Groups don't lose search visibility the way single practices do. They lose it to their own location pages competing for the same treatment query, to duplicate profiles inherited with an acquisition, and to a blended report that hides a struggling site inside the average. We untangle that: page hierarchy, profile estate, migrations and per-clinic numbers.
Running a single location? SEO for dentists is the better starting point.
Five near-identical implant pages, one per suburb, all chasing the same intent. Google can't tell which one you meant, so it splits the authority and often shows none of them.
Old listings under the previous owner's account, duplicates nobody removed, retired trading names, a phone number that rings out. Each one dilutes the location it belongs to.
The group total looks steady while one site quietly slides. Without per-location and per-treatment attribution, the strong clinics keep hiding the weak one for another quarter.
Cannibalisation at group scale is a structural problem, not a copywriting one. The fix is deciding which page is allowed to compete for the treatment query across the whole group, then giving every location page something the hub cannot carry: the practitioners who work there, the equipment in those rooms, the parking, the nearest station.
| Typical group setup | What it should be |
|---|---|
| Five implant pages, one per suburb | One implant hub, five differentiated location pages |
| Location pages built by find-and-replace | Practitioners, rooms, parking and transport per site |
| Every page links to the homepage | Hub links down to sites, sites link back to the hub |
| Practitioner names buried in a team list | A profile per practitioner, linked from every site they work at |
Growth by acquisition leaves a trail: profiles under previous owners, duplicate listings, dead numbers, three spellings of the same address across directories. It is unglamorous work, and it moves local visibility more reliably than almost anything else. The same care applies when an acquired practice's website is folded into the group domain. That site carries years of local authority, and a careless cutover throws it away.
A group average is a comfortable place for an underperforming clinic to hide. One location with two hundred reviews and another with four are two different businesses in the eyes of local search, and they need separate review velocity, separate visibility tracking and separate attribution. Practitioner profiles get the same treatment, because they attract name searches of their own, support the clinical content across the group, and have to follow the dentist between sites.
Sameness is the problem, not the count. One page per clinic you physically operate is right, however many that is. What breaks a group is publishing a treatment page under every location with only the suburb name changed, because those pages then argue with each other for the same query. Treatment depth lives on the hub; the location page carries the practitioners, the rooms, the parking and the transport.
Do not switch it off on handover day. That domain usually holds years of local links, its own profile history and the pages patients in that suburb already reach. We crawl it first, identify the pages earning search visibility, map every URL to a destination on the group domain, and redirect one-to-one rather than pointing everything at the homepage. The domain stays registered and redirecting long after the rebrand.
Yes. One verified profile per physical location where patients are seen, each pointing at its own location page rather than the group homepage. At group scale the work is mostly removal: duplicates created by previous owners, listings under retired trading names, and profiles with dead phone numbers. Practitioners who work across several sites are handled separately from the clinic listings.
Per location, then per treatment line within it. A single blended traffic figure across six clinics hides the one site that is falling behind, because the strong locations carry the average. We separate calls, form enquiries and booking clicks by clinic, track each site's local visibility and review velocity on its own, and report which locations need attention this month and why.
We'll map where your location pages compete with each other, list the duplicate and stale profiles attached to the group, and check whether AI assistants describe your sites consistently. Free, and specific to your estate.