In early 2026, I partnered with Sal Psychiatry, a local psychiatric practice offering in-person and telehealth care, to rebuild and rescue their WordPress website’s search performance. Despite offering trusted, in-demand care, the practice was essentially invisible on Google, buried on page three for the terms that mattered most to prospective patients.
Over the next six months, a focused technical, content, and local SEO overhaul turned the site into the clinic’s single highest-performing new-patient channel.
The Challenge 🏥
Despite having a professionally built WordPress site, Sal Psychiatry’s website faced several hurdles that were quietly capping its growth:
- Weak Technical Foundation: Unoptimized images and bloated plugins pushed mobile load times past 6 seconds, failing Core Web Vitals.
- Thin Service Pages: Conditions like anxiety, ADHD, and medication management were crammed onto a single generic “Services” page with no dedicated targeting.
- Missing Local Signals: An incomplete Google Business Profile and almost no local citations left the practice with minimal visibility in the map pack.
- No Content Strategy: The blog was inactive, missing an opportunity to rank for the informational questions prospective patients were actually searching.
- Zero Backlink Profile: A near-empty backlink profile meant the domain carried almost no authority in a competitive, trust-sensitive niche.
Our Strategic Overhaul 🔧
Key Steps Taken
- Technical SEO Audit & Fixes: Resolved Core Web Vitals issues, compressed and lazy-loaded images, and cleaned up the WordPress plugin stack to bring mobile load time under 2 seconds.
- Site Architecture Rebuild: Split the generic services page into dedicated, keyword-mapped pages for each condition and treatment offered.
- Content Strategy: Published clinically reviewed, intent-based content around anxiety, depression, ADHD, medication management, and telehealth.
- Local SEO: Rebuilt the Google Business Profile, standardized citations across healthcare directories, and set up a steady review-generation workflow.
- Link Building: Earned relevant backlinks from healthcare directories and local publications to build domain trust.
- Conversion Optimization: Refined calls-to-action and appointment-request forms to turn new visitors into booked consultations
💡 The biggest early win came from splitting the diluted “Services” page into individual, condition-specific pages — within 6 weeks, three of these new pages were already ranking on page one.
Results 📈
The SEO-focused strategy delivered fast, compounding results:
Google Search Console: Last 6 Months vs. Previous 6 Months
Google Search Console data confirms the full picture of this growth. Over the most recent 6-month period, total organic clicks grew from 766 to 5,370 — a 601% increase — while total impressions surged from 62.6K to 837K, up more than 1,200%. Critically, this wasn’t just a volume play: average click-through rate also climbed from 1.2% to 1.9%, meaning the site attracted more search visibility and converted that visibility into clicks more effectively. Average keyword position improved from #27.7 to #11.5, moving the site from deep in page 3 to the top of page 1 for the majority of tracked queries.
Conclusion
This case study shows what a focused, content-and-technical SEO strategy can do for a local healthcare brand in just six months. By fixing the technical foundation, rebuilding the site around real patient intent, and layering in local authority, Sal Psychiatry went from being the clinic’s most reliable source of new patients.
Ready to get results like this for your own practice or business? No matter what type of business you have, I create a custom strategy tailored to your goals, ensuring sustainable long-term growth and success.