Optimize Your Online Content

SEO Toolkit for Medical Writers and Editors

A Little About Us

Sara WuillerminSenior Editorwww.linkedin.com/in/sarawuillermin

Nicole HessDirector of Strategywww.linkedin.com/in/nicolecheriehess

What We’ll Cover➔ What SEO Is ➔ Why it’s Important➔ Strategy & Execution➔ Measuring Results➔ Q&A➔ Resources

What SEO Is

SEO is getting traffic to your site by being here

Why SEO Is Important

72 % of Americans

search online for health

information

50% schedule an appointment

based on what they find

SEO as Inbound Marketing

“Organic Search Is Actually Responsible for 64% of Your Web Traffic”

We have a responsibility.

And an opportunity.

Basic Terminology

Keywords / Key Phrase

A keyword (also known as key phrase) is what someone types into this search box.

Keyword Tail Length

Short tail Long tail

Tip70% of all searches are for long-tail keywords.However, most CEOs get excited by the high search volume of short-tail keywords.Your challenge awaits!

Keyword Tail Length

Short tail Long tail

@aaronfriedman

Google’s Index

That’s a lot of indexed sites for one keyword!

Keyword “nursing shoes”

ads

SERPs

The list of results that appear when a keyword is searches is called the Search Results Pages (SERPS)

There can be both ads and “organic” results on SERPs. organic

Keyword “nursing shoes”

ads

Ranking position #1

Ranking position #2

Ranking position #3

Organic Rankings

The order in which a site appears in the organic part of a SERP is its organic ranking position.

Google Changes, and Keeps Changing

A note on Google’s algorithms and updates.

4 updates in 4 years:PandaPenguinRankBrain“Possum” (name TBD)

Lesson learned? Good content always, always wins.

Google Scholar

Google wants scholarly articles. Options for individuals, universities and journals to submit to Google Scholar with minimal effort.

Google NewsWrite medical content for a non-medical site?If it’s newsworthy, Google News wants your content.

AMPGoogle wants to deliver a faster mobile experience, so it created AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages).

53% of mobile site visits are abandoned if pages take longer than 3 seconds to load

The average load time for mobile sites is 19 seconds over 3G connections

SEO in Action

Hospital Network of

40+ Locations

Situation:

40 hospitals in 6 states

Many offered the same services and treatments

Goal:

Increase organic SEO traffic to each hospital

Hospital Network of 40+ Locations

Steps:

1. Define specialties for each hospital.

2. Identify words that patients would search.

3. Map out geographic overlaps of hospitals.

4. Develop content strategy.

5. Implement new copy.

6. Track and measure results.

Results

Developed 50 unique content pieces

• One-fourth of original number of pages, pre-SEO estimate

Increased rankings and traffic for targeted hospital services

Content first redesign for all hospitals

• SEO + Content even led the redesign kickoff call

Why is SEO important for you?Connect your content

with the right audience

Use data to help people find the content that best suites their needs

It’s up to you to guide how users find your content

Developing SEO Content Strategy

Full SEO PlanStrategy Copy

Optimization

Technical SEO

Link Building

Keyword Selection

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Review Results

SEO Content Strategy In 4 Steps

The Assignment.

What is the assignment?

- Draft a new page for “Echocardiography”

Why is copy being assigned?

- To get more echocardiograms scheduled every week

TipFind out the main goal for the assignment before creating the copy→

Sometimes the “ask” and the actual “want” might require a different approach for content and SEO.

1. Define Goals“SMART” Goals:SpecificMeasurableActionableRelatable, and to occur within a specificTime

By writing a new page for the echocardiogram test we will increase traffic by 25% over 3 months and gain 2 new Web inquiries per month starting in 90 days.

2. Identify Target AudienceWho is your Audience?

3. Determine Desired Interaction

How should the audience feel after reading the content?Informed, reassured, ready to get the test done

Where should the audience go after consuming this content?To the Schedule an Appointment page

How will they get there?Custom image with link “Click here to schedule your

appointment”

4. Competition

Check out competitor pages for:

●Inspiration ● Things to avoid● What their SEO targets

are

Doing SEO

SEO Content PlanStrategy

Identify audience, needs, goals, and UX constraints

Keyword SelectionDetermine the words they are using to find your new cardiology content

1. 2.

You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.

- Dale Carnegie

Keyword Research:

Get interested in what people are searching for.

BrainstormThink of all the words someone may use to search for the particular page.

Write them down.

- Echocardiogram

- What is an echocardiogram?

- Stress echocardiogram

- Echocardiogram vs. ekg

- Echocardiogram near me

Go to the ToolsAnswer the Public.Mission: Get more ideas

Answer the Public

Go to the ToolsSEMrushMission: Get search volume dataMission: Research the competition

SEMrush Dashboard - Keyword Search Volume

SEMrush Dashboard

Go to the Results

Google.Mission: Not only to make good content, but make it better than everything else that’s out there.

echocardiogram

Review the search results for the keyword.- Can our content outrank what’s already there?

Review Content OutlineDetermine which keywords make the most sense to add for your page.

Use keyword Echocardiogram?- Yes.

What sites rank now?- General ones

Will we have a chance to rank for it?- Not likely

Transesophageal

echocardiogram

Review the search results for the keyword.- Can our content outrank what’s already there?

TipUse the results to get more ideas.

Review Content OutlineDetermine which keywords make the most sense to add for your page.

Use keyword Transesophageal echocardiogram?- Yes

What sites rank now?- Hospital, some general ones

Will we have a chance to rank for it?- Yes

List of Keywords to TargetKeyword Tail

LengthSearch Volume

Competition

To rank for?

echocardiogram short 74,000 General sites Not likely

Transesophageal echocardiogram

mid 5,400 Hospital sites, some general

Yes

Stress echocardiogram mid 2,400 Hospital sites Yes

How much does an echocardiogram cost

long 260 General sites Possible

How is an echocardiogram done

long 170 General sites Not likely

Content Optimization

Using target keyword strategically in copy.

SEO Content PlanStrategy

Identify audience, needs, goals and UX constraints

Copy OptimizationDevelop the copy with SEO best practices

Keyword SelectionDetermine the words they are using to find your new cardiology content

1. 2. 3.

Now where to put the keywords

MetadataMeta TitleMeta Description

Body CopyURL StructureHeadings (H1, H2s)Images

Alt Tag

The H1 title has no length requirements.

Include target keyword.

Ensure the H1 Tag is different from the meta title and meta description AND ensure there’s only one per page.

SEO for Titles (H1)

SEO for Body CopyGeneral rule of thumb is 500 words is the minimum.

Include 1 target keyword in the first paragraph.

There’s no ideal # of keyword variations to use.

Google punishes keyword-heavy content with no real substance, called “thin content”.

Make sure there’s a call-to-action (CTA) in the page

InterlinkingMakes it easier for search engines to find and crawl

more pages

Builds a better semantic understanding of an entire site

Passes page value from the main piece of content or web page to the pages it links to

Think before you interlink:- DO link to other internal pages that are relevant to the topic of the page and/or helpful for the visitor to the page.

- DON’T link to other pages immediately. Wait until the second or third paragraph.

- DON’T link to external sites you don’t trust. This could tell search engines that you aren’t providing real value to searchers.

SEO for Meta TitleLimit title tag to 55 characters. (

Moz’s Preview Tool)

Include target keyword 1-2 times.

Write keywords into title tags using natural language.

Title Tag Writing Best PracticesCapitalize Each Word, It’s okay to use “&” instead of “and”,

Punctuation rules need not apply. Grammar should be like that of a book title. Make it unique. It should be different from your other pages’ meta titles, as well as different from competitors’ meta titles.

SEO for Meta DescriptionLimit meta descriptions to 155 characters.

Include target keyword 1-2 times without being repetitive and without keyword stuffing.

Meta Title Writing Best PracticesMake it unique. It should be different from your other pages’

meta descriptions, as well as different from competitors’ meta descriptions.

Deliverable Cheat Sheet

Measuring Performance

SEO Content PlanStrategy

Identify audience, needs, goals and UX constraints

Copy OptimizationDevelop the copy with SEO best practices

Technical SEOEnsure page code optimized

Link BuildingPromote content worthy of being shared (linked to)

Keyword SelectionDetermine the words they are using to find your new cardiology content

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Review ResultsMeasure performance

Remember “SMART” Goals:SpecificMeasurableActionableRelatable, and to occur within a specificTime

By rewriting the copy of this page and supporting “cardiology pages” we will increase traffic to this page by 25% over 3 months and gain 2 new Web inquiries per month starting in 90 days.

Goal Tracking

Google Analytics (GA)

Tracking organic performance of a post before and after SEO

Link: http://www.greenlaneseo.com/blog/2016/07/introducing-url-performance-tool/

Recap

Why is SEO important for you?Connect your content

with the right audience

Use data to help people find the content that best suites their needs

It’s up to you to guide how users find your content

SEO as Inbound Marketing

“Organic Search Is Actually Responsible for 64% of Your Web Traffic”

We have a responsibility.

And an opportunity.

Thank you.

bit.ly/amwa-seo

Resources➔ Template: Content Request Form➔ Template: Content + SEO

➔ SEMrush

➔ Answer the Public➔ Google Scholar

➔ Google News➔ AMP Setup in 15 Minutes

➔ Keywords and Topics Webinar

➔ Technical SEO