Healthcare as an industry has a very strong online presence as it is a very private matter for many people, so many feel more comfortable researching or discussing it online, where assumed anonymity helps them feel more secure. Today, we discuss what strategies healthcare websites and businesses online can use for SEO promotion and building a, pun intended, healthy backlink profile. Which is, of course, vital since it plays an important role in how these websites perform online, how they are perceived by potential patients, and how they can compete in a highly regulated and competitive market.
Key Factors that influence Link Building Strategies for Healthcare Businesses
To make your link building campaign tailored for your particular goals and business needs, you need to consider numerous external factors that influence your domain, your position within it and actions you can take to promote your standing within your domain. Here are some key factors SEO marketers need to take into account when promoting healthcare websites:
- Reputation and Trust
In healthcare, trust is paramount, as people trust healthcare institutions with the most precious thing, their life. When reputable sites link to a healthcare website, we can say it’s like a vote of confidence, suggesting that the site is a reliable source of information or services. In a field where misinformation can have serious consequences, this trust is especially important. That is why you need to pay special attention to the authority and trust flow metrics of your link sources.
- Regulatory Compliance and Ethical Considerations
When people search for healthcare services, they want to be sure that information they use is accurate, up-to-date, and compliant with regulations. That is why you need to take extra care about content and link relevance. A strong link-building strategy that you want to see should focus not just on the quantity of backlinks but on securing links from authoritative sources that adhere to high ethical and professional standards.
- Patient Privacy and Security
Healthcare websites usually deal with very sensitive information, so a lot of content you would want to market might be exactly this. It could refer to successful cases, various statistics and studies. When using such materials for link building, make sure you anonymize them.
Developing a Tactics for Link Building for Healthcare
Now, as for particular actionable tactics that you can use when developing a link building strategy for a healthcare site, here are a few that will help you keep your backlink profile clean and robust.
1. Quality and Relevance of Content
Your healthcare website must provide content that is accurate, evidence-based, and up-to-date. Especially content you are creating for marketing purposes. Clickbait titles, empty texts for the sake of SEO will do you more harm than good when it comes to the healthcare domain. However, specialized content addressing specific conditions, treatments, or healthcare services can attract links from niche websites and professional communities.
2. Regulatory Compliance
Compliance of the information on your website with healthcare regulations such as HIPAA in the U.S. and GDPR in Europe is something you really need to look into. Sites that prove compliance are more attractive link partners for other credible organizations, which will be excellent grounds for you to build partnerships and collabs with such entities.
3. User Experience and Accessibility
With the recent Core Update of March 2024 from Google, positive UX and Accessibility are now even more vital when it comes to factors that affect your SERP results. This is specifically true for healthcare options where your information needs to be accessed by people with special needs. A mobile-friendly website is essential for user engagement and can influence backlinks, as mobile use is prevalent among healthcare information seekers.
Ensuring that content is accessible to people with special needs not only broadens the audience but also excellently aligns with the values of many potential linking partners.
4. Professional Networking and Partnerships
Link building for healthcare benefits greatly from establishing connections with doctors, hospitals, and other healthcare providers can lead to link exchanges where all parties profit. Consider also guest blogging on relevant and professional websites for healthcare and partnering with media that write about health and wellness. There are also plenty of opportunities for content collaboration with health-focused organizations, nonprofits, and advocacy groups all of which can bring you valuable backlinks.
5. Local SEO for Healthcare Providers
If you are marketing a healthcare business, never underestimate local SEO, as many people prefer getting healthcare services in their vicinity. Backlinks from local business directories, community websites, and local news outlets can not just greatly add to your backlink profile, but also reap a lot of traffic and potential warm leads. Another factor that can greatly help is creating content that addresses the health concerns or resources of a specific geographic area where your business is located. This type of content can score very high with local websites and local social media communities in terms usability and attractiveness and gain you a lot of organic links and traffic.
6. Social Media and Online Communities
Your active participation in health forums and Q&A sites, especially local, can lead to organic link building, as users share and reference contributions they find valuable. At the same time, maintaining an active social media presence can increase your trust with users as they like to communicate with engaged businesses, especially when the issue at hand is healthcare. It also will help you to establish a following and a loyal user base. Here is some information to consider: most positive reviews about healthcare services received mention responsiveness and willingness to communicate openly and freely. As you can see from the image below, social media marketing and content marketing occupy almost half of the huge healthcare digital marketing budgets.
Utilizing Professional Network
Like we have already mentioned, trust and authority play a special role in link building for health sites since people generally will only use your healthcare services if they trust you. That is why your brand needs to have a very noticeable and positive presence in the online network of healthcare professionals. This usually involves establishing long-lasting relationships with various notable players on the market such as influencers, reputable doctors, journalists, bloggers, experts, nonprofits, taking part in important events, getting listed in professional directories. With Serpzilla, you can build such a network around your healthcare resource easily. Utilizing our guest blogging and listing services, conducting outreach campaigns and monitoring their settings and results, you can automate and streamline a lot of the menial work that maintaining a professional network involves.
Common Pitfalls to Avoid in Healthcare Link Building
Since healthcare is a highly sensitive domain, the cost of mistakes for healthcare SEO marketers can be much higher than for other industries. Let’s take a look at some of the pitfalls that should be avoided at all costs if you want to build a working backlink profile for a healthcare website.
- Compromising on Quality for Quantity
Always avoid acquiring links from low-quality, irrelevant, or spammy sites. This can lead to penalties from search engines and damage your site’s precious credibility.
- Neglecting Content Relevance and Accuracy
Stats show that users tend to avoid healthcare websites with irrelevant, vague or incomplete content. Take care with texts you write for marketing purposes solely. Also, make sure your content is accurate, including all applied warnings and stipulations, listing potential threats and providing users with full information on essential healthcare issues.
- Underestimating the Value of Patient Reviews and Testimonials
While for many domains, user reviews and testimonials may not play a crucial role, it is totally not so for healthcare. Positive reviews and testimonials not just enhance your website’s credibility and attract more links, but act as the best ‘word of mouth’ marketing tactic. Neglecting to cultivate and showcase patient feedback is sure a missed opportunity for healthcare SEO marketing.
4. Ignoring Privacy, Security and Compliance issues
Healthcare is one of the most heavily and strictly regulated domains, so you need to be extra careful to comply with numerous written and unwritten rules and regulations, from privacy and security concerns, to government policies. Failing to do so will quickly ruin your professional reputation and no link building efforts will help you then. Google also treats rule breakers quickly and severely, so if your site is being reported by users anywhere, from google to social media, it is a sign that you need to take quick action.
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Conclusion
Healthcare marketing deals with a highly sensitive, regulated and well-established domain. This influences how SEO marketers build backlink profiles for healthcare websites and tackle the challenges the market presents. Playing safe, complying with rules and regulations, using white-hat link building tactics and building a strong network is key to a working and diverse backlink profile for healthcare websites.
