SEO for Senior Living: Benefits, Costs + 10 Tips to Get More Leads

SEO can help senior living websites rank higher in search and drive qualified leads. Learn the steps, expert tips, costs, and mistakes to avoid. Downloadable checklist included.

Looking out for your website’s health is like caring for residents in a senior living home. You must provide top level care and monitor each person to ensure their happiness and wellbeing.

In website SEO, each element also needs constant attention and care to rank higher in search engines.

So in this guide, we’ll explore steps for building an SEO strategy and common mistakes to avoid when optimizing your site.

What is SEO for senior living?

SEO for senior living helps companies in the assisted living industry rank their websites higher in search engines.

Unlike other businesses, senior living institutions may require gentler marketing approaches that are sensitive to the clientele and patients.

Proper research will determine the right language to speak directly to families with loved ones needing assisted living facilities.

Why perform SEO for senior living?

When a family member needs senior living services, where does their search begin? Odds are, it’s on Google or another search engine. So marketers have a great opportunity to use SEO to attract traffic from these searches.

But that’s not the only benefit — you may also see:

• Increased brand awareness
• Higher trust and credibility
• Quicker indexing on Google and Bing
• Increased reach for unique potential clients and patients
• Better user experience for families looking for answers
• More targeted marketing
• Long lasting ranking results
• More honed target audience
• Improved data and performance insights
• Higher cost savings (compared to pay-per-click ads)
• Increased competitive advantage especially locally
• More improved search engine rankings
• More quality backlinks to boost domain authority
• Higher conversion rates
• Better algorithm change adaptability
• Improved user experience (UX)
• Increased online website traffic
• Reduced website technical errors

Performing SEO is easy, especially with help from an expert agency. See how HawkSEM helped Legends Senior Living, a senior living community, double its conversion rates.

10 steps to building an SEO campaign for senior living

How exactly do you use SEO to rank on Google? You need an SEO plan for your senior living website.

So let’s get into the steps.

1. Know your target audience
2. Perform keyword research
3. Optimize your website’s structure
4. Create exceptional content
5. Optimize for on-page SEO
6. Pay attention to technical SEO
7. Engage in link building techniques
8. Incorporate SEO tracking and analytics methods
9. Engage on social media
10. Always update content

1. Know your target audience

To improve your online presence and appeal to the assisted living community, learn everything you can about your target audience. This will inform how you create a senior living marketing strategy that speaks to families and their prospective residents.

To narrow your target audience, craft buyer personas for multiple types of online users, including family members of the potential resident (e.g., child, sibling).

Also, target specific health conditions, such as dementia, schizophrenia, cardiovascular disease, cancer, and so on.

This way, your web content speaks to the unique needs of your target audiences. Build landing pages for each group you want to target to personalize the pain points and offer.

2. Perform keyword research

Keyword research and keyword mapping identify search terms to target throughout your website.

Performing keyword research starts with an idea of a topic you’d like to write about. For example, health safety tips in your assisted living facility.

From that general idea, use keyword research tools like Ahrefs, Semrush, Spyfu, Keyword Planner, and Moz Keyword Explorer to find the best keywords for that topic.

These keyword research tools provide insights for:

• Average monthly search volume
• Keyword difficulty
• Search intent
• Cost-per-click (CPC)
• And SERP feature

Go for search terms with low keyword difficulty and high search volume to rank easier for keywords that drive traffic.

3. Optimize your website’s structure

Before making alterations to your website, invite someone outside of your organization, like a friend or family member, to engage with it and provide feedback.

Here are questions you should ask after they engage with your site:

• Can you easily navigate the website?
• Is it easy to find information?
• Does it have an intuitive site structure?
• Is the web design attractive?
• Would you benefit from a chatbot?
• Are the pop-ups intrusive?

If the answer to these questions was “no,” make website design or structural changes. Improving the user experience and making navigation easier increases the chance of retaining and converting visitors.

4. Create exceptional content

Content creation doesn’t stop at landing pages and blog content. Other valuable forms of content can entertain and educate potential website visitors, such as:

• Videos
• Infographics
• Memes
• Case studies
• Ebooks
• Whitepapers
• Podcasts
• Courses
• Webinars

Whatever you choose, make sure it’s valuable and shareable. It’s about appealing to the different types of learners on the internet. Some people will read every word of a blog post, while others prefer watching videos to consume information.

If extensive content creation seems too overwhelming, invest in SEO services or an SEO consultant to lighten the load.

5. Optimize for on-page SEO

Don’t ignore on-page SEO factors. While optimizing your content, also optimize your alt tags, meta descriptions, and title tags.

For assisted living SEO, you’ll need readable and easy to digest content. Also, structure your content with H1s, H2s, and H3s so readers can skim for an answer.

Plus, it helps Google understand what your content is about so it can place it in front of the right eyes. As a final note, it’s wise to link to other pieces of internal content that support your main topic.

6. Pay attention to technical SEO

Technical SEO is essential to overall website function and user experience. There are ways to audit and improve elements of technical SEO to make sure your website is running smoothly.

Use SEO audit tools from Semrush or Ahrefs to help discover opportunities for improvement like:

• Duplicate content or title tags
• Uncrawlable pages
• Missing schema markup
• HTTPS requests
• 404 errors
• Broken links
• Page redirects

Just one of these can negatively impact your website and keep you from ranking and generating qualified leads.

For example, if you have a 404 page that doesn’t redirect to a different solution, you increase the likelihood of a user clicking away to a competitor’s website.

Since technical SEO is complex, hire someone to conduct an SEO audit or reach out to developers to make technical changes.

7. Engage in link building techniques

Google is slowly phasing out backlinks as an important ranking factor, but many reputable marketing professionals recognize its ongoing importance. Backlinko, for example, increased its organic traffic by 110% over 14 days using “The Skyscraper Technique.”

Although an involved process, you can start building relationships with other websites to get those quality backlinks. Gather the highest quality backlinks from reputable websites, rather than a large quantity from low-authority sites.

Semrush’s link building tool makes reaching out and communicating with backlink opportunities easier.

8. Incorporate SEO tracking and analytics methods

Organic search metrics can tell you so much about users and how they’re consuming your content.

You can collect new insights on how your SEO strategy is faring by using special SEO tracking and monitoring tools. This isn’t just valuable for reporting progress, it can also help you reach defined KPIs, benchmarks, and goals you’ve put in place at the start of your SEO journey.

Monitoring your website performance consistently is as important as making updates.

“Tracking is an essential part of any SEO campaign, especially for Manufacturing Firms,” says Sam Yadegar, CEO of HawkSEM.

“We use ConversionIQ to granularly track every step of the buyer journey so we can understand what aspects of a campaign are working and where we should trim the fat. This allows us to optimize towards a higher ROI YoY.”

Google Analytics and Google Search Console are free tools that simplify tracking progress and seeing data insights. They also aid in discovering weaknesses, strengths, user behavior, and demographic data.

All are vital for improving on and altering your SEO strategy, and even your targeted audiences.

9. Engage on social media

Not being active on social media could negatively impact your website. Google and other search engines rank websites that are active.

While this isn’t a direct ranking factor, search engines take social media activity into consideration when presenting pages in search results.

The goal is to present the most relevant and credible content to the user, and if search engines see a competitor interacting more genuinely, it may prioritize that competitor.

Social media activity and engagement looks like:

• Consistently posting content
• Interacting with other pages and posts relevant to your industry
• Replying to user comments
• Sharing other relevant content, images, or videos

Social media is also a crucial part of content marketing and a preferred avenue for distributing your content.

If a blog post or ebook resonates with a user, the likelihood of them sharing it with others on social media increases, generating more organic traffic.

10. Always update content

We advise updating content before creating something new. If you have lots of content that’s outdated and shows potential for better ranking, update it before creating something on a similar topic.

To assess whether your content needs refreshing, perform regular content audits. If your website goes through frequent changes, conduct at least two audits per year.

Average cost of SEO for senior living

Pricing can range between $3,000 and $10,000 a month depending on your business goals and the type of services you need.

Before making any buying decisions, interview several SEO companies to see who offers the most services at the best value.

And be sure to heavily interview and vet your SEO specialist to ensure you’re hiring an agency that can deliver results.

We’ll get into some tips on how to hire an SEO agency, so you know where to begin.

Local SEO tips for senior living

Senior living and retirement communities usually operate on a local level, which means there is a huge opportunity to leverage local SEO techniques. This is because only one third of businesses incorporate local SEO strategies into their overall marketing strategy.

To get started with local SEO, here are some quick tips:

• Enhance your Google Business Profile: When you claim your Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business) you gain full control of your online business listings. From your GBP, you can upload images, optimize critical business info, and change name, address, and phone number (NAP).
• Conduct local keyword research: A bit different from traditional SEO, local SEO keyword research involves looking for location-based keywords like “best senior living homes in Kansas City” or “senior living home costs in Detroit.” Add these keywords in your content to attract more localized search queries.
• Create localized content: Your blog posts and landing pages can talk about your services, but also use your website to uplift local events, news, or community activities. Doing so can boost your local SEO and reinforce your facility’s presence in the community to create credibility.
• Encourage online reviews: Word-of-mouth is a powerful tool for garnering clientele, so is having great online reviews. People read reviews to inform their buying decisions, so encourage your current customers to leave a review on Facebook, Yelp, Foursquare, and Google.
• Engage in local link building: Working with the city government staff, Chamber of Commerce members, or other businesses should be a big part of your strategy. You can acquire quality backlinks from local businesses you partner with. This may require in-person networking and relationship building.
• Update local business listings: Update your local business listings on dozens of directories across the internet. Some tools that can unify your business listing information include Semrush and Yext. They secure more consistent business information and NAP so your customers always know how to find you.
• Create a local URL structure: Creating location-specific landing pages better appeals to target audiences. For example, if you have multiple facility locations, create a page optimized for a local keyword dedicated to each specific location.

If you’re a local facility that doesn’t target clientele outside the region, you may benefit more from local SEO.

Common mistakes to avoid with SEO for senior living

Over the years, the Google algorithm has become stricter to keep website owners from using unethical techniques to secure better rankings.

Even with these strict guidelines in place, it’s possible to make mistakes when optimizing your site.

Here’s a short list of the common mistakes marketers and brands make when launching their strategies:

• Not updating content
• Low-quality backlinks
• Never running content audits
• Duplicate content or plagiarism
• Using irrelevant keywords and phrases
• Inconsistent listing directories
• Poor and rushed content
• Neglecting use of analytics and audit tools
• Not engaging with customer reviews
• Overlooking mobile SEO
• Stuffing keywords
• Low-quality user experience
• Ignoring local SEO
• Cannibalizing pages
• Ignoring Technical SEO, on-page SEO, and off-page SEO
• Not using schema markup
• Opting out of social media activity

Fortunately, these are avoidable with help from an SEO agency. By avoiding these altogether, you can rank smoothly and without issue.

21 Common SEO terms to know

If you plan to hire an SEO agency, knowing these terms can inform you about the work the agency is doing for you.

Here are those common SEO terms:

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO): A way to improve website content and page elements to improve online visibility in search engines.
2. Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs): A collection of page listings that appear in search results after performing a search query.
3. Organic Traffic: The monthly website visitor count.
4. Search volume: The average number of times a keyword is searched per month, which you can discover when doing keyword research.
5. Local Search: When a user conducts a search query that looks for solutions or results in a specific area.
6. On-page SEO: When you optimize a website’s content and page elements like alt tags and meta data.
7. Off-Page SEO: When you optimize your website externally using methods like link building or guest blogging.
8. Pay-per-click (PPC): A paid advertising technique where you pay each time a user clicks on your ad.
9. Backlink: Can be acquired when another website links back to your website, which can improve your overall ranking.
10. Conversion rate: The percentage of users taking action on your website.
11. Link Building: A part of the off-page SEO strategy which helps acquire qualified backlinks from other websites through relationship building.
12. Page Rank: A web page value (on a scale of 0-100) put in place by Google, to help determine page ranks for a website.
13. Domain Authority: A scoring system Moz developed to rank websites based on their authority.
14. Keyword: The primary search term or phrase you can use to optimize your page content for search engines.
15. Keyword difficulty: Tells you the ranking ease for a keyword on a scale from 0-100.
16. Meta descriptions: The snippet of text that describes what a web page is about in search engine results.
17. Anchor text: The highlighted text attached to a link in your content.
18. Alt text: Added to your images help describe them to Google search engines and users.
19. Technical SEO: Involves changing elements of the site to improve the user experience.
20. Title tags: An HTML element that tells users the titles of your landing pages.
21. Lead generation: A process of building interest in a product or service with intent to convert a customer to a sale.

Taking the time to understand these common SEO terms is the first step in devising a strong strategy to attract that right clientele. Of course, there are many other terms you will come to know over time once you get more familiar with digital marketing practices.

Free SEO Checklist for a senior living SEO campaign

10 Steps to Building an SEO Campaign for Senior Living

• Know your target audience
• Perform keyword research
• Optimize your website’s structure
• Create exceptional content
• Optimize for on-page SEO
• Pay attention to technical SEO
• Engage in link building techniques
• Incorporate SEO tracking and analytics methods
• Engage on social media
• Always update content

Local SEO Tips for Senior Living

• Enhance your Google Business Profile
• Conduct local keyword research
• Create localized content
• Encourage online reviews
• Engage in local link building
• Update local business listings
• Create a local URL structure

Common Mistakes to Avoid with SEO for Senior Living

• Not updating your content
• Low-quality backlinks
• Never running content audits
• Duplicate content or plagiarism
• Using irrelevant keywords and phrases
• Inconsistent listing directories
• Poor and rushed content
• Neglecting use of analytics and audit tools
• Not engaging with customer reviews
• Overlooking mobile SEO
• Stuffing keywords
• Low-quality user experience
• Ignoring local SEO
• Cannibalizing your pages
• Ignoring Technical SEO, on-page SEO, and off-page SEO
• Not utilizing schema markup
• Opting out of social media activity

The takeaway

Navigating SEO for senior living communities is more than a marketing strategy, it’s an empathetic approach that helps you connect with families. A strategy that seeks the best care for their loved ones should be at the heart of your SEO plan.

Let this comprehensive guide help you create a powerful strategy that compassionately recruits new residents and helps you position your brand as credible and trustworthy.

Remember, just like caring for residents, your website’s SEO requires continuous attention and care. By adopting these techniques and keeping up with SEO trends, you can make a meaningful impact in the senior living community through the power of SEO.

Need help with ranking your assisted living website? Request a free consultation with HawkSEM today.