Like 2020, 2021 promises to be a year like no other. Will we see vaccines drop the COVID infection rate by summer? Will Fall 2021 start to resemble the reality that all of us used to know? What will the fallout be for addiction after more than a year of social distancing and quarantines? Finally, what is drug rehab marketing looking like in 2021?

As addiction treatment centers assess their marketing needs this year, Dreamscape Marketing recommends keeping the following strategies in mind:

Prioritize Local SEO

There used to be an expression that said, “SEO is King.” Now, in the midst of the pandemic, this saying must necessarily be changed to, “Local SEO is King.”

All politics are local. Remember that phrase? It’s smart to think of SEO in the same way. The importance of local SEO is clear: 

• 46% of all Google searches have what’s called “local intent.”
• “Where to buy” + “near me” mobile queries have grown by more than 200% since 2018.

Local SEO is how local audiences find your drug rehab center. And the key to local SEO is Google My Business.

Not every drug rehab center understands why the Google My Business (GMB) profile is so important. The ones that don’t are the same ones having difficulty increasing their web traffic.

With GMB, consistency is everything. That means info in your GMB better exactly match what’s on your website and on NAPs (name, address, phone #s) located across the internet. 

• Google decides how legit you are by whether these exact matches can be found across the internet. 
• If there is any kind of inconsistency, Google will assume something isn’t right.

As you consider what drug rehab marketing strategies are a good fit, remember that the importance of local SEO is never going to go away.

Expand Your Video Content

For too long, video content was viewed as an extra… as something that wasn’t necessarily required on a website. In the last year, that concept disappeared forever.

Video content gets watched. The right videos, especially those that have been properly optimized, get watched a lot. This is one of those drug rehab marketing strategies that pays off almost immediately.

Why does video content work? There are two reasons. One, people are more likely to watch a video than read content. While unfortunate, it’s just the way things are. Two, your video content actually stands a better chance of ranking than your written content. How is that possible? For one simple reason: there isn’t nearly as much video content as there is written content on the web. Consequently, there is less competition for your video.

Keep in mind also that Google looks very favorably on video content. Look at any search engine page results and what do you see at the top of the page? YouTube thumbnails very prominently displayed. What better way to drive your drug rehab marketing than with eye-catching thumbnails on a search results page?

Improve Your Written Content

In the past, Google couldn’t understand your written web content at all. That’s why it relied so heavily on things like keywords. Its primary algorithms looked at keywords and how often they were used to figure out what your page was about so that Google could figure out how to index it. 

That led to an era of badly written content that ranked well because unscrupulous website owners ruthlessly gamed the system. They used the practice of keyword stuffing to trick Google and other search engines into ranking web pages far higher than they ever deserved.

Now, Google algorithms are far smarter. They’re beginning to understand content without the need to rely so much on things like keywords. They can identify weak, thin content very easily. That means websites must concentrate more than ever on quality, relevant content. No more SEO tricks, just decent content that is what people are looking for.

Who Do You Trust to Deploy Drug Rehab Marketing Strategies For You?

As the pandemic continues to rage and people continue to deal with isolation and depression, addiction rates will continue to rise. Your digital marketing strategies are the key to bringing patients to your addiction treatment center. Are they comprehensive enough and leading edge enough to make that happen?

Dreamscape Marketing is a full-service digital marketing agency whose number one priority is getting tangible, trackable results for our clients. Call us today at 888.307.7304 and let’s discuss how we can take your marketing to the next level in 2021.