Attract More Clients With Highly Targeted

Assisted Living SEO

assisted-living-seo-portland

Written By: Joey Randazzo

Joey Randazzo is the owner and Founder of Portland SEO Growth Partners based in Portland, OR. He’s worked with dozens of businesses, including multiple assisted living communities (scroll down to see a real case study) to build growth-centric SEO campaigns.

Updated: January 5th, 2023

This Assisted Living SEO Guide Has Been Comprehensively Updated for 2023

Due to consistent algorithm updates, the relatively recent Helpful Content Update in late 2022, we’ve updated the written content that already existed on the page. We’ve written new content. And we’ve filmed new video content. Everything is up-to-date, fresh, and helpful for your senior living facility to dominate Google for 2023.

How We Help Assisted Living Facilities Grow Their Practice & See A

5.7x ROI on Their Monthly SEO Investment

Increase Google Rankings

Get your assisted living website ranking on Google for high-value keywords that senior adults and their families are searching for.

More High-Quality Web Traffic

Get more interested senior adults and their families coming to your website each month.

Increased Leads & Phone Calls

Get more motivated senior adults and their families who are looking for assisted living facilities calling your facility to get a quote and to find out what your facility offers.

You Get Your Time Back

Stop having your receptionist or technician writing blog content or trying to figure out digital marketing on their own.

Senior living SEO case study for a multi-location facility: from 3,000 organic website visitors per month to 18,000+ per month

Senior Services of America is a multi-location assisted living facility located in the Pacific Northwest.

Through initial optimizations and ongoing content creation, we’ve helped them dramatically increase website traffic from Google for relevant, high-impact keywords.

Traffic:

  • Before working together: Averaging just under 3,000 organic visitors per month from Google
  • September 2022: should finish the month with 18,500+ organic website visitors from Google.

Here’s a screenshot from Google Search Console proving traffic performance:

Keywords:

  • Before working together: 1,118 keywords ranking on Google
  • September 2022: should finish the month with 11,500+ keywords ranking on Google, with over 600 keywords ranking in the top 3 positions of Google, including incredibly difficult keywords like “assisted living requirements”)

Here’s a screenshot from SEMrush proving keyword performance:

Projections for 6 months from now (March 2023):

  • Traffic: +30,000 organic visitors per month from SEO
  • Keywords: +18,000 keywords ranking on Google
Here’s what the Director of Marketing for Senior Services of America has to say:
 
“I’m the Director of Marketing for a multi-location senior living management services company. We’ve been working with the team at Portland SEO Growth for a few months now and have been very pleased with them. They are timely in their content delivery and are very focused on results. We are very happy with the results we have seen so far.”

The Goal For Assisted Living SEO? Dominate Here...👇

When Someone Types "Assisted Living Near Me" Into Google, You Show Up Here …

assisted-living-featured-snippet

When Someone Types "Assisted Living Near Me" Into Google, You Show Up Here …

Think about how people search for assisted living facilities. They’re probably thinking about their own needs or the needs of an aging family member. They will likely pull out their phone and begin looking for facilities and what they can offer for their family member. 

They go to Google and type in something like “Assisted Living Near Me” – the FIRST thing to show up is the Maps area of Google called the Google Local Pack. The assisted living facilities that show up here “win” and get the most phone calls.

When Someone Types "Best Assisted Living in [City]" Into Google, You Show
Up Here …

assisted living featured snippet

When senior adults or family members are looking for assisted living facilities, they often use the language of “best assisted living near me” or “best assisted living in [city]”. 

The assisted living facilities that rank in the Maps area for these keywords get the most website visitors and phone calls. 

assisted living featured snippet

When Someone Types Questions Into Google Like "Which Assisted Living Facilities Accepts Medicaid?," You Show Up Here …

When Someone Types Questions Into Google Like "Which Assisted Living Facilities Accepts Medicaid" You Show Up Here …

Senior adults and their family members ask tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of questions on Google each day. Questions like…

  • “How much does assisted living cost?”
  • “What activities are available for assisted living?”
  • “How to find funding for assisted living costs”

Ranking for these keywords in Google proves that your website is an “authority” and can be trusted.

People Are Searching Differently For Assisted Living Than They Used To

Just take a look and see the increase in people searching for “assisted living near me” over the last five years. 

This screenshot above comes from a tool called Google Trends (a tool created by Google itself). You can see the drastic increase in the number of people searching for “assisted living near me.”

See The Common Theme? You Want To Increase Your Assisted Living's Digital Presence Online To Be Found By Motivated Seniors And Their Families

At the end of the day, you want more senior adults in your city to know that you exist. Whenever they do a Google search online around assisted living facilities, you want to show up over your competitors.

How Do You Get Tangible Results With Assisted Living SEO Services?

Step 1: Comprehensive SEO Audit

Most SEO companies fail to complete this step. And this is the most important step of all!

How can you get where you want to be if you don’t even know where you are?

We recommend doing a comprehensive SEO audit to determine:

  • Your current SEO performance 
  • Your current SEO errors
  • What your local competitors are doing
  • Your technical SEO performance
  • And more

Step 2: Local SEO Visibility Audit

The goal for assisted living SEO is to increase your “local visibility,” as we call it.

We use robust and powerful third-party tools to run an “SEO visibility test” on your business. This allows us to see how visible your business is on Google.

Step 3: Create a Roadmap Based on Data

We now have a lot of data from the SEO audit and the local SEO visibility audit. 

SEO for assisted living facilities should be strategized based on data. Most other SEO companies don’t do this! They have a “hunch” that something will work. 

We recommend creating a comprehensive roadmap based on the data. If the data show that your website is loading really slowly (which is negatively impacting performance), you should probably fix that first!

Step 4: Implement Highest Priority Changes First

Here’s where the magic happens:

Not all SEO activities are created equal.

Updating the alt text for images on a blog post from 2015 won’t be as impactful as improving your home page’s content.

Therefore, based on the data, you need to target the “low hanging fruit” opportunities first. 

Don’t have a Google Business Profile set up? It is essential for your results that you create one!  If you don’t have service pages specifically for “Assisted Living Services” and “Financing Options for Assisted Living,”  you should build those first before worrying about your “About Us” page’s images. 

Step 5: Local SEO Best Practices & Content Creation at Scale

Local SEO for assisted living facilities comes down to the following:

  • Consistent information that Google trusts
  • Authority
  • Accurate information

If your business has a different phone number on your website than what’s on your Facebook page, that’s a red flag for Google.

If Google chooses to rank your business, they can’t trust that if a user picks up the phone and calls, they’ll actually get through to you.

Having consistent NAPs (Name, Address & Phone Number) on high-authority directories across the internet is critical.

Now, when it comes to “authority,” that’s where content comes in. If you create content that answers the questions that your target audience has, Google will see your business as more authoritative than an assisted living facility that does not have as much content on their site.

Step 6: Meticulously Track Data

The goal of SEO is to have a tangible impact on your assisted living facility. To increase website visitors. To increase phone calls. And to ultimately have those activities lead to increased revenue.

To ensure your SEO campaign is performing, you have to track data and build a comprehensive dashboard that gives insights into your:

  • Keyword rankings
  • Website visitors
  • Phone calls
  • And other important KPIs

Top 4 Common SEO Mistakes Made by Assisted Living Facilities

Mistakes happen. 

But SEO mistakes can be costly, so let’s take a look at some common SEO mistakes that you can avoid.

Mistake 1: They Don’t Fill Out Their Google Business Profile in Detail

Google Business Profile is a simple tool to use, but without accurate and detailed information, your GMB page will not be very helpful.

Make sure to include the following details when completing your GMB profile:

  • Business name
  • Physical address
  • Phone number
  • Website URL
  • Business hours
  • Reviews
  • Photos; and
  • Posts

The goal is to get customers to your page and to rank higher in Google searches. Complete information on GMB can help you reach your SEO goals.

Mistake 2: They Don’t List All of Their Services Properly on Their Website

Let your potential clients know exactly what they can expect from your services.

  • Do you offer memory care?
  • Do you offer financial assistance?
  • Do you provide facilities for both independent and assisted living?

Listing all of your services in an easy-to-find format will keep customers on your page and will aid them in finding the information they are looking for.

Mistake 3: They Fail to Create Data-Driven Content That Adds Value to Their Target Audience

Writing articles and blog posts with relevant information and keywords play a key role in your SEO strategy. 

Care should be taken to include content that adds value to the reader rather than merely including lots of keywords into your articles. 

Google is getting smarter every day. Google picks up on keyword stuffing and cares more about how the content is helpful to the reader. 

Mistake 4: They Don’t Have a Reputable Process for SEO

Anyone can try their hand at SEO, but not everyone will have the same results. 

Without the experience of a trusted SEO professional, your SEO efforts may be subpar, lending subpar results.

Working with an SEO expert with an exemplary reputation will give assurance that you’re on the right track and that your SEO endeavors will pay off.

Assisted Living SEO Services Shouldn't Be 🍪 Cookie-Cutter — Everything Is 100% Customized To Your Business

Assisted living SEO is not the same as other types of SEO. Unfortunately, many other SEO companies treat it as such. They use the same “tips and tricks” that they use in other industries, thinking that it’ll work with assisted living facilities. That’s not the best way to do it.

We treat your business as unique. We take an individualized approach to each industry (such as assisted living facilities), to your specific city (NYC might be different than a smaller town in Montana), and your specific website (is your website built on WordPress or Webflow?).

5 Tactical Local SEO Strategies for Assisted Living

Strategy 1: Google Business Profile Optimizations

This is an example of a Google Business Profile for a senior living facility:

seo for assisted living

Well, this is an example of the front-end of a Google Business Profile. The part that a Google searcher can see.

Actually, before we go any further, let’s back up:

Why do Google Business Profile matter for assisted living facilities? Google Business Profile profiles are relevant and important ranking factors in order to rank in the Google Local Pack. If you forgot what the Google Local Pack is, below is a screenshot:

Optimizing your Google Business Profile helps you get found here.

And when you show up in the Google Local Pack, you WIN. You get more phone calls and website visitors than your competitors.

So, how do you properly optimize your Google Business Profile so you get found in the Google Local Pack?

The answer is … are you ready for it? Comprehensiveness.

The best way to optimize your Google Business Profile is to provide as comprehensive information as possible.

There are many sections that you can provide comprehensive information, such as:

  • Your categories
  • Your main description
  • Your services
  • Your products
  • Your photos

Here’s a quick example that explains the difference between being comprehensive and not being comprehensive:

For your main description, you may just be inclined to write a sentence like… “We are an assisted living facility focused on meeting the needs of senior adults.”

That is just one sentence… Google allows 750 characters for the main description. Use them up! Do you offer financial services? Do you offer memory care? What about independent living? Do you have recreational facilities and activities? 

Answering EVERY possible question is how you can be more comprehensive.

Strategy 2: On-Page SEO for Your Homepage and Location Pages

On-page SEO for assisted living facilities is just a fancy way of describing the content on your website.

It includes things like:

  • Your title tags
  • Your meta description
  • Your header tags (H1, H2, H3)
  • Internal and external links
  • Your images
  • And basically anything that you can put on a website page!

Why does on-page SEO for assisted living matter? Well, Google cares about it.

For single-location assisted living facilities, the most important page on your website, from a local SEO perspective, is the homepage. For multi-location assisted living facilities, the most important pages on your website are your location pages.

When doing on-page SEO for these pages, you want to implement SEO-friendliness through keywords while also providing as comprehensive information as possible to the user (and Google).

For example, instead of a title tag like “Brookside Assisted Living – 503.111.1111” you can provide more context to Google by writing something like “Caring for Seniors in Downtown Portland – Brookside Assisted Living.”

Strategy 3: Website Architecture Best Practices

This is an underrated SEO strategy for assisted living facilities. Your website architecture and your sitemap are intimately connected.

Google crawls your sitemap to understand your website architecture, which in turn allows Google to understand what your website is about. 

Here’s what a sitemap might look like to Google.

A little confusing, right? Don’t worry about it too much. Just know that when Google looks at a sitemap like this, it’s putting together what your website is about (which is really important for local SEO).

The main point is that your website structure should make sense hierarchically. Let’s use two of the main services that assisted living facilities offer – 1) independent living and 2) assisted living.

Where should these pages live on your site? First, you should probably have a “services” page that has the URL structure similar to .com/services/

Now, any services that you offer (such as assisted and independent living) should live UNDER this main services page. See below:

  • .com/services/assisted-living
  • .com/services/independent-living

This seems obvious, but many websites do this wrong. There’s no vertical architecture. Instead, every page lives directly under the homepage. See below:

  • .com/services/
  • .com/assisted-living/
  • .com/independent-living/
  • .com/memory-care/

With this structure, it’s not clear to Google that “Memory Care” is a service that you offer. It’s just another page on your site!

Strategy 4: Content Creation at Scale

This is where it gets fun. Senior adults and their family members search for thousands of questions on Google every day.

Some are very local:

  • Best assisted living in Portland
  • Best assisted living activities near Portland

Some are generic:

  • Can Medicare pay for assisted living?
  • Can I deduct senior living expenses on my taxes?
  • What are the best activities for seniors with dementia?
  • What is the difference between independent and assisted living care?

If you answer these types of questions through comprehensive blog articles on your website, it will do 2 things:

  1. You may rank in Google for these keywords that people are searching and therefore drive traffic.
  2. Google will take notice and see your website as an authority over your competitors. Google will think, “Wow, they’re answering all of these assisted living questions that users have. Their website is therefore more valuable than local competitors who haven’t answered any questions.”

Strategy 5: User Experience is a Bigger Deal Than You Think - Stop the Keyword Stuffing!

The old days are gone. Keyword stuffing… PBN link building… all the stuff that used to work. 

Google’s getting smarter. And Google’s starting to understand that a user’s experience on a website is important.

What does this mean for you as an assisted living facility?

  • Make it easy for users to find what they’re looking for. They shouldn’t have to spend 5 minutes figuring out if you offer financial assistance or not.
  • Make it easy for users to contact you. Your phone number should be clickable on a mobile device. You should consider online appointments so someone can easily get an interview. Anything to make the user’s experience SUPER easy.
  • When writing content, you should actually offer value to the reader. Gone are the days of outsourcing writers who produce vague, keyword-stuffed articles. Your content should thoroughly answer the user’s questions and add value to them.

On Average, Our Assisted Living SEO Services Cost

31% Less Than Other SEO Companies

Compared to Other SEO Companies That Average Between $1.5k and $3k Per Month.

FAQs About Assisted Living SEO Services

Here are the most common questions we’ve heard.

What is Assisted Living SEO?

Assisted living SEO is a form of marketing that helps assisted living facilities increase their visibility in search engines, particularly Google.

The specific SEO strategies that are used for assisted living facilities vary greatly (which is why all assisted living SEO is NOT created equal).

Strategies include:

  • Keyword research
  • On-page SEO
  • Off-page SEO
  • Google Maps optimizations
  • Local SEO
  • Content creation
  • Landing page creation
  • PR 
  • And more

Why Is Assisted Living SEO Important?

Assisted living SEO is important because it allows you to get in front of your target audience (The senior adults and their loved ones looking to find an assisted living facility RIGHT NOW).

Think about how social media marketing for assisted living works: People are scrolling through Instagram or Facebook and stumble upon an advertisement for an assisted living facility in their city. They might be actively looking for a senior adult facility, but it’s unlikely.

On the other hand, SEO puts you in front of motivated buyers looking for what you have to offer:

SEO for assisted living allows you to show up in Google for people actively looking for an assisted living facility. People searching for “best assisted living near me” or “assisted living in downtown [city].” Ranking for those keywords has a MUCH higher conversion than people scrolling on Instagram.

How Long Does It Take for Assisted Living SEO to Work?

Assisted living SEO can take 1 week to 6 months for you to start seeing results. It depends on a variety of factors:

  • How big of a city you’re in
  • How long your website has been around
  • How high your website’s “domain authority” is
  • How your current SEO is performing
  • And much more

Some of our clients have seen 2x-3x the phone calls within a month after starting their SEO campaign. Other clients don’t see noticeable increases in phone calls for 2-3 months.

Think about this, though:

If everyone could make a couple of tweaks on their website and rank overnight for the HIGHEST value keywords out there, like “best assisted living in New York City” then the internet would go haywire.

Things take time. Google built their algorithms that way for a reason. 

What Assisted Living SEO KPIs Should We Track?

Assisted living SEO should be meticulously tracked.

You want to know, with absolute certainty, that the money you’re investing in SEO is working for your assisted living facility.

Because of that, you need to track certain metrics to ensure that the campaign is working:

  • Keyword rankings: Are your ranking on Page 1 of Google for your most important keywords? How are your keyword rankings changing week over week? Month over month?
  • Organic website traffic: Is your organic website traffic from Google going up or down? Which keywords are driving the most traffic?
  • Online lead submissions: Are you seeing more online leads? How are they changing month over month?
  • Phone calls: Are you getting more phone calls from people searching on Google? How are phone calls changing over time?

What Type of Content Should Assisted Living Websites Have?

Assisted living SEO should include content that your target audience is searching for:

How do we know what keywords/content your target audience is searching for? We use advanced software and tools that give us insider information and data. We, for example, know that 120 people per month (on average) search for “best assisted living.”

So, with that being said, we do extensive keyword research to find the topics/questions that those looking for assisted living have. 

Questions like:

  • “How can I pay for assisted living?”
  • “Are pets allowed in assisted living?”
  • “What are the best activities for seniors with dementia?”

If you create content that answers these questions, then you can potentially rank on Google when people search for these.

Also, Google may favor your site more than competitors because Google may have more trust in your site. 

What are the Most Valuable Assisted Living Keywords for SEO?

How To Work With Us

First of all – we don’t work with all assisted living facilities.

We only work with assisted living facilities who:

  • Are ambitious about growing their business
  • Have the bandwidth to take the growth that will come from working with us
  • Treat their employees and their customers well

If that sounds like you, then go through the easy process below:

Step 1

Request a 'Free SEO Audit'

This process takes about 2 minutes.

Step 2

Check Your Email

In less than 24 hours, one of our talented SEO specialists will send you a 3-5 minute customized video analysis. It will explain opportunities for you to outperform competitors.

Step 3

Sit Back And Watch Your SEO Skyrocket

Just look at our case studies of the success that other Portland businesses have seen. You can have the same results.

If you’re looking for SEO growth, we can help. Give us a call today to learn more about our pricing and availability. 

Let's Take Your Assisted Living Facility From The "Best Kept Secret" To The "Most Sought After Brand"