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Case Study SEO for Medicare Agency

Implementation of a Custom SEO strategy for a Health Insurance and Medicare Broker Company

INTRODUCTION

The client is a well-known Medicare Brokerage operating across the USA. Their main customers are health insurance and medicare beneficiaries. 

Website platform: WordPress

Builder: Elementor

Additional plugins (we didn’t change): WMU DEV package

Plugins we added: Redirection, WP Rocket, Better Search & Replace

Project duration: 8 months

Main Problems

The website in question faced significant challenges across several key areas. Foremost among these was the inability to effectively index both existing and newly published content, leading to stagnant website rankings despite consistent new publications. This was further compounded by a notably low overall number of keywords appearing in search engine results pages (SERP), particularly within the crucial top 10 positions. A lack of a cohesive internal linking strategy was identified, alongside content that remained largely unoptimized beyond the basic H1 tag. Performance issues were also prevalent, with the website suffering from slow loading times. More specific technical deficiencies included excessively long titles, ineffective meta descriptions, absent alt text and descriptions for images, and broken internal links.

Goals

Addressing these critical issues, the primary objectives were established to significantly increase the total number of keywords present in the SERP, specifically aiming to boost the count of keywords ranking in the top 5 and top 10. Enhancing website speed was a high priority, as was the integration of EEAT (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) elements to improve credibility. Furthermore, a concerted effort was made to refine the overall website structure and to rectify and enhance internal linking through the implementation of content clusters and silos utilizing both pages and posts. Strategic keyword research was planned to identify additional opportunities with low to mid-range keyword difficulty, focusing on informational and commercial intent by analyzing keyword gaps between the client and competitors. Ultimately, the goal was to produce high-quality, link-worthy content capable of attracting natural backlinks.

Preparation and Audit

The initial phase of the intervention involved comprehensive preparation and a thorough audit. This included performing a full technical audit using Website Auditor with custom settings from SEO PowerSuite, SEMrush, and Google Search Console. Website speed was rigorously checked using GTMetrix, Pingdom Speed Test, and Google PageSpeed Insights. Current keyword rankings were meticulously reviewed with SEMrush, with particular attention paid to positions 20-100. The internal linking structure was scrutinized using Website Auditor and Screaming Frog. A detailed assessment of E-A-T (now EEAT) factors was conducted, alongside an examination of both indexed and non-indexed pages. This preparatory stage also focused on identifying the most valuable pages, such as evergreen content, useful resources, and pages with existing backlinks, as well as pinpointing weak posts and pages characterized by a lack of indexing, poor content, absence of links, and limited utility for readers or potential customers.

Actual Work

Following the exhaustive audit, the actual work commenced with the team diligently rectifying all identified technical issues. The rate of new content publication was deliberately reduced to one blog post every two weeks to allow for focused implementation of necessary changes. New content was then meticulously prepared, adhering to proper on-page structure informed by competitor analysis and established SEO practices, including optimized H1, H2, and H3+ headings, strategic keyword placement, and optimized images. Crucially, EEAT components were integrated by developing a robust author profile complete with a dedicated page detailing the author’s biography and contact information. Pages were systematically grouped into silos with proper linking. Existing content was diligently improved, and additional features such as FAQs were incorporated. Titles and meta descriptions underwent significant optimization, and the overall website structure was enhanced through the effective use of parent pages. WordPress tags, which were consuming substantial crawl budget without contributing to optimization, were removed from indexing. Furthermore, a content brief was created to guide and plan all future content published directly by the company. Leveraging existing keywords and content, in-depth keyword research was conducted to uncover “golden nuggets” opportunities for significant ranking improvements through content enhancement. Subsequent to this initial phase, further keyword research was integrated into new content briefs to identify additional relevant keywords.

TLDR – STRUCTURED IN BULLET POINTS BELOW

MAIN PROBLEMS

  1. Indexing old and new content
  2. Publishing new content constantly without any effect on rankings (website rankings were standing still)
  3. Low number of total keywords in SERP
  4. Low number of top 10 keywords in SERP
  5. No internal linking strategy
  6. Content that was not optimized at all (besides h1)
  7. The website was slow 
  8. Several additional, more specific problems like:
    1. Titles too long
    2. The meta descriptions were weak
    3. Alt texts and descriptions on images were empty
    4. Broken internal links

GOALS

WHAT WE DID

PREPARATION AND AUDIT

ACTUAL WORK

BEFORE AND AFTER

WE STARTED AROUND APRIL 2022:

Total keywords in SERP: 1511

Total top 10 keywords: 53

CURRENT SITUATION (AFTER WORK):

Total keywords in SERP: 5464

Total top 10 keywords: 219

GROWTH REPORT (LAST 6 MONTHS)

Organic keywords growth: 123%

Organic traffic cost: 49%

TRAFFIC INCREASE (LAST 6 MONTHS VS SAME 6 MONTHS YEAR BEFORE)

CLOSER LOOK AT ORGANIC TRAFFIC INCREASE (SAME TIMEFRAME)