Showing up in internet search results when people are looking for medical information is vital to the success of any medical office — whether you’re a dental office, veterinary clinic, eye doctor, or other healthcare office.

That’s where Google Analytics comes in. 

If you have a website, GA4 (the latest version of Google Analytics) is something you need. It’s how you’ll measure the success of your SEO efforts — as well as any paid marketing you do for your clinic.

Understanding your users’ online behaviors can help you:

• Optimize how your potential and current clients interact with you online.
• Improve your offline procedures — such as reducing patient wait times.
• See which of your current marketing efforts are working (or not working).

To help you get the most insight out of GA4, we pulled some of our most frequently asked SEO questions to provide you with answers.

Can I Tell How Many Times People Have Visited My Site?

If you want to know how many people have looked at your site, the sessions metric will give you that answer. However, if you want to see who’s actually engaging with the content on your site, you need to look at something else.

The engaged sessions per user metric in GA4 shows you how many times a user has returned to and interacted with your website — whether that’s a click, scroll, video play or conversion. You can also use this metric to evaluate your page or website quality.

If the engaged session count is going down, it’s possible that some pages on your website could use a little fixing up.

How Can I Find Out How Effective My Ads or Website Buttons Are?

Take a look at a metric called conversion rate. 

Conversion rate tells you how many of the visitors to your site complete a conversion — like filling out a form, downloading a PDF or making a purchase.

What does this mean for your website or SEO? The higher your conversion rate, the more reliable your content is. According to MailChimp, “Your conversion rate tells you, in no-nonsense terms, the efficacy of your public-facing content.”

Ruler Analytics did a study of 14 different industries and found that the average conversion rate for them all was approximately 2.9%. In the healthcare industry? The average conversion rate there is 3%.

If you want to give your conversion rate a boost, think about ways you can improve your users’ experiences on your website. Hubspot suggests trying things like reviewing the language on your forms, including stronger CTAs and making sure your website is mobile friendly.

Think about the things you see online that catch your eye and make you click on a link. Then think about the things that make you roll your eyes when they don’t work. Those same things might apply to your website, too!

You Probably Don’t Need a New Website – You Just Need SEO

Is There a Way to See How Much Time People Spend on My Site?

You bet there is! Look at your average session duration to see the average amount of time that people spend on your site.

Now look at the trend over the last few months. Is it going up or down?

You can also see how many people leave your site without completing any actions by checking out your bounce rate. Agency Analytics defines bounce rate in GA4 as the percentage of sessions that had one of the following:

• Were less than 10 seconds long 
• Had no conversion events
• Had fewer than 2 page or screen views

The average bounce rate goal to stay under is 60%, based on stats from Spinutech, Hinge Marketing and Brafton. 

Now, that doesn’t mean a bounce rate higher than 60% is bad. When users search for an answer to their question, they might find the immediate answer on your website and end their session. You gave them an answer. That’s great! They’ll more than likely come back to you the next time they have a question.

This is why it’s important to make sure your pages are optimized with the most current information and provide your users with clear calls to action (CTA).

If you want to lower your bounce rate and increase time on site, take a look at the readability of your website. Is your content clear, concise and well-formatted? Are there broken links and something taking forever to load? Those are a quick reason for a user to click the back button or close their browser.

What Are People Searching For to Find My Site?

This is a question we see a lot! Business owners want to know how people are finding their website. 

That’s where your organic (or non-paid) search queries come in.

Your organic search queries are the keywords and phrases users put into search engines that trigger your website to appear in search results.(Hint: these are non-paid, or essentially “free” traffic.) 

Tracking your organic search queries can also give you a competitive edge against other businesses. Use Google Search Console — either within the platform or by linking it to your GA4 — to identify what terms people are using to find your site (for free!).

Do they surprise you? Are you not ranking for something you want? By identifying areas where your website could improve or areas where you’re dominating the SEO field, you can make strategic adjustments to improve your presence and competitiveness.

Please Note: Google’s default settings don’t guarantee HIPAA compliance, but it is possible to set up GA4 so you can get the data you need while maintaining HIPAA compliance.

That’s why we created our GA4 Setup Package, with pricing starting at $555. Our GA4 experts have years of experience setting up and working in Google Analytics for healthcare providers like you.

Google Analytics GA4 Setup Package

Prescribe Some ROI to your SEO

Want to set your organization up for SEO success? Our team can help you clearly see the results of your SEO efforts. We’ve partnered with businesses to help them measurably lower their bounce rates, increase website form submissions and more.

Put your website in good hands with our Marketing ROI Packages, which help you see exactly how much return you’re getting from SEO and other marketing activities.

I Want to See My ROI »