As the landscape of online search continues to evolve in the age of generative AI, many healthcare systems are struggling to meet their patients where they are. The medical copy and SEO team at mhp.si has a proven record of creating accurate, SEO-optimized medical copy that not only translates into more website traffic, but more patients as well. Here’s one great example:
In early 2023, a large, campus-based hospital client serving Southern California came to mhp.si with a problem. Their Digestive Health program was excellent, delivering cutting-edge technology and life-changing procedures, including many options that are unique on the West Coast. But because the program’s website didn’t rank well in Google search, local patients searching online for digestive treatment weren’t finding the client’s website.
Over just three months, mhp.si used a blend of authoritative, deep-dive content and hyper-local SEO techniques to solve the client’s issue and then some. A few of the remarkable results the client saw in the first full quarter after the content was published include:
- A 246% increase in overall impressions between Q1 2023 and Q1 2024.
- A 534% increase in clicks over the same period.
- 276 digestive-health keywords ranked in the top 100 search results (up from fewer than 150 before the project).
- 56 keywords ranked in the top 3 results, compared to only 10 keywords in the top 3 when we took on the project.
- Organic search traffic rose to 41% of the site’s overall traffic, surpassing national benchmarks.
- The client’s page on Liver Fibrosis went from 116 impressions and two clicks in Q1 2023 to 267,372 impressions and 7,413 clicks in Q1 2024.
- Quarter-to-quarter impressions on procedure- and treatment-related pages increased by 833%, with clicks on those pages up by an incredible 1,130% (no, that’s not a typo).
How we did it holds a number of important lessons for healthcare providers trying to break through the online noise in high-competition areas.
Read: Five Actionable Tips for Hyper-Local Hospital Content
The Challenge: An ‘Online Invisible’ Provider
The client’s Digestive Health program is a pillar of their brand, delivering world-class specialists and clinics, next-generation diagnostics and the most comprehensive treatment options in the area. But because the client’s website content was outdated and thin, their competitors dominated search rankings for high-value digestive procedures like colonoscopies, endoscopies, diagnostic scans, IBS treatment and minimally-invasive surgery.
That was impacting the hospital’s bottom line, and preventing local residents from finding the advanced care the client could provide.
Packed with highly respected providers, Southern California is one of the most competitive and profitable healthcare landscapes in North America. That makes the region notoriously difficult to crack with traditional Search Engine Optimization techniques. We knew it was a problem that would require outside-the-box thinking — and the most informative medical content mhp.si had ever produced.
Our research showed that the client had fewer than 150 digestive health keywords in the top 100 search results, and only 10 keywords in the top three. Google Analytics research also told us that organic search volume only contributed 26% of the site’s total monthly traffic.
To turn things around in the most beneficial way, we needed to help the client attract the right traffic: patients in Orange County, L.A. County and Southern California who were actively looking for nearby digestive health treatment through searches like “Liver Fibrosis Care in Southern California,” or “Colonoscopy Orange County.”
Location-based searches like these are often highly indicative of a patient who is deep in the decision funnel, committed to seeking answers and actively looking for a trusted, nearby provider. If we could win local search for digestive conditions, we wouldn’t just bring traffic to the client’s website. We’d bring patients through their doors.
The Solution: Next-Level Medical Content and Hyper-Local SEO
Between July and October 2023, our team developed 34 long-form pages covering a wide range of digestive conditions, plus diagnostic techniques and treatment options offered by the client. In total, we produced more than 46,000 words of rigorously researched, medically accurate and information-rich content in just three months.
If patients can’t understand what they’re reading, they’ll soon move along to another source that explains it better. Knowing how dense and jargony the medical information offered by the client’s competitors could be, the dedicated, in-house medical copywriting team at mhp.si went all-in on patient readability, focused on making complex conditions and treatment options clear for average readers while still being rigorously accurate.
In addition, through close collaboration between our Copy and SEO teams, each of the 34 pieces was carefully optimized for hyper-local keywords like: “HIDA Scan Orange County” or “IBS treatment Huntington Beach,” often mentioning the names of specific communities to target searches by the wealthy, aging population in those areas.
The Results: Just What the Doctor Ordered
As we’ve discussed, the client quickly realized big-time results — and a sizable organic traffic and conversion jump that continues to this day.
But the real proof that hyper-local SEO techniques work, even in markets as competitive as Southern California, was the explosion in patient leads. In Q1 2024 alone the client’s Digestive Health pages generated 130 phone calls and 50 information form submissions. In Q1 2023, there had been none.
The client is also cited by name in many of Google’s AI-generated overviews for Southern California-specific digestive health searches. This result shows that detailed, information-dense medical content and hyper-local SEO techniques can still help hospitals get to the top of the page, even as generative AI actively reshapes how patients search for care.
If hyper-local SEO and exhaustive, patient-first medical content can crack Southern California and breach the AI search gap for a client, we believe it can do the same for hospitals in markets across the U.S.
Read: Five Actionable Takeaways for Hospital Execs
Based on This Case Study
Contact mhp.si today
Getting your healthcare institution’s share of online traffic and patient attention is harder in the age of AI, but mhp.si can make it happen for clients, even in highly competitive markets. As our results show, pairing hyper-local SEO tactics and patient-focused content can help hospitals push through the noise online, show up in AI overviews and connect with nearby patients looking for the care you provide.
Need hospital website copy that can boost your visibility online and get nearby patients through your doors? The in-house medical copywriting and SEO teams at mhp.si can help. Contact us today.
