Ask the SEO Wizard
Dear O Mighty SEO Wizard,
We're moving our clinic to a busier area. How do we get found there?
— a co-owner of a dental hygiene clinic in Beaverton, adapted from a question on r/smallbusiness
Asked
Our clinic is moving from Gresham to Beaverton. We have loyal patients and years of history, but we need new patients near the new location, and our marketing budget is small.
The Wizard answers
The most important thing: move your Google Business Profile. Don’t create a new one. Update the address on the profile you already have so you keep every review you’ve earned. Creating a fresh listing throws all of that away.
Then, in roughly this order:
- Update your address everywhere. Your website, Facebook, Apple Maps, Bing, Yelp, and any health or dental directories you’re in. Google cross-checks these, and mismatches slow everything down.
- Expect a dip. Rankings often wobble for a few weeks after an address change. Don’t panic and don’t change anything else while it settles.
- Tell your current patients. Some will follow you. Ask the ones who make the trip for a review after their first visit at the new location. Reviews that mention Beaverton help you in Beaverton.
- Write a real page about the new location. Parking, transit, what’s nearby, hours. Useful for patients and for Google.
- Make friends nearby. Dentists without in-house hygienists, physiotherapists, pharmacies. Local referrals are cheap, and they last.
If you have a little budget for the launch, run Google Ads in a tight radius around the new clinic for the first two or three months. It brings in new patients while your map rankings catch up.