SEO is the strategy you need for your acupuncture clinic if you want to experience long-term growth and success. In this article, we will discuss how investing in SEO for acupuncture will help your target audience find your acupuncture clinic, maximize your reach, and boost your visibility on search engine results pages to bring you more new patients and help you stand out from your local competitors.

What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

SEO or Search Engine Optimization is the process used to optimize a website’s technical configuration, content relevance, and link popularity, making these websites or pages easier to find, more relevant, and more popular towards a user’s search queries. As a result, search engines will rank these pages higher, increasing visibility to drive more people to the website, and the chances for more conversions, leading to more customers and higher revenue.

On-Page SEO (or on-site SEO) involves optimizing your web pages to rank higher on search engines, such as the title tag, relevant keywords, internal links, meta descriptions, and URL structure.

Off-Page SEO involves improving and making efforts to your website from the outside, by building backlinks and gaining exposure through different channels, such as guest postings or social media marketing.

Technical SEO is optimizing the technical aspects of your website for search engines, which can include fixing indexing issues, keyword cannibalization, making your website mobile-friendly, and more.

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1. Why SEO for Acupuncturists?

There are many benefits to using SEO for acupuncture clinics, such as improving your digital marketing ROI, decreasing advertising costs, promoting your company every day, targeting every stage of the buying funnel, and more.

SEO for your acupuncture clinic will help your website get improved visibility, meaning that your rank on search result pages will be higher, increasing the chances of people clicking on your website. It will also help build your credibility as an acupuncture clinic because ranking on the first page of search results signals users that search engines trust your website.

Another reason why your acupuncturists should invest in SEO is that it is a long-term strategy that will provide you with positive results in the long run, such as generating more organic leads and sales, driving high-quality traffic to your website, and being able to outrank your local competitors on search result pages.

Let’s look at a Search Engine Results Page (SERP) for Acupuncture in Irvine, California:

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1.2 How Do Google and Other Search Engines Rank Websites?

Google and other search engines use complex algorithms to determine your rank on SERP or search engine results pages, and these will also depend on the relevance and quality of your website content. Let’s look at some of the key elements that influence algorithms to rank your acupuncture website:

1. Relevance – Search engines will assess how relevant the content of your acupuncture web page is through elements like keywords, content quality, and user engagement levels.
2. Authority – The authority of your acupuncture website can influence ranking, and this is usually determined by factors like using backlinks from reputable sources, which you can optimize through on-page and off-page SEO.
3. Crawling and Indexing – This is the process where search engines use web crawlers or spider bots to scan and index the pages from your acupuncture website, so your web pages are accessible for search queries.
4. Layout – These are the key factors involved with your web page layout that can be optimized with on-page SEO strategies, to positively impact your ranking on SERP, such as headings, meta tags, and internal and external links.
5. Context – Search engines will consider how relevant the context of your web page is to search queries and the user’s location when ranking your pages on SERP.
6. Classification – The process of search engines classifying your web page into different groups or categories based on attributes and characteristics of the page, like content, keywords, and user intent.
7. Weighting – Different elements for on-page and off-page SEO on your acupuncture web page will have different weights depending on their importance in ranking.

It’s important to take note that SEO algorithms are constantly evolving. This means that you will need to stay updated with SEO best practices and continuously adapt and apply your strategies.

2. On-Page SEO Strategies

2.1 URL Slugs

A URL slug (also known as website slug) is the last part of the URL address that serves as a unique identifier of the page. It is often considered a great place to include the target or primary keyword of a page and keep in mind that the URL slug should be user-friendly.

For example:

• https://acupunctureinirvine.com/about-us/
• https://acupunctureinirvine.com/conditions-treated/acupuncture-for-back-pain/

These examples use a URL slug that provides a clear indication of the content of the website. For instance, “about us” as the URL slug gives the user an indication that they can learn more about the acupuncture clinic, its achievements, credentials, and more. The other example has a longer URL slug of “conditions-treated/acupuncture-for-back-pain”. Using the target keyword in the URL slug, and providing a concise description of the page is more likely to encourage a user to click on the link over a URL slug that has irrelevant information, such as a chain of numbers.

Optimise URL Slugs for SEO:

• Be descriptive (describe the content of the page using your target keyword and make it user-friendly)
• Make it concise and easy to read (try to use less than 5 words in your URL slug)
• Separate words (improves the readability of the URL slug)
• Use hyphens, not underscores
• Use lowercase characters (they can be case-sensitive so keeping them lowercase avoids any issues)
• Avoid special characters (don’t use emojis)
• Make it future-proof (Avoid using numbers that may change in the future, such as the publishing date)

2.2 Meta Descriptions

An HTML meta description tag is a brief summary of a webpage. You want to keep it unique, descriptive, and relevant to the page. It is also the part of the search snippet in a search engine results page, that helps give the user an idea of the content page and how it is relevant to their search query.

With an effective meta description tag, you can convince users to click on your link, therefore increasing your click-through rate.

Optimize meta descriptions for SEO:

• Keep your meta descriptions between 155 to 160 characters max
• Include your primary target keyword
• It should satisfy the user’s search query (Understand the search intent for an effective meta description)

2.3 Title Tags

A title tag is an HTML element that sets a webpage’s title. This can be seen in browser tabs and search results. It is recommended to keep title tags between 50 to 60 characters max so that the words won’t get cut off on desktop or mobile search engine result pages or SERPs.

Optimize Title Tags for SEO:

• Keep title tag length between 50 to 60 characters
• Avoid keyword stuffing
• Target one primary keyword
• Make sure the <title> element is present in your page’s HTML
• It should accurately describe your page

2.4 Internal and External Links

Internal Links

Internal Links are relevant pages on your acupuncture clinic website that should be useful for the page visitor, and that provide additional content of useful and relevant information.

Internal linking also helps improve your website’s SEO by helping search engines find new relevant content, and boosts the relevance and authority of your web pages for specific keywords.

Best practices for internal links:

• Create plenty of internal links throughout your acupuncture website. You will need to create many internal pages and write quality content.
• Link high authority and relevant pages to improve your ranking and for a better user experience
• Use anchor texts instead of phrases like “click here”.
• Include at least 3 to 5 internal links

External Links

External Links are relevant pages that are found outside your website, and they act as hyperlinks (or outbound links) on a website pointing to a different domain.

External links are used to help search engines and users have a better understanding of a site’s topic, and they can boost the ranking and reputation of a site if they are used on authoritative and relevant sources.

Best practices for external links:

• Link to relevant sources. Make sure these sources add value to your page and to your readers.
• Use external links from credible and professional sources
• Don’t link your competitor’s website
• Use keyword anchor texts
• Ensure that external links open to a new tab

2.5 Alt Tags

Alt tags (also known as alternative text, alt attributes, and alt descriptions) are used to describe the appearance or function of an image used on a page. Alt tags add additional context to the images you use on your blog posts, and they help screen reading tools to describe the images to visually impaired readers. Alt tags also allow search engines to crawl and rank your website.

Along with implementing image title and file naming best practices on your alt tags, including alt text ensures that all users and bots can understand the content of your website.

Best practices for alt tags:

• Describe the image as specifically as possible
• The description should relate to the topic of your blog post
• Keep it relatively short or up to 125 characters
• Include keywords but avoid keyword stuffing
• Don’t include “image of” or “picture of” in your alt text.

Headings to boost the rank of posts

Using relevant headings in your blog post will increase the chance of your blog showing up on Google’s featured snippets. Showing up on Google’s Search Results Page with effectively featured snippets containing a concise description (usually made up of 40-60 words) will increase your click-through rate, and will help you get a better understanding of your target audience’s interests.

Tips on how to rank on Google’s Featured Snippets:

• Content should match the user’s intent
• Well written content
• Understand searcher intent
• Create/Update content outline
• Add relevant graphics and lists, such as data displayed in tables and organized lists

2.6 Updating old blog posts

If you have a lot of old blog posts on your acupuncture website, you want to update them to support your SEO efforts. Updating these will help your website rank high on relevant searches, and one of the advantages of updating these is that it will take less time compared to writing new posts. Doing so will also maximize the reach and engagement of your posts

How to update blog posts?

• Check for any outdated features or trends that were applicable in the past, but not applicable in the present time
• Check every internal and external link on your blog posts. Some of these might redirect website visitors to dead links and some of these may have changed to a new domain
• Promote your blog using other formats, such as infographics (this is especially useful for long-form content)
• Share them on social media platforms like Pinterest

2.7 Keyword Research

Keywords are one of the most critical elements that help your acupuncture clinic be found by your potential customers, hence the importance of keyword research prior to creating your content. Having comprehensive research on keywords for your business will help you have a better understanding of the actual search terms that your target audience is searching for when looking for acupuncture treatments or services.

Choosing your keywords:

When choosing your keywords, you want to consider the following factors to help with your keyword research.

• Monthly search volume indicates the demand for that keyword. This is the number of times a specific keyword was searched within a month, or even within the last 12 months.
• Keyword difficulty is how difficult a specific keyword can rank organically
• Relevance to your business – use keywords that are relevant to your acupuncture business. These can be services you offer, locations where your acupuncture business operates, and more.
• Search intent is the intention of the user when searching for a specific keyword. These can be informational, navigational, transactional, or commercial.

Types of search intent:

• Informational intent is when a user wants to learn more information about something. These searches will usually be phrased questions with terms such as “how”, “why”, “tips” and “solution”.
• Navigational intent is when a user is actively looking for a specific page. This is usually an indication that the user already knows what they are searching for, such as “acupuncture for back pain”
• Commercial intent will include keywords users use to research before making a purchase. These can also involve searches such as “acupuncture clinic near me x reviews”
• Transactional intent is when users want to find something specific (for instance, acupuncture treatment for tendonitis), to make a purchase, or even sign up for a newsletter

2.8 Keyword Tools for Keyword Research

Browser Extensions (e.g. Keyword Surfer, Keyword Everywhere)

Using browser extensions for your keyword research offers plenty of benefits such as saving you time on research, and offering help with your SEO efforts. Here are some we have tried and tested:

Keyword Surfer is a browser extension that collects search data for your keywords. Essential metrics like search volume, CPC, and estimated traffic can be seen using this tool. This browser extension also lets you generate keyword ideas and see search volumes directly in Google search results.

Keywords Everywhere is another browser extension that offers a “freemium” SEO keyword research tool. It’s a fast and easy-to-use powerful keyword research tool that doesn’t require you to log in to any SEO tool online. It will provide you with analytics on volume searches, CPC (Cost-Per-Click), relevant keywords, and even long-tail keywords.

Google Ads Keyword Planner

Google’s Keyword Planner is one of the free tools you can use to help with your keyword research, especially when creating search campaigns. It helps you discover new keywords, provides keyword forecasts and you can get bid estimates which can give you a better understanding of how high intent a keyword is.

Google’s Autocomplete Predictions

This is a feature within Google Search that uses automated systems to generate predictions with relevant search queries coming from real and trending searches, based on your location.

Google’s Related Searches Section

Related searches are generated based on Google’s algorithm, and are very useful for SEO-related searches to help you get a better understanding of your target audience’s search intent.

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3. Off-Page SEO Strategies

3.1 Guest posting

Guest posting (or guest blogging) is one of the most effective link-building tactics (which is the process of getting other websites to link back to your acupuncture website) to get your brand in front of a different audience and attract traffic back to your acupuncture website. It can also help you get high-quality backlinks, and improve domain authority. All these factors also signal to search engines that you are an industry expert.

For guest posting opportunities, you can try using keywords such as “write for us + acupuncture clinic”. This will provide you with websites accepting guest posts along with guidelines.

Tips when writing guest posts:

• Follow their style of writing
• Follow the guest posting guidelines
• Include internal links from their website
• Proofread for grammar and spelling mistakes before publishing
• Work on your author’s bio (you should tell something about yourself, what you do, and social channels where they can reach you)

3.2 Content Marketing

Content marketing is an important off-page SEO tactic referred to as the basis of all sorts of digital marketing campaigns. You need to produce content specific to your target audience that will be enjoyable and provide a solution for the searcher to read, such as a blog post on acupuncture for chronic pain. It is also referred to as a strategic marketing strategy that focuses on attracting and retaining your target audience, ultimately driving profitable customer action.

Finding ways to distribute your content to other channels can help boost off-page signals. Some of those channels you can use for off-page SEO are:

• PR
• Social Media
• Influencer Marketing
• Podcasts
• Content Syndication
• Forums
• And more.

3.4 Join forums

Another off-page optimization strategy you can use for your acupuncture site is participating in online discussion forums such as Reddit, Quora, and LinkedIn groups. Online communities help boost your off-page SEO by making your acupuncture site more popular and improving your rank on SERP or search engine results pages. Participating in relevant online discussions is an opportunity to establish your expertise in the industry and linking relevant blog posts from your acupuncture website to support and further explain your answer will help build your authority, resulting in more backlinks, site traffic, and more new customers.

During online discussions, there are a few factors you want to consider for instance:

• Follow the platform policies
• Only add links from your website that are relevant to the topic being discussed
• Don’t spam the comment section just to get more links. This could make you lose credibility and ruin your reputation
• Don’t add links in every single answer you provide
• Provide accurate answers

As we’ve mentioned earlier in this article, technical SEO focuses on the technical aspects of your website. These are extremely important because you want to ensure that your website is easy to navigate for users, and is free of any technical issues to prevent it from not ranking on search engines. Implementing technical SEO is also essential to attract organic traffic that converts into customers for your acupuncture clinic.

4.1 Optimize your site

The first step that you need to do is to optimize your site for technical SEO to ensure that search engines can effectively crawl it. Crawling involves the process of search engine bots systematically discovering content on a website, such as text, images, videos, links, and other file types accessible to bots. Content is exclusively found through links, and if you want your pages to show up in search results, you will need to make sure they are first and foremost accessible to search engines.

After crawling your page, you want to make sure you index it. Indexing a website or page URL involves storing, analyzing, and organizing the content and connections between pages. You want to ensure that you index your URL to be found by search engines. Without indexing your URL, you are unlikely to be found by potential customers interested in acupuncture treatments or services.

4.2 Make sure your site is secure

To earn the trust of your customers, your site needs to be secure. Having an unsecured website will put your customer’s personal information at risk with the likelihood of all information getting stolen by hackers, and it will drive away potential customers. If your acupuncture site does not have a “connection is secure” sign, it suggests to the user or website visitor that you don’t have an encrypted connection, further giving your site and your acupuncture business a negative reputation.

Website security is one of Google’s ranking signals, therefore you want to ensure that your website uses an encrypted connection to avoid ranking lower on the search results page.

• Use HTTPS

HTTPS is a secure version of HTTP, and using HTTPS will help you protect sensitive user information from being compromised such as passwords and credit card details.

• Choose a reliable hosting provider
• Install an SSL certificate (This authenticates the identity of your website and establishes a secure connection when users are accessing it)
• Update your website to the latest version
• Schedule regular website backups

4.3 Improve your page speed

Page speed is one of the ranking factors on both mobile and desktop, so you want to ensure that your site loads as fast as possible. When checking your page speed performance, it will give you a performance score from 0 to 100. You want to aim for a higher number, because the higher the better.

To help improve your page speed, you want to implement technical SEO strategies like compressing your images, and using CDN or a content distribution network so there is less distance for the requested files to travel by using the nearest server. Lastly, you want to minimize the use of javascript files, which improves page load time.

4.4 Make sure there is only one version of your website

Users and crawlers should only be able to access one of these two versions of your site:

• https://acupunctureinirvine.com
• https://www.acupunctureinirvine.com

Having both versions accessible can create duplicate content issues, and it can reduce the effectiveness of your backlink profile, negatively affecting your performance in Google. In short, you want to only use one version of your website.

4.5 Ensure your website is mobile-friendly

Google uses mobile-first indexing, meaning that it looks at mobile versions of your acupuncture webpage to index and rank content, therefore you want to ensure that your site is compatible with mobile devices.

To check if your acupuncture site is mobile-friendly, you can use tools like Mobile-Friendly Test on Google Search Console

4.6 Find and fix duplicate content issues

You want to avoid duplicates on your site, which is when you have the same content on different pages of your acupuncture website. This can cause problems to your site and negatively affect your SEO efforts. Having duplicates will also make it hard for search engine crawlers to decide which page should rank high, and as a result, it can hurt your rank on search engines, it can cause backlink dilution and wasted crawl budget.

To ensure that you don’t have duplicates on your site, you can use tools like Semrush to check which pages on your acupuncture website rank for the same keyword. With tolls like Semrush, you can also get real-time performance reports to identify what your rank is on search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo, and YouTube.

4.7 Find and fix broken links

Broken links can happen when several pages on your site are no longer accessible by the website visitor. When this happens, it can negatively affect the user experience, resulting in page visitors leaving your site without performing an action.

Some reasons why you may have broken links on your acupuncture site could be because you changed the URL of a page on your site, a specific page on your site was removed, or you may have forgotten to redirect old URLs.

One of the tools that can help you find broken links on your acupuncture site is Google Search Console. Aside from helping you find broken links on your site, you can also keep track of your site’s ranking and performance on Google’s search results page.

Another tool to check for broken links on your acupuncture site is Ahrefs’ Broken Link Checker.

4.8 Find and fix keyword cannibalization

Keyword cannibalization occurs when there are too many multiple pages on your acupuncture site that contain identical or similar keywords spread throughout the content on your site. This results in search engines and web crawlers having a hard time prioritizing which page should rank higher. If not fixed, it will cause potential site traffic loss and lower search engine rankings.

How to fix keyword cannibalization:

• Create a spreadsheet and organize all the URLs of your acupuncture website and their target keywords
• Check any pages that cannibalize each other and the reason why (for instance, is the target keyword for other pages being used too many times?)
• You can reduce the number of times the keyword is used or simply remove it if possible.
• Work on improving the content of the page with better quality.

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5. Key Takeaways

SEO for Acupuncture clinics is one of the most effective marketing strategies that will help you rank high on the Search Engine Results page. As more potential customers rely on search engine results to actively look for acupuncture services and treatments, it will not only enhance your online presence, but it will attract the right customers for your clinic, and it will give you a competitive advantage over your competitors.

It can take a longer period of time before you see results and get more new customers, but investing in SEO and optimizing your SEO efforts will give you the best results in the long run. Although SEO is extremely effective and has many advantages as we mentioned, it is a longer process compared to other digital marketing platforms. If you’d prefer to get much faster results, learn How This Acupuncture Clinic Got 20+ Extra New Leads Per Month Through Google Ads.

In this article, we shared our insights and best practices you can implement to have a successful SEO campaign for your acupuncture clinic, which we acquired from running over 1,000 successful SEO campaigns at Yoyofumedia. Learn more about our successful SEO case studies at Yoyofumedia’s page.