Maximizing Visibility: The Role of Images in Google's Local Search for Podiatry

You're listening to podiatry marketing, conversations on building a successful podiatry practice with Tyson Franklin and Jim McDannald.

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

Tyson, feeling good. It's 2024. It's a new year. I'm excited to see where things go with our podcast. Life, I'm gonna be heading out to a bunch of conferences in 2024.

So excited to kind of reconnect with some of my podiatry colleagues in The US.

What time of the year do you get to go to the conferences?

Yeah. So I'm gonna be heading to the New York Podiatry Conference in early I guess it's in late January. Then ACT FAST, which is the American College of Foot and Ankle Surgeons in February. And then there's a meeting in North Carolina that I'm talking to some folks about maybe giving a talk at. So, yeah, it's it's kind of the it seems like conferences mostly happen in the kind of late I guess January, February time in the fall.

And then there's a few in in the summertime, like the big American Podiatric Medical Association is usually in June or July. So, yeah, that kinda happen all year long in The US, but it kinda seems like the pockets are usually beginning of the year and near kind of the tail end of the year. And the middle of the year is usually a bit more open except for APMA.

Yeah. Because I heard somebody told me once that the the big conference period was, like, September, October was really big because they've got through the summer and the and everyone's trying to get everything done before it starts getting too cold and people don't wanna sort of go outside so much.

Yeah. Sometimes when like November hits, right, like that then like the holidays season is kind of on in a way. Mhmm. So you wanna get it in that September, October window for the fall. Like I said, kinda after the holidays, January, February seems to be kind of a busy time as well.

So, yeah, I'm excited to get out there and see what's happening. It's been a little while. I was supposed to give some talks in person, but then COVID hit. So it'll be good to see some some folks that went to school with and went to residency with here pretty soon.

Yeah. No. I'm looking forward. 2024, I've got big plans for 2024. And Awesome.

And I'll be back over in The States in October. Think I actually might be there for Halloween this year.

How about that?

So that should be fun.

Up as?

I don't know. I know. Podiatrist. My girl's a podiatrist.

There you go. There you go.

So what's the what's the topic for today?

Yeah. So today we're gonna jump into basically maximizing the visibility of your clinic. So, you know, the role of images in Google's search for podiatry.

Oh, good topic.

Why we bring yeah. Yeah. This really important topic because, you know, for a really long time with any kind of search engine optimization or, you know, trying to be found on Google or other places, it was really text heavy, you know. It was all about kind of what are you writing on your website. Are you writing blogs?

Is there enough, you know, high value content? Are people clicking on links? But what's changing over time now is that images are becoming much more popular and much more important for kind of Google search algorithm. And we'll get into some of the specifics of what that is on today's podcast. But you know, today's my goal is to really kind of explain to our podiatrists in the audience about, you know, what this is and then what are some practical ways to kind of be aware that this is happening and kind of future proof their their website, some of their other Google properties to make sure they're being visible in their local areas.

Yeah. I've been saying this to people for a while now that Google's always changing things. And if you if you're not keeping up to date or talking to someone about it, you can fall behind. So it's important to sort of try and stay up to date with the changes that Google are are making. And I know towards the end of twenty twenty three, Google did a couple of changes that affected a lot of people's websites.

And anyone who just left their website as it is sort of were were missing out. So they needed to talk to their website developer. Unless your website developer was professional, like yourself, then they weren't reaching out to the clients either and telling them that these changes had actually happened. So as I said, if your 14 year old's done your website, he may not be aware that Google made a few changes.

That's a good point. And it is one of those things we talked about in our previous podcast that Google can be a bit of a moving target. If you're just kind of setting and forgetting it, you're gonna gonna run into some issues because Google's always kind of, you know, adapting to the changes that are going on. For example, you know, if you remember the the first kind of iteration of Google search was all these blue links and all text. Right?

So you type in podiatrist near me or podiatrist or foot and ankle pain, and it would just be a bunch of links. Know, sometimes there are ads in there, sometimes it's organic search results, but there are really really no maps or no images in the search results. But Google has significantly increased the number and uses of images in their search results over the past few years. So now, you know, if you see you do a search for a clinic, you're gonna see a little image next to the text. You might have a map or you might have a Google My Business profile with images.

So, you know, more space is now being devoted to images. They're becoming larger in size and, you know, really there's kind of some advanced image recognition that's taking on you know, taking shape behind the scenes, which makes images more relevant, to a searcher. And like we talked about in the past with some of our discussions on SEO, Google has these kind of bots that that kind of crawl the Internet. And for a long time, it was very text based. Right?

They wanna see keywords. They wanna see these words next to each other, these cluster of of words. But now with AI and machine learning, Google can kind of crawl websites and some of the platforms where people can upload their images into, and they can see they can say that, you know, there's a podiatrist treating a foot of a 30 year old woman or Yeah. There's a podiatrist treating a you know, it can tell that that's what's happening in the photo. Right?

So those websites that have, you know, footprints on the beach or, you know, feet, you know, bare feet on the end of a dock are in big trouble now because they're not being seen as as professional or as authoritative as these more, you know, websites that that show images that are authentic and real. So that's that's the kind of first thing. These kind of increase the increasing importance of images in search results.

Yeah. My favorite photo is the foot that has the flower between the toes.

That is a good one.

With with nature in the background, you sort of go, yes. It's kind

of a hippie foot. It's kind

of a

hippie foot.

In regards to photos on people's websites, and you're saying that their little Google bots are going around looking at things. If people are using stock photos instead of their own images, is Google punishing websites for using stock photos instead of actually taking their own photograph?

I don't know if they're punishing them yet, but I know that sometimes websites multiple websites will have the same image.

Yeah. You know, it's

kind of this duplicate content situation. So it's too early to tell whether or not Google is punishing them, but it definitely, you know, for other reasons besides just these kind of Google bots, it's important to have these, you know, we talk about it a lot, these genuine authentic images of you treating your ideal patient. So, you know, there's I don't I can't tell for sure not if they're being punished, but I say now is a good time to consider, you know, getting a photographer and taking better images of you treating your ideal patient.

Yeah. And we have mentioned that before that there's nothing better than seeing the real practitioner with a patient in their consultation room. So when a patient does arrive at your clinic, everything seems authentic, not images of people who just, you know, do not belong. Just do not belong to it.

No. Exactly. And I think that's really, really important because we talked about Google's kind of enhanced understanding of these images is something that, you know, it's kind of a hidden thing. It's kind of a, you know, you you don't see it happening. Google's kind of a black box.

They're not going to tell you necessarily that, you know, this image is being punished or that kind of thing. But, you know, like we talked about in a previous episode with the the style guide, the colors, the images you have on your website, if there's consistency, some that's something that Google can kind of measure behind the scenes and and and rank and score your your website. So you just wanna make sure that you're aware that it could be a you know, it plays a really critical role potentially in how your images are displayed across different Google properties. It's not only your website, but you know, sometimes it'll extract images and put them into the search results. It'll take images and put it on your Google business profile.

There's a lot of different places it'll put it on maps. It's really important that the images you have are authentic and that you know like I said Google sees them as being original and not duplicate.

Okay. So with the photos that you're talking about, are you saying just having these on your website or also in your Google business page?

No, that's a perfect example. You want to have these kind of optimized images in other places as well because these kind of important kind of high quality relevant images local business can happen other places. Right? Maybe it's Google on Google reviews or Google Business profile, you'll have to upload them. Right?

So it's a matter of taking those steps. Sometimes also Google Business profile has these posts. So having good images on those posts is a way of telling Google that, you know, you're you're staying current and giving your patients, you know, consistent information. So, you know, know, podiatry clinics are encouraged to regularly update these images to ensure that they are, you know, covering the types of services and the type of care you provide. You just wanna make sure they're relevant and updated.

And like I said, this is a signal to Google that you're doing things. You're not just kinda letting setting it and forgetting it

Yeah.

And that's not what Google wants. They want someone that's interacting with their properties. So, you know, these are really really important things.

Yeah. And I've heard that before that Google wants to see websites and business profiles that they're actually still alive and kicking. They weren't set up five, seven years ago, dumped there, and then everybody's just moved. So they don't know whether the business is still relevant to to the needs of the people that are doing the search.

Yeah. When a when a Google business profile has zero reviews, zero stars, zero images and the only thing that's there is that Google street view like three sixty view of you know the parking lot in front of the podiatry clinic.

Yeah.

That's not a very good strong signal to Google and it's not a very strong signal to you know, to your to your potential patients that are gonna come looking for you. Because we've talked about in the past, these Google Business Profiles are really like almost like a second website for you. There's gonna be some people that look at that Google Business Profile and already decide whether or not you are trustworthy and relevant to kind of be the one that wants to provide them that choose you to provide the care. So it's really important that these Google Business Profiles are kept updated, relevant with hours, you know, your your your address, your name, all the services you provide on there are really, really important. The photos help build that trust.

Okay. So how do you optimize an image?

Yeah. So optimizing image basically means that, know, what kind of format is it like? You know, like is it, like you talked about, is it pixelated? Is it in a, is it a PNG or JPEG that really is high quality? Okay.

Or is it an empty clinic? You know, the right kind of file for that, but also, you know, what is the composition of the image? Is it, you know, are you showing, is it a stock image of somebody touching a foot, right? Or is it is it your face? You know, like I talked about, there's these bots that will crawl images now and can really tell whether on a Google property or not, it's on your website, you know, if something's authentic or not or is it duplicate.

So you really want to strive for original relevant photos.

And you said that it's looking for people in the photos. If you have a a photo of your reception area and it's bare, compared to you having someone behind the reception and maybe a patient there or the podiatrist is standing there near the gate, having people actually in the photos itself are better than just a a blank photo.

No. I definitely agree with that. And I think it's really, really important that if you're gonna have a photo shoot, number one, you have, you know, a list of all the specific angles, it's certain things you need to have done. So it can be done in a really orderly fashion. They don't have to be there all day with you.

They can be in and out or two or three hours potentially.

Yeah.

But then you wanna have whether it be family members, friends, you know, men, women, children, whoever you wanna treat or whoever's kind of in your local area that would be willing to kind of sit in front of the camera while you're kind of giving them, you know, either some fake procedures or fake examinations or you're doing an orthotic. You know, you wanna have you doing those things in these images. And, you know, like I said, Google can tell like there's a there's an orthotic, you know, in that image with the foot and the doc you know, a doctor wearing a white coat or something or, you know, there's a person is wearing a surgical gown with a mask and something on their head. So if you wanna do surgery, kind of playing the part is not just for the building the trust with the patients or prospective patients, it can be a way of showing Google that you are that person without having to type in a bunch of text to say that you are foot and ankle surgeon, for example.

So you were saying that Google itself can recognize people in the photos. So the podiatrist that owns a clinical, the podiatrist that work there should actually be in those photos because then Google will actually match them up no different to if I take a photo on my phone and it passes it over to Google Photos that all of sudden it will recognize if you're yeah. If I've had a number of photos with you or some other friends, I can just type in their name, and straight away, it knows who that person is. I haven't even told them who it is, but it knows. It recognizes people.

It can be a little bit scary. Right? Like this kind of machine learning that it kind of it can, you know, kind of put this facial recognition. Right? And, you know, whether it's in your Google Photos or your Apple Photos, you know, and you can, you know, you typed in you maybe didn't type anything in.

You said it was like my brother Doug in one photo, and then it has all of the photos of Doug forever. And it can do other things, right? It's not just photos you know, it's not just the faces of people in photos, but like you said, you know, is it an orthotic that's in the photo? Is it a a you know, someone wearing a surgical scrub mask or, you know, wearing scrubs, wearing different things. So it's a it's it's kind of amazing what Google can do now, and it's this kind of hidden layer of scanning photos and drawing information from them.

And they're gonna wanna put those ones that are more relevant that are showing those things higher in the rankings because Google's all about providing relevant search results.

Yeah.

If their number one goal is to like take what you say is a search term and show you what exactly you wanna see. And it used to be it was only with text they could do that, but now they can do with images and they could probably do with video as well. So the more, you know, text, video and photos you have, the higher you're gonna be ranking in the future with Google.

Yeah. It's funny. I did a talk a while back, and when I did the when I did I was doing like a webinar, and I I showed a video. It's just a short snippet of a video within my whole webinar. So it was a video within a video because we're recording it.

I put it onto Facebook to do something. Next thing, I got a message from Facebook saying I'd breached Disney's copyright laws, and it was in a private group that I'm thinking, well, that was just amazing that it was a small, small snippet of a video, and it was the audio in that video that they picked up on that that I so I had to actually take it down, edit that out, and then redo it. So it's amazing what is happening in the background that we are totally unaware of. And people always ask, oh, but why is this business ranking better than me? I have more Google reviews.

But they might have an article on Shockwave, and there's a number of photos of so you're saying that Google would recognize what a Shockwave machine looks like because they've seen enough photos now of what a shock shockwave machine looks like.

No. Exactly. And I it's kind of like I don't if I I say it would be creepy or it's a little concerning sometimes. You know, you have these

I think it's fun.

Facebook. These Facebook I mean, some of it

is fun. I'm

not going But, you know, when when Facebook wants to see the 20,000 photos I've taken of, you know, during my lifetime, they can put together like a story of who I am Mhmm. Like what I like to do, you know, where I where I hang out at. And to be able to serve me, you know, they're gonna get, you know, they can serve me advertising, they can serve me all kinds of things because they know me probably better than most people do because they have an intimate view into these things. So I think it's important that, you know, with your own data too, right, make sure that you're aware when you're sharing all your photos with these services, whether it be Google, Facebook that there's gonna be certain insights that could be a little creepy at times when it comes to that stuff.

Well, that makes sense because when we did the live reboot in Brisbane last year, while we were there, somebody had a an injection free needle to for local anesthetic. They need to volunteer. So, of course, I didn't wanna volunteer, but everyone said, Tyson, you have to do it since you're hosting this event. We did it. Some people took some photographs of that happening.

That must have been posted somewhere that night. Someone's posted those photos. The next day, I was getting advertising on my phone through through Facebook of that particular equipment for sale.

Oh, wow.

Or that device that night. And I said to my wife, look at this. Never seen this ad before in my life. And all of a sudden, it popped up on my feed. So very quickly, it's recognized that service or that piece of equipment, me, and now it's gone, oh, you wanna see more of this?

No, it's it's it's a hugely, you know, it's all about relevance, right? And you know, the impact of images, you know, can help build, you know, trust in your in your business's reputation. So they're gonna keep, like I said, this is just the beginning. This is going to be something we see more and more as time goes on because these high quality relevant images, you know, are going to be seen as more reputable or more relevant and really attract potential patients. So it is one of those things you have to, like I we're just kind of hitting the tip of the iceberg when it comes to that.

Yeah. And I think people because because when that actually happened, I told everyone the next day because this was a two day event. This happened on the first day, and then I was telling them on the second day, look what turned up on my feed. And everyone's going, oh, I knew our phones listened to us. But it probably wasn't them listening to us, it was an image was posted by somebody in the group because everyone was taking photos because I was having a big soak before getting it done.

In the end, it didn't hurt. Was very brave. But and I know the person who did it on me, Elon, listens to this podcast all the time, so he will probably be chuckling about this. But that's how it turned up on my feed the next day, probably from the photograph.

Most likely, yes.

Amazing. So what's what's next? What what what's happening future wise with trends to in this area?

Yeah. So the next kind of the next kind of trend or the thing that's kind of moving in the future besides this kind of the increasing amount of, you know, facial recognition and image recognition is that you know we all have smartphones in our pocket, right? Yep. You know I live in a country where I don't speak, I don't least a province where I don't speak the main language and I use something called Google Lens. So with Google Lens, I can, you know, pull up my phone, use Google kind of Google Translate with Google Lens.

And if I have a French menu, I can, you know, hold my phone there and it'll turn everything into English for me.

That's

good. But what's gonna happen over time is that we're going to continue to have increases amount of visual search, right? So like I want to take I want this computer. I want this pair of shoes. Take an image of it, and then you can basically do all your shopping or you can do everything with it.

And a lot of kind of settings will happen now with kind of reverse image search. You have an image of something, you want to find that thing. Know, you saw an image of it and you can kind of put that image into Google. You can actually do that this right now. So we're gonna see more and more this evolution of Google Lens, different types of visual search.

Like I said, not only is it gonna be static images or translation of text, but you know, videos are gonna be kind of the next frontier of you'll be searching for something, you'll find that, you know, YouTube's that that kind of big search engine now where we find video, but it's gonna be even more refined as time goes on.

We've never spoken on this subject before. We've never even touched on this particular subject. So I'm finding this really really interesting and I think it's something that everybody should be doing a little bit more reading about the yeah, about this or reaching out to you and I and talking about it if they want more information.

No. Definitely. It definitely is, you know, for podiatrists, you know, these kind of insights about visual search kind of underscore the importance of, you know, you've got to kind of actively manage your online profile, right? You got to be kind of constantly evolving it because, know, this this kind of content associated with your practice, especially on platforms like Google, these high quality images that accurately represent their services, your facilities, your staff can really have a huge impact, not only now but in the future on online visibility, your reputation, and how you're able to acquire patients in the future. So you really want to stay on top of these things.

You know, we're going to keep on putting out, you know, these podcasts to help you understand why it's important. But it's important to take that next step and, you know, take action on some of these things we're talking about. So whether it be, you know, getting together a plan and having kind of a, you know, someone along your side from a coaching perspective like Tyson, or implementing some of these things on my side with podiatry growth, you know, we're here for you. So don't hesitate to reach out and, you know, set up a, you know, call with us, you know. We're not gonna, there's no such thing as a hard sell between me and Tyson.

We're gonna just give you some information about what we do and how we can help. If we're not the right people for you, fantastic. But, you know, kind of taking that step in 2024 to New Year, it's time to kind of take action on some of these things we've been talking about over the last hundred and five, hundred and six episodes. So, you know, really excited to see where we can take this podcast, but also help our listeners kind of reach that next level.

Yeah. One thing I just want to touch on before we we finish up was you said when everybody gets a or brings a new service into their into their business or they get a new piece of equipment. So if they've never had Shockwave and they buy a Shockwave machine, is making sure that they get some professional photos taken with the team members using that equipment and then getting that on the website as soon as they can. And every aspect or every service that they offer, they need to get photographs of that so that when Google's doing all got the Google bots out there doing all the searching, they will actually recognize and find those images and then possibly send more patients your way.

No. Exactly. The more you can have high quality text, high quality images, and high quality video of all the care that you provide. You know, I think our generation is pretty used to reading a lot and looking at images, but the next generation is going to be different. Right?

And the younger generation right now, they're on their phones, they're watching Instagram Reels and TikTok and different things. And it sounds silly to us because I'm kind of you know, I'm 46 years old. I'm kind of entering into the the older generation in a way of podiatrists. And we have to kind of stay on top of these things. So you're right.

Like, it is something where you have that high quality text, high quality images, high quality video of all the care you provide, and then you'll be that kind of go to expert for whoever's looking for that type of care.

No. I think this has been an absolutely fantastic topic. I've really enjoyed this. And what you said then too about generations changing, I think you've just gotta you gotta put a little bit of time aside and a little bit of effort to stay in touch with what's happening. You you can't just think, oh, well, yeah, I'm now too old to learn this.

No. I just think you just gotta stay at home. It's no different to your podiatry skills. If you've been doing podiatry twenty years, it doesn't mean you're too old now to keep learning. You you probably you're you're always gonna die.

And so it's just I think it's wanting to actually learn. And that's why I think this podcast is great. It's because we're we're bringing new information to to the podiatrist. That hopefully, they will be applying to their business.

Yeah. It's exciting. That's why I love doing the podcast every week with you, Tyson. It's just kind of getting out that information. So so podiatrists and, you know, practice management folks can really, you know, the the practice managers can really implement some of these things in their practice to really future proof their practice, but also help it grow well into the future.

Okay. So have you got anything else to wrap up on or you're done, Jim?

No. I think that's good. Think it just, you know, like I said, if if people have questions or any comments about today's episode, definitely reach out to Tyson and myself.

Yeah. And what I usually say is some people, if you felt you listened to this episode and you didn't get anything, you need to go and give yourself an uppercut. Take two Panadol, have a lie down, get back up and listen to it again. Because there was, I think, a lot of information this particular episode that will change the way that you're gonna start using your websites, using Google Business in so many ways. So thank you, Jim.

My pleasure, Tyson.

Okay. Talk to you next week. Alright. Bye. See you.

Bye.

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