Search engine optimization (SEO) has become an essential marketing strategy for businesses looking to improve their online visibility and attract more customers. This is especially true in the dental industry, where many patients now search online to find a local dentist.Â
Investing in dental SEO can help your practice stand out in competitive local searches and drive more appointments and new patients. But how much does it really cost to do effective SEO for a dental practice?Â
In this comprehensive guide, we’ll break down the typical costs and investment required for DIY and professional dental SEO services.
Factors That Impact Dental SEO Costs
The costs for optimizing a dental practice website can vary quite a bit based on several factors:
- Location and competition: If you’re located in a major metro area, SEO costs will likely be higher due to more competition for ranking well locally. Rural areas are generally more affordable.
- Size of practice: The number of services you offer, size of your staff and facility can impact the scope and costs of optimization. More pages/content generally means higher SEO costs.
- Current website setup: A site on an SEO-friendly platform like WordPress with decent on-page optimization done will require less work than an outdated website.
- Type of SEO services: DIY SEO using free or low-cost tools has minimal financial investment. Hiring a professional SEO company involves higher monthly/annual costs.
- Competitiveness of keywords: Targeting highly competitive keywords like “cosmetic dentistry” will be more expensive than opting for less competitive terms.
Average Costs for DIY Dental SEO
For small dental practices with a limited marketing budget, doing SEO in-house can seem like an attractive option. The costs for a DIY approach are minimal, but it does require a strong time investment to do it right. Some average costs for self-managed dental SEO include:
- SEO tools & software: $100-500 per year for tools like Moz, SEMrush, Ahrefs, or SEO PowerSuite to do keyword research, site audits, rank tracking, etc.
- Website hosting: $100-300 per year for hosting on an SEO-optimized content management system like WordPress.
- Premium SEO plugins: $100-500 one-time fee for plugins that enhance technical SEO, speed, security, etc.
- Content creation: $300-1500 if outsourcing blog posts and other content to freelance writers. Longer specialty content like eBooks could cost more.
- Local citations: $250-750 per year to manually build and verify local listings, like Google My Business, Yahoo Local, etc.
- Advertising: $300-1000 per month for Pay-Per-Click ads via Google Ads and Bing Ads to complement organic SEO.
With a total budget of around $1500-4000 per year, plus significant time and effort, a motivated practice owner can make gradual DIY progress on dental SEO. However, this approach can take many months or years to see significant results.
Average Rates for Professional Dental SEO Services
Most dental practices choose to work with a professional SEO agency to achieve faster results with their campaign. The costs are higher, but you get the expertise of an experienced team handling everything for you. Average professional SEO rates include:
- One-time SEO audit/setup fees: $500-2000 to analyze your website and create an initial optimization roadmap.
- Monthly SEO retainer: $750-2500 per month for ongoing optimization, content creation, link building, and reporting. Longer 12-24 month contracts may offer discounted pricing.
- Hourly consulting fees: $100-250 per hour for ad hoc SEO tasks and coaching calls.
- Content creation fees: $50-150 per blog post or page of content from a professional writer.
- Link building packages: $500-5000 per month, depending on authority and relevance of links acquired.
- Technical optimization fees: $100-250 per hour to implement development tasks recommended in audits.
With monthly retainers averaging $1500-3000 in total for a comprehensive SEO campaign, professional services offer faster results but require a more significant marketing investment. Longer term contracts can offer the best return on investment!
Key Factors That Impact Results From SEO Investment
While the costs to have an SEO professional or agency handle optimization for your dental website are higher, this investment pays off in the form of higher visibility, more website traffic and new patient appointments. However, the return on your investment depends on a few key factors:
Realistic Goal Setting
Having clear monthly and quarterly goals for your SEO campaign ensures you see incremental progress. Setting unrealistic expectations for rapid rankings or massive traffic overnight will only lead to disappointment. SEO takes time, so focus on smaller wins.
Authority and Trust
Search engines want to rank websites they trust to offer a great user experience. Professional content, reputable links, positive online reviews, and social proof build authority to earn rankings.
Technical Website Health
A fast, mobile-friendly site built on a modern platform like WordPress with excellent user experience and security helps build SEO authority. Fix technical issues early.
Competitor Analysis
Analyze what your competitors are doing well digitally. Match or exceed their efforts by nurturing your website’s content, links, reviews, local listings, and other assets.
Integration With Other Marketing
An SEO campaign works best when complemented by other digital marketing like pay-per-click ads, email nurturing, social media, and more. Integrate for the strongest results.
Long Term Investment Is Ideal for SEO Success
While you can achieve noticeable SEO results in the 3-6 month timeframe, long term investment over 12-24+ months is ideal to become established as a leader in local search results.Â
Consider SEO as an ongoing commitment to stay ahead of competition. After an initial optimization push, a modest monthly budget toward content, links, citations, and monitoring is all that’s needed to maintain results.
Done right, dental SEO delivers a very strong return on investment in the form of visibility, website traffic, and new patient leads. Most practices see a 10x or higher return on their SEO investment in terms of new patient revenue, making it one of the most profitable marketing channels available today.
Focus on Dental SEO for a Competitive Advantage
In an increasingly digital world, practices that don’t have a dental website optimized for SEO and conversions will continue to lose potential patients to competitors who do. Investing in your online presence fosters sustainable long term growth by tapping into how patients now search for providers. And picking the right SEO company as your digital marketing partner is key to maximizing your return on investment.
Take Away
If you are feeling overwhelmed by the costs of professional dental SEO services, don’t worry. There are affordable options to fit any budget. Reach out to Bonjo Tech, a full-service digital marketing agency that specializes in cost-effective SEO solutions for dentists.
Bonjo Tech offers customized dental SEO campaigns. Their team of experts will conduct a comprehensive audit of your website, identify optimization opportunities, and handle all ongoing SEO tasks each month to boost your local rankings.
With Bonjo Tech, you get complete SEO services tailored to your dental practice without the high costs. Our monthly SEO packages include:
- Keyword research and targeting
- Technical website optimization
- Authority building content creation
- Link building and local citations
- Detailed analytics and reporting
Bonjo Tech works as an extension of your team to make dental SEO easy and stress-free. Their affordable pricing structure means you get a significant return on investment from increased new patients and website traffic.
Don’t break the bank for essential dental SEO. Bonjo Tech offers a cost-effective done-for-you solution to build your online visibility and attract more patients in local search. Reach out today to learn more about their flexible, budget-friendly SEO packages for dentists.
