[00:00:00] If you're looking to grow your business as a registered dietitian, you've come to the right place. If you're not sure what to do or what steps to take next so that you can create flexibility and freedom in your life, then you're going to learn a lot from tuning into our podcast here at Dietitian Boss.
[00:00:17] I'm Libby Rothschild, the founder of Dietitian Boss, a [00:00:20] fellow registered dietitian and business owner. And in our podcast, I share some The highs and the lows. And I talk all about how to grow your business, get it started. And I interview our clients to date. We've had over 200 interviews from clients who share their journey on our podcast, dietitian boss.
[00:00:39] Welcome to [00:00:40] today's episode. I'm so excited to talk about this important topic, the basics of SEO for an online dietitian. You might not understand how important SEO is in context of growing your online presence as a registered dietitian. SEO stands for Search Engine [00:01:00] Optimization. SEO. Now SEO is a way to improve your website so it ranks higher in the search engine results like Google, for example.
[00:01:09] And this matters because higher ranking means that more people can find your website and that leads to more clients and growth of your practice. What you need to do [00:01:20] is make sure that people can find you and people have a better chance of finding you when you're using SEO properly. It's such a powerful tool for you to grow your brand as a registered dietitian.
[00:01:33] Now, search engines are platforms like Google that can help people find you on the internet. And search engines use algorithms to [00:01:40] find, index, and rank your content based on relevance and quality. So the first thing you want to do is think, okay, am I putting out content at all? And the second thing you want to ask yourself is, am I putting out regular content?
[00:01:54] And the third thing you want to ask yourself is, are you putting out regular, relevant, quality [00:02:00] content? So I'm going to break that down, but if you're new to SEO, you do want to start with putting out some type of content, and then improving your content with time. Now this is a process, and it can take some time to tweak and modify.
[00:02:13] So when it comes to keywords, I want to talk about how keywords are the foundation of SEO. Keywords are [00:02:20] phrases that people type into search engines when looking for information are really important. So you want to ask yourself, what are people searching? You're probably thinking dietitian, registered dietitian, nutritionist, things like that.
[00:02:31] But you want to get more specific because there's a ton of competition for a registered dietitian. And there might be less competition for a [00:02:40] registered dietitian in Tampa Bay, Florida, or a registered dietitian in New Jersey. So I want you to think of the types of keywords because not all keywords are the same.
[00:02:50] So we have short tail keywords. So that would be like one or two words like dietitian and long tail keywords. That's a phrase like dietitian meal plans. [00:03:00] for diabetics. So when you choose your keywords, you want to pick your words that match what your potential clients are searching for online. And that can take a little bit of practice because remember short tail keywords like dietician or nutritionist is not enough.
[00:03:15] You absolutely want to use both types of keywords, short and long [00:03:20] keywords, short and long tail keywords in order to boost your ranking in the algorithm. Now, if you have a website, you want to be optimizing your website content. So you want to think about high quality content. And what that means is you have to create useful and relevant information that's going to answer your audience's questions.
[00:03:38] I know what you're thinking, Libby, I don't know what [00:03:40] my audience is thinking, and that's a really common concern. And the best way for you to get really clear with what people want and need is to have regular conversations with people in your target market. So first, you want to think about who you want to serve, for example.
[00:03:54] Maybe you want to work with kidney disease patients, or maybe you decide you want to work with [00:04:00] pediatric patients. So after you narrow down the target market, then you want to start having conversations with people in these target markets to narrow down what problems and concerns they have. So you can address those concerns in your high quality content.
[00:04:13] Maybe you're helping. infants grow through a vegan dietary pattern in pediatrics, and then you can come up with short and long [00:04:20] tail keywords based on that content. But you need to know what are the questions that people in your target market are asking so that you can come up with answers to their questions.
[00:04:29] With the content that you create, that's going to help you create higher quality content. You also want to use keywords naturally. You don't want to force it. So you do want to include your chosen keywords in [00:04:40] a way that feels natural, and then it helps explain your content. So if you're stuffing keywords and adding things that just feel unnatural, It's not going to read well.
[00:04:49] So you want your process to flow really well, which also just takes a little bit of practice. Now, the next thing I want you to think about includes meta tags and descriptions. So on your [00:05:00] website, you will have meta titles. That's a title that appears in search engine results. So you want to make it clear and include your keywords in the meta titles.
[00:05:09] You will also have what's called meta descriptions. I know I'm getting a little technical here and meta description includes a brief summary under the title and. Each search result and you want to use this and that's going to [00:05:20] entice people to click on your content because remember, not only do you want to create content, but you want people to click and read and engage with your content.
[00:05:28] The next function of SEO includes header tags and structure, so this gets a little technical as well. Header tags are also referred to as H1, H2, and H3, and you want to [00:05:40] use header tags to organize your content. H1 is for the main title and H2 subtitles and H3 smaller sections. So once you break up your content into H1, H2 and H3 sections, you're going to have a better chance of ranking for SEO, but that's not enough.
[00:05:58] You're going to want to have to [00:06:00] naturally create content with the structure to fit what people in your audience are searching for. You might be wondering what, why does this even matter? Search engines, they're going to understand your content and it's going to be easier for readers to follow when you use this H1, H2, H3 format.
[00:06:16] Again, H1 is the main title, H2 is a subheading, H3 would be a [00:06:20] smaller section. So you want to think about breaking down your content into bite sized pieces that people can understand. Now, the technical SEO basics that you might have already be familiar with include website speed. So you want to make sure your website loads quickly to keep visitors from leaving because if your website lags and it takes too long, people get distracted.
[00:06:39] You want to [00:06:40] make sure your website is mobile friendly. So your site has to visually look good and work well on a mobile device as well as on a computer. So that's easy to test. If you look at your website on your phone and on your computer. Now there's URL software. You want to keep your URL short and include keywords that should clearly [00:07:00] indicate what the page is all about when you're directing traffic.
[00:07:03] And then there's sitemaps and robots. TXT, and this helps search engines navigate and index your site properly. Now there's off page SEO and building back links off page. SEO is activities outside of your webpage or your website that improves your SEO. Like if you get other [00:07:20] websites to link to yours, which is a really good tactic, if you don't yet have a.
[00:07:24] site. Or if you're looking to build your brand, you can get a lot of good offsite SEO. And then there's building backlinks. So that's high quality sites that link to your content and this shows search engines that your site is trustworthy. So you want to get backlinks. [00:07:40] And then there's local SEO for dietitians.
[00:07:42] So this is important because you can attract local clients in your geographical area, if you can plug in a registered dietitian and then where you're located, if you have a in person practice, then you can optimize Google My Business, so you can set up and optimize your profile with accurate information and [00:08:00] keywords and regular updates.
[00:08:01] Then there's local citations and reviews. So you want to ensure your business is listed correctly on local directories. And encourage satisfied clients to leave reviews, which is a great way for people to build trust as well. Now, again, you only want to ask for reviews if somebody enjoyed their experience with you and you want to make sure you're spending time and energy building a great [00:08:20] experience with your clients.
[00:08:22] You want to create SEO friendly content. So that means blog posts, articles, videos, and infographics. We're a huge fan of videos here at Dietitian Boss. We don't see enough registered dietitians creating videos. Many dietitians prefer blog posts, which is great, but remember that videos are an untapped opportunity for you [00:08:40] to show your face and get your brand message out there.
[00:08:42] You also want to optimize your content. It's not enough just to create a blog post. For example, you want to use keywords, create engaging titles, and make sure that your content is easy to read and informative. One way you can do that is breaking down your content using what we talked about earlier, the H1, H2, and H3 [00:09:00] format so that you have a main title, a subheading, and a smaller section.
[00:09:04] Additionally, what you want to do is look at your metrics because you want to measure your success. So you want to look at traffic engagement and conversion rates to gauge success. You can also use tools like Google analytics to see how many people visit your site and [00:09:20] where they come from. And that can really help you understand how to improve your content.
[00:09:24] Now adjusting your strategy takes time. So SEO tactics, you're going to have to measure the success of your SEO efforts. which you can do on a regular basis. And that's something we help you with inside of the library. You can go to dietitianboss. com [00:09:40] and check out our membership called the library that helps you improve your online presence, including leveraging SEO in addition to other marketing tactics online.
[00:09:48] Such as social media and email marketing. Common SEO mistakes to avoid include black hat SEO. That's unethical practices like keyword stuffing or buying backlink. Remember you want your [00:10:00] content to feel natural. So if you stuff the keywords, Google doesn't like that. Also common pitfalls would be duplicate content to ensure that your site is root user friendly.
[00:10:10] And best practices are going to focus on quality content, ethical link building, and staying updated with SEO trends because SEO does change. And the good news is you don't have to [00:10:20] keep on top of it. If you join our membership, we will help you with what is current and what the best practices are so that you can take action and keep updated with keeping your website and your content in ethical best practice to help you rank higher.
[00:10:35] Now, some advanced SEO tips for those of you that are already practicing SEO with [00:10:40] good results and future trends include keeping up with future trends. So stay informed with changes in search engine algorithms and industry trends. And you can also consider voice search optimization and video SEO as you become more familiar with the basics.
[00:10:54] So if you're already doing what I'm saying, I suggest really leveraging video. That means YouTube [00:11:00] really looking into video marketing and how you can. to help you rank higher in SEO. Now, the future of SEO, I want you to think about looking at emerging trends and technologies that can impact SEO like AI, artificial intelligence, which can greatly impact how people are searching for information.
[00:11:18] I think voice is [00:11:20] something that's definitely a new trend just to keep in mind about how can that impact your practice and how you're marketing your business. As a conclusion, We talked about the significance of SEO. I broke down some of the technical aspects, why it's important. We talked about short tail and long tail keywords.
[00:11:36] If you're just getting started using words like dietitian and [00:11:40] nutritionist registered dietitian is a good start, but with time you want to get more specific. Such as. Diabetes meal plan, dietitian and things that people might be searching that are related to your target audience. And that has to do with short and long term keywords.
[00:11:53] So dietitian is short term keyword where dietitian meal plans for diabetics includes a long term [00:12:00] keyword. Additionally, as we wrap up here, I want you to apply these SEO basics to your practice and ask yourself, what is it that you're not doing? Maybe your website isn't fast enough. Maybe it's not mobile friendly.
[00:12:12] Maybe you're not. Optimizing for titles, or maybe you're not looking at your metrics and adjusting with some of the tactics to optimize how you are improving your [00:12:20] website presence. Or maybe you want to focus on getting backlinks. And that's something that you can add to your schedule and what you have.
[00:12:28] to do in your business. So if you have any questions or thoughts or feedback about SEO and what you want to learn as a registered dietitian to grow your business, let us know. Find us on Instagram at dietitianboss or reach out to [00:12:40] us at dietitianboss. com. And remember that joining the library, our monthly membership can help you grow your business with support from me and my team.
[00:12:48] That's coaching support, as well as content. We have a roadmap and modules at Four different stages of business to help you grow with an emphasis on marketing principles, looking for support to grow [00:13:00] your dietitian business, or even get started. I invite you to join the library, our monthly affordable membership that shows you exactly what to do every step of the way so that you can create the business of your dreams.
[00:13:12] Not sure if it's the right time, the membership gives you an option to. Go at your own pace. We have modules, a [00:13:20] road map to show you exactly what to do and monthly live calls, as well as new content that we release every single month based on requests. Inside of the library, we have four stages of business.
[00:13:30] So whether you come in getting started or you want to enter the membership and grow or scale your business, we have the appropriate resources for you and our team to help you. Including myself [00:13:40] available to answer your questions. Head on over to dietitianboss. com and check out the library today. We'd love to see you there.
