Finding ROI in Healthcare Marketing.

Healthcare Marketing is Challenging!

Healthcare marketing is a very competitive digital marketing space. Even more so in the midst of a dramatic shift as the ACA (Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare) will be modified or replaced. Marketers in the healthcare industry need to proactively research and implement strategies to stay at the top of search engine search results. Below are some steps we implemented to help the Center for Elder’s Independence (CEI) increase their organic search rankings and therefore bring in new healthcare consumers.

The Center for Elders’ Independence (CEI) is an Oakland, CA- based PACE affiliated healthcare organization. PACE is a Medicare and Medicaid program that helps low income elderly people stay at home. They also have their care needs met in the community instead of going to a nursing home or other care facility. CEI gets most of their new patients through online inquiries and phone calls. We wanted to get their listing moved to the top of search engine searches for elder care in the Oakland and San Francisco East Bay. We implemented several steps on their website to increase search awareness and new patient registrations. These steps will apply to any healthcare organization.

First, Find The Right Language for Your Site Via Keyword Research

Comprehensive Keyword and Key Phrase Research is Essential.

Your target audience finds your site through online searches using keywords or phrases. So, your first problem will be researching keyword or key phrases most frequently used by potential site visitors. In this case we were targeting a specific set of elderly healthcare patients. Start by reviewing both your website and your competitor’s sites. Talk to key stakeholders – the sales team, your product development team and, most definitely, your customers. Listen for key phrases that best describe the healthcare market niche you’re researching. Once you have a base of key phrases, then go to Google’s Keyword Tool, or SpyFu. Or, consider “Searches related to…” at the bottom of a Google search page to refine your research. Be creative researching the marketplace and the language your potential customers are using for both voice and traditional search.

One consideration for CEI was targeting clients in a small geographic area, the East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area. Therefore, inclusion of geographic modifiers in key phrases was necessary to attract well-qualified local web traffic, i.e., “Oakland Elder Care Services” vs. just “Elder Care Services.”

The other consideration for CEI was potential changes to Medicare, so the best research information was found on government websites, such as www.medicare.gov or The Department of Health and Human Services.

Sources for reliable information are dynamic. So, don’t fall into the trap that what you knew a month ago still applies. It might, but be aware even subtle changes can add to the success of your campaigns. News sites are okay, but they mostly report what’s current for the day. Ultimately, you want to keep ahead of the game by following the data as it unfolds.

Secondly, Be Objective in Your Research, and Follow the Data

Secondly, objective and effective results come from following the data.

Opinion doesn’t matter. Whether your healthcare marketing target audience is local or national, as healthcare legislation changes appear you’ll need to objectively analyze the data. Start by setting a baseline search engine traffic measurement before you implement changes, then compare it to results post-implementation. Google Analytics is a great tool, and it’s free! As we rolled out changes on CEI’s website we closely monitored the search traffic generated by Google and the other major search engines. Were our changes to the language of the site demonstrating success or did we need to revisit our assumptions and tweak the copy more? Were we attracting well-qualified local East Bay traffic? Was the client satisfied with the results?

Third, Google’s Rules Rule

Google sets the rules on how it ranks a website for any particular search query, and we have to follow them. Understanding how Google analyzes your website is key to restructuring the content to get the broadest exposure within search results.

When writing META Tags (Titles, Descriptions) and headlines, front-load the target key phrase that best describes page content. Include the company name at the end of the Title, and with Descriptions be concise, close with a strong call-to-action.

Google uses Titles to rank web pages. Descriptions aren’t a ranking factor. But, they are critical in getting a viewer to click through for more information. Remember, they’re your sales pitch to get a click from well-qualified searchers.

Read details about Titles and Descriptions in Google’s Guidelines.

Content will remain king. A large part of Google page ranking is based on content focused on a topic, its authoritativeness, and the authority of links from other web pages to yours. It’s a vicious circle. To attract the best backlinks your content has to be among the best.

Lastly, maintain awareness of coming and current changes to Google’s search algorithm. Moz has a “Google Algorithm Change History” page. Also, run periodic searches for changes in Google’s search algorithm. While keeping up with digital healthcare marketing, you don’t want a surprise penalty because of a Google rule change.

Comprehensive Data Analysis Pays Off!

In conclusion, a successful healthcare marketing strategy.

Changes we made to CEI’s META data (Titles, Descriptions, Headlines), along with on page content, resulted in an increase in monthly traffic of about 6,500 new users. Further, potential clients on average visited 3 pages, reading each page for over 2 minutes. Thousands of Bay Area site visitors per month found the healthcare services they were looking for.

How can Beasley Direct and Online Marketing, Inc.’s organic search marketing team expand your healthcare business? Contact us today and let’s get started.

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Andrew Hoover has been a consultant in Internet Search Marketing, Web Site Optimization, and pay-per-click/CPM/Display for over 15 years. He has extensive experience with Google, Yahoo, Bing, Ask, AOL and was a beta tester for Amazon’s search engine. Andrew started a Network Consulting corporation in 1999 (GLT, Inc.), and a search marketing company in 2003, Lead Adrenaline: he has worked with medical, financial services, real estate, retail, entertainment and high-technology companies. His educational background includes degrees from both the University of California, Berkeley, and California State University, East Bay.

– See the Beasley Team.

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The dates, topics and descriptions are:

Search Engine Optimization Fundamentals:
How to Build a Solid and Search-Friendly Site

Date and Time: June 22, 2017, 10:00AM-12:00PM (PST).
Register Now

Google and Bing have all pushed the boundaries of how they look at websites in order to give the most relevant results. But they have also stood by a set of core areas that they continue to look for on a website. By understanding what the engines are looking for, you can optimize your site to deliver it, and you will have a solid foundation for future search success.

What you’ll learn:

• How to review your site as a whole, that will support the individual sections and pages in the search results
• How to do solid keyword and language research, using the language your customers are using
• How to develop an architecture that re-enforces your site’s content for the search engines
• The top three tools to identify technical and on-page issues
• On-page factors that need to be optimized
• Top five WordPress optimization tips
• How to understand inbound link profiles for your site and start a solid link building campaign that plays by the engines’ rules

Advanced Search Engine Optimization:
Beating Your Competition in a Constantly Changing Search Landscape

Date and Time: June 29, 2017, 10:00AM-12:00PM (PST).
Register Now

The landscape for search engine marketing is constantly changing and requires sophisticated techniques to beat your competitors and achieve your marketing goals. As search engine marketing moves away from the old keyword centric paradigm, new approaches need to be laid out to aid in your site’s visibility.

What you’ll learn:

• SEO in the time of RankBrain, Panda, Penguin, Hummingbird, etc:
• How to insulate your site from Google’s constant updates
• Understanding the new ways in which Google tracks search quality
• Optimizing your domain for the best search visibility
• Optimizing your servers for the best search performance
• Structured data markup and why you need it on your site
• Advanced Link building and offsite factors:
• Going the extra mile to find the right link targets in the right “neighborhoods” without violating Google’s rules

For more information on the LIVE Online Certification Workshops, or to register go here.

About us:

Beasley Direct and Online Marketing, Inc. (www.BeasleyDirect.com) is known for bringing the latest marketing strategies to online and direct marketing. Beasley provides services in inbound and outbound marketing including: content creation, email marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), print advertising, social media advertising, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, website design, media planning/public relations, direct mail marketing, lead generation and nurture campaigns, and database management. Beasley Direct and Online Marketing, Inc. helps clients in both B2B and B2C marketing and is privately held and headquartered in the Silicon Valley suburb of Morgan Hill, California.

About DMAnc:

(www.dmanc.org): The DMA of Northern California was formed to educate, inform and provide networking opportunities for Direct and Online Marketing professionals in the San Francisco Bay Area.

We hold monthly luncheon meetings, live online workshops, periodic half-day seminars, and provide opportunity for the best in learning and job networking in the Northern California marketing community. Become a member the DMAnc, click here.

For More Information, Contact:

Laurie Beasley
President
Beasley Direct and Online Marketing, Inc.
408-782-0046 x21
lbeasley@beasleydirect.com

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AdWords Quality Score

When Google first started its pay-per-click (PPC) advertising business, they did not want to create a strict pay-for-position marketplace. Google firmly believed that the ads they served up should be relevant to the search being performed to mirror the reputation for quality that Google built with its organic search results. To deliver this, AdWords first started measuring an ad’s quality by looking at its click-through rate (CTR). Google assumed that the higher an ad’s CTR, the more likely it was the ad was delivering what the searcher wanted. AdWords would serve these ads more often, giving more exposure and traffic to the advertiser.

Over time, Google AdWords expanded and refined this concept of “Quality Score.” An ad/keyword combination that has a high Quality Score will appear more often, be higher on the results page and have a lower cost per click than a lower Quality Score ad/keyword combination. This gives advertisers incentive to take advantage of this by creating good, relevant ads for their keyword selections.

Google measures Quality Score starting at the keyword level, looking at the keyword, how relevant it is to the ad it triggers, and the landing page it points to. Quality Score is a dynamic factor that changes on a second-by-second basis and is impacted by many different factors. The AdWords interface reports on a subset of these factors for the advertiser and the results are not real-time, sometimes reflecting the keyword status of five to 10 days earlier.

Before we look at the major factors of Quality Score, let’s take a moment to review how it impacts your ad’s position and cost per click (CPC). When an advertiser bids on a keyword to trigger an ad’s appearance in the Google results page, they are participating in a real-time ad auction for the top spots on the page. These top spots drive more traffic that is often better qualified for the advertiser’s goal. Its “Ad Rank” determines the position of any advertiser’s ad on the page. Ad Rank is a score that AdWords calculates using two elements; the maximum PPC bid that advertiser is willing to spend, multiplied by the Quality Score of the desired keyword. The higher the Ad Rank, the better the on-page position for the ad.

An Example

Let’s look at an example of three advertisers that are all bidding a maximum of $5.00 per click for their ad to appear. And, see how their differing Quality Scores will impact the ad position and eventual CPC:

Advertiser – Alpha

QS 7 multiplied by a max bid of $5 CPC

Ad Rank = 35

Advertiser – Baker

QS 8 multiplied by a max bid of $5 CPC

Ad Rank = 40

This advertiser’s ad will appear higher on the page

Advertiser – Charlie

QS 6 multiplied by a max bid of $5 CPC

Ad Rank = 30

This advertiser’s ad will appear lowest on the page

Consequently, a higher Quality Score will also influence how much the advertiser eventually pays for the click. Using the same scenario, let’s look at another example:

The actual cost per click that the advertisers will pay will be determined by the Ad Rank of the advertiser appearing in the position below them divided by the Quality Score of the winning advertiser. For our example above, advertiser Baker was the winning advertiser with a higher Ad Rank (maximum CPC bid x QS) of 40 versus Alpha’s Ad Rank of 35.

# 1 Position on the page:

Advertiser – Baker

Ad Rank = 40

Actual CPC = $3.89 (Alpha’s Ad Rank divided by Baker’s Quality Score)

#2 Position on the page:

Advertiser – Alpha

Ad Rank = 35

Actual CPC = $4.28 (Charlie’s Ad Rank (30) divided by Alpha’s Quality Score (7))

#3 Position on the page:

Advertiser – Charlie

Ad Rank = 30

Actual CPC = Minimum Allowed Bid for the auction

The illustration above seems fairly straightforward. But in reality, the ad auctions are complex, with tens or hundreds of advertisers bidding on any specific word and automated bidding tools rapidly changing the scenarios. The thing to remember is that having a high Quality Score will make your ad dollars go further.

Improving a Keyword’s Quality Score

So how does one go about viewing and improving a keyword’s Quality Score? Let’s start by understanding where Quality Score reporting lives in the AdWords interface.

While Quality Score is reported at the keyword level, it isn’t one of the metric columns that appear in the default view within the AdWords interface. You can add it by going to the “column” dropdown in the keyword view and adding it from the display. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. Adding Quality Score to Your Google AdWords Program

Source: Google

Now that you can see your Quality Score for your keywords, the next questions are, “What should it be?” and “How can you improve it?”

Firstly, Quality Score should be targeted for improvement at any level below a seven out of 10. An ideal score is 10, but that is hard to attain except for highly branded keywords for your own products. Living in the seven-to-10 range will help to keep your CPC down and your share of impressions up.

To improve your Quality Score, focus on three attributes for your keyword/ad combination: CTR, the relevance of the ad text to the keyword, and the relevance of the keyword and ad text combination to the target-landing page

.

Improve your Quality Score by Improving Your Click-Through Rate:

This will have the biggest impact on Quality Score by far and is the easiest one to understand.

• First of all, use your keywords in your ad text.
• Write compelling ads with benefit statements and strong calls to action.
• Finally, use your display URL to add more text to the ad. This is an ideal place to put a call to action.

Improve Your Quality Score by Placing an Ad That Is Relevant to Your Target Audience’s Expected Search Queries:

• Especially relevant: make sure that your ads are addressing the needs of your audience. If the ad does not answer their need, the audience will click on your competitors. Google looks at your ad much as they evaluate organic search results. The ad needs to address the search with a relevant message.

Finally, Improve Your Quality Score by Creating a Relevant Landing Page Target

• First of all, the landing page must make a clear payoff to the ad’s promise in an easily visible part of the page.
• Secondly, the landing page must not be swarming with ads.
• Furthermore, the time your visitor spends on the landing page is vital to AdWords viewing it as a relevant landing page. This is measured by quickly “pogo sticking” back to the search results page on Google, looking for better results, and/or by Google’s tracking how much time is spent on the page when the visitor is logged into a Google account such as YouTube, Gmail or Google Drive.

As was previously stated, Quality Score is measured by a variety of factors in real time. The three mentioned above have a significant impact on your Quality Score and are the easiest to manage.

In addition, you can find out more about the details of Quality Score measurement and improvement at the following links:

• Video: How the PPC Auction Works and Quality Score

• Google AdWords Help Article on Quality Score

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The Author

This post was authored by John Thyfault, Vice President of Search & Social Strategy, of Beasley Direct & Online Marketing. Contact John at jthyfault@beasleydirect.com.

John has more than 19 years of marketing, sales and product development experience, and he brings a proven track record of successful campaign, program and product development expertise. His knowledge of search engine optimization and marketing, combined with an in-depth understanding of customer identification, market analysis and segmentation, allows him to deliver high returns on our client’s marketing investment for both business-to-consumer and business-to-business markets.

Prior to working with Beasley Direct, John was Senior Client Services Project Director at ThirdAge.com, a first wave baby boomer lifestyle and community website. At ThirdAge he successfully led major client sponsorships for Fortune 100 companies in healthcare (Tylenol), financial services (American Century), technology (Intel & IBM) and consumer products areas (Revlon & Viactive). He was responsible for strategic and tactical goal setting, project management, new product creation and web site production. John previously worked in Channel Marketing and National Account Sales for IDG Books Worldwide, the publishers of the immensely popular “…For Dummies” book series. Additionally, he managed the wholesale distributor sales channel for Tor/Forge Books, an imprint of St. Martin’s Press.

John is active in local marketing associations, including the Direct Marketing Association, the Business Marketing Association and is currently serving on the board of directors for the Silicon Valley American Marketing Association.

John has taught search engine marketing fundamentals extensively. He has led workshops for the Silicon Valley American Marketing Association, Northern California Direct Marketing Association (DMAnc.org) and the Business Marketing Association. He also teaches Search Engine Marketing at UCSC Extension (UCSC Silicon Valley Extension).

The post Understanding AdWords Quality Score and How It Can Lower Your Cost Per Click appeared first on Beasley Direct and Online Marketing.

By John Thyfault, Vice President of Search & Social Strategy, Beasley Direct Marketing

Nothing arouses more alarm—even panic—in a web-intensive business than to get a manual penalty for “unnatural inbound links” from Google. If you have never received one of the warning messages shown in Figure 1, count yourself fortunate. But, don’t get too complacent; it could happen to you, too. When Google places a manual penalty on your site, your search traffic plummets along with the leads and revenue generated by search.

Case in Point

Figure 1: Recent Example of a Google Manual Penalty

In this case, there were a number of links to the site that Google viewed as suspicious. That is, pointing to the possibility of the company having engaged in what Google calls “unnatural link building.”¹ An unnatural link is one that Google views as having no relationship to your site, or is from a suspect site. Furthermore, it exists probably because the site owner has engaged in buying links, participating in link exchanges or creating thin, poorly written articles/content and engaging in a paid content network. All of these practices are called out specifically in Google’s Terms of Service (TOS) as forbidden. Figure 2 is an example of a link exchange site that posts your articles, with links back to your site. This might seem like a dandy idea, except that these sites don’t care about the quality of the content. They care only about the links. Google, on the other hand, cares primarily about content quality and penalizes sites that have links from link exchanges.

What about Link Exchange Sites?

Figure 2: A Link Exchange Site

Usually, the “articles” on these sites are of minimal value, largely aimed at advertising products and services. They are often poorly written and riddled with typos and other mistakes. If you or your SEO consultants have been link building through such sites, rest assured you will eventually receive a warning and a penalty from Google.

However, links to your site are not 100% within your control. There may be links to your site from others trying to boost their search ranking by linking to your site and requesting a reciprocal link. Whether or not you reciprocate, the link may still be there. If you are selling graphic design services and the link is from, say, a machine shop, Google will view the link as bogus.

Consequences of Receiving a Google Warning

OK, so Google doesn’t like the links to your site and tells you to clean up your act. What difference does that make? Google isn’t exactly Interpol.

As it turns out, it can make a huge difference. A Google penalty removes you from the Google search results in full or in part. In one case that we know of personally, a company relied heavily on its web site for business development. They lost 82% of its traffic from Google during the penalty period¾about 62% of their overall traffic. This was the result of a limited manual spam action/penalty. This can be a tremendous blow to a company’s revenue stream when it relies on the web for leads, sales and revenue.

Other companies have received full manual penalties. This is when they are pulled out of the index completely and NO traffic is driven to the site.

How Can You Regain Google’s Approval?

When you receive a warning, it can deeply hurt your company’s business and you need to attend to it immediately. In our next blog post, we’ll tell you exactly how to go about fixing the problem and negotiating with Google for reinstatement.

¹ For more detail on how to build links organically (in a Google-approved manner), please download our free white paper, “Link Building: Staying Current in a Shifting Landscape.”

* * * *

About the Author

This post was authored by John Thyfault, Vice President of Search & Social Strategy, of Beasley Direct Marketing. Contact John at jthyfault@beasleydirect.com.

John has more than 18 years of marketing, sales and product development experience, and he brings a proven track record of successful campaign, program and product development expertise. His knowledge of search engine optimization and marketing, combined with an in-depth understanding of customer identification, market analysis and segmentation, allows him to deliver high returns on our client’s marketing investment for both business-to-consumer and business-to-business markets.

Prior to working with Beasley Direct, John was Senior Client Services Project Director at ThirdAge.com, a first wave baby boomer lifestyle and community website. At ThirdAge he successfully led major client sponsorships for Fortune 100 companies in healthcare (Tylenol), financial services (American Century), technology (Intel & IBM) and consumer products areas (Revlon & Viactive). He was responsible for strategic and tactical goal setting, project management, new product creation and web site production. John previously worked in Channel Marketing and National Account Sales for IDG Books Worldwide, the publishers of the immensely popular “…For Dummies” book series. Additionally, he managed the wholesale distributor sales channel for Tor/Forge Books, an imprint of St. Martin’s Press.

John is active in local marketing associations, including the Direct Marketing Association, the Business Marketing Association and is currently serving on the board of directors for the Silicon Valley American Marketing Association.

John has taught search engine marketing fundamentals extensively. He has led workshops for the Silicon Valley American Marketing Association, Northern California Direct Marketing Association (https://www.dmanc.org/) and the Business Marketing Association. He also teaches Search Engine Marketing at UCSC Extension (https://www.dmanc.org/) in Silicon Valley.

The post Bouncing Back From A Google Manual Penalty (Part 1) appeared first on Beasley Direct and Online Marketing.