For practices organised around services nobody types
The search is heel pain, not podiatry, and half your work arrives by referral anyway.
A report on your own site, listing the symptoms your patients arrive with that it never names.
By Reece Rainer
spareday, Newcastle NSW
Last updated
13 September 2026
Read time
4 minutes
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Podiatry gets found through two doors that have almost nothing in common: somebody in pain who searched a symptom, and somebody sent by a GP or an endocrinologist.
Most practice websites are built for a third door that barely exists, which is somebody who woke up wanting to see a podiatrist.
Plantar fasciitis, heel pain, ingrown toenail, bunions, a foot that hurts in the morning, orthotics. The profession's name appears in the search only after somebody has worked out who fixes it, and many never do.
That is the whole gap. A practice organised around services is invisible to the person describing a symptom, and the person describing a symptom is the larger and earlier audience by a wide margin.
Heel pain is the clearest example. It is one of the most searched musculoskeletal complaints in the country, it is squarely podiatric, and most sufferers spend months trying stretches they found on a general health site before anybody suggests a podiatrist.
A page written properly about heel pain does two jobs: it reaches somebody months earlier than a podiatry search would, and it establishes that this is a treatable thing rather than something to put up with.
Diabetic foot care, wound management, paediatric referrals and vascular checks arrive through GPs, endocrinologists and diabetes educators rather than through search. Those referrers still look you up before sending anyone.
What they are checking is different from what a patient checks: scope, credentials, whether you take care plan referrals, whether you handle high-risk feet, and how quickly you can see somebody urgent.
Almost no podiatry site addresses a referrer directly, and a single page written for them, stating exactly what you accept and how to refer, is worth more than most of the marketing on the site.
Diabetic foot care deserves its own page for both audiences at once. Patients are told to have their feet checked and search it; referrers are looking for somebody who genuinely does high-risk work rather than nail care.
People search whether orthotics work, what they cost, whether custom is better than the pair in the chemist, and how long they last. Almost every practice sells them and almost none has written an honest page about them.
The doubt is the opportunity. Somebody who suspects orthotics are an upsell is looking for an explanation that does not read like one, and the practice that gives it plainly, including when orthotics are not the answer, is the one they trust.
Cost matters here more than elsewhere in the practice, because custom orthotics are a substantial out-of-pocket item and the patient has no reference point. A published range with what is included prevents the quiet abandonment.
Saying when they are not appropriate is the strongest possible move and almost nobody makes it. It is the single fastest way to be believed by somebody who arrived sceptical.
A page per symptom, a page for referrers, an honest orthotics page including cost, and a listing with online booking, because a lot of podiatry is booked in the evening.
The symptom pages are the engine and they compound. They reach people early, they rank steadily rather than dramatically, and they keep earning for years because the way somebody describes a sore heel does not change.
The referrer page is the highest-leverage single page in the practice, because one GP who understands your scope sends patients for years rather than once.
Then the ordinary layer: online booking, correct hours, whether you have a care plan option, and reviews that name the condition, because that is the language the next patient will be searching with.
The patient with six months of heel pain has already read four general health articles and tried three stretches. The practice that wrote the fifth article, properly, is the one they finally ring.
Related reading from us: seo for medical clinics and seo for insurance brokers.
Weeks for the listing, three to six months for the symptom pages. Those pages age extremely well, because the words people use for a sore foot do not change.
Conditions. Almost nobody searches for podiatry directly, and the person describing a symptom is both the larger audience and the earlier one.
Write a page for the GP rather than the patient: what you accept, your scope with high-risk feet, care plan handling and urgent availability. One GP who understands your scope refers for years.
It is the most searched and most doubted part of the profession. An honest page, including cost and when orthotics are not the answer, is the fastest way to be believed by a sceptical patient.