By: Iram Ghafoor
Off the clock, when you’re looking for a specialist or type of business you haven’t used before, what do you do? You probably open up Google and type something like ‘mechanic near me’ or ‘piano tuners in XYZ city.’
It makes sense. Google’s Map offers a rich experience to browse and compare lots of businesses in your area. And the Google My Business (GMB) profiles shown on these results pages generate 94% of calls and 56% of website visits for local businesses.
When locals in need of orthodontic care do their searches, their results will only include practices that have optimized their profiles with Google My Business. And you want to make sure yours is one of them. Optimizing your GMB profile improves your chances of appearing in the Google Local Map on search result pages, which makes it easier for you to capture the attention of locals looking for treatment.
Let’s dive deeper into how you can optimize your practice’s GMB profile and listing.
Google My Business is your practice’s online listing in the Google database. It means the listing is indexed by Google, and can be shown on results pages when people search for a business like yours.
GMB lists information like your practice’s name, address, phone number, images, reviews, and operation hours, at a glance. The business module also offers a link to your website and directions to your office’s location on Google Maps.
For instance, if a patient were to search for “orthodontist in Dallas Texas,” the results would look something like what you see here:
Claiming your Google My Business profile is easy and simple. All you have to do is to head over to the GMB home page and click the “Manage Now” button.
You’ll have to navigate through a few steps to complete your profile, such as adding your business name, type, category, service area, address, contact details, and more.
Once you provide basic information about your business, Google will send a postcard to the provided mailing address, with a verification code. Follow the instructions on that postcard to return to the site and enter the code. Remember that verification is crucial to make your listing visible in Google search results.
You’ll see a lot of customization options when setting up the Google My Business Profile for your orthodontic office. Here are a few necessary GMB customizations to improve your local search exposure and organic ranking in Google’s listing.
Updating your practice’s name, address, and phone number (sometimes abbreviated “NAP”) is crucial for optimizing your GMB profile. Make sure that your practice’s NAP information is 100% correct and up-to-date. Your listing’s NAP information should be consistent across online platforms—including as your website, Facebook page, and anywhere else you list your practice’s contact information. This helps search engines verify that the information is correct. Inconsistent information may impact your ranking.
You can choose one main business category and up to nine secondary categories. Your primary category should always be the most specific one that accurately represents your business. You can use secondary categories for specialties and additional services. Wisely using subcategories will increase your chances of local ranking for all the terms you’ve used in those categories. Just don’t go overboard; only select subcategories that accurately reflect what you do, and don’t choose duplicative subcategories.
You’ll want to write a catchy description of your orthodontic practice for your GMB profile that tells your potential customers why they should choose your office. You can add 750 characters to the description, and you should take advantage all of them.
Don’t forget to add your target keywords in the description — these are the words or phrases that may help boost your search ranking and the ones that most people might use to try to find an office like yours. The keywords shouldn’t sound forced, so be sure to use them naturally in the description.
You can see in the this screenshot that the description for Dallas Orthodontics contains keywords like orthodontics, orthodontic treatments, provider for braces, clear aligners, Invisalign, and more.
Make sure to add accurate and up-to-date hours of operation. Mention whether you see patients on weekends or not, and be sure to update hours when vacations or holidays will your impact open hours. Forgetting to update this information could cost you patients, since Google prominently displays hours-related information on results pages with labels like “Open Now,” “Closing Soon,” and “Closed.” Set reminders to update your hours, if needed, so you don’t unintentionally broadcast to both current and potential patients that your office is closed, when it isn’t.
Businesses with more than 100 GMB photos get 520% more calls, 1065% more website clicks, and 1038% more direct searches as compared to those with one image, so don’t just add your logo and call it a day. Adding a range of high-quality images of your office exterior, waiting room, treatment areas, equipment, staff, and treatment results—like Advanced Dental Arts in NYC did below—allows your prospects to get a better sense of your practice before they make an appointment with you.
Google offers additional details and guidelines for adding photos and videos to your Google My Business Profile here.
Google allows your business to create posts that may appear with search results or maps, like a news feed of recent activity for people viewing your business profile. You can use these posts to share additional information not contained in your profile or photos, like new-patient specials, events you’re hosting or attending, awards you are nominated for or win, free consultation offers, recognizing staffers, and more. Choose from one of these available post categories to further optimize your posts:
Tell your customers how they can book appointments with you by adding accurate appointment links and instructions. Whether they book with you via your website, phone call, a form, or some other method, make sure to provide clear and accurate instructions for how to get on your schedule for consultation or care.
It’s no secret that customers read reviews to help with decision-making, so it should come as no surprise that 43.3% of people consider reviews when choosing something as important as a dental professional. Encourage your existing happy patients to review your business on Google.
Read and respond to each review, whether it’s matter positive or negative, just as Raleigh Family Orthodontics has done in this example. Responding to negative reviews helps your prospects know your side of the story, and even a simple acknowledgment of a complaint will tell your customers that you care about them. (Check out the book ”Hug Your Haters,” by Jay Baer, for more on professionally engaging with negativity online.)
Engaging with reviews also increases your chances of ranking higher on search result pages or map listings.
Since patients are often willing to travel to nearby towns for top-notch care, it might make sense to adding surrounding cities as “service areas” if they aren’t represented by the city in your mailing address. You may also want to add the names of specific neighborhoods as service areas, if potential patients are more likely to search for “East Village Orthodontist” or “Times Square Orthodontist” than “New York City Orthodontist,” for example.
Optimizing your orthodontic practice’s My Business profile is crucial if you want Google to recommend you to potential patients when they search for your services online. It’s worth the time and effort to ensure your profile is complete, accurate, regularly updated, and compelling enough to help attract all the local patients you know you can help achieve their ideal smile.
If you need help with creating, updating or optimizing the Google My Business Profile for your office, Google has Small Business Advisors who can help.
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