Online listings or citations are crucial to a clinic's online presence. But how many listings does your clinic truly need for effective SEO? Let's dive into the world of citations, uncover the facts, and review a case study. We’ll look at how online listings affect your website ranking on Google and how they affect your Google Maps (Google Business Profile) listing. 

Here you’ll learn:

• What citations are

• Key elements of online listings

• Whether you should pay for citation listing services 

• How and when you should conduct a citation audit 

• How many citations you really need

• And more 

Whether you're focused on optimizing your visibility or just keeping your business information accurate, this episode offers practical advice to help you navigate the complex landscape of local SEO. Tune in for all the details!

Listen to the podcast episode: Local SEO for Clinics: How Many Online Listings Does Your Clinic Need for SEO? [Case Study Included]

Related Resources:

• Citation study mentioned in the episode

• Brightlocal  

• Whitespark

• 4 Online Listings that Will Help Your Clinic Get More Patients

• Ready. Set. Rank! 

How Many Local Listings Does Your Clinic Really Need for SEO?

Local citations are crucial in a clinic's online presence in today's digital age. But how many local listings does your clinic truly need for effective SEO? Let's dive into the world of citations and uncover the facts.

Understanding Citations and NAP

Citations are online listings of your business information on various websites and directories. Your NAP (Name, Address, and Phone Number) forms the core of these citations. Maintaining consistent NAP information across all online platforms is crucial for establishing trust with search engines and potential patients.

The Changing Landscape of Citations

Historically, search engines like Google heavily relied on citations as trust signals. However, the importance of having numerous citations has diminished over time. Today, quality and accuracy trump quantity when it comes to local listings.

When to Focus on Citations

There are specific scenarios when you should invest time and resources into managing your citations:

1. New Businesses: When just starting, creating online listings helps search engines and potential patients find you easily.

2. Information Changes: If your clinic's name, address, phone number, or website has changed, it's imperative to update your existing citations.

3. Personnel Changes: When key staff members (like doctors) join or leave your practice, consider updating relevant listings.

Citation Cleanup Methods

You can approach citation management in two ways:

1. Manual Cleanup: This involves personally updating each listing, which can be time-consuming but gives you complete control.

2. Service Providers: Tools like Bright Local or Whitespark can help streamline the process, especially for large-scale cleanups.

The Real Impact of Citations: A Case Study

A recent study examined the effect of building 50 citations each for a handyman and a dentist. The results were enlightening:

• Minimal impact on local pack (Google Maps) rankings

• Some improvement in organic search results

• After six months, only 2 out of 50 citations remained indexed for both businesses

This study suggests that while citations can boost organic rankings slightly, their impact on local pack rankings is negligible, and their longevity is limited.

How Many Citations Do You Really Need?

The magic number isn't as high as you might think. Aim for 10-20 high-quality citations rather than hundreds of low-value ones. Focus on:

1. Identifying where your target audience searches for information

2. Prioritizing key platforms: Google Business Profile, Yelp, Apple Maps, Bing Business, health-specific sites (e.g., Healthgrades), social media, Better Business Bureau, Yellow Pages, etc.

3. Ensuring accuracy in map listings for easy patient navigation

Key Takeaways

1. Citations can boost organic rankings but have minimal impact on local pack rankings.

2. Many citations don't remain indexed long-term, diminishing their value over time.

3. Focus on accuracy and consistency across 10-20 high-quality citations.

4. Prioritize citations based on your audience's search habits.

5. Regularly audit and update your citations, especially after business changes.

By understanding the true value of citations and focusing on quality over quantity, you can effectively manage your clinic's online presence without wasting resources on unnecessary listings.

Local SEO for Clinics: How Many Online Listings Does Your Clinic Need for SEO? [Case Study Included] - Podcast Transcript

Hello and welcome to this episode of the Clinic Marketing Podcast. I'm your host, Darcy Sullivan, from Propel Marketing & Design. Today, we're talking about citations and we're asking the question: how many local listings does your clinic really need for SEO?

Citation are online listings, ranging from ones that you might be familiar with, like Google Business Profile or Yellow Pages, to ones you've never even heard of. 

Local citations are multiple, consistent mentions of your company's information on website directories and other properties found online on the internet. 

Years ago, search engines like Google used these mentioned factors as trust signals, but is that still true? Well, that's what we're talking about today.

First, let's talk about your NAP. 

Your NAP is your name, address, and phone number. We want to make sure that your company name, address and phone number, along with your website and other prevalent information, is consistent throughout all of your online listings. 

Now, before Google became the powerhouse that we know it as today, it used to rely heavily on gathering data points by looking at other listings to see accuracy. 

Well, that's really not the case as much anymore as it used to be, but there are key times when you need to make sure that your information is correct online and sometimes invest in either a citation cleanup or invest in your citations–your local online listings. 

First up is when you're a new business. Obviously, when you're a new business and you're just getting started, you're going to have zero listings, right? Because you're a new business. 

So you want to make sure that you go through the actions of gaining online listings to help Google and your potential patients or customers find you with ease. 

Again, we want to focus on those critical elements: your name, your address, your phone number, and your website. There can also be times when you should do citation cleanups. 

This includes if your name, your address, your phone number has changed or if any of your personnel the doctors working for you have changed, when key entities associated with your business perhaps the company name, address, phone number and website have changed. 

You want to make sure that you go through and conduct what we call a citation audit and a citation cleanup. Now, if you're a member of our DIY SEO program, Ready. Set. Rank!, we do a deep dive into this process in the Ready. Set. Local! section. If you're interested in learning more about that DIY SEO program, you can do so by visiting propelyourcompany.com.

There are two ways to do a citation cleanup. You can either do it manually or you can go through a service. 

Now, there are tons of services out there. These include Bright Local, Whitespark, Yext, Moz Local, and more. 

If you are in the category of needing to clean up your citations and you don't want to do a manual audit and do the manual process of cleaning them up, meaning you go to each and every listing, make sure you have a login and manually change your information, then it might be worth going to one of the providers to help you clean up the citation. 

If that is the category that you fall in, I suggest that you check out Bright Local or Whitespark. Those would really be the only two that I would recommend for a citation cleanup. Yes, I know there's tons of them out there, and yes, I know there are tons of companies out there that promise that they will get you all of these local listings.

Sterling Sky recently did a really interesting case study that I want to mention, and will include the link in the Notes associated with this episode. 

What they did is they took two companies. They took a company that was a handyman and they took a dentist and they added 50 citations were built for both the dentist and the handyman, and what they wanted to do is look at see how this actually impacted rankings, and I think it's very important to note that there are two types of rankings. 

Right, you have your local pack ranking, that's your Google Maps section ranking, and then you have your general listings on Google. 

Well, when it came to the map pack, it had barely any improvements at all. It did have impacts on organic results. Those would be the organic results in Google below the Google map pack. 

But I think this is what's really interesting is that it was apparent that over time, it really wasn't worth it. 

A month after the citations were submitted, only about 26 out of the 50 remained for the dentist, and after six months, this dwindled down to just two. 

And for the handyman they experienced a similar drop, with only two out of the 50 again remaining after the six months of being indexed.

So, do I think that you should pay one of these services that claim that they will get you all of these amazing citations? Is it really worth it?

Not necessarily, as we can tell from the case study that we just went through, but if you are just starting out, or even if you are an established company, you do want to make sure that you do have local citations online. 

So this leads us to the question how many citations do you really need for SEO? And I'm going to tell you as long as you have between 10 to 20, you're doing all right. You don't need to go out there and try to build 200 listings.

But I think what's really important is to start by identifying your audience and where they search online for their information. And if you had to prioritize which citations you should focus on, that would be your Google Business Profile listing your Yelp, apple Maps, bing, business. 

If you are in the health business, it should probably be health grade. Facebook, instagram, Better Business Bureau, Yellow Pages, Yahoo, Waze. 

Focus on the way your ideal audience searches for information. You want to make sure that every map listing for your business is correct–very important. We want to make sure, if somebody's searching directions to come find you, that they can find you. 

We also want to make sure that your listings, again, have the name, the address, and phone number that match your website.

All right, let's start to wrap this up. While citations can sometimes boost organic rankings, they have little to no impact on your Google Maps, Google Business Profile listing in the local pack ranking. 

Additionally, many of these citations fail to stay indexed by Google, which means they have diminishing returns, so the life and the value of them are minimal. 

However, there are times when you do need to invest in your local listings, like we mentioned before. 

That would be if you currently have inaccurate information about your business, if your company has changed or updated any entity related to the business, like the phone number, the name or the address, or if you are a new business.

Sponsors

This episode of the Propel Your Practice Podcast is brought to you by Propel Marketing & Design. Propel Marketing & Design helps Chiropractors, Acupuncturists, Physical Therapists, Wellness Practitioners, and other clinic owners improve their website rankings.

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