Local SEO for doctors: how patients find a practice on Google

Google says local results are mainly based on relevance, distance, and popularity. Relevance is how well your profile matches the search. Distance is how far you are from the patient. The third factor, which Google's page details under the heading prominence, is how well known you are, which Google says draws on things like how many websites link to you and how many reviews you have.

Two points matter most for practices. First, Google says there is no way to request or pay for a better local ranking. Second, it says businesses with complete and accurate information are more likely to show up in local search results. For a practice, completeness and accuracy are where the work starts.

Doctors are a special case in Google's rules. Google's guidelines name doctors, dentists and other public-facing professionals as individual practitioners, and they get their own rules:

• Several doctors at one location. The organization should create its own Business Profile for the location, separate from each practitioner's profile. Each doctor's profile title should include only the doctor's name, not the practice name.
• A solo doctor at a branded location. If one practitioner is the only public-facing doctor at a branded organization's location, Google suggests a single shared profile named in the format "[brand]: [practitioner name]."
• One profile per doctor. A practitioner shouldn't have multiple profiles to cover different specializations.

Google also allows a practitioner's profile to include a title or degree certification, so "Dr." in a doctor Google Business Profile name is acceptable when it reflects how patients know them.

Pick the fewest, most specific categories that describe what the practice is. Google's test is whether the category completes the sentence "This business IS a", not "this business HAS a." A pediatric practice should choose the category that says what it is, not one for every service it offers.

Hours need care in medicine. Google's guidelines say that businesses that operate only by appointment shouldn't provide hours. If your practice takes walk-ins during set times, list those hours. If every visit is booked in advance, follow the guideline and make the booking path obvious instead.

Patient reviews feed prominence, and Google says more reviews and positive ratings may help your local ranking. They also do something rankings can't: they tell a nervous patient what it is like to be treated by you.

Three habits help:

1. Ask consistently. A short request after a good visit, through the channel your patients already use, works better than a yearly push.
2. Answer every review. Google notes that replying shows that you value their feedback.
3. Protect privacy in every reply. Never confirm that a reviewer is a patient or mention anything about their care. Thank them, invite them to call the office and keep the details offline. Check your reply policy with whoever handles compliance for your practice.

A profile that was right last year can be wrong now. A new doctor joins, another leaves, the suite number changes or the office closes for a holiday. Google warns that if your information isn't accurate, your Business Profile might not show up for relevant searches in your area. Check the profile every time something changes, and fix it before patients notice.

Photos help too. Google suggests adding photos and videos to show customers what you offer. For a practice, real photos of the entrance, the waiting room and the parking area help a first-time patient arrive calm and on time, which is a better start to any visit.

The map is where patients find you. Your website is where they decide whether to trust you. Health is one of the areas where Google is strictest. Google says its systems give even more weight to content that aligns with strong E-E-A-T for topics that could significantly affect a person's health, and that of experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness, trust is most important.

In practice that means:

• Each doctor has a bio page with training, board certifications and the conditions they treat.
• Health articles say who wrote them and which clinician reviewed them. Google's own questions for content creators ask whether content is written or reviewed by an expert who knows the topic well.
• Facts are current and easy to verify.

1. Claim and verify the practice profile and each public-facing doctor's profile.
2. Fix names, categories and hours using Google's practitioner rules.
3. Set up a simple, steady review request.
4. Reply to every review without mentioning care details.
5. Add or update a bio page for every doctor.

Local SEO for doctors is not a trick. It is the discipline of being accurate in the places patients look first.