DENTAL LOCAL SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING SERVICES
Stop Losing New Patients to Competitors Who Simply Show Up First on Google
Every day in your city, people are searching for a dentist and scrolling right past your practice. Not because you're not qualified. Not because your care isn't exceptional. But because when it mattered most, when they needed help and opened Google, someone else was there and you weren't.
25+
Years in Google Search
100s
Local Businesses Ranked on Page 1
Local Markets
Where Patients Actually Search
The Reality Check
You're An Exceptional Dentist. Your Patients Just Can't Find You.
Most dental practices we work with have the same problem. Their care is outstanding, their facilities are modern, their staff is trained, but none of that matters when new patients searching for help right now don't even know they exist.
You're Invisible During the Moment That Matters Most.
When someone has a toothache at 11 PM, when a parent searches for a pediatric dentist after school, when a professional needs cosmetic work before a big presentation, they open Google. If you're not on that first page, in that map pack, you're not even a consideration. 92% of searchers choose a business from page one. Everyone else is fighting over table scraps.
Your Google Ads Budget Disappears Into Clicks That Don't Book.
You might already be spending thousands per month on Google Ads, watching your budget drain on clicks from tire-kickers, people with no insurance, or searchers 40 miles outside your service area. The second you pause the campaign, the phone stops ringing. You're renting visibility instead of owning it.
Competitors With Worse Care Are Stealing Your Patients.
Right now, someone within three miles of your practice is searching for exactly what you offer. Another dentist, maybe one who just opened last year or has half your experience, is capturing that patient. Not because they're better. Because Google decided they were more relevant, more visible, more worthy of the click.
Your Website Looks Professional and Generates Nothing.
You spent $8,000 on a beautiful website with before-and-after galleries, staff bios, and a blog nobody reads. It's a digital brochure sitting in a drawer. Design without visibility is just decoration. Traffic without conversion is just noise. You need both, and right now you have neither.
Why This Keeps Happening
The Dental Marketing Industry Has Been Selling You The Wrong Solution.
Here's what nobody wants to admit: most dental marketing companies treat every practice exactly the same. They plug you into a template, run generic ads to generic keywords, and send you a monthly report full of graphs that mean nothing for your actual business. Meanwhile, your schedule stays the same and your competitors keep growing.
"We paid a dental marketing company $3,200 a month for over a year. Our rankings never moved. We got leads, but none of them had insurance or were even in our city. When we asked why, they said we needed to 'give it more time.' We gave them $40,000 and got six real patients."
We hear stories like this constantly from dentists across the country, from family practices to cosmetic specialists to multi-location groups. They weren't failed by digital marketing as a concept. They were failed by agencies that never understood how dental patients actually search, what makes someone choose one practice over another, or what it takes to compete in a local market where every dentist is fighting for the same search terms.
And here's the part that makes it worse: every month you wait, your competitors are building authority. Their reviews are stacking up. Their content is aging into trust. Their backlinks are compounding. The gap isn't staying the same, it's widening. And the longer you wait to fix this, the more expensive and difficult it becomes to close.
How We're Different
Dental Local Search Engine Marketing Built Around How Patients Actually Make Decisions.
The Highland Marketing Group has been in digital marketing since 1999, back when "SEO" wasn't even a common term. We've watched search behavior evolve, watched Google's algorithm shift hundreds of times, and built a process that reflects how real patients find and choose dental practices, not how some offshore agency thinks it should work.
Our approach starts where most dental marketing companies never bother to look: understanding your specific patient, the actual searches they're running when they need help, and the specific competitors standing between you and that new patient appointment. Then we build a strategy designed to make you visible, credible, and unavoidable when it matters most.
01
Local Keyword & Competitive Intelligence
We audit your current visibility, identify exactly what your ideal patients are searching for (emergency dental care, cosmetic dentistry, pediatric services), map the competitive landscape in your specific area, and find the gaps nobody else has filled yet. This is your roadmap to page one.
02
Custom Strategy Built for Your Practice
A pediatric dentist in a suburban area needs a completely different approach than a cosmetic specialist downtown. We don't do cookie-cutter campaigns. Every strategy is built around your services, your patient demographics, your goals, and the specific competitive dynamics in your local market.
03
Google Business Profile Domination
Most dental practices treat their Google Business Profile like an afterthought. We treat it like the most important piece of real estate you own. Optimization, posting strategy, review generation, Q&A management, photo optimization, and local pack ranking, all designed to make you the obvious choice when patients compare their options.
04
On-Page Optimization for Patient Intent
Every page on your site gets rebuilt to match how patients search and what Google rewards. Service pages optimized for local keywords, metadata structured for click-through, content designed to answer patient questions, internal linking that moves authority where it matters, and conversion paths that turn visitors into appointments.
05
Technical SEO That Most Agencies Skip
Site speed, mobile experience, schema markup for dental services, crawlability, HTTPS security, duplicate content cleanup, and all the behind-the-scenes work that Google absolutely notices but most marketing companies ignore because it's not flashy enough to put in a sales deck.
06
AI Overview & LLM Optimization
Google's AI Overviews and ChatGPT are changing how patients find dentists. We optimize your content to appear in these AI-generated answers, making sure your practice shows up when patients ask questions like "best dentist near me for crowns" or "what to expect during a root canal."
Why Dentists Stay With Us
We Don't Just Generate Clicks. We Fill Chairs.
25+ Years in Digital Marketing
We've been doing this since before Google was the dominant search engine. The industry has changed dramatically, we've adapted and stayed ahead. Our experience means we've seen what works, what doesn't, and what actually drives new patient appointments vs what just looks good in a pitch deck.
Local Expertise in Competitive Markets
We're not running your campaign from a call center overseas or managing 200 clients from a corporate office in another state. We understand local market dynamics, how patients search in different cities, seasonal trends in dental demand, and the competitive landscape in markets where every practice is fighting for the same keywords.
Patient Appointments Are The Goal, Not Rankings.
We care about rankings because they drive traffic. We care about traffic because it generates inquiries. But what we actually care about is whether your phone is ringing, your online scheduler is booking, and your front desk is adding new patients to the calendar. Everything connects back to that, not impressions or engagement rates.
You'll Actually Understand What We're Doing
Most agencies hide behind technical jargon and vague reports because they don't want you to realize how little they're actually doing. We explain everything in plain English, show you exactly what work was completed, why it matters for your practice, and what results you can expect. Transparency builds trust, and we want you here long-term.
Investment
Straightforward Pricing. No Surprises.
Dental marketing is not one-size-fits-all, and we don't pretend it is. The right campaign depends on your services, your local competition, and your growth goals. Below is a starting point, the exact strategy will be customized specifically for your practice.
Not sure which tier is right for you? Start by letting us build you a free dental marketing game plan. We'll assess your current visibility, analyze what your competitors are doing, show you the opportunity gaps, and give you an honest recommendation with no obligation to move forward.
Common Questions
What Dental Practice Owners Ask Us Most.
How long does it take to see results from dental SEO?
Most practices start seeing meaningful movement in rankings and increased patient inquiries within 3–6 months. Full results compound over 6–12 months and continue growing from there. Anyone promising you page one rankings in 30 days is either lying or using black-hat tactics that will get your site penalized. We set honest expectations and then exceed them.
How much does dental local search engine marketing cost?
Our campaigns start at $1,495/month and scale based on your local competition and scope of services you want to rank for. We'll never recommend spending more than what your practice actually needs to hit patient acquisition goals. The free audit gives you a clear picture of investment vs expected return before you commit to anything.
Can you help with multiple locations or DSO groups?
Absolutely. Multi-location dental groups and DSOs require a different strategic approach, coordinating brand consistency across locations while optimizing each office for its specific local market. We're happy to help you multi location practices and offer steep discounts for creating multiple campaigns.
What makes local dental SEO different from general SEO?
Local dental SEO is a completely different game. You're not trying to rank nationally, you're trying to appear when someone within 10 miles of your office searches for "emergency dentist near me" or "cosmetic dentistry [your city]" right now. That requires local keyword targeting, Google Business Profile mastery, patient review strategy, and citation authority that generic SEO agencies completely miss.
Do I need to stop running Google Ads while doing SEO?
No, and for most dental practices in competitive markets, we actually recommend running both in parallel while organic rankings build. Over time, as SEO gains traction, many practices reduce ad spend because they no longer need to pay for traffic they're earning organically. It's a gradual transition, not an immediate switch.
How will I know if it's actually working?
You'll get a monthly report showing your keyword rankings for important dental searches, organic traffic growth, Google Business Profile visibility, new patient inquiry attribution, and conversion metrics. But more than anything, when digital marketing is working, you can feel it by the increase volume of inquires and appointments.
Your Competitors Are Booking The Patients You Should Be Seeing.
Find out exactly where you stand in local search right now, what it would take to get you on page one, and what that would mean for new patient appointments. No pressure. No sales pitch. Just honest answers and a clear path forward.