Social network ’share’ buttons have increased the number of ways that individuals can share information online. Now, Google has decided to implement a feature that offers the same convenience. In late March, Google unveiled their plans for the +1 button. This would allow individuals to share organic search engine results as well as web pages with friends.

Details and Features of Google’s +1 Button

• The +1 button will appear next to each website in Google’s search results
• Later, webmasters will also have the option to add the +1 button to their websites along with their other social media buttons
• The goal of this button is not to broadcast information for all the world to see, instead, friends that login to their Google accounts will be able to see which search results or websites you have marked as worth reading
• +1 buttons will also be added to Google ads
• Google will likely use these +1 votes as a factor in search engine rankings

This change will provide a new way for you to share information with your patients using the +1 button to mark search results. It will also provide greater convenience to patients that would like to share your services with others (when the button is on your site).

Take Advantage of Google’s & Other SEO Strategies

MedNet pays close attention to the frequent changes at Google and we adjust our SEO strategies accordingly. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help your practice become more visible in search results.

With the rise of social media for brand awareness, online marketing now requires a carefully balanced strategy. High page rankings, quantity of quality backlinks and more used to be a few of the major players in making a website successful from an online marketing standpoint. They still do have a major impact, but now, to have your website rise up those ranks, a greater level of interaction with the general public is required.

Your involvement with social media can actually impact just how much visibility your medical website receives. Using Facebook or Twitter alone can improve your online presence and help you reach your target audience, but more than that, it can also help improve your website ranking. In the past, it’s been debated whether or not social media plays a role with the strength and authority of a website, but recently it’s been confirmed that in fact, search engines like Google and Bing do rely somewhat upon social media reputation as well.

How Social Media Effects Search Engine Rankings

Your social media activities have an influence upon more than just the social media search tools that the major search engines offer. The more active you are online and the better associated you are with other reputable social media accounts, the more authority you will gain. This means that when you mention another website on social media, you’ll play a greater role in setting their website rankings because of your own reputation.

Essentially, when a site is mentioned on social media, the same ranking consideration takes place when a ‘person’ does it as when another website does (with backlinks, for example), just to a lesser degree. The more frequently a website is mentioned by reputable, highly-ranked social media accounts or websites, the higher its own rankings will become. Social media accounts just happen to have less influence because of some specific limitations that have been placed upon them, but their role is still important, especially when your activities on Twitter or Facebook can do even more for your practice that have benefits beyond your website rankings.

How Your Social Media Activities Can Help Your Site’s Rankings

With an understanding that social media activities do play a role in your website rankings, there are a number of things that you can do to ensure that your practice’s website is benefiting from this knowledge:

1. Get active on social media - start interacting with the people that follow you on a regular basis to increase the reputation of your social media account in the eyes of the search engine.
2. Promote your website content - posting your own website content, especially as your social media account is in good standing, can have benefits to your website rankings. But it also encourages other people to share the content that you’ve posted, and each and every time they do, that moves your website up the ranks.
3. Engage with people of influence - if you start engaging with people influential on social media with plenty of followers who share great-quality links and content, you’ll have some strong accounts pulling for the success of your website in time as this may compel them to retweet something you’ve posted on Twitter, for example.
4. Post information that’s newsworthy - Google has mentioned that the more an article is shared on Facebook or Twitter, the better an opportunity it has to appear on their News page and rank high. Adding new, exciting content to your practice’s blog or website that you know is current and relevant to what’s happening in the world will catch the attention of social media users.

MedNet Can Help Your Practice Get Social!

For more information on how social media influences search engine rankings, watch this video and be sure to contact us so we can help you with your online marketing strategy.

Social networks have begun to play a much more important role in the world of online marketing and SEO, and they’re finding their way into the mainstream components of social network features. Since the Bing and Yahoo! merger, Bing has become a trendsetter in establishing a variety of cutting-edge features. The additions it has made related to Facebook as outlined below are just a few of the things that they’ve rolled out to continue their growth in the new year.

Facebook Like Annotations on Bing

Over the past year, Facebook has really pushed its ‘Like’ feature to new levels, allowing it to be integrated directly onto a business’ website. Following its increased use, Bing decided to include social annotations which means liked pages can have an impact upon the Bing rankings of an individual. Social media does influence search engine rankings minimally, but with this addition, Facebook activity can have a great effect, especially since ‘liked’ pages are public in most circumstances while a lot of other Facebook features that they could use for ranking reputation are kept private (like a user’s Wall, for example).

The incorporation of ‘Like’ data by Bing will also serve another purpose beyond rankings. It creates greater networking opportunities by showing the websites that friends have liked each time an individual logs into Bing and a query is made. The idea of customized search results using friend Facebook data is an interesting one and it can definitely allow medical practices to get greater exposure amongst their target audiences. As friends start liking the websites, their friends will have greater exposure to them in their search results and that can encourage them to like the page. In a way, it’s a modern referral process that the medical community already relies upon greatly!

We can help you work with Bing’s new functions and develop a social media strategy that will allow you to benefit from these recent changes and evolve your strategy with others in the future.

In the past, if Google determined a search had local intent, they displayed a breakout of listings from their local business database on Google Maps. These local business listings followed a separate algorithm than the main, or organic, search results. This past month, Google unveiled some major changes that alter the way these local search results are displayed, as well as how their order is calculated.

What are these changes?

• Local search results are now blended into the organic search results. These new results include information from both the organic listing and the local listing (Google Maps). In addition to displaying an image from the local listing, patient reviews are now displayed more prominently.
• The map is displayed above the PPC listings in the right column. As you scroll up or down, the map now moves with you. This may or may not have an effect on the performance of pay-per-click listings.
• The rankings are ordered using a combination of local listing factors as well as typical organic factors. This may cause changes in your website’s rankings. A practice that had a very strong local listing with many patient reviews may see an increase in visibility, while a practice with strong organic placement but a weak local listing may see a decrease in visibility.

What does this mean?

• Harder to rank for a location-based search in which you don’t have a physical office. Previously, location-based searches would display results for services located within that area itself as well as within neighboring towns. Now, those same location-based searches may only display results for services physically located within a given area.
• Make sure that the addresses of your office locations are listed consistently across the web. This is necessary to prevent any incorrect local listings from appearing and potentially impacting your website’s search rankings.
• More important than ever to have a fully-developed local listing complete with images and patient reviews. In addition to maintaining your reputation, local listings now serve as a major ranking factor. It is especially important at this point to encourage patients to post positive reviews on your listing.

Uncertain Landscape

At this time, Google is still testing different layouts, so we do not know exactly what the final results will look like. Regardless, it is clear that a major change has taken place. As always, we will continue to follow Google’s actions closely and adjust our SEO techniques where necessary.

The Internet is Now Used as the Primary Means of Finding Local Businesses, Including Healthcare Practices.

Not too long ago, most people tended to think of the Internet as the global marketplace —  the source where people would look up information and purchase goods and services from companies that were far away from their homes. But not anymore. According to a recent study by Comscore, 40% of all searches on the Internet are local in nature.  The general public are now using their computers as the primary means of finding or researching a local business rather than the local Yellow Pages.

Think about it. Computers with Internet access are now a common appliance in people’s kitchens, not to mention wireless home networks that allow for use of your laptop throughout the house. Now instead of the local Yellow Pages, today consumers use their computers as the primary means of finding or researching a local business.

What does this mean for you? Clients are researching your practice and other doctors too. If you aren’t taking steps to be found for local searches related to the services your practice provides, then you are missing out on potential new patients. You’re also potentially losing patients who may have tried to find you, but couldn’t because they looked for you by specialty within your local area, instead of your name.

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The Current State of Video on the Web

Video optimization is becoming more important as a mainstream aspect of search engine optimization. It can be a great way for you to expose your brand to users who may have otherwise not been familiar with your practice. With the launch of Universal Search from Google, which was explained in a previous issue of MedNews, you can expect to see more and more video results occupying the search engine results that are presented to potential patients.  Getting on board with this early can help you stand out amongst the competition and open up new avenues of exposure on the Internet.

Here are some common questions about MedNet’s Video SEO service and ways it can help you improve your website:

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"How do I improve my search engine optimization (SEO)?"

This is without a doubt the most common question doctors present to me. Since it is so common, I thought it would be ideal to share the question and answer with everyone. The answer is quite complicated; however, I have been blessed with a reading pool of probably the smartest people on the planet. Therefore, I have no reservations about sharing the answer with everyone.

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The Importance of SEO!

Imagine buying a beautiful sign for your practice that nobody could see or read because it had a cover on it. Potential patients, existing patients, and anyone else wouldn’t be able to find the office. It’s safe to assume that you would ask the sign manufacturer to remove the cover so people could locate the practice. Leaving a cover on the sign seems crazy, right?

An unsearchable website is like a sign with a cover on it. Websites are the electronic equivalent to a medical practice’s sign, but better — they provide information to potential patients, existing patients and everyone else that a sign could not possibly fit. An unsearchable website is not effective; it will not be found during a search engine query.

Installing Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tactics removes the cover from the website. Search engine optimization must become a long-term and permanent answer to your website’s traffic. A website without SEO seems crazy, right?

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Establish a Search Engine Marketing (SEM) Campaign to Augment Your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Efforts

Even the most aggressive Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Plan can benefit from a SEM Campaign.  Why?  Because Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Ads can be used to maintain your website’s visibility regardless of the constant ups and downs of your organic rankings.  Because the position of PPC Ads can be controlled, they guarantee that your website will appear among the results of the search terms that you want to be found under.

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