How to Prioritize Drug Rehab Marketing Needs to Help You Rank Higher
Using the word ‘higher’ in the addiction treatment industry may be taboo, except when you’re talking about search rankings. That’s something addiction treatment facilities, resources, and program owners want to fuel. But how to get there, is really up to you. Is this a commitment you can really sink your teeth into? Or will you look at the New Year as more of a same thing, different day approach to your business? Let’s tackle why stale approaches in drug rehab marketing are prevalent and how to rank higher in rehab searches.
Find Your Focus First
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve met with so-called drug rehab marketing experts and addiction treatment facility owners who think that the wider the net they cast online, the more admit fish they can catch. It doesn’t work that way. That’s old school thinking and it’s passe.
Multiple websites, under different names and parallel strategies to direct traffic to your business don’t help you rank higher, they actually hurt you. It’s as if you’re competing against yourself. You’re much better off heading into the New Year with a refreshed digital marketing strategy that strengthens the power of a single website for your business.
Find Your Niche, Hone Your Brand
By thinking of your business as a singular digital marketing silo, it’s easier to identify who you are, what you’re about and what it would take to get the right people interested. This isn’t just about touching those who are in need of addiction treatment services, but their families, friends and an often neglected audience – health practitioners and employers, a built-in referral network. But I’ll save that for another blog.
Out with The Old, In with The New
Much like running an A/B test to your marketing campaigns, the New Year is a great time to rethink what you’ve been doing online, identify the holes in the process, review last year’s goals, success or failures in execution, the amount of intake conversions and your overall ROI. What you’ve done for the past 12 months is Test A, your next 12 months are Test B.
You don’t have to upset the apple cart and change everything, keep what’s been working for you and replace the rest. Most marketing agencies (even the big ones in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago and Dallas) formulate new creative strategies to their marketing initiatives at least once a year. They do this because it allows them to provide fresh messaging to their existing client base, which helps keep their business and content relevant. Otherwise, the best you’ll get from the people who are already familiar with your brand is a yawn.
Why Time Is on Your Side
Patience doesn’t come easy to anyone who’s good at marketing. But it’s the nature of the beast, especially organic marketing. Someone once told me that when you’re trying to build a solid relationship, those that come in fast leave just as quickly; while the ones that are a slow grow, stay. Because online marketing is all about nurturing relationships, the slow grow is the only way to go.
And research surrounding the merits of organic campaigns bears the proof.
The Best Things in Organic Searches Are Free
There are aspects of digital communication that are readily available for you to enhance your web presence, without breaking the bank. In fact, if you follow these steps you’ll be good to go. The success has a lot to do with taking your rehab business hat off and putting on a consumer hat instead. Think of it this way, if you don’t set up your website in a manner that appeals to the people who are looking for exactly what you have to offer, your page hits may be high, but your bounce rate will be outta this world. And conversions? Forget about it!
Top 10 To-Dos to Rank Higher for Drug Rehab Searches
There’s no reason to dive deep into your pockets to get a better response rate for your digital marketing. Unless you haven’t already established your business with a company website, you probably already have what it takes to rank higher for drug rehab searches. With these recommendations, and not necessarily in the order listed, you can start enhancing your online positioning right now.
Top 10 To-Dos to Boost Search Rankings
- Make sure your website is user-friendly. Is it easy to navigate (both for desktop and mobile viewing)?
- Take the load off. Can a viewer make a fresh cup of coffee in the time it takes to load your webpages? According to Google, 53% of mobile users will leave a webpage if it takes more than 3 seconds to load. Test your load time here.
- Scrub your site for outdated or broken links and irrelevant content (out with the old, remember).
- Stay current with industry news and changes to your products or service offerings, and post the info on your site.
- Don’t be spammy. Google is on the hunt for strong, medic-based, quality content. Fluff is not enough.
- Review page content and revise SEO (meta data) where needed in copy AND imagery.
- Build industry authority. Add more backlinks to your pages.
- Integrate local search features. Because more people find their digital experience through mobile applications, adding local flavor to your Google My Business listing and other content allows the people near you to find you, faster.
- Snippet good. Google will use featured snippet web content on search finding pages. To boost your chances of being featured, add concise content into your site that provides answers to search questions your viewers would likely ask.
- Futurecast. Indicators show that within the next 12 to 18 months, more consumers will use voice search to find you. Use the phrases most likely to be used in a voice search and add them into your website. Google will love that.
Now that you’ve got your drug rehab marketing priorities straight for 2019, you can get a head start on your competitors.
For a more custom review of your addiction treatment business needs, let’s talk.
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