Covid-19 coronavirus has affected various aspects of life, and much of the future is still uncertain. Healthcare SEO is among those affected. Almost no industry is left untouched with the slowdown that the pandemic has brought about.
While pharmaceutical companies are seeing the opportunity and feeling the burden of developing drugs to combat coronavirus, most other industries have seen their sales being affected. Small businesses are also particularly affected. In this situation, can SEO help these affected businesses to be sustainable? In fact, SEO itself can be tricky, with these businesses also seeing rankings and traffic drops in the uncertainty of the coronavirus scenario.
Why a Global Pandemic Can Affect Traffic & Rankings
While core updates by Google were the one thing businesses and SEO companies were worried about from an SEO perspective, other factors such as a global pandemic can also bring about uncertainty, because you just don’t see that many people visiting your website as before. It needn’t be that there are issues with your site or that your content is stale.
It’s just that the pandemic has altered perspectives of people and they’re not searching or browsing for things they used to before because they need something else that could give them a clear direction in terms of how to live and work in the context of an unpredictable pandemic. They want to keep themselves and their loved ones safe. They may be confining themselves to their homes, and perhaps could not access your services or buy your products.
As you’ve probably guessed, improving your content or addressing certain design elements of your website probably may not help bring traffic and rankings in this situation of a global crisis. But there’s something you can do from a content perspective.
Coronavirus Themed Content & Services
Could some coronavirus pages, articles or blogs help? Healthcare organizations can put out some coronavirus blog posts and articles. They can include Covid-19 checking services in their facilities, publicize them through social media, and benefit from the inflow of people wanting to check if they have the disease.
As you probably know, coronavirus related searches have soared this month. Most of the search terms have “coronavirus” or “Covid-19” included in them. But they aren’t the only things people search. With the increasing importance of cleanliness and personal hygiene, the need for hand sanitizers is felt more. Many people search for “hand sanitizers”, “toilet paper”, etc. And because people are discouraged from heading to department stores or malls, they would buy these things online. Ecommerce businesses could gain. And since people lock themselves in their homes, they would also look to buy other stuff online too, apart from just personal hygiene products, while they’re at it.
Tapping in on Ecommerce and Other Opportunities
Content revolving around these keywords would certainly grant you more visibility. And visitors checking out your content could perhaps be attracted to your products or services and sign up for them. Once you get people to your site, it is easier to get them to convert. If you are doing ecommerce, you could gain significantly.
Another potential opportunity out there comes from the fact that you have more people online. With people forced to be indoors, they need to spend time. While many will be working online, their leisure hours would be spent browsing. While much of that time will be spent shopping, they could also be checking for information, playing games or socializing. In any case, there is an audience out there you can tap into even in this time of crisis.
There are potentially strong sales out there that you don’t want to miss out on. So you may need to modify your strategies and focus on those search topics that matter. Efficient medical website marketing companies can come up with not just content but also services such as new apps and publicize them through social media optimization services to tap into the increased online audience.
