Top 50 SEO Keywords for Doctors to Attract More Patients Online

top seo keywords for doctors

Doctors often struggle to maintain a top position in today’s highly competitive healthcare industry. The only solution to improve the practice’s online visibility is to optimize the website and digital presence with relevant SEO keywords for doctors. Relevant and high-intent keywords are the key to achieving a higher ranking in search engine result pages (SERPs).

Relevant keywords and phrases can ensure that your potential patients easily find your website and learn more about the treatment services you offer. In this blog, you’ll learn more about the effective keyword research strategies for doctors, with a list of the top 50 keywords. These keywords will help boost your SEO efforts, rank your content, and reach your medical practice with new patients.

What are SEO Keywords for Doctors?

It refers to the phrases or query terms entered into an online search engine by patients or other people to find a good doctor. SEO keywords can be one word or a series of multiple words that can make a doctor’s website content appear on the first page of search engine results. Effective keyword research is quite crucial to SEO for doctors who can use the keywords related to their specialization, treatment services, and location.

It’s not a good idea to avoid search engine optimization if you’re a doctor and want to attract new patients through a strong online presence. Relevant keywords can significantly boost your SEO efforts and maximize their impact. Some significant examples of keywords for doctors are ‘best doctor in town’, ‘affordable doctor clinic near me’, and ‘top general physician near me’. 

SEO keywords help doctors target the potential patients who are further in the appointment booking journey. It also increases the likelihood of conversions. Doctors can reduce their ad spend and reach patients who are more likely to schedule an appointment. This targated approach positively contributes to the increased patient appointments and an exceptional return on investment (ROI). 

Suppose a patient has conducted an online search using these keywords. You can use these same keywords in your content to rank it higher in the relevant search engine results.

Are there many keyword variants? The answer is yes, there are some major types of keywords that doctors can utilize to optimize their content and make it more relevant to the relevant search queries. 

Some of the important types are long-tail, brand, condition-related, and location-specific keywords. Furthermore, doctors need to employ various tools to find and analyze their target keywords and their online search volume, competition, and relevancy.

Why Doctors Must Use SEO Keywords in Their Content?

A study result has shown that 77% of patients conduct online searches to find a doctor or to learn more about one. But how can medical providers like doctors make their practice more visible in those search results? It’s through effective keyword research for SEO. The process will help the doctors discover phrases that can enhance the online visibility of their practice and treatment services.

SEO keywords for doctors are the critical components of any successful SEO campaign. When you research the keywords thoroughly, you get to know about the patient’s intent and personalize your content to meet their unique needs. Let’s have a look at the four major reasons why doctors must use relevant SEO keywords in their content.

1. Increased Content Relevancy

Your website also requires accurate keyword optimization to improve the user experience. Keywords make your doctor’s online presence more relevant to the user’s search intent. The right utilization of keywords makes the user believe that their treatment services perfectly align with their medical requirements.

Additionally, these keywords help search engine crawlers align the content with relevant search queries. For example, you’ve added the keyword ‘cost-effective doctor clinic near me’ to your website homepage. Your Home page will appear in the search results when a patient searches for the same keyword online, as the page matches the search query.

2. Enhanced Search Engine Visibility

Search engines like Google prefer to rank keyword-rich content. Doctors must find and use keywords relevant to their niche that will improve their search engine visibility. Keywords help search engines understand your content and match it with the user’s search queries. When you strategically place your target keywords in title tags, headers, meta descriptions, and body content, it makes your medical practice more visible in the search results and helps you attract new patients.

But can every keyword related to a doctor’s specialization ensure higher conversions? No, it can’t. You need to find relevant and high-intent keywords that your potential patients mostly use when they search online for doctors and book appointments.

3. Local Domination through Keyword-optimized Content

No matter how valuable and beneficial a doctor’s treatment services are, he/she must build a strong local presence and attract the local prospects. Doctors can use location-specific keywords in their content to make them appear in local search results. How? Let’s find out.

You’ve found that most of the local patients who have the potential to seek your treatment services search online using the keyword ‘best family doctor near me’ to find a good doctor in their location. If you optimize your website content and online presence with this keyword, your practice will appear in the results of those local search queries. This way, you can dominate the local searches with your local keyword-optimized content.

4. New Patient Appointments

When the potential patients can easily find the information they need through a doctor’s website, they consider the source knowledgeable and credible. It significantly influences their medical decisions. Sounds complex? Let’s understand it more easily.

Suppose one of your potential patients seeks online information regarding ‘home remedies for chronic cold and cough’. You’ve written a blog on the same topic for your website. When the patient uses the same keywords to conduct online research and finds the essential information from your website, they are more likely to consider your practice as credible and reliable. Likewise, they tend to book appointments at your clinic and may return to your practice for their medical needs in the future.

6 Types of Keywords for Doctors to Rank Their Practice Online 

Sometimes your researched keywords and the common search queries by the patients may not match with each other. Here comes the different types of SEO keywords for doctors. Let’s have a look at the 6 major types of keywords that doctors can use to optimize their online content.

1. Long-tail Keywords

These keywords contain three or more words and are more specific. These keywords often contain additional terms, geographic modifiers, or terms that are very relevant to the patient’s search queries. Long-tail keywords are mostly ‘intent’ terms, which makes them more specific to a search intent like appointment scheduling.

Though these keywords drive less traffic than broad terms, long-tail keywords can convert at a higher level. Some examples of long-tail keywords for doctors are ‘best doctor in town’, ‘urgent care doctor near me’, ‘best orthopedic doctor in town’, and ‘dentists who offer telehealth consultation’.

2. Broad Keywords

These types of keywords have broad significance or meaning, containing one or two words. Broad keywords often cover many significant topics as they are root terms that most patients use to start their online search session. Due to the broad appeal, you may struggle to convert with these broad keywords. Keywords like ‘dentist’, ‘physician’, ‘family doctor’, ‘cardiology clinic’, or ‘plastic surgery services’ are broad terms related to a doctor’s practice.

3. Brand Keywords

Are you a renowned doctor in a location? If yes, you can use your brand name as a keyword in your content. It can be the name of your medical clinic or even your name as a doctor. Suppose a local patient who already knows about your medical practice or knows you as a local healthcare provider, he/she is more likely to search your practice online by the name itself.

Utilizing these brand keywords will make your website rank for these search queries. For instance, you have a medical clinic and the name of it is Dr. XYZ Family Clinic. You can optimize your content with your clinic name to attract patient leads who have more potential to choose your medical care treatments.

4. Location-based Keywords 

These keywords help doctors target a specific patient group based on their geographic location. Similarly, it helps patients find local doctors online when they use these location-based keywords. For example, a doctor who offers medical care treatments in his/her city and wants to attract local patients. Keywords like ‘best physician near me’, ‘general treatment care in my location’, ‘cost of regular health checkups in my city’, or ‘top-rated doctor nearby.

5. Service-specific Keywords

These types of healthcare keywords are related to the services a doctor provides. For instance, you provide general treatments at your medical clinic. You can use keywords like ‘cold and cough treatment care’, ‘diagnostic tests and examinations’, and ‘fever treatment care services’ in your website content. This way, you can attract patients who specifically search for these treatment services and convert them into your loyal patients.

6. Condition-related Keywords

It refers to the phrases related to some common health conditions or issues people often suffer from. Doctors can use medical condition-related keywords ‘fever’, ‘flu and cough’, ‘high blood pressure’, ‘migraine and headaches’, or ‘high blood sugar’ in their website content to convey the message that they offer treatment services for these health concerns.

6 Key Steps to Find Relevant SEO Keywords that Can Acquire New Patients for Doctors 

Keywords play a pivotal role in medical SEO strategies. While the research part is the initial step before you proceed with the on-page, off-page, and technical optimization, it paves the path to your SEO success. However, nothing can be achieved without a proper strategy plan. A keyword research strategy requires you to find phrases with higher search volume and lower competition. But this is not the only thing doctors need to do.

The research may seem complex, but it can be a cakewalk for you if you implement the proper strategies to find SEO keywords for doctors. Let’s unveil the secret to discover keywords for doctors’ SEO and attract organic traffic to your practice. Follow the below-listed 6 crucial steps to make your practice thrive on search engine results.

Step 1: Understand Your Niche and Target Audience

The first step is to identify your practice’s niche and target audience. Your keyword research will be of no use if your content doesn’t reach the right people. For example, you are a doctor who offers treatment services for general medical issues but doesn’t provide specialized treatments. You’ve optimized your content with incorrect and irrelevant keywords like ‘best pediatrician in town’ or ‘top child specialist for general illness’. It is more likely that your content will reach those who need pediatric services, and they may not contact you for appointments.

3 Tips to Understand Your Practice’s Niche

Let’s explore how a doctor can identify their niche.

  1. A doctor’s private practice must be specialized in a particular area of medicine. You need to identify this specialized area where you have proven expertise.
  2. You may have your ideal patients and medical problems or ailments you work best with. You need to identify these target patients and the medical field you have accurate knowledge.
  3. You also need to identify the medical issues you’re compassionate about treating.

These things are your practice niche. Accurate identification of these keywords can help you personalize your keyword research strategy to align it with your practice’s specialty.

Factors to Consider When You Understand Your Target Audience

Patients are more likely to use certain related keywords to find a doctor online. Understand their search intent and the keywords they mostly use so that you can add them to your online content. SEO for doctors and keyword research will be incomplete if you fail to identify your target audience properly. Check out the following factors that you must consider to identify your target patient market.

a. Which keywords do the prospective patients mostly use when they search for a doctor online?

b. What keywords do they mostly use when they’re about to book a doctor’s appointment or consult with a doctor?

c. What kind of information about a doctor’s practice does your target audience need?

d. How frequently do the prospective patients use those terms to search for a doctor online?

Doctors must have a clear idea of these factors before they proceed with the keyword research. They need to use these insights to boost their keyword research efforts.

Step 2: Make A List of Topics and Expand Them into Phrases

It is the second step to find SEO keywords for doctors. Doctors need to create a list of broad topics related to their niche and ensure the topics they’ve chosen are related to the treatment services they offer. They can also choose the topics they believe their target audience would be interested in. Such topics will attract more patients and encourage them to choose the medical services the doctors provide.

Did you know that 80% of Internet users are more likely to search for health information, including a doctor’s information? This statistic shows why you must cover all the topics related to your practice’s niche. We suggest you start with general health-related topics if you’re a doctor treating general medical issues. Similarly, you can select topics related to your medical specialization if you provide any specialized treatment service.

Examples of Broad Topics a General Doctor Can Choose

For example, you can choose the following broad topics if you’re a general doctor.

a. Medical checkups

b. Cold and cough

c. Best doctors

d. Family doctor

e. Fever treatment and medicine

Examples of Broad Topics a Specialized Doctor (Dentist) Can Select

The broad topics a specialized doctor who provides dental care treatment services can use are mentioned below.

a. Orthodontic treatment

b. Root canal services

c. Oral health and hygiene

d. Home remedies for dental care

e. Preventive dentistry

f. Oral medicine

g. Cosmetic dentistry

h. Dental surgery

It’s now time to make a list of phrases that you have created by expanding these broad topics. These phrases must complete your website content. How can you ensure it? For instance, you want to search online for a good and reliable doctor. The best way is to ask yourself what you would type into Google or what keywords you would use to search for a doctor online.

Another way to do this practice free of cost, without the help of any keyword research tool, is to Google your target phrases. This practice will help you get a complete list of related keywords and check whether these keywords are the most-searched ones or not.

You can Google the term ‘family doctors’ to see the other related and common search queries, such as ‘best family doctor near me’, ‘affordable family doctor in town’, and ‘reliable family doctor for senior citizens’. It allows you to optimize your content with keywords and answer these queries through your content. This is one of the most beneficial practices to perform in SEO for doctors.

Step 3: Analyze the Keywords and Check their Relevance

Now that you’ve the list of your potential keywords, you need to employ the keyword research tools like Google Keyword Planner and SEMrush to analyze those. It’s essential to choose the right keywords that can rank your doctor’s website higher in the relevant search results. How to analyze these keywords with the help of these tools? These tools will help you track certain important metrics of these potential keywords. such as:

a. Search Volume – How many times have users searched for something online using these keywords?

b. Cost Per Click – The amount an advertiser pays for every click on their PPC ad when it is displayed on the search engine results based on specific keywords.

c. Keywords Trends – Whether your potential doctor-related keywords are trending or not?

d. Search Value Over Time – How many times the keywords are searched over a length of time?

e. Keywords Difficulty – How difficult or easy to rank your content for these keywords?

f. Keyword Relevancy and Search Intent – Whether these keywords relevant to your practice’s niche and medical services? Whether these potential keywords perfectly align with the patients’ search intent.

How to Check the Relevancy of Your Potential Keywords?

To check the relevancy of your potential SEO keywords for doctors, you need to check whether your chosen phrases are accurately relevant to your medical expertise, niche, and services. We will tell you the easiest way to check the relevancy. Ask yourself the following question and check whether the answers are YES. If it is, you can consider the potential keywords accurate and beneficial for a doctor’s practice. Check out these three questions first.

a. Are the potential keywords suitable for your practice?

b. Can these keywords rank your website content on search results?

c. Can the ranking bring a good return on investment (ROI) for your practice?

Another crucial practice is to remove irrelevant keywords from the list. Otherwise, you may end up wasting your money and resources on those irrelevant keywords. One advice from us is to put some of your potential keywords into Google or other search engines to check what results pop up. These results will help you understand the relevance of your potential keywords.

Step 4: Find High-Intent Keywords

You need to choose the high-intent keywords from the list of your potential keywords. Before you proceed with the website design for your practice, you need to target certain keywords you need to utilize in your website content. According to research, 87% of patients who find doctors online are more likely to book an appointment. Thus, doctors need to find out the most relevant keywords for their website, specifically those mostly used by potential patients. Let’s find out how you can identify the high-intent keywords for your practice and target the most relevant ones.

Tips and Tricks to Identify High-Intent Keywords for Doctors

Let’s find out how you can identify the high-intent keywords for your practice and target the most relevant ones.

a. Doctors can target phrases and terms like ‘best doctor near me’, ‘affordable walk-in medical clinic’, ‘primary care doctor in (city name)’, ‘general physician near my location’, and ‘doctors offices near me’.

b. Tools like SEMrush and Ahrefs can help you identify keywords related to a doctor’s practice.

c. You can effectively utilize these tools to find easy-to-rank phrases with higher search volumes. We’ve already provided you with a brief understanding of these keyword research tools. You need to use the competitive ranking data for keywords for doctors’ SEO.

d. You can even find the most-searched keywords related to your medical practices in Google’s ‘related searches’ and ‘people also ask’ sections.

e. The last tip for effective keyword research for doctors is to estimate the cost and potential ROI of the keywords if you want to buy them. Google AdWords Keyword Estimator is one of the popular platforms you can use for this purpose.

f. This practice will help you understand whether you should perform SEO for doctors and optimize your content with specific keywords or simply buy the PPC ads.

Step 5: Prioritize Local Keywords to Dominate Local Searches

Local SEO keywords for doctors are crucial to grow a medical practice in a geographical area. For example, a doctor who offers top-notch treatment services lacks a solid local presence, as most of their local prospects are not aware of the doctor’s practice and service offerings. Will the doctor be able to grow his/her practice and ensure exceptional success? The answer is no. It doesn’t matter how valuable your medical practice is to the patients, you must have a strong presence and visibility in the local healthcare market.

Without a strategic approach, you may lose a noticeable number of patients in your service location. 8 in 10 US consumers search for a local business online at least once a week. The foundation of a successful local SEO plan is thorough local keyword research. Doctors who provide treatment care services in a specific location must have a clear idea of the most-searched keywords by the local potential patients.

How to Find Location-specific Keywords for a Doctor’s Practice?

The following three practices are the most beneficial ways to find localized keywords for a doctor’s practice.

a. Choose Relevant Local Keywords – Doctors need to search for local keywords relevant to their practice niche. These relevant keywords can be the phrases commonly used by the local potential patients. For example, patients who seek treatment services in their nearby location search for keywords like ‘doctor near me’, ‘medical clinic in my location’, or ‘family physician in (city name).
b. Effectively Use Keyword Modifiers – Patients often use keyword modifiers like ‘best’, ‘top’, and ‘affordable’ to describe the quality of the type of treatment services they want to seek or find online. Doctors can use these modifiers with their target local keywords to improve their click-through rates. Such modifiers have a direct impact on the search intent of the local keywords. Two examples of such keywords with modifiers are ‘best doctor near my location’ and ‘affordable doctors clinic near me’.
c. Choose Localized Keywords – Most patients prefer to visit a doctor who provides treatment services in their nearby area. So that whenever there is an emergency or transportation issue, the patients can get urgent care without any hassle. Doctors and specialized medical service providers can select location keywords such as ‘top gynecologist near me’, ‘best general physician in my city’, and ‘reliable dental care provider in my location. They need to strategically use these keywords in their blogs, social media posts, and website pages.

Step 6: Perform a Competitor Keyword Analysis

The key to achieving success in SEO for doctors is to know about the keyword research strategies your competitors have implemented. Doctors must identify the keywords their competitors have ranked for but haven’t. They can employ keyword research tools to assess the performance of their competitors’ target keywords and identify the well-performing ones. Utilize these missed opportunities in your favor and select those keywords that can rank your practice as well.

How Can Doctors Perform a Competitor Keyword Analysis?

Explore how you can perform this analysis and get to know how the top-ranking doctors’ websites perform in terms of SEO.

a. Gather the URLs of your competitors’ websites and make a comprehensive list. If you still don’t have a good idea of your market competitors, it’s time to research them and learn more about the local doctors who provide similar treatment services in your service area.

b. You need to create a keyword list of those phases that you don’t want to target. Those keywords that can hamper your SEO efforts must be in the list. You shouldn’t;t invest your efforts and money to rank your content for these irrelevant keywords.

c. Medical care providers, like doctors, can use the keyword research tools to get the organic keyword report for their domain. We suggest you export the top 1000 rankings and repeat the process for your competitor’s site domain as well.

d. These tool allows you to apply certain filters before you export the keyword data. Now you need to create a spreadsheet of the rankings of your and your competitor’s target keywords.

e. Bonus Tip: Doctors need to add all the important keyword data together in the sheet, as it will help them find the keyword gap. Doctors can now find out those phrases their competitor sites have ranked for, but their websites haven’t.

Major Tools Doctors Can Use to Find Relevant And High-Intent Keywords 

If the process to find SEO keywords for doctors seems difficult and complex to you, here is a solution that can make it more simplified. There are some tools that doctors can use to identify the high-intent and relevant keywords to rank their practice higher on search results. These tools offer a list of helpful features to ensure the success of SEO for doctors. Here we have enlisted the top 5 keyword research tools and mentioned their features as well.

1. Google Keyword Planner

This is a beginner-friendly, free tool from Google that doctors can use to discover keywords relevant to their niche. It will provide you with the entire data insights related to the most-searched keywords on Google. You can track the average monthly searches, the competition or difficulties a keyword has, and even the suggested bids. You need to put the target keyword in the tool, and it will provide you with the entire list of other secondary relevant phrases. It is one of the keyword search tools that is directly related to the Google user’s search habits.

Want to find keyword phrases that web users from a specific location search for the most? With Google Keyword Planner, it is possible as well. The tool has location filters that help doctors target trending location-specific keywords and build a strong local presence.

2. Ahrefs

It is a multi-dimensional tool that offers more than keyword research. It provides various features such as keyword rank tracker, site audit, domain comparisons, site explorer, keyword generators, and broken link checker.

Ahrefs is one of the most popular SEO tools that offers you extensive keyword data, such as search volume and difficulty. You can even check the keywords’ potential to drive traffic to your website. But what is different in this tool? Ahrefs allows you to perform detailed competitive analysis and get a list of keywords your market competitors have ranked for. Furthermore, you can get the keyword suggestions based on their performance.

3. SEMrush

Another popular keyword research tool doctors can use is SEMrush. It is quite affordable for those doctors who want to start their keyword research and optimization journey but don’t want to invest a significant amount of money. It allows you to perform organic keyword research. Doctors can find the top keywords that potential patients search online to find a good doctor.

Are you one of those medical professionals who want to focus more on your competitor’s keyword strategy? If yes, then SEMrush can help you get the insights related to the keywords your competitors have targeted, their PPC ad budget, and campaign strategy. It also allows you to use a unique feature, which is the Keyword Magic Tool. This specific tool provides a list of related keywords grouped by various medical topics. Doctors can identify keyword gaps in their medical websites and other reputable websites of their competitors to improve their keyword strategy.

4. Google Insights and Google Trends

Google Insights is a tool that you can use to gather data on a specific topic. For instance, you want to know about the most common medical issues. This tool will provide you with the possible data available on Google regarding the topics. But how can a doctor effectively utilize this tool? They can find meaningful keyword opportunities and compare similar keywords related to their target phrases. It will help to decide which keywords to focus on and which are irrelevant.

On the other hand, Google Trends can help you identify keywords for doctor SEO related to a specific topic. It is also a free tool to analyze the popularity of search queries or the keywords used for such search queries on Google over a specific time. You can get extensive data about the keywords and your website’s performance.

5. Google Search Console

Though it is not a traditional keyword tool, it can help doctors find exceptional distance keywords to improve their content search rankings. For example, some keywords that you’ve targeted have ranked your website or specific services on Google. 

You can get the data insight into these keywords with the help of Google Search Console. This tool also offers you the information regarding the number of clicks and impressions those keywords have received. However, doctors can find their long-tail niche keywords through Google Search Console, while other traditional keyword research tools may overlook these crucial phrases.

Top 50 SEO Keywords for Doctors

Below is a list of the top 50 popular keywords for doctor SEO that you can use to rank your website and online presence. We’ve also provided you with the monthly search volume and difficulty of these popular SEO keywords for doctors. You can target these keywords and rank your website content for relevant search engine results.

Sl.no Keywords Volume Keyword Density
1Doctors near me450 000Low
2general physician near me246 000Low
3Skin Dr near me246 000Medium
4primary doctors near me165000Low
5Skin specialist doctor near me165000Low
6family doctor near me110000High
7ear doctor near me90 500Low
8Doctors’ offices near me90 500Low
9family doctors90 500Low
10doctor appointment74 000High 
11primary care doctor near me49 500Low
12doctor on demand49 500Low
13doctor on call49 500Low
14eye doctors49 500Low
15Holistic doctor near me49 500Low
16heart doctors near me49 500Low
17Internal medicine doctor40 500Low
18Hair Doctor near me33 100Medium
19doctor clinic near me33 100High 
20doctor of physical therapy33 100Low
21primary care doctor27 100Low
22General doctor near me27 100Low
23best eye doctor near me27 100Low
24Female doctors near me27 100Low
25medical doctor27 100Low
26best skin doctor near me22 200High
27Private doctors near me18 100Low
28Geriatric doctors near me18 100Low
29walk in doctor near me18 100Low
30MD doctors near me18 100Low
31allergy doctor18 100Low
32primary doctor14 800Low
33Homeopathic doctors near me14 800Low
34Best primary care doctors near me9 900Low
35Pediatric doctors near me9 900Low
35doctor appointment near me8100Low
36best doctors near me8 100Low
3724 hour doctor near me6 600Low
38Hand doctor near me33,100Low
39doctor for women near me4,400Low
40medical clinic near me201 000Low
41Find a doctor33 100Low
42Doctors accepting new patients6 600Low
43Doctors open today6 600Low
44frontline doctors3 600Low
45lung doctor near me9 900Low
46general medicine doctor near me9 900Low
47hair specialist doctor near me8 100Low
48Family practice doctors near me8 100Low
49Asthma specialist near me4 400Low
50primary care doctors accepting new patients5400Low

Conclusion

If you’re a doctor and planning to launch a website for your medical practice, you must prioritize search engine optimization to rank your practice and drive exceptional search engine traffic. And your search engine optimization will be incomplete without a detailed keyword research. SEO keywords for doctors are the cornerstone of the SEO strategy. Without high-intent and relevant keywords, you’ll not be able to make your content relevant to the common search queries of patients and rank the content for the same. We hope that our list of keywords for doctors’ SEO will make your medical practice rank higher in the search engine results pages. Additionally, our complete guide to the keyword research process will boost your SEO efforts and maximize their impact. You can also hire a doctor marketing company to avail their tailored SEO services.




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