Veterinary practices offering exotic care services or exclusively exotic veterinarians are not as common as general dog and cat practices. You want exotic pet owners in your community to be aware of your presence and become a loyal client of your practice. To do that, your website is going to need some work. The driving force behind ranking locally on Google is SEO (search engine optimization). In clear terms, this means optimizing your website to help it rank higher in local search so more pet owners can find you. This should lead to more appointments and patients at your practice.
Is Your Website Optimized
for “Exotic Animal Vet?”
“Exotic animal vet” receives about 5,400 searches per month. While not the highest volume, this does give your practice the opportunity to rank higher for it than other local practices–if you use the keyword strategically in your website content. Therefore, if a pet owner does happen to type “exotic animal vet” into Google Search, your practice could be on the first page and potentially near the top (if not at the very top) in your local pack.
Regularly Post Search Engine Optimized Blog Articles
We make the case for maintaining a website blog here. A blog provides valuable support for your website’s SEO (when done right) and can help you get more appointments scheduled and bring more patients and clients to your practice.
There are several ways you can use your blog to benefit pet owners and in the process, grow your practice. You can choose to educate pet owners with blogs that provide useful care tips and “how-to,” step-by-step articles that anyone can easily follow. Your blog can also be used to offer up your practice as the solution to a pet owner’s problems, and encourage them to contact you for an appointment and additional information. You can also address frequently-asked questions and promote specific services.
As long as your blog content is relevant and contains keywords that people are actually using in Google Search, it will continue to be a useful tool for your practice’s growth.
Optimize Your Google My Business Listing
SEO also applies to your Google My Business listing. This listing is your virtual storefront on Google and it helps people who are searching for an exotic vet find what they’re looking for. Plus, it makes it super easy for pet owners to learn about your practice, contact you, and visit your website.
To optimize your GMB listing to get more clicks, calls, and appointments, here’s what we recommend:
- Use the keyword “exotic animal vet,” in the description of your practice
- Include supporting keywords such as “rabbit vet,” “small animal vet,” “bird vet,” and “reptile vet” (if applicable)
- List out the services you provide for exotic pets
- If possible, upload photos to your GMB profile showcasing your team caring for exotic pets, and make sure file names include “exotic animal vet” and your hospital’s city and state
- Google Reviews also help to increase your practice’s Google ranking–encourage exotic pet owners to leave a review after their appointment to give your GMB listing a boost
Promote Your Exotic Pet Services via Google Ads
If you’re not using Google Ads already, then you should be! Google Ads is pay-per-click (PPC) advertising that, as the name suggests, only charges you when your ads get clicks. PPC is an excellent marketing technique for generating awareness of your practice and services, and you can jump in and edit your ads whenever you want to help them perform better. You can also optimize your ads using the keywords we’ve mentioned above so you can rank higher locally, and link to an equally well-optimize landing page on your website.
Use Social Media as a Bridge to Your Website
Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok (to name a few) are key players in veterinary marketing when used well and consistently. In addition to helping you build a rapport with pet owners, develop trust and establish a good reputation, social media platforms also enable you to link people to your website. Create posts that feature some of your exotic pet patients and encourage people to find out more. Offer pet care recommendations and follow up with a call-to-action to get pet owners to reach out to your practice.
Take Your SEO Game to the Next Level
At InTouch, SEO is our second language. Our digital marketing specialists excel at helping veterinary practices like yours grow by leaps and bounds while you can stay focused on what’s most important: your practice, and your patients and clients. We’ll help you understand SEO and why it’s important, but you won’t have to lose sleep over the super technical stuff (we can handle that part). To find out more, get InTouch at (800) 493-9003.