Still obsessing over keywords? If so, it’s time to reboot your healthcare digital marketing SEO strategy. Optimizing content for the “perfect keyword” or even an exact keyword match is not only a waste of time, but may even hurt your Google page rank. Unfortunately, too many healthcare marketers continue to be misled by keyword myths, and end up creating over-optimized content. Is your content relevant and meaningful – or are you so focused on finding the right keyword that you’re missing the bigger picture?

Get the facts behind these four popular keyword myths:

Myth #1: Keywords need to be an exact match.

Keywords do not need to be repeated verbatim throughout a piece of content. Include the keyword (or a variation of it) in your headline, the URL and at least once in the content. However, make sure that your keyword(s) are included in a manner that always makes sense. For example, if your healthcare digital marketing team wants to target “health care Atlanta” as a term, actually writing content around this phrase could be a bit awkward. Would you click on a headline that says “Health Care Atlanta Costs Increase” or “Atlanta Health Care Costs Increase”? The first headline option sounds like Google search bot wrote it rather than a real human. Don’t make the same mistake with your content.

Myth #2: Optimize content for the most popular keyword.

Stop worrying about the most popular keywords; chances are, the big competitors already have these keywords locked up and you won’t be able to rank highly for them anyways. Instead, focus on longtail keyword phrases (three to four words). Since keyword phrases are more specific, you’ll be targeting a smaller audience. This actually is not a bad thing; in fact, delivering highly specific content to a smaller target will improve conversion rates because you'll be driving the right people to your site in the first place.

Myth #3: Write your headline around your keyword phrase.

Depending on your content, including your keyword or phrase in your headline may make sense. In other cases, however, creating an entire headline around an awkward keyword phrase just doesn’t sound right. When it comes to integrating longtail keyword phrases into headline content, you want to use the keywords in a way that makes the most sense to your audience. A stellar headline (usually no more than 10 words) will clearly explain what your content is all about and “tease” why your audience will want to read on for more information.

Myth #4: Your content should have an ideal keyword density.

No matter how many times Google debunks this myth, it just doesn’t want to die! Here’s the truth: there is NO ideal number of times that you should repeat a keyword (or variation thereof) on a page. Having said that, yes, you should integrate your longtail keyword phrase a few times throughout the page in a manner that makes sense to your audience. And yes, tracking the number of times that you include a specific phrase can make sense too; after all, you don’t want Google to think that you’ve been stuffing this phrase throughout the page and then get hit by a Google penalty. While keyword density tools are helpful for tracking your own keyword usage (and avoiding inadvertent overstuffing), focus your efforts on creating quality content.

Bottom line:

At the end of the day, your mission is to deliver clear, relevant and meaningful content to current and prospective patients. That’s why these folks clicked through to your page in the first place. Don’t assault them with over-optimized content that’s stuffed with keywords or awkward keyword phrases. The best healthcare digital marketing will naturally integrate one or two longtail keyword phrases throughout a blog post. Honing in on just one keyword does your site a disservice. Searchers use a wide mix of words and phrases to find what they are looking for; the content on your site should be equally varied.