How to Thrive When Google Changes the Rules

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a successful podiatry practice with Tyson Franklin and Jim McDannald.

Hi. I'm Tyson Franklin, and welcome back to this week's episode of podiatry marketing with me every week. As usual, it's big Jim Mac. How are doing today, Jim?

Tyson, I'm doing great. Excited to chat with you today and see what's been going on with you.

Not a lot, but isn't this year going fast? It is going so quick.

Yeah. Absolutely. It just seemed like you know, like it was April March or April recently and now we're you know, the back half the year and it's gonna be 2026 before we know it.

And I can't believe how quick we're getting up to almost episode 200. It's not far away.

I know it's kinda hard to believe we're closing in on four years of the podcast, which is like like this year flying by. I honestly I don't know where the last four years have gone. So

Yeah. I know. It's it's gone longer than my first marriage. But I learned from that one. And the second marriage is over twenty seven years now.

It's fantastic.

There you go. Congrats on that.

Anyway, see, this is what I find interesting in podcasts. If you listen to podcasts long enough, you learn these little snippets about the hosts that you sort of go, ah, see, some people wouldn't know I've been married once before. There you go. Yeah.

I've only had one wife, but, yeah, that's that's this little tidbit about me. So

Yeah. Well, it's the only one we talk about. Anyway, I mean, I talk about your 52 children. So what are we talking about today?

Yeah. So today we're gonna jump into a little bit about the changes that have happened over the course of the last five, ten years with Google. Right? You know, we've talked about this a little bit in the past, but we're really gonna dive in today about, you know, how you can how your clinic can thrive or maybe the marketing person you're working with when Google changes the rules. Because that's the only real constant with Google is is change.

Whether it's a new platform, whether it's the way they're kinda adjusting their current platforms, you really need to know what's going on here in order to make sure that your clinic is getting the accurate amount of visibility it needs to kinda show up on these different Google pro these different Google channels because although AI is all the rage and that's getting all the hype, still Google channels is kind of the the main source of online referrals for people. So it's really really important to to know what's going on with Google because you can't just expect, you know, what's going on if you, like, looked it up, like, three to five years ago.

And it's constantly changing, isn't it? It's like every day, every week, they're making these little subtle changes. And then occasionally, they'll make some bigger ones that we all that all a sudden you'll hear about on social media.

Absolutely. I mean, it's one of those things where, you know, if you think about it five or ten years ago, was a bunch of blue links. It was pretty predictable. You're trying to rank as well as you can on Google search, you know, and that that's kinda what you wanted to do. Right?

So if a patient clicked and booked, you know, that that was a pretty straightforward way to be explained what was going on. And then also a lot of podiatrists are doing these things, you know, themselves. But now, you have things like AI overviews, things like local service ads, you know, the map pack and how that affects how people are clicking through, you know, as far as looking at reviews. You know, there's kind of a shrinking space when it comes to these organic results. So, you know, in this episode, I really wanted to kinda like talk about, the old way that things were working and then kind of show you kind of talk to people a little bit today about the new rules that have kind of changed the game and how your clinic can really stay visible no matter, at least in 2025 here at the latter stages of 2025.

Okay. So what's the first one you wanna touch on?

The first one I wanna touch on is AI overviews. You know, think we touched on this on an episode not so long ago, but I think it's really worth bringing up because it's really changing the way that people are either clicking or not clicking to your website. Like we talked about, like I said, mentioned here previously, it used to be that the main goal of Google was to send you traffic. People to click on links and show up on your website, and that'd be where they would kind of make that final determination about whether you're trustworthy to make an appointment with. But, you know, that's the you know, you used to have to kinda write keyword focused pages, rank high, get clicks from patients, and then there you go.

But now, with these kinda AI answers, you know, this is gonna show up before the organic results. You know, you're gonna have a paragraph or two paragraph that shows at the very, very top. It often gives patients kind of an answer to what they're looking for. So instead of going to your website to look for what plantar fasciitis is or you know, how to treat an ingrown toenail, maybe this AI overview is gonna give them that information. So to be much more strategic about the type of content you're creating, otherwise, you know, you're just gonna be kinda like almost battling Google to get those clicks and and 99 times out of a 100, you know, Google's gonna win that battle.

Yeah. Well, I must admit, I have used the AI overview so much, Reese. Just that even the last few weeks, I've used it more than I ever have before. I'll be searching for something. It'll have the overview at the front.

Oh, and I read the first paragraph. Oh, this is actually what I was looking for. I click more information, and I start reading that, and I'd actually say nine times out of 10, I haven't searched anywhere else. I've got the answer that I was actually after. It didn't go any further.

Well, that's the problem. That's what they call these kind of zero click searches. Right? So there's no click after. They just see the AI overview.

And so the game here is to really have great content on your site that answers patients' questions. Because if you're answering some of these queries or these questions they're putting into Google, you might be able to be one of the resources that Google pulls from, and they will generally link out in the Google overview, the IO reviews to those sites. But definitely is is decreasing the amount of traffic that's going directly to your blog, to your diagnosis and treatment pages. But it's still important to have great content on your website so you can still show up there and maybe, like I said, they'll be, you know, they'll kind of give you some credit or to give you a link back if you have one of the best answers and kind of the most patient friendly content.

Yeah. But this is really good, especially for podiatrists that are prepared to put some thought in and write a decent article or create some really good content instead of the lazy ones that may just be going to an AI program go, hey, can you write me an article on heel pain? And they're whacking that on their website. So then AIO views are looking through. Probably looking at your website and go, well, you're not saying anything that we can't say, and you're not giving us any additional information that we can't just produce ourselves.

So I think the podiatrists that are prepared to put the work in are going to benefit from this, and the lazy podiatrists will not get rewarded. They always said it was coming.

No. It's a great point. I think it is how do you differentiate your content. Right? I think sometimes it is just the quality of the writing like you're talking about there, but maybe it is, you know, what you can talk about.

Google Analytics is installed on the majority of websites across the Internet. So Google knows what people want and what kind of pages they're staying on. Right? So, you know, whether it's having, you know, better video content, you know, like we talked about, maybe it's just a, you know, a video you're talking about, a procedure to kinda talking over things. Maybe it's you talking to camera, but something that's a bit bit more engaging to show Google that people are spending time and paying attention to your website is gonna help differentiate you and hopefully be get you more visibility than just, like you said, someone who's copy pasting into AI a very generic description of what plantar fasciitis is or something.

There has to be, you know, engaging video or some other types of, you know, personally written content to really separate yourself from this kind of generic, you know, mass produced AI content.

Yeah. No. I'm I'm I'm all for this. I think it's great, though. I think it's good to actually make you force you to create better content and not and not get lazy.

And I think everyone thought they could just be lazy because of AI. And I've I've heard people say, oh, wait. If I was at university now, it would've been so much easier because AI could be doing all this stuff for them. I'm thinking, I'm sort of glad we weren't. I'm glad we had to actually go and do the research yourself to find answers to things.

If you're not like, you know, I think the game now is to like who can create the most kind of customizable or more more most personalized kind of prompts that you put into to AI. Obviously, you can write out all those things yourself. But there's ways to make your content be more personable even if you are using, you know, ChatGPT or Claude or something. But it takes a little bit extra time. And you wanna make sure that, like you said, you're kinda talking to patients and and kind of answering their questions.

And that's really gonna be the differentiator.

So what's the next thing?

So the next thing is like the way that Google search ads has changed over time. You know, it used to be that, you know, you'd have to go in there. You'd have to basically like write out the the headline, all the copy in a search ad. You know, there, you know, there wouldn't really be it kinda be up to you as far as how are you gonna test it. Are you gonna three different types of ads?

It was kind of a very manual process. And while it could deliver really good results, you know, now things have changed in a way where Google search ads, you know, especially when you're using kind of the more, kinda higher level editor view, is that it's gonna give you a lot of both good and a lot of bad suggestions. A lot of the bad suggestions come from, you know, kind of, I would say, more like generic terminology, you know, podiatrist, maybe zip code, which, you know, if that's the headline of your ad, it's not really that engaging to a human. Maybe from a robot or from a SEO perspective, that would make sense. But you need to make sure that, you know, if you do do Google Ad yourself or you're working with someone that's Google Ads, to make sure that you know which of Google's kind of recommendations to ignore and which ones you should really be aware of.

Because sometimes it can save you a bit of time when you're trying to write out a 180 characters, you know, for that that that search ad. But you really need to be careful if you're trying to, like, advertise for things like podiatrist near me or heel pain treatment. You'd really need to kinda talk to a very specific kind of demographic of patient to make those Google Ads kinda more successful. Because if you're just talking kinda generically about diagnosis and treatments, you're kind of letting Google run the show, you're gonna get a lot of ad spend, but you're not gonna a lot of conversions or a lot of ROI on that ad spend.

But this comes back to the first point about creating really good specific detailed content that Google knows that's a good resource. So you're doing the same thing with your ads is being a little bit more specific with what it is that you want.

No. Absolutely. I think it's not only what's in the ad copy there, but is it relate, and is there a good trade off or a good good hand off when you when someone were to click on that ad when they show up on that landing page. Right? Is there a similar, you know, similar photos or similar text?

Does that make them does it kinda continue the promise of what the ad talked about? So if you say something like, you know, same day podiatry appointments, but then you just have them land on your homepage. Your homepage doesn't mention same day appointments or, you know, twenty four hour Yeah. You know, follow-up appointments. It's gonna someone's gonna feel like it was kind of a bait in the switch.

Right? But if you have a dedicated homepage that shows, know, okay, like, we get most patients within twenty four hours. You know, if, you know, if you have this kind of issue, maybe it's good to contact the emergency room if it's really an emergent thing. But like, it's a good way to really kind of understand the the kind of patient or the potential patient's intent and try to serve that in a way that the ad and that landing page both make sense together.

Yeah. Well, even the podiatrist near me, when I get a report from Google, and I have a look at it just from my own website, but it'll say what search things have happened, which explains why I still get people calling me to make an appointment, and I don't have a podiatry clinic and haven't for nine years, but I still get people ring me. So I guess I guess sore heels, one of you be able to fit me in. I go, no. I can't, but I'll tell you where to go.

Because they're putting in podiatrist near me, because I still have a website that has the word podiatrist in it, I still come up I'm still ranked really high just for normal, just for podiatrist in my area.

Your marketing is just working too well even years after you've left practice.

Oh, actually, I can set a clinic up in one of the rooms of the house here, and I've just had people coming over. Because it's just every week, I'm getting phone calls. But I did when I see the report and I see what people are searching for, I understand why I keep popping up all the time.

Yeah. I don't there's a lot of people that will misclick things too. Right? They just see maybe it's doctor Tyson Franklin there, they just don't even read any other part of the the ad or the website. They just click on it and they automatically assume that maybe you're still in practice.

Yeah. And majority of my I usually don't pick my phone up anyway. So if anyone's called me and I don't pick the phone up, just leave a voice message and I'll call you back. And that's why I don't pick it up because most of the time, it's the patient trying to make an appointment. And if they listen to my voice message, then it usually will they don't leave a message.

They'll call somewhere else. So what's next?

So next is, you know, kind of something that wasn't available, you know, three to five years ago. This is what we call local service ads. And they're really kind of taking up prime real estate in the search results these days. You know, we talked about, you know, the traditional Google ads where people are typing, you know, podiatrist near me or, you know, bunion surgeon, and there was gonna be a bunch of links. There was gonna be kind of like the they try to make the ads almost look like the organic section in a way.

But sometimes you're gonna get that map pack and that'll be great. But the very, very top now in a lot of locations, at least in North America, if you type, you know, maybe like a podiatrist or bunion surgeon, you're gonna get a a square at the very top of the Google search results that looks much visually different than the rest of them. It'll say like either Google Guaranteed or Trusted by Google. It'll basically be maybe a photo of the physician. Maybe it was like, you know, bunion surgery surgeon, their phone number.

And this is this is almost like kind of a a new form of lead generation that Google is doing to try to get people to click on those ads and basically make appointments for those very specific types of care. It's something you have to apply for. There's an application process. Business license required, a medical license is required. So there's a lot more kind of red tape you have to go through in order to be there, but it is a way to show up at the very top of Google because because because the the search ads are no longer always the top prime real estate these days.

Okay. So what should everyone be doing?

Yeah. So like I said, I think it's important to to to number one, experiment with this a little bit. So go through that process of getting verified by Google. But then I would say once you get verified and you maybe allocate a $500 a month budget, just get a general sense of, like, who's who's it bringing in. Right?

Obviously, maybe for the first few months you're doing it, maybe it's surgeries or higher paying types of care that you wanna provide while you're there because it definitely, it's it's it's paid out a little bit differently or you pay Google in a different way where it's more like, you know, it could be 20 to $30 for a call as opposed to like $6 for a click. And you wanna make sure that this is not already an existing patient. So maybe doing over the last, you know, for the first three months, getting a general sense of like who's come calling in.

Yeah.

Make sure your staff is ready for these types of ones. Because if if your phone rings like five or six times, Google notice notices that. And basically, we'll kind of like ding clinics. They want, you know, clinics that are open you know, picking up their phone quickly. So if you have like you have a a phone answering service where it's like push 1 to do this, push 2 to do this.

Maybe it's not right for you. But if you have a human answering the phone, it can be a way to to see whether it's worth that ROI. You know, if you're only doing bunion surgery and you get five bunion surgeries from it, or four foot surgeries that first month, maybe it's worth that, you know, 20 to $30 per call. But you have to have your systems kind of in line before you decide to to just kind of experiment with these local service ads.

Yeah. It does sound that way. So it's like anything though. It's it's the preparation you do behind the scenes before you implement something. It's not just, oh, we've heard about this and just dive on board, register, and start doing it without a bit of planning in the background.

No. Absolutely. You have to have your systems in line if you're gonna spend, 500 or a thousand dollars on something. There's no reason to do it if you don't feel like you have confidence in your staff to number one, answer the phone call in a reasonable time frame, but also make sure, you know, because I've I've heard some people have tried LSAs a bit. And one of the bigger drawbacks they thought is that they were getting people that were either already their patient or that they felt like would have, you know, come to the clinic even without the local service ad.

So it can be a way you know, it's not it's not a perfect solution, but I have definitely heard that people can like I said, if you're trying to go after a niche type of patient, sometimes it can be a little bit difficult on in Google search ads to stand out. But this local service ads, like I said, by its location and the way it looks visually might be a way to to kind of get more of those high revenue patients into the practice.

Okay. And I think it's like you said, it's the high higher ticket items that you wanna be sort of promoting this way because it costs you more money when people actually click on it. And also be aware that your competitors might keep clicking on it just to annoy you.

Google's getting better about that click spam stuff. So like if someone's clicking the same thing multiple times, yeah, like they'll Google's getting better about that. But yeah, like you'd have to be a little bit aware of that.

Okay. Next one.

Next is kinda like how SEO has changed in a way with Google. The Google business profile obviously, has changed names in the last three to five years. It used be called Google My Business. So I would say if you talk to any marketer or marketing consultant that's still saying, Google My Business, they might be stuck and and their strategies might be three to five years old. I I definitely find myself thinking it sometimes, but always am able to kinda spit out Google business profile when I'm talking to folks.

So just be aware that, you know, SEO alone is, you know, not necessarily gonna get you where you wanna go. This is like we talked about the 10 blue links. Now Google wants to keep people seeing ads. They wanna keep people on their homepage. So, you know, you really have to build out that Google business profile.

So it almost looks like the branding of a little mini website on Google's platform. Right? So you can get calls there. People can click to make an appointment. You know, people can get directions there.

Your services, the types of care you provide can all be on this Google business profile. So it's just another form of SEO that has kind of changed and shifted over time. It didn't used to be that important, to be honest. But over time, this Google Business Profile has become more and more important for clinics to take seriously. They have, you know, great trustworthy photos on there.

Really make a big difference when people are, you know, shopping around. Obviously, reviews show up there as well. So you really need to have a well rounded Google business profile to have a strong SEO presence now in your local area.

I use it a lot. Even this week, there's probably three or four times I've have a rough idea of the business or the service that I want. So I type I just type in what I'm after. I don't read the AI thing at the beginning because I know that's not what I'm not I don't wanna review. I'm looking for actual businesses.

But straight to the right hand side, it'll have the, you know, the business profile there, and I'll either use that to click go to their website or depending on what the services that I'm after, because I know there's photos there, I'll click on the first photo, I might scroll through the first five or six photos, go, yeah, this has given me the feel that I want. I then go and look at the hours. I go, it's suiting the hours that I want, so it's giving me that information, and then bang, straight on the website, and I feel like I'm in the right place. And I've done that. Today's only Wednesday, and I reckon I've probably done it four times this week already.

Yeah. It's hugely important. Right? You know, the that's kind of star rating or the number of if someone is posting weekly about, you know, things going on in their clinic or, you know, having fresh photos or having dark and jury photos, it can make a real difference when it comes to, you know, that kind of building that trust. And like you said, you do can do so much kind of background information and research about, okay, the hours, you know, who is this doctor, what do they look like, you know, kind of what you know, you you can really understand a lot about that clinic from the Google profile.

So just one way that kind of Google is changing how SEO works and how local SEO with the map pack, you know, where you wanna be as high as you can on that map pack, but also having a built out Google Google Business Profile is gonna really, really affect you and your clinic's visibility.

Yeah. Well, I have a a little note in my Google Calendar. And every week, it says update business profile. I go in there. I try to every week, go in there and just even if I'm just reviewing, I don't always add a new photo, but I will try and add something.

I may have had an article I've written or a link to a video, might be a link to a podcast episode, but I'll try and put something on there just to keep reminding Google that I'm still alive. So if people if people are searching searching for me, I I am there. And but I've got to look at other podiatry clinics because I do that on a regular basis, And some of them will have two photos, and the two photos are not doing them any favors. They they really need to go and look at it.

Yeah. Just need to take those professional photos from your website or, you know, from some of your marketing and put it in there. And like you said, just showing the Google that you're, you know, either putting photos in or you're putting these Google posts out shows that, like, you're making an effort on their platform. And then, you know, if someone's making an effort on their platform, it only makes sense that they would reward those folks. So it's definitely worth the time.

And I like it how Google does send you remind reminders to say, are your hours changing? Do you need to update your hours? And I think it's important too if you know there's public holidays or you're gonna adjust your hours over Easter and those sort of events is go there and just adjust your hours and then remember to go back and then just change it again. Just keep I reckon the more accurate that can be, more people are actually using it, especially if you're gonna be open when others aren't.

That could be a huge competitive advantage because there's been different studies that show that, whether you have ads or you have like your kind of Google Maps, the times when you're open, they'll actually show you more than when the times when you're closed.

Yeah. Okay. What else we got?

I'd say last but not least is Google reviews. I think we've had a number of podcasts here in the last couple months about Google reviews. But you know, it used to be kind of a nice to have. You know, they were not essential for ranking or patient trust. It was you know, everyone had maybe 10 or 20 and it was like, you know, people were kinda allowing them to show up when they showed up.

So you know, maybe we'd get a couple of good ones, and you get that, you know, angry patient one star. And you would like, wow, it's I don't know what to do about that. But I think a lot of clinics, the new way is that people are understanding that these star ratings, and when people see it on Google Business Profile, or it's showing up in different places on different Google properties, that a four or five star means a lot as far as building trust now. Reviews are just becoming kind of more of a mainstream thing. So the more review volume you have in their front and center in the search results now, it can really make or break a patient's decision to come see you or not.

So the real goal now and how things have changed, you need to have a consistent process about asking happy patients at the right time for these reviews, and they're responding to all reviews, whether they're positive or negative. If you don't have this process, you're kinda falling behind. You're kind of whether if you're not actively going out there and getting these reviews, you're kind of waiting for your next one star in a way. And then you're gonna be in kind of panic mode about, oh, no. Like, I need to get, like, a couple reviews in quickly to kinda make this one star, you know, disappear or go down lower on the page.

But if you have a consistent flow of positive reviews coming in, people are gonna understand that you have a one negative review every 20 or 30 or 50. Right? So, like, just get in the habit and get it in a workflow of asking these reviews from happy patients and responding to them.

Yeah. And I think this is where I've noticed a change with the rating and reviews is when you have someone like my mom, for example, who's 80 years of age, will comment on a business because I I noticed they had a 4.7 star review. And I'm thinking, years ago, no one would even mention that. But I think more and more people, it's just a mandatory thing. You look at it.

That's why when you see the business profile, you see the photos, straight away, you're looking at the reviews. And if I see it's like say it's 4.2. I'm eager to know why is it 4.2. I will click on that, and I start reading through the reviews. And some things I have noticed, the ones that the ones that tend to get more, you know, one and two star reviews are also the businesses that don't respond to any reviews.

It's they just don't respond to anything. And and I think it's it's such a good opportunity to think that people give you a five star, but also an opportunity to maybe explain something that a once review wasn't happy with.

No. It's a great way to show your humanity as well, whether you can resolve that in the review or the the reply. Probably not, but it's gonna show you that you care, that you're not just there like kind of ignoring things. Because that's what it looks like when you're not responding to negative It looks like you're ignoring the patient and that's just not a good look and no one wants that kind of physician.

Yeah. And I find it funny when you go to a business that is awesome. I mean, just awesome. And you know what? You wanna rave about them, and they don't even have a business profile.

They don't have a website, and you're thinking, oh my god. They're just gonna rely on word-of-mouth. So anyway, so how we how we wrapping up this episode?

Yeah. Before you before we go, I I definitely feel you on that. There's so many, like, webs there's so many businesses out there. And I find them more when I was in kind of when I visited Latin America or maybe Europe a bit, they just have a Facebook page. Yeah.

But there's no Google business profile. There's no website. It's like everything is like I guess they didn't wanna spend on the website or spend the time to figure out what Google business profile was, but it's it's tough being a business owner, but those are definitely worth the time investment at the least.

I think I think some of those things we just said about Facebook then. I think there was a period of time, probably going back a decade ago, where, you know, the influencers were going on, and they were more just using Facebook and Instagram. They weren't actually having websites. They were just using the social media platforms, which is dangerous.

Yeah. You don't wanna build your home on that foundation. You wanna have your own foundation for sure.

Okay. Anything else before we wrap up?

I would just kind of reiterate, you know, the old way like we talked about is, you know, is you had some kind

of

simple Google search ads and 10 blue links on that homepage and that's the way that people saw Google. That's the way you tried to, like, you know, find ways with SEO to get to the top of the organic section and maybe you paid for some ads. But it's really important to know now that you really have to diversify across all of Google's channels. It's not just those two things anymore. You know, it's AI overviews.

So you need to make sure you have top top level friendly AI content. You know, search ads has changed in a way where you need to really know what to do on that platform to make sure that you're getting the ROI when you're doing Google search ads. There's these local service ads where, you know, something to test out and to try. Your Google business profile is hugely important. Like I said, it's almost like a mini home page.

Then you have your, you know, Google reviews where you really need to kind of get a workflow and a system going to make that stuff happen. So the things you can do on Google and the opportunities there, you know, really multiplied. And and the kinda little details about what they allow and don't allow, that's always gonna change. So you really need to make sure that your clinic is adapting to these new rules and the new paradigms that Google has. Because if you're not, you're probably missing out on patients and kinda losing that opportunity to be visible to prospective patients.

So, you know, I would say, you know, spend a little bit of time, learn about these different channels. If you have any questions, obviously, reach out to myself or to Tyson. We're happy to kinda guide you through what these things are and provide some additional resources. But it's one of those things where you gotta stay informed about how things are changing because if you're trying to get those blue links and that that's, you know, your entire game plan, Time has passed you by.

So I like it. Just the last thing I wanna say, I like it that Google keeps changing, keeps moving the goalposts, because it it keeps people thinking and active in how the business is running and how it's being seen. They're not just it's not all about, oh, just because that person had their clinic set up five or ten years ago that, yeah, I can't compete with them. If they're resting on their roles or resting on their reputation, a new person can come into the market tomorrow. And if they know how this all works, they can very quickly make up a lot of ground on someone that's been out five, ten, fifteen, twenty years before them.

So I actually like the idea of this.

Yeah. I can really help level the playing field.

Yeah. And I'm old, and I like it. So younger people, anybody younger than me, you have no excuse. Okay, Jim. I look forward to talking to again next week.

Sounds great, Tyson.

Okay. See you later. Bye. Bye now.

Thanks for listening to Podiatry Marketing with Tyson Franklin and Jim McDaniel. Subscribe and learn more at Podiatry Marketing. That's the website address, podiatry.marketing.