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How a Thailand Private Hospital Grew Traffic by 523% YoY

https://www.medparkhospital.com/

Stats

241.6K to 1.5M Monthly Visits

Industry

Health & Medical

Niche

Hospital

Reporting Date

October 2023

In the booming realm of medical tourism, Thailand is projected to reach 760 billion baht (21.5B USD) by 2027.

Thailand recently introduced one-year visas for medical tourists to drive this growth. This aligns with the national agenda to become a global healthcare destination.

In today's case study, our focus shifts to a private hospital leading the charge with its SEO efforts to reach its international audience.

We'll reveal how they're navigating the digital landscape to boost brand awareness and win the attention of tourists seeking medical care abroad.

Let's dive in.

About MedPark Hospital

MedPark is a private hospital in Bangkok, Thailand. It opened in the latter months of 2021, amidst COVID-19 lockdowns.

MedPark Hospital is a 25-story building with 550 inpatient beds and 300 examination rooms. The site boasts an impressive 90,000 square meters.

According to Hospital Management Asia, “nearly 70% of its medical specialists and house doctors hold American Board certification and/or are accredited by international programs.”

The hospital also partners with specialists from over 30 different fields of medicine.

Overall, MedPark Hospital aims to become a leader in Southeast Asia medical services for locals and tourists alike.

They were recently awarded one of Thailand’s top 10 hospitals.

Historical Performance

Despite opening in Q4 of 2021, MedPark Hospital’s website went live a year prior.

Semrush historical data reveals the first organic visits occurred in September 2020.

The website was steady to take off, winning 9,784 organic visits by year’s end.

2021 and 2022 experienced significant growth, but it was 2023 that launched site traffic to new heights.

Here, we see a breakdown of organic traffic over the years, highlighting the dramatic shift in 2023.

So, how did they increase global traffic 5 times over the previous year? And how is MedPark using this digital traction to get on medical tourists’ radar?

Let’s find out.

The Catalyst: How MedPark Reached 1.5 Million Monthly Visits

Medparkhospital.com grew its organic traffic by performing the following:

1. Crafting new content for its local audience
2. Assigning hreflang attributes for its international audience
3. Targeting informational intent to boost brand awareness

Let’s explore each point to discover how this influenced MedPark’s newfound SEO success.

1. Crafting New Content for Its Local Audience

Between October 2022 and October 2023, MedPark grew its website from 700 to 2,510 pages.

(It’s important to note that these pages cater to Thailand traffic. We’ll explore international traffic in our next section.)

More specifically, MedPark targeted two areas of its site with new content:

• Disease & Treatment
• Lifestyles

Both these categories are easily discoverable via the navigation bar.

(For the sake of clarity, we’ll be using English screenshots in this case study, but all pages are available in Thai.)

Within each category, MedPark shares articles written by its team of medical professionals.

Here’s an example of some topics within the lifestyles category:

For now, we won’t get into the details of these new pages but rather focus on the output of new content and its effect on organic traffic.

With around 1.8K new pages, MedPark saw a rapid increase in keyword rankings.

They more than tripled keyword rankings over the last year for Thailand traffic, growing from 11.3K to 37K.

Why this matters:

New keyword rankings bring new traffic.

And in October 2023, MedPark experienced 253% growth year-over-year (YoY) for Thailand traffic alone.

Not to mention, many of these pages are available in English, which skyrocketed their international traffic. (We’ll tell you more about that next.)

Let’s look at how new content can also be instrumental in growing your website traffic.

How to find new content opportunities for your site:

Keyword research is at the core of finding content opportunities. This process allows you to identify what your audience is looking for and tailor your content to meet their needs.

This guide shows you how to do keyword research using popular SEO tools.

We also recommend utilizing topic clusters.

Topic clusters help you organize your keywords into an actionable content strategy.

Tools for keyword research:

Want a fast and easy way to do keyword research in WordPress?

All in One SEO (AIOSEO) helps you streamline the process with keyword ideas directly in the WordPress editor.

Our Keyphrase Suggestions tool connects with your Semrush account to deliver relevant keywords for your page or post.

You’ll receive a list of keyword ideas, like the example below.

Once you’ve added a keyphrase, our TruSEO tool will analyze your content optimizations.

This feature helps you maximize your content’s reach by giving you actionable insights for improvement.

Here’s an example of the Readability Checklist from TruSEO:

Now that we know how MedPark grew its local traffic, let's see how it leveraged this new content to reach its international audience.

2. Assigning Hreflang Attributes for Its International Audience

Hreflang tags are code snippets within your site's HTML headers. They tell search engines what language you use on the page. They can also communicate if you’re targeting a specific region.

Both these pieces of information are relayed using language and country codes.

Here’s what it looks like in plain HTML:

<link rel="alternate" href="example.com" hreflang="en-us" />

This tells us that the page is in English, targeting the United States.

If it were “en-uk” we would know it’s English, targeting the United Kingdom.

You can also use a language code without a regional code if your situation calls for it.

In MedPark Hospital’s case, they use English – United States hreflang tags.

And while they’ve always used them, 2023’s content strategy produced more English pages than ever.

The United States and the United Kingdom saw an influx of new traffic in October 2023. (MedPark does not use a UK region code so that traffic is also being directed to the US URLs.)

Here we see the traffic growth in the United States:

And the United Kingdom traffic, which mirrors this growth.

In October, both countries brought in over a quarter-million visits for these /en/us/ pages alone.

These URLs also generate traffic in other countries, contributing to MedPark Hospital’s international reach.

Why this matters:

Implementing hreflang tags is not just a technicality; it's a strategic move to win over MedPark's global audience.

These attributes ensure search engines understand the language targeting of the content, boosting visibility in English search results.

In October 2023, MedPark’s US traffic ranked for 206K keywords.

How to optimize your site for international traffic:

Not implementing hreflang tags is considered among the 5 SEO mistakes for multilingual websites.

Luckily, it’s easy to add with plugins. This tutorial shows you exactly how to add hreflang tags in WordPress (with a recommended plugin and manually.)

It’s also worth noting that preparing your site for international traffic goes beyond this attribute.

Multilingual SEO is a complex process that requires careful planning and execution to succeed.

This beginner’s guide to multilingual SEO walks you through the different elements needed to optimize your site for international traffic.

Tools for multilingual SEO:

Multilingual plugins are the best option for translating every element of your website. But they’re only as good as the original data you give it.

This means your SEO needs to be high-quality before you start translating.

AIOSEO can help you make strong optimizations, setting the foundation for the rest of your localized efforts.

Take the local SEO tool as an example.

This feature allows you to set up important business details for your local market. This information can help you rank higher and show in Google Maps.

Have more than one location? No problem.

Simply toggle the Multiple Locations button, and we’ll help you set up a profile for each location.

Also, as we mentioned earlier, TruSEO Analysis is another great tool for optimizing content.

Then, when you're ready to set up SEO for different languages and countries, AIOSEO integrates with all your favorite translation plugins.

Translations API makes this possible, so your translations are more effective.

Now, let’s look at what MedPark is doing with its new content to boost brand awareness.

3. Targeting Informational Intent to Boost Brand Awareness

MedPark has a strategic approach to its content, specifically for its international audience.

When we look at US traffic, 81.3% of ranking keywords have informational intent.

Informational keywords are typically hard to rank for because they have high search volumes and a lot of competition.

With that said, every website should include them in its content strategy.

Informational keywords are the first steps within a user's buying journey, also called the marketing funnel. This model assigns a stage to each phase, with each step getting the customer closer to conversion.

Informational keywords align with the Awareness stage, where users are gathering information.

Marketers often refer to content in this stage as TOFU (top of the funnel) content.

TOFU, or informational content, is an excellent way to reach a broad audience.

These users are early in their investigative process, meaning your chances of introducing your site to new users are highest at this stage.

MedPark Hospital is well aware of this fact.

Their content meets the informational intent, providing a comprehensive article to the health query, but they also take the opportunity to introduce their services.

Let’s look at this article on cracking joints as an example.

After an in-depth explanation of cracking joints, its causes, and exercises to treat it, MedPark closes the article with this:

Not only do they introduce themselves as a specialist in this article’s subject (bone health), but they also give users an easy way to book an appointment.

They also go on to present related doctors, their specialties, and services.

Why this matters:

Considering it’s a new hospital, MedPark is still in the raise brand awareness stage. This means they must make a significant effort to make a name for themselves in the international market.

By taking every opportunity to address popular health topics, MedPark positions itself as an authority in the medical field and introduces its services to a vast global audience.

How to create informational (TOFU) content on your site:

TOFU content aims to educate and engage. Here's a step-by-step guide to creating compelling informational content on your site:

1. Identify Relevant Topics. Leverage keyword research to uncover topics related to your industry and audience interests.
2. Understand Your Audience. Define your target audience, understand their informational needs, and tailor your content accordingly.
3. Craft Comprehensive Articles. Provide in-depth information on the chosen topic, answering their questions and concerns.
4. Integrate Brand Messaging. Weave your brand messaging into the content. Remember, this content is your foot in the door, so make a good first impression.
5. Facilitate Engagement. Include calls-to-action (CTAs) that guide users to take the next desired step.

This article on TOFU – MOFU – BOFU gives you specific examples of content for all stages of the marketing funnel.

Tools for TOFU content:

Steps 1 and 2 of the above process can be achieved through keyword research using the Keyphrase Suggestions tool we discussed earlier.

Now, let’s focus on Step 3 – Craft Comprehensive Articles.

Creating a well-structured article is paramount in delivering valuable TOFU content.

AIOSEO’s TruSEO tool can help you organize content to meet informational intent. One smart way it does this is by analyzing your article and its subheadings for your focus keyphrase.

As shown below, you’ll get a checklist of items and actionable insights to improve your content for maximum reach.

Strategically positioning your keywords is an effective way to organize your content to meet search intent. TruSEO helps you achieve this seamlessly.

Standout SEO Wins

1. They leverage image SEO.

Image SEO is the practice of optimizing your images to rank in Google image search results. It includes elements like alt text, title tags, file names and dimensions, and more.

Overall, MedPark Hospital does a good job applying image SEO best practices.

They place their primary keyword in the file name, write descriptive alt text, and use clear images.

Let’s look at an example to illustrate these optimizations.

Here’s a photo from their earlier cracking joints article:

• File name: crepitus-or-cracking-joints-banner-1.jpeg
• Alt text: Causes, treatments, and physical exercises for Crepitus
• Thai Alt text: The above alt text is also written in Thai.

Tool: Make image optimizations a breeze with AIOSEO’s image SEO feature. This tool allows you to use smart tags to generate image titles and alt text automatically.

Takeaways

In our analysis of medparkhospital.com, we’ve uncovered the strategies that contributed to their new local and international success.

Now, let’s review which strategies to use on your website and which to reconsider.

Top 3 Strategies to Emulate

1. Grow your content portfolio to win more rankings. Growing your content is a proven method to secure more rankings by targeting a broader range of keywords. A comprehensive content portfolio also establishes niche authority for users and search engines.
2. Assign hreflang attributes on multilingual sites. MedPark's use of hreflang tags highlights their awareness of language and regional optimizations. These attributes ensure local audiences reach the correct version of a page for the best user experience.
3. Use the marketing funnel to meet the different stages of your customer’s journey. While MedPark excels in high-competition TOFU keywords, it may not be the optimal approach for every business. They have the domain authority to compete and win these keywords, which isn't always tangible for new or growing businesses. Consider focusing on MOFU and BOFU keywords aligned with commercial and transactional intent for less competition and better results.

Bottom 3 Strategies to Reconsider

1. Lack of automatic redirects for 404 errors. MedPark delivers a suboptimal 404 error experience, with a blank page simply displaying “404.” This creates a dead-end for both users and search engines. A recommended solution is using Redirection Manager to set up automatic redirects. This process ensures a seamless navigation experience when content is deleted or moved.
2. Metadata exceeds character limits. MedPark's metadata extends beyond character limits, risking truncation on the SERP. Maintaining concise and well-optimized metadata is crucial for an effective online presence. An AI Title/Description Generator can assist in writing metadata for you. You can also check this information in a SERP snippet tool to preview before publishing.
3. They neglect image title tags. While MedPark excels in most image SEO practices, it overlooks the importance of title tags. Title tags are visible when users click or hover their cursor over an image. They play an important role in user accessibility and assist search engines in understanding image content. Smart tags in the image SEO tool can automate the generation of these elements for you.

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Gabriela Jhean SEO Specialist

Gabriela is a creative and results-driven SEO specialist dedicated to helping small businesses stand out online. She contributes in-depth SEO case studies at AIOSEO Trends to reveal the winning strategies of top-ranking websites. In her downtime, Gabriela enjoys treasure hunting for antique jewelry.

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