Project Overview

Incredible Marketing helps NYGPS increase their search engine traffic by over 400% in three years, from 26K annual visitors to 120K annual visitors.

“The Incredible Marketing team have been outstanding for our plastic surgery group.They are knowledgeable, easy to work with, honest and straightforward, and they really know how to increase business. I can say there has been no other marketing group who has ever done as much in a short time for us!”

– Dr. Andrew Salzberg

 

Certifications

Certifications

Board certified plastic surgeons
Expertise

Expertise

Plastic/reconstructive surgery
Locations

Locations

Offices in NYC, Tarrytown, Goshen, and Cortlandt Manor
Case period

Case period

January 1, 2014- December 31, 2016 (3 years)

Background

The New York Group for Plastic Surgery consists of Dr. C. Andrew Salzberg, best known as the pioneer of Direct to Implant and AlloDerm Breast Reconstruction; Dr. R. Michael Koch, better known for his microsurgical reconstruction and breast surgery; and Dr. Jordan M.S. Jacobs, a specialist in craniofacial and aesthetic plastic surgery.
With six locations in New York and an outstanding reputation across the state since 1981, the NYGPS didn’t feel that their online presence accurately reflected their offline reputation, especially in the nation’s most competitive market for plastic surgeons: NYC. So they contacted us to help them build an SEO strategy that would parlay their offline experience into online authority and win new patients from search.

Big decisions. Big Apple.

The first step in defining our winning strategy required a prescient understanding of both the New York Group for Plastic Surgery’s business goals and the nature of search in their specific market.

From the beginning, NYGPS wanted to increase revenue from their liposuction-related procedures (lipo, smart lipo, laser lipo), as well as increase overall traffic and conversions from search. But the hyper competitive landscape of New York meant hundreds of other surgeons were lobbying for the same goals and rankings, and most of them had a head start.

If we were going to help NYGPS achieve their business goals through SEO, we would have to concentrate our resources on a few critical objectives rather than spread ourselves thin competing for everything.

Armed with intelligence from a comprehensive technical SEO audit, competitive research, and thorough discovery meetings with both teams, we built a three-tiered strategy that would help us accomplish NYGPS’ business goals.

1. A foundation for growth

NYGPS built their previous website using Bitrix, a dated content management system (CMS) heavy with unnecessary code, slow to load, and hard for search engines to crawl and index. And aside from performance, it failed the mobile-friendly test and offered a poor user experience for patients. So our first step toward improving rankings, increasing conversions, and generating revenue through SEO was to ensure we were building on a stable foundation, which meant overhauling their entire website for search engines and patients.

In November, several months after starting our SEO program, we launched their new website on WordPress, a much faster and lighter CMS, featuring a new brand identity and user experience.

With an improved website architecture, faster speed, and better path to conversion for each patient, search engines could now crawl and index the site easier, more frequently, and with more trust, and patients could better find answers to their questions. As a result, in less than a month post launch, organic traffic increased by 78% on desktop and 111% on mobile as rankings skyrocketed, and conversions increased by 188% from the influx of new visitors. Also, average time on site increased by 121%, bounce rate decreased by 35%, and pages per visit increased by 180%.

Results

new site launch results

120% Increase in traffic

Increased average monthly search traffic from 1,500 to 3,300

17% increase in indexed pages

Increased quantity and frequency of pages being indexed by 17%

118% increase in consultations

Increased monthly website form submissions from 12.5 to 36 (188% increase)

2. Local mobile

Local Pack (or 3 Pack) results on Google refer to the three map listings that appear atop search results for category-defining keywords like “plastic surgeon” or “dentist.”

Though NYGPS already ranked high page one for “plastic surgeon in New York” in organic results, a huge portion of that traffic clicked on Local Pack results first, especially on mobile. The only problem was that NYGPS, at the time, ranked on page ten (+100) locally. Despite the challenge, we decided that rather than invest our resources in competing head to head with entrenched incumbents for organic results, we could potentially double traffic by winning a #1 position in the Local Pack- where everyone else ignored.

The biggest issue keeping NYGPS from ranking in local results wasn’t domain authority; it was inconsistent business information (“citations”) across the internet from the myriad address changes and phone numbers over the years. And since Google treats inconsistent business information like antitrust signals, we spent 12 months cleaning up old citations and building hundreds of new industry-specific and local business listings.

In one year, and over 200 business listings later, we took NYGPS’ underperforming local page from page ten to #1 for primary keywords like “plastic surgeon in New York.” The results? Search engine traffic increased from 3,300 average monthly visitors to 6,545 average monthly visitors. And website form submissions increased from 36 to 72 contacts per month (100% increase).

Results

local ranking first on google

 

 

#1 Rankings on Google

Increased local page (Google My Business) rankings 100 spots in one year

98% increase in traffic

Increased average monthly visits by 98%, from 3,300 in fall of 2014 to 6,545 in 2015

293% increase in mobile traffic

Increased mobile traffic by 293% (700 to 2,749)

100% increase in form contacts

Increased monthly website form submissions from 36 to 72 (100%)

3. Liposuction or bust

While our local mobile and website rebuild strategies led to the most favorable increases in overall search engine traffic, it didn’t solve for NYGPS’ most critical business objective: to increase revenue from liposuction-related procedures.

We were lucky: NYGPS understood the strategic importance of narrowing our focus on a single category vs. spreading our resources thin by trying to be all things to all people in a competitive market. If we wanted to take NYGPS from page three to page one on Google for liposuction-related keywords, it was going to take everything we had.

Over the first 18 months of our SEO program, it was critical that all of our marketing activities aligned with the singular goal of building NYGPS as an authority on liposuction. So blog posts, social activity, blogger outreach, citation building, and link building all focused on deepening NYGPS’ perceived topical expertise on liposuction- nothing else.

In January of 2014, we started at #23 (page three) for “Liposuction New York.” By mid-2015, we had successfully positioned NYGPS at #1 overall- a place it has stayed ever since. Shortly after, keywords like “laser lipo New York” and “smart lipo New York” followed suit, and by the end of 2015, all of our liposuction-related keywords were high page one of Google. The results? As of today, the site receives over 1,200 monthly unique visitors for liposuction-related keywords and over 20 monthly consultation submissions.

Results

#1 ranking on google

Ranked #1 overall for “liposuction new york” in organic results (started at #23)

increased targeted traffic

Increased liposuction-specific visits to over 1,000 per month

increased inquiries

Increased liposuction consultation requests to 20 per month

Summary

Since 2015, and after securing the #1 spots for our target keywords, only then did we begin to broaden our approach and pursue a strategy to rank for other procedures like breast reconstruction (Dr. Salzberg’s specialty). As of April 2017, NYGPS now attracts more than 10,000 monthly visitors and over 90 monthly consultation submissions (not including calls) from search engines, and they’ve opened two new locations in New York City.

 

 

 

2014 total organic traffic

24,428

2015 total organic traffic

78,548 (221.55% increase YoY)

2016 total organic traffic

126,241 (41.50% increase YoY)

3 year total growth

417% increase in organic traffic; 90 form consults/month

Turn rankings into revenue with patient-obsessed SEO

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