Behavioral Health Network Resources

Drug Rehab SEO Vs. Digital Darwinism

𝘿𝙧𝙪𝙜 𝙧𝙚𝙝𝙖𝙗 𝙎𝙀𝙊 is not a one time and your done marketing component for inpatient rehab marketing, substance abuse IOP marketing, and service organizations. Buying treatment calls and boots on the ground marketing strategies are commonly used by many in the recovery industry.

These strategies are the costliest in the long run and are proven to be much less effective than in the past. These short-term and costly solutions are used because the recovery industry suffers from Digital Darwinism.

𝗗𝗿𝘂𝗴 𝗥𝗲𝗵𝗮𝗯 𝗦𝗘𝗢 𝗩𝘀. 𝗗𝗶𝗴𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹 𝗗𝗮𝗿𝘄𝗶𝗻𝗶𝘀𝗺

Digital Darwinism is a sign of the 21st-century demonstrating that conducting business, as usual, will eventually force you to close your doors. There are many addiction treatment centers and behavioral health organizations closing their doors nationwide.

The one thing they all had in common is that they suffered from Digital Darwinism. They stayed with past drug rehab marketing and business strategies of a buy rehab leads mentality. These organizations should have learned from Google when addiction treatment ads were first banned on July 1, 2017.

Now, in 2018, if you want to buy rehab leads or do PPC on Google and Facebook you need the Legit Script certification. This certification is only needed if you want to place paid ads on these platforms. This certification does not apply to organic marketing. In order to achieve page one rankings in organic marketing, it takes a structurally correct website, schema, a fast loading website, and drug rehab SEO.

Each component requires a specialist with specific knowledge. It takes time and an investment. However, the payoff goes way beyond a buy rehab leads strategy. Consider this, AdWords or PPC only account for about 2% of page one click-throughs, while the first three organic slots account for 70% of page one click-throughs.

𝗗𝗶𝗴𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹 𝗗𝗮𝗿𝘄𝗶𝗻𝗶𝘀𝗺 𝗙𝘂𝗲𝗹𝘀 𝗦𝗵𝗼𝗿𝘁-𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗺 𝗠𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗦𝗼𝗹𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀

Digital Darwinism is when technology evolves faster than businesses can adapt. The substance abuse industry has ignored web marketing for short-term solutions to their long-term problem of maintaining a healthy census. Not realizing that the short-term solutions strategy has put them on a hamster wheel with their addiction treatment marketing. They are forced to pay over and over again for the lead generation. Many of the small to medium size recovery centers think that they cannot compete on the web with the big players spending $100,000’s every month. They can compete with proven strategies put into place properly.

Many of these centers have also been burned by the large drug rehab marketing agencies with their cookie cutter option. Many of these agencies do not even rank for key terms for their own business like; drug rehab marketing agency or drug rehab marketing consultants. If they can’t rank their own business, how can you expect them to rank yours? Being educated on the many components of drug rehab SEO, knowing what to look for, and performing some of the SEO themselves will get the smaller centers on page one of Google.

What is Drug Rehab SEO?

Drug rehab SEO has many components including proper website development, schema, Google My Business, proper H tags, keyword counts, META descriptions, SERP descriptions, ALT tags and URL’s to name a few. Then there is off-page SEO that involves citations, back-links, long tail keywords, social media, and email marketing to name a few. These are some of the long-standing components that must be performed.

The newest, as of July 2018, is Google’s speed update affecting rankings on mobile devices. We recently spoke with Brian Frye, of Magna Technology, a national leader in website development about the importance of speed. This is what he had to say;

"After proper website development and SEO, speed becomes a big factor when ranking on mobile"

While it is impossible to name all the different components, CEO’s and marketing directors must get educated in order to rank on page one organically. Many in the drug rehabilitation industry have a poor website and poor SEO in their lead generation strategy. During our conversation with Mr. Frye, we decided to invite him as one of our 5 Executive Thought Leader panelists at our 10/23/18 addiction conference.

Critical Business Areas of Drug Rehab Marketing and Substance Abuse Billing

In any business, the #1 factor is generating revenue. In the drug and alcohol addiction treatment industry you generate revenue from marketing and billing. Many recovery industry businesses think they have these two areas under control. These are critical areas that CEO’s must be extremely knowledgeable in. In many cases organizations are leaving huge chunks of revenue on the table.

Marketing dollars are being thrown and wasted on top of a poorly developed website with poor drug rehab SEO. In-house billing and unchecked substance abuse billing companies are costing centers operating revenue. If you aren’t getting paid in 14-days with some of your receivables, do not know how much is out in receivables, or have large amounts owed you may not be in business much longer.

Our industry is changing fast and the organizations that don’t adapt will not be in business. You will not be able to operate with lazaire fare strategies. Relying upon your marketing Directors and Outreach staff’s book of referral sources puts your organization at great risk. Many are simply shuffling the same referral sources back and forth.

This is a short-term strategy that is causing many centers to close their doors. Drug rehab New Jersey does an excellent job with their marketing. They get their message in front of their target audience.

Marketing Directors in our industry do not understand web marketing in general. They have risen to the position of Marketing Director because at some point they generated a referral base from boots on the ground tactics. What happens many times is that their referral sources dry up and they are let go because they have little value to the organization with substance abuse marketing.

They have no marketing education or skills that provide value to the organizations. Judging from the many LinkedIn profiles we see daily, the average length of employment for Marketing Directors is about one year.
Drug Rehab SEO Website Development is the First and Most Important Step

The very first step in a solid marketing plan and drug rehab SEO is website development. An abundance of addiction treatment and opiate detox centers will use a website designer, not a website developer build their website. There is a very distinctive difference between these two roles.

A website designer will build the most beautiful website. This is often what CEO’s and marketing directors are most concerned with on their website. They don’t understand that this is only a small part of web marketing.
On the other hand, a website developer plays a much larger role in marketing on the web. A website developer puts the many critical components in place that get you ranked on Google.

Many judge their website on its’ aesthetics. This is about 10% of what you need to be looking at on a website. The remaining 90% is like the inside of a watch. There are many moving parts that must be placed correctly for Google to rank on page one. Without a structurally sound website, you are leaking wasted marketing dollars. If a website does not have a proper silo, schema, sitemap, HTTPS, mobile optimization or proper local SEO to name a few Google will not rank you or rank you poorly. This is a key factor in you substance abuse marketing.

What to Look for in Drug Rehab SEO

A Marketing Director position definitely says you are an addiction professional. As a professional, you should be skilled in every aspect of that position. This biggest chunk of that position is web marketing. Web marketing if executed correctly outperforms all other marketing combined. There are only a few small to medium size addiction treatment centers, detox’s, sober living facilities and sales/service organizations that have a decent web marketing strategy.

If your organization or drug rehab marketing agency are not on the first page of Google in the 3-pack or in the first three slots on page one organically for key longtail keywords you are not doing your job very well.
Drug Rehab Affordable SEO Checklist for CEO’s and Marketing Directors
As a CEO or Marketing Director you should be able to answer the following marketing and drug rehab SEO questions;

• Is our website structurally correct?
• Is the hierarchy of our website good for Google?
• Are the URL’s for our website correct for SEO?
• Does our website have an SSL certificate?
• Do we have schema incorporated into our website?
• Are our Google maps properly coded and placed on our website?
• Does our website have a sitemap and have we told Google it’s there?
• What is our list of drug rehab marketing keywords based on our organization’s services? And, out of those keywords which ones can, we easily rank for on the first page of Google?
• Do the main pages of our website have SEO for these keywords?
• Is our website fast enough on mobile for the new speed update released on July 9, 2018?
• What marketing company is performing our SEO and have we recently looked at their performance? Do we rank in the first three slots of Google organically for any of the keywords?
• What keywords are we ranking for in the Google 3-pack?
• What keywords are we ranking for in the top 3 organic slots of Google?
Addiction Treatment Centers Google your “drug rehabs” or the main services you offer followed by the city you are located in. ie. Drug Rehabs West Palm Beach.

• Do we understand Google analytics and how to use it to build our marketing campaign?
• What posts are producing the most calls from our call tracking metrics?
• How many calls are being produced by our marketing company?
• When was the last time we posted in our Google My Business?
• When was the last time we uploaded pictures in our Google My Business?
• Are we using Yoast to check the bare minimum for our SEO?
• Are our pictures on the website optimized?
• Do we have a blog?
• Does our blog have SEO for our keywords? If so, what are those keywords and how many of the blog posts have made it to page one of Google?
• Is our blog attracting and engaging for our target audience?
• How are we building quality back-links?
• How many citations do we have?
• Do we have a staff page?
• Are we getting regular Google Reviews? If not, why?
• Are we using email marketing to professionals, individuals seeking treatment and our alumni? Are we emailing EAP’s, Labor Unions, Interventionists, Private Clinicians, Treatment Centers, Detoxes and more…?
• How many of our staff are involved in our social media marketing? And, what are the uniform messages we are using?
• Are we building a targeted and captured social media audience of professionals and individuals seeking treatment with our drug rehab marketing on Facebook and LinkedIn?
• Are you utilizing addiction treatment email marketing?
• Is our direct addiction professional, and individuals seeking treatment audience over 10,000?
• Are you utilizing the World’s #1 business networking site LinkedIn (500 million members)? Are you using drug rehab marketing strategies to connect on LinkedIn?
• Do we understand how to maximize Facebook (2 billion members)
• Are you driving 500-1000 targeted visitors (per article) to your blog posts?
• Do we understand and utilize your Google Analytics?
• Do we understand and use call tracking metrics?
• Are we doing Lunch and Learns at our center for EAP’s, Labor Unions, Interventionists, Private Clinicians and more…?

You can get answers to these critical questions and more at Behavioral Health Network Resources addiction conferences EMP (ethical marketing Practices) Series next event on 10/23/18. This conference will cover proper website development, SEO, branding, social media marketing, and substance abuse billing.

Outreach Needs More Marketing Education

This is even more evident for Outreach positions. There are many new pups that are in the role of Outreach. Many are out of treatment for less than a year, and again have some source for referrals. Once their referral sources dry up or get reduced they are given the talk by the treatment center owner that they have 30 days to start generating more referrals.

In that 30 days, they are aggressively seeking new treatment centers for employment. Many times this is when they try to start using LinkedIn for outreach and addiction professional networking. As an Outreach professional and certainly as a Marketing Director you need to understand the complexities of web marketing.

Understanding Drug Rehab SEO Vs. Digital Darwinism

Your drug rehab SEO and marketing plan should utilize many different areas. Not getting up to speed with Digital Darwinism could be a deadly mistake. Once you have set-up the proper foundation you need to drive your target market to your website. Many drug and alcohol addiction treatment centers, opiate detox’s, sober livings and behavioral health sales/service organizations do not have the proper foundation in place. Without the proper website foundation, you are wasting large amounts of money on marketing. A website is like an iceberg only 10% of it is showing. The 90% underneath is the critical piece to be examined. Many organizations judge their website on how it looks. This is a critical and costly mistake. Take a look at drug rehab New Jersey and look closely at their SEO. They do an excellent job in the lead generation and SEO.

Drug rehab SEO is extremely complicated and behavioral health organizations need to be educated on what needs to be done. Drug rehab SEO involves key search words, H tags, internal and external links, high PR back-links, citations, Google My Business, Google 3-pack, schema, site speed, SERPS, and this list goes on. While this article provides a healthy checklist for drug rehab SEO, there is much more. SEO is an on-going task and treatment centers must take on more of this role. By attending addiction conferences that focus on the business and marketing side many can gain vital information. We not only perform drug rehab SEO, but we also teach our clients to be able to perform many tasks needed for SEO. Give us a call at 561-235-6195 and ask about our 90-day program that also provides you SEO training.