I’m Jordan from Marketing Well, and over the past few months, one question has kept resurfacing, quietly at first, then insistently:
Is SEO still a wise investment as we move into 2026?
The answer isn’t binary. It never is. It hinges on several variables, which I want to unpack here.
The Search Landscape Is Changing
First, we need to acknowledge an uncomfortable truth: the search environment is no longer what it used to be.
Open a Google results page today, and you’ll notice the shift immediately. Paid placements dominate the upper real estate. AI-generated overviews sit prominently at the top. Google Business Profiles often appear before traditional organic listings have a chance to rank. Beyond Google, people are increasingly turning to AI tools—such as ChatGPT, Claude, and others—to shortcut their search for answers.
All of that matters.
That said, Google still controls the lion’s share of search behaviour. I can demonstrate this clearly through my clients’ Google Ads data. People are searching. They are clicking. They are converting. Search is not dead.
But whether to invest in SEO is a separate question.
This topic came into sharp focus last week when a potential client reached out, eager to explore SEO. On the surface, it sounded reasonable. But once I reviewed their website and ran the numbers, the conclusion was unavoidable: SEO would not be a prudent investment for them, at least not right now.
Here’s why.
The client is based in Calgary, so I evaluated their site through that lens. I ran a ranking report in BrightLocal, entering multiple therapy modalities paired with geographic modifiers: “Calgary,” “near me,” and similar variations.
The report told a blunt story.
BrightLocal only surfaces rankings if a site appears in the top 50 results, roughly the first 5 pages of Google. When a keyword shows a dash, it means the site isn’t visible there.
In this case, most keywords returned nothing but dashes.
Only two terms showed any traction: IFS therapy Calgary and somatic therapy Calgary. Everything else was absent. No organic desktop presence. No meaningful mobile visibility. No local pack inclusion.
That’s a red flag.
And the cause was apparent almost immediately.
The site lacked dedicated pages for individual therapy modalities. Everything was forced into a single, generalized structure. Trauma, somatic work, and IFS were collapsed into one place and expected to rank collectively.
That approach no longer works.
If you search for a modality-specific query, say, “EMDR therapy Calgary,” you’ll notice a consistent pattern. The results are almost always standalone pages built explicitly around that service. Not a homepage. Not a generic services page. A focused, intentional URL.
After our call, the client addressed this. They created the missing pages and properly optimized them. In a few weeks, I’ll rerun the report to see whether those pages have entered the top five pages of results.
They might.
But realistically, they probably won’t crack page two or three yet, and that distinction matters.
SEO Makes Sense In This Case
Here’s the line I drew very clearly:
If you’re not already hovering on page two or page three, SEO is rarely a worthwhile investment. If you are ranking on the first three pages of Google for many of your keywords, this is a green flag, and SEO is a good investment.
Climbing out of invisibility requires time, sustained effort, and often a significant financial commitment. Whether you’re doing the work yourself, learning SEO, writing content, building backlinks, or paying an agency hundreds of dollars month after month, the cost accumulates quickly.
For larger practices with multiple clinicians and discretionary marketing budgets, that investment may be justified. For solo practitioners or newer practices, it often isn’t.
That doesn’t mean you should ignore SEO fundamentals, such as proper page optimization.
Those modality-specific pages still matter, not just for search engines, but for real people as well. When someone arrives at your site via a referral or directory listing, they are often in a fragile state. If they’re seeking trauma support and your site doesn’t have a page that speaks directly to that experience, they may leave without reaching out.
So yes, build the pages. Optimize them. Get the basics right.
But then pause. Reassess later.
The Importance Of Google Business Profiles
The most impactful SEO lever today, especially for therapy practices, isn’t traditional organic rankings. It’s the local pack.
Breaking into the top three, or at least the expanded local finder, can outperform standard organic listings entirely. Reviews, proximity, and profile completeness play a decisive role here.
Distance, in particular, is critical.
In larger cities, Google prioritizes proximity aggressively. If someone is searching downtown, they’re unlikely to see practices 30 minutes away. This mirrors real human behaviour; most people don’t want a long commute for therapy.
Beyond distance, there are tangible actions that help:
- Adding high-quality photos to your Google Business Profile
- Uploading images of yourself, your office, and your team
- Fully completing service listings and therapy specialties.
- Selecting accurate primary and secondary categories
- Earning reviews where ethically appropriate, including from professional peers
These signals compound. I have another post on five ways to improve your GBP rankings.
Looking ahead, the local pack will continue to eclipse traditional SEO in importance. It offers visibility, social proof, and immediate context, all before a user ever clicks through to a website.
Webpages still matter. Rankings still matter. But whether SEO is worth the investment depends entirely on where you stand today.
If your site already lives on page two or three for meaningful terms, SEO may be a smart next move. If it doesn’t, Google Ads is often the more rational path.
That’s why most of my work with therapists now focuses on Google Ads.
Paid search delivers immediacy. It brings high-intent visitors to your site right away. It allows you to validate whether your website experience actually converts into booked sessions. And once you know that it does, every future marketing channel becomes more efficient.SEO can come later, once the foundation is proven.
If you’d like clarity on where your practice stands, I offer a complimentary 20-minute consultation. I’ll pull a ranking report, walk through your site, and provide a straightforward assessment of what’s likely to drive clients through the door.
No guesswork. No generic advice. Just an honest evaluation of what makes sense for you.
