Content Management for Your Dental Website

In the past, search engine optimization (known as SEO) and content creation have been seen as separate disciplines. One person would create the content for your website and another would optimize your website for search engines, usually an SEO provider.

The process would consist of one person writing original content for your dental website. Once a website was complete another person would modify the website to add titles and metadata to each page and optimize a few other external sources for SEO. Then magically your website would begin to rank higher on search engines!

In reality, content and SEO fit hand-in-hand and always have. In recent years SEO providers and content creators have concluded that an SEO campaign cannot be done without proper content creation. Combining these two mediums has resulted in a marketing tactic known as Content Management. Content Management is the process by which quality content is written incorporating SEO keywords, links, titles, etc.

Without Quality Content, SEO is Near Useless

While metadata, proper website code, backlinks, etc. are still important parts of Google’s SEO algorithm, the major player for SEO has always been and most likely always will be the content seen by viewers within your website. At the end of the day, quality content is the most important part of your dental practice’s successful SEO campaign.

There are many ways to make sure the content you’re providing is valuable. You need to make sure your content is relevant, interesting, and includes a natural selection of targeted keywords. It’s important that clients feel engaged with your website, meaning how your patients interact with your dental pages after visiting them.

Signs of Poor Engagement

• Content is not user-friendly – Keep paragraphs short and simple, and make sure to include headings and bullet points. This is much more engaging than a wall of text.
• Content is confusing – If your sentence structure or grammar is poorly written or if the content contains too many keywords that make little sense, then you'll lose interest in potential patients. Moreover, Google and other search engines (SE's) will dock you for "Keyword Stuffing".
• Content is not inspiring – If your content is predictable, cookie-cutter, or filled with complicated dental jargon, you’ll have a difficult time keeping your patients or potential patients engaged. Also, any plagiarized content will be detected by SE's resulting in SEO ranking loss.
• Your webpage design isn’t visually appealing – Make sure your website is easy to read, simple in design and try to have custom photography. Stock photos can be useful, but custom photos make your patients feel more bonded to you.
• Mobile and desktop optimized – It’s important that your website is able to be seen and properly displayed over an array of devices including desktop computers, tablets, and cell phones.

The goal of quality content is not only to provide successful SEO but also to convert digital visitors to your website into real patients at your dental practice. This means wowing them the second they visit your site!

Here at CTC Associates, we know a thing or two about dental practices and dental practice management. Although our primary specialty is in dental transitions (buying and selling dental practices), we know the ins-and-outs of the dental profession. If you're interested in learning more about how to bring in more dental patients into your office, retain current patients, and remain profitable, we'd be happy to point you in the right direction. For more information with dental transitions we are the experts - please contact our office today.