer look at each of these digital marketing components.
1. Website Design For Behavioral Health Practice Marketing
In today’s world, having a fast-loading, mobile-friendly behavioral health treatment center website is essential. A reputable digital marketing agency for behavioral health is essential for creating a user-friendly, leading-edge website that people will want to visit.
Web design and development isn’t a static, one-time process. Changing tastes and technological innovations mean your website’s design should be constantly evolving. While your website may have looked great a few years ago, it’s likely out of date now if you haven’t made any changes. You’ll never outrank competitors with a website that’s behind the times.
2. Content Marketing
Patients typically find your behavioral health website because they’re in the education phase. They search for certain terms on Google and then follow links that discuss their areas of concern, which hopefully lands them on your website. This only happens if you have optimized, compelling content on your website.
As part of a behavioral health marketing strategy, content marketing doesn’t consist of the occasional blog. You need a thoughtful strategy where fresh content is consistently uploaded to your website.
Based on diligent keyword research, you’ll upload the kind of content prospective patients are looking for. You’ll never need to guess what your behavioral health website content should be. Instead, research will dictate the topics on your editorial calendar.
Your content marketing needs will naturally vary. Perhaps your behavioral health treatment center is woefully short of landing pages. Maybe you only manage to upload a few blogs each year. Neither situation is optimal.
You want prospective patients and their families to see you and your website as an educational resource. Frequently uploaded content as part of a behavioral health digital marketing strategy helps make this possible.
3. PPC
Pay-per-click is a valuable first step toward getting prospective patients’ attention—especially if your organic traffic is still developing.
While Google isn’t very transparent with details regarding the relationship between paid and organic rankings, Dreamscape Marketing knows from years of aggregate data that PPC can be a catalyst for strong digital growth across all traffic channels.
Running a PPC Campaign as part of a behavioral healthcare marketing strategy benefits you in the following ways:
- More traffic on your website and Google Business Profile
- Optimize overall online visibility
- Rank higher on search engine results pages (SERPs)
- Appear in sponsored ads
- Generate immediate leads for your behavioral health treatment center
- Promote a new brand or facility aggressively
4. SEO
Your website depends on search engines pointing to it. If your website is invisible to search engines, it’s invisible to the world.
Therefore, it’s important to prioritize SEO in order to rank highly. While PPC is a viable strategy, success in organic search should always be your ultimate goal. Your behavioral health marketing strategy depends on it.
Optimized content is a big part of the SEO process. Great content alone isn’t enough for landing pages or blogs to be ranked highly by Google and other search engines. That’s where search engine optimization comes in. Careful optimization and tagging will help Google’s algorithm find your content and then determine what it’s all about.
Today, local SEO has become more important than ever. “Near me” searches are extremely prevalent. That means your Google Business Profile listing must be accurate and complete. Despite this fact, many behavioral health centers have either an incomplete listing or one with errors (old physical location, outdated phone numbers, etc.).
Who Can Best Deliver Your Behavioral Health Marketing Strategy?
The process of getting prospective patients to find you never ends. Dreamscape Marketing, a nationally recognized behavioral healthcare marketing agency, has the deep knowledge and experience needed to bring people to your behavioral health center.
As a digital marketing agency for behavioral health centers, we understand your unique needs. We also understand what it takes to deliver the results you need from your website.
PPC and SEO strategies are the backbone of a strong digital marketing plan. To be effective, your behavioral health marketing agency must have what it takes to get the job done. When you choose a digital marketer to execute a behavioral health marketing strategy, choose carefully.
Remember that your marketing budget isn’t unlimited. Therefore, you need to get the most “bang” for your marketing buck. Dreamscape Marketing will partner with you to create a customized behavioral healthcare marketing plan that genuinely works for you.
Want to learn more about how you can bring new patients to your door with effective digital marketing? Dreamscape Marketing can help. Schedule a strategy session with us by calling 888.307.7304.
Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in September 2021 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.
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