Makarios Marketing provides healthcare SEO for physicians, dentists, orthopedic and pain practices, dermatologists, med spas, chiropractors, physical therapists, and multi-location clinics. We rank your practice for the conditions and treatments patients search, put every provider and location in the Google map pack, and build the trust signals Google requires from medical websites. You get more new-patient appointments, and we do it without touching protected health information.
Patients search in two ways: by symptom or condition when they are trying to understand what is wrong, and by specialty plus location when they are ready to book. A medical SEO strategy has to win both. Ours is built around provider profiles, condition and treatment pages, and the review and citation signals that make Google confident enough to recommend you.
Google allows a profile for the practice and one for each physician. We set them up correctly, choose the right primary categories for each specialty, add services, insurance, and hours, and manage review responses in a HIPAA-compliant way.
Patients search “knee replacement recovery time” long before they search “orthopedic surgeon near me.” We build condition and treatment pages that answer those questions with clinical accuracy, provider attribution, and the structure AI answer engines cite.
Healthgrades, Zocdoc, Vitals, WebMD, Doctor.com, CareDash, insurance provider directories, and NPI records are the citations Google trusts for medicine. We claim, correct, and align them so every provider’s name, credentials, address, and phone match.
Medical content is the strictest YMYL category Google has. We build provider pages with board certifications, education, hospital affiliations, and publications, and we earn links from medical associations, hospital systems, and local health press.
Medical sites are frequently slow, bloated with plugins, and full of duplicate location and provider pages. We fix indexing, speed, mobile usability, and Physician and MedicalClinic schema so pages rank and appointment tracking works.
Reviews are the single strongest map pack factor for doctors. We build a compliant review request process, respond to every review without acknowledging that a reviewer is a patient, and monitor Healthgrades and Zocdoc alongside Google.
Most agencies that sell SEO for doctors reuse a home services playbook and hope. Medical SEO has rules the rest of the industry does not: HIPAA governs what you can say in a review response, Google applies its highest content quality bar, and every provider is a separate ranking entity. We built our healthcare SEO process around those constraints, and we measure it in new-patient appointments.
A group with six providers, three locations, and twenty treatments has hundreds of search combinations patients actually use. We map the ones with volume and intent, build provider pages, location pages, and treatment pages that each target their own, interlink them so authority flows through the site, and support each with citations and reviews so the whole practice ranks together.
Healthcare SEO is not harder than other SEO, but it is different, and the differences are exactly where most campaigns fail. This is what we would tell a practice administrator or physician-owner who asked us how patients actually find a doctor online today.
Medical information is the core of Google’s Your Money or Your Life category. Its ranking systems look for evidence that a real, credentialed person stands behind the content: named physician authors, board certifications, education, hospital privileges, and external mentions from medical organizations. A practice website with anonymous service pages copied from a template will lose to a competitor whose pages are attributed to a named physician and cite clinical sources. SEO for doctors begins with making the practice’s actual credentials visible and attaching them to the content patients read.
Before someone searches “dermatologist near me,” they search “is this mole normal” and “how do you treat rosacea.” Before “orthopedic surgeon,” they search “torn meniscus symptoms” and “how long does a knee replacement last.” A practice that only has a homepage and a list of services is invisible during that research phase. Condition and treatment pages, written at depth, with clear answers and a path to book, capture patients earlier and rank for far more terms than a services list ever could. These pages are also what AI Overviews and ChatGPT cite when patients ask those same questions.
For “pediatrician near me” or “urgent care [city],” the map pack sits above every organic result and takes most of the clicks. Ranking there depends on your Google Business Profile, your reviews, proximity, and consistency of your practice data across the web. Medicine has a specific advantage: Google permits a separate profile for each physician alongside the practice profile. A six-provider group can hold multiple map pack positions for the same search if the profiles are set up correctly with distinct categories and specialties. Set up wrong, they cannibalize each other. We audit every profile connected to the practice, fix ownership and categories, and build the review flow that makes each one competitive.
Responding to a Google review with “We are so glad your knee surgery went well” confirms that the reviewer is a patient and what they were treated for. That is a HIPAA violation, and it happens constantly. The same problem shows up in testimonials, before-and-after photos, and case studies. We write review responses that thank the reviewer and invite them to contact the office without acknowledging a patient relationship, we never use patient information in content without documented authorization, and we set up your review request process so it does not create the problem in the first place.
For a restaurant, citations mean Yelp. For a physician, they mean Healthgrades, Zocdoc, Vitals, WebMD, Doctor.com, CareDash, U.S. News, the NPI registry, and every insurance carrier’s provider directory. Google cross-references these to verify that a provider exists, practices a specialty, and is located where the website says. Providers who have moved practices, changed names, or added locations typically have years of conflicting data across these sites. That inconsistency directly suppresses map pack rankings. We audit every directory, correct the wrong ones, claim the unclaimed ones, and keep them aligned when a provider joins or leaves.
Patients check the doctor before they book. A provider page with a headshot, a two-sentence bio, and no schema is a missed opportunity twice over: it does not satisfy the patient, and it does not satisfy Google. Strong provider pages include board certifications, medical school and residency, fellowship, hospital affiliations, conditions treated, procedures performed, languages, insurance accepted, a real bio in the physician’s voice, patient reviews, and Physician schema markup so search engines understand all of it. They rank for the doctor’s name, for “[specialty] in [city],” and they convert.
A group with four offices needs four location pages that each rank for their own city. Most groups have four pages that differ only in the address, which Google treats as duplicate content and ranks poorly. A real location page includes the providers who practice there, the services offered at that site, hours, parking, insurance, nearby landmarks, that location’s reviews, and content that is specific to the community. We build them as distinct pages, each tied to its own Google Business Profile, and we interlink them through a locations hub.
Healthcare SEO pricing depends on the number of providers and locations, the specialties involved, and how competitive the market is. Cosmetic specialties like dermatology, plastic surgery, and med spa are among the most competitive; primary care and pediatrics are typically less so. Most practices see map pack movement within 60 to 90 days once profiles and citations are corrected, and condition and treatment page rankings build over 4 to 8 months as authority accumulates. We scope it during the strategy call and report monthly against new-patient appointment requests.
Estimate what one more new patient per week is worth against what you spend on SEO. Enter your specialty, average patient value, current monthly new patients, and where your practice sits in the map pack today to see realistic projections for your market.
Every engagement starts with an audit of your practice and provider Google Business Profiles, your condition and treatment pages, your healthcare directory citations, and the practices outranking you. Then we fix the foundation, build the pages that are missing, and track everything back to appointment requests.
We audit practice and provider profiles, condition and treatment pages, citations across healthcare directories, and competitors, and we review your existing content and review responses for HIPAA exposure. You get a prioritized plan.
We fix technical issues, set up and optimize every profile, correct directory citations, and write or rebuild provider, location, condition, and treatment pages with Physician and MedicalClinic schema and proper internal linking.
We track map pack and organic rankings by provider and location, calls, appointment requests, and new patients. Each month we expand into the next treatment, condition, or location and report what changed.
“I’ve worked with Jason at Makarios Digital Marketing for the past year on SEO, and I’ve been really impressed with the results. He’s helped significantly increase the number of organic calls and website visits, and our rankings on Google have improved across the board.”
“I had the pleasure of working with Jason to enhance our company’s SEO and online presence, and I couldn’t be more satisfied with the experience and results. He took the time to understand our specific needs and goals.”
“I recently had the privilege of undergoing an initial evaluation with Jason, and I must say, the experience surpassed all my expectations. His insights are clearly worth every penny of the investment.”
“Jason and his team are fantastic. We are a typical small business and I was expecting to be blown off, instead we found an agency that actually desires to help small businesses, prompt in their response, and VERY knowledgeable.”
Quick case studies that show the challenge, the actions, and the impact.
You get a senior-led team that understands the compliance and credibility requirements medical marketing operates under. No junior account managers, no templates reused from a plumbing client. The people building your strategy are the people you talk to.
The questions practice administrators and physician-owners ask us before starting a healthcare SEO campaign.
Medical SEO is the process of ranking a practice’s website and Google Business Profiles for the searches patients use to find a doctor, understand a condition, or choose a treatment. It differs from general SEO in three ways: Google applies its strictest quality standard to health content, the citations that matter are healthcare directories like Healthgrades and Zocdoc rather than general ones, and HIPAA constrains what you can say in reviews, testimonials, and content. A campaign that ignores any of those will underperform or create legal risk.
Healthcare SEO pricing depends on the number of providers and locations, your specialty, and your market’s competition. Cosmetic and elective specialties in large metros are the most competitive and require more investment than primary care in a smaller market. Most serious medical SEO campaigns run in the low to mid four figures per month. We scope it on the strategy call once we have seen your practice and your current position.
Map pack improvements from Google Business Profile and citation cleanup usually appear within 60 to 90 days. Condition and treatment page rankings for competitive terms build over 4 to 8 months as content and authority accumulate. Practices with an existing presence move faster. Practices with duplicate provider listings or years of inconsistent directory data need the cleanup first, and we tell you which situation you are in before you sign.
Google allows a practitioner profile for each physician in addition to the practice profile, and set up correctly they let a group hold multiple map pack positions. Set up wrong, they suppress each other. The right structure depends on whether providers see patients at multiple locations, whether they have distinct specialties, and whether patients search for them by name. We audit what exists and build the structure that ranks.
SEO itself is, but common marketing practices are not. Responding to a review in a way that confirms someone is a patient, using patient stories or photos without documented authorization, or collecting health information through an unencrypted contact form all create exposure. We write review responses that never acknowledge a patient relationship, we use only properly authorized patient content, and we flag form and tracking setups that need to be corrected.
Yes, if you want to rank for them. Google ranks pages, and a search for “rotator cuff surgery recovery” needs a page about rotator cuff surgery to rank. A practice with twenty treatments needs twenty pages, built in priority order by patient value and search volume. These pages also capture patients during research, before they are ready to search for a doctor by specialty.
They do. They are citations that confirm each provider’s name, credentials, specialty, and location to Google, which supports map pack rankings, and a few of them carry enough authority that a complete profile with a link is a meaningful backlink. Inconsistent or duplicate listings across these directories, which are common for providers who have changed practices, actively hold rankings back.
We build a compliant process for inviting patients to leave Google reviews, typically through automated post-visit messages, without offering incentives. We respond to every review, positive or negative, without confirming that the reviewer is a patient or referencing any treatment. Review volume, recency, and response rate are among the strongest map pack signals for medical practices, and a negative review handled well often does more good than harm.
Yes, when the content is built for it. AI answer engines cite health pages with clear question-matching headings, direct answers, named physician authors, clinical sources, and FAQ and medical schema. Every condition and treatment page we build includes those elements. You cannot buy your way into an AI answer, but you can be the practice whose page it cites.
Primary care, pediatrics, orthopedics, pain management, dermatology, plastic surgery, med spas, dentistry, orthodontics, chiropractic, physical therapy, urgent care, mental health, and multi-location specialty groups. The specific playbook changes by specialty, and cosmetic and elective practices in particular need a conversion-focused approach, but the foundation of provider profiles, condition pages, citations, and reviews applies to all of them.
Book a free strategy call. We will review your practice and provider profiles, your treatment pages, and the practices outranking you, and tell you exactly what it would take to close the gap.
Full-service SEO agency delivering measurable revenue growth. We work with clients in Buffalo, New York, across the USA, and internationally.
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