How to get more people to read your psychology blog: Beginners SEO for psychologists and therapists
If you are a psychologist or therapist you probably know you should write a blog. But how do you get more people to read it? Here are my top 5 tips for getting your amazing content seen.
One of the most frustrating realities of being a psychologist or therapist who needs to build an online audience is the horrible truth that no one will just magically land on your website. If you want anyone to benefit from your expertise and support you need to write content that pops up on google when they most need it.
Write your blog for real people
Firstly, if you have not already, you need to know your Ideal Client Avatars. Your blog posts will be easier to write and are FAR more likely to reach people if you write them for ONE specific person. If you need convincing or you haven’t fleshed out your ICAs yet then if you are a DMTT member you can take the short course on that subject inside the membership or if you aren’t a member you can listen to last month’s podcast episode on that subject. No other advice will work if you don’t know exactly who you are writing for.
There is an art to to getting your blog (or other content) found but here are five steps you can take to get more eyes on your brilliant content.
1. Find out what your ICA is searching for.
You can use a tool like Answer the public to find out what searches people are making in your area of expertise. This is one of the reasons it is so important to only try and market to people with one (or a few related) specific problems. For example, if I were to type “depression” into answer the public I would find so many hits and such high search volumes that I would never be able to choose what to write and the chances of my blog post standing out against all the psychology today, NHS and other trusted sources would be very low. However, if I know my ICAs really well I could search for something only “they” will be looking for. For example, I might write a blog post for a parent searching for “how to help my thirteen year old who has ADHD and anxiety” or “what to do if my twelve year old won’t stop wetting the bed.” Those are much more specific problems that I know my ICAs might be searching for at 2 o’clock in the morning when they are worried.
2. Use the language that people REALLY speak in your Blog title and intro.
What would they say to their friend over coffee? What are they typing into google? This is another reason why launch in 14 steps is all about trying to actually have coffee (or a virtual one) with your ICAs so you can pick this language up. Remember you may not like the language they use but you might need to use it in order to be found.
3. Talk about your content in different ways/repurpose for different learning styles.
One blog post can easily become several social media posts, a podcast, a Facebook live. Think creatively, draw out key parts of the content and make it multi media.
4. Ask questions on social media
You can then drop the link to interested people who will boost your traffic and make sure google knows your content is good.
5. Give a clear call to action at the end of your blog.
Readers need somewhere to go at the end of your content, make sure you don’t leave them hanging.
BONUS tip – give your best stuff away. Don’t hold back. Marketers that tell you to give the why but not the how are unethical (in our space) and shooting themselves in the foot in my opinion. You are trying to establish trust here. If people want to they can find EVERYTHING for free on the internet. I’ve written something like 54 ACT and CFT based blog posts for parents on my website. If someone wanted to they could print them all and use it as a self help book. They don’t do that because they are busy and because it wouldn’t give them the same experience as working with me. If you want to establish trust and authority then you need to be generous. Look at Russ Harris if you need an example. He gives away virtually everything for free and yet I still chuck my credit card at his books and courses whenever he releases anything new because I want to have it in the most accessible and easy to learn format. Often when I look at blogs written by psychologists and therapists for their websites I feel a little bit sad because they don’t really say much other than “book me”. In my opinion every blog should aim to genuinely solve a problem for someone. Google also doesn’t really recognise blogs under 1000 words (or so I have been told).
There are lots of issues that come up for us when we are trying to write content that genuinely helps people, draws them towards our services and helps sustain our businesses so this is a topic we will revisit regularly. Please do get in touch and let me know the specific things that you get stuck on.
Want to go deeper?
In order to make blogging, podcasting or any content marketing work for you it is crucial to know your ICAs, have a content creation strategy, an SEO strategy and have a good way of measuring your progress.
This is exactly why we have a masterclass on understanding your google analytics data with Vicky Jakes, website and SEO expert coming up in the DMTT membership in October. Vicky will be talking to us about how we can tell if what we are doing is working. To learn more about the membership and how you can join click here.
Links
Launch in 14 steps podcast:
https://psychologists.drrosie.co.uk/episode/simple-launch-for-psychologists-and-therapists
Launch in 14 steps download:
https://psychologists.drrosie.co.uk/launch-in-14-simple-steps
The ICA podcast episode:
https://psychologists.drrosie.co.uk/the-business-of-psychology/ideal-client-avatar-psychologists-therapists-marketing
Join the DMTT Membership :
https://psychologists.drrosie.co.uk/the-do-more-than-therapy-membership/
Answer the public (to find out what people are searching for) https://answerthepublic.com/
Uber Suggest (tool for checking search volumes) https://app.neilpatel.com/en/ubersuggest
