How Local SEO Helps Therapists and Clinics Get More Clients

Local SEO practices are the key to improving online visibility and website traffic. Local search engine optimization helps match your clinic’s services directly to the potential patients who are ready to book. 

Here are some of the ways that local SEO can help grow your practice by using search engines to enable patients to find you quickly and easily. 

Local SEO Strategies Are the Key to Reaching Potential Patients

Local search engine optimization focuses on optimizing your website content to include target keywords related to geographic location. This is one of the most effective means of digital marketing for therapists, as it focuses the marketing budget on potential patients who are located near your clinic and actively searching for services. In other words, these are people who are ready to book.

As a full-service digital marketing agency, we have over ten years of experience navigating the ever-changing digital landscape to boost visibility in local search. Our SEO experts will design a customized plan tailored to your local market, specific offerings, privacy and security needs, and SEO best practices.

Here are some of the top ways that optimizing your online presence can bring new clients to your counseling or therapy website. 

The Basics: Effective Local SEO Strategies for Therapists

Engaging with local patients can be challenging when search results for terms like “therapist near me” or “psychologist accepting new patients” are dominated by massive national platforms like BetterHelp or TalkSpace. While there’s nothing wrong with these services, your practice needs a way to stand out and communicate what makes it distinct. Strong local SEO is crucial for building a local presence and connecting with nearby patients. 

Make sure the basics of SEO are in place. If you want to drive traffic to your website, you need to make sure that you have keywords for therapists throughout your content. Make sure your website is mobile-friendly, since most patients are searching on their smartphones. Quick load speeds, alt text, and schema markup improve your local SEO and make sure that visitors to your site have a smooth experience.

Not sure how your on-page SEO is working? Check now with a free SEO analysis.

Next, we’ll go a little more in-depth on the three most effective tools that help therapists aiming to drive more traffic to their sites:

• Google Business Profile Optimization
• Bing Places Optimization
• Google Local Service Ads 

Google Business Optimization for Mental Health Professionals

Once upon a time, people turned to the Yellow Pages to find local services like doctors, mechanics, and yes, even therapists. In this digital age, people turn to search engines and conduct local searches, like “therapist near me,” “counselor in Chicago,” or “psychiatrist who takes my insurance.” 

People conducting these local searches are more likely to click on the top three search results, usually called the Google three pack. Completing your Google Business Profile is the most effective way to ensure that your practice is prominently listed in these search results. In fact, recent research indicates that businesses with a complete Google Business Profile receive seven times more clicks than businesses without one. And since it’s a free listing to claim, taking the time to optimize it effectively should be a no-brainer. 

This boosts your SEO by ensuring there is up-to-date business information about your location. After all, people searching for therapists in 2025 expect quick answers to their questions. Customized Google Business management services can go even further, though, with SEO strategies tailored specifically to your particular needs. 

Google Business can help you automatically address frequently asked questions, like whether your office accepts insurance or self-pay. You can also include location-based keywords and tags to help search engines connect your practice to local patients. Adding photos is a great way to convey a comfortable office environment to potential clients who may feel nervous about trying out therapy. 

At the very least, claiming and completing your Google Business Profile is the best way to ensure that the public information online is accurate when potential patients look you up. 

Bing Places for Counselors and Therapists

Bing Places is a local business directory that functions similarly to Google Business Profiles. For businesses with a local clientele, like counselors and therapists, we have found that Bing can be one of the most effective tools for driving visibility. When combined with an optimized Google Business page and a solid foundation of general SEO, it helps direct local traffic straight to your website. 

There’s another reason why a completed Bing Places listing is important. Having your practice listed on as many relevant local directories as possible can dramatically improve your marketing strategy.  These listings are called local search citations, and they communicate to search engines that your website is accurate, active, and helpful. 

So, making sure that your practice has consistent contact information, descriptions, and links on healthcare directories, Bing and Google, your local BBB, and even Yelp can help improve your online reputation. 

Google Local Service Ads for Telehealth Mental Health Companies

So far, we’ve discussed using organic SEO to attract new patients to your practice. You can also leverage paid search strategies to help match your company to potential patients searching for general information about mental health topics. 

Google Local Service Ads is a subset of Google Ads that enables businesses in specific industries to pay for sponsored ads targeting local customers. This includes healthcare companies. 

Local service ads can play a strong role in your SEO strategy by providing a paid “bump” to your organic SEO. When local searches happen that relate to your business and geographic region, potential clients will see several pages of organic results. At the very top of the page, clients will see a few results marked “sponsored” that promote certain companies. These are the local service ads.

Like other Google Ads, you can’t simply “buy your way to the top” of these sponsored ads. While the bid amount certainly does play a role in which ads are featured, your website also needs to be tailored to your local market and provide an overall good match for the client inquiry. After all, Google wants to make sure that people find the results they want; otherwise, people might stop using their service! 

That’s where the benefit of working with a full-service digital marketing agency comes in. We design a holistic strategy that makes all elements of local search work together, from choosing keywords to bid on for ad strategy to helping you ensure your website is mobile-friendly. This helps your business stand out in local searches, even among the massive companies pouring tons of money into online marketing. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Standing out in a crowded field can be difficult. At SEO Design Chicago, our expert SEO services are custom-designed to grow your practice’s local SEO efforts through careful local and competitor analysis. 

If you’re new to SEO, take a look at our FAQs to see how focusing on local search rankings can be the key to finding local patients ready to book services. 

What is local SEO for therapists, and why is it important?

Local SEO is the process of optimizing your online presence to ensure your website shows up for local intent searches like “therapist near me” or “counseling in [city].” Optimizing your website for local search terms is one of the most effective tools for therapists to connect directly with local clients actively searching for mental health services. 

How can I get my therapy practice to show up on Google Maps?

Making sure your Google Business Profile includes an up-to-date phone number, website address, hours, contact information, and relevant keywords is the best way to make sure your practice’s local office shows up on Google Maps for “near me” and geographically local keywords searches.

Do reviews really impact my therapy clinic’s local SEO?

Therapy practices with more positive reviews across all online platforms consistently rank higher in local mental health search results and build trust with potential clients looking for therapists.

That said, the APA’s Code of Ethics prohibits mental health professionals from soliciting reviews, and responding publicly to either private or public reviews would be a HIPAA violation. So it’s best to simply leave your Google Business Profile available for clients to leave positive reviews, but to find other ways of engaging with your local community, like offering useful, but general, information through a blog or email newsletter.

What’s the difference between SEO and local SEO for mental health practices?

SEO boosts your overall online presence for specific search terms. Local SEO is a subset of general SEO that enhances your visibility to clients in your local area who are ready to book services. 

How long does local SEO take to bring in new clients?

You can often see improved rankings in local search results after 1–3 months. Your SEO efforts build on previous successes, so as you drive more traffic to your website, search engines like Google will rank your site even higher, further boosting your domain authority. 

Ready to rank higher in local searches? Request a free local SEO analysis today to get started!