And... we're back!
We're finally caught up. Over the past week or so we back-published every edition we'd missed since early March, and with this one, the report is current again. Thank you for your patience through all of it. Grief sucks.
Since we just dropped a dozen-plus editions at once, here's the quick play-by-play of what actually happened across those weeks -- especially the new names in therapist directories.
LinkedIn and Psychology Today are still the leaders here. They had some strange ups and downs, but overall, they are definitely still on top. Maybe a new Google algorithm update? Who really knows.
But here's the juicier part, now that we're back to finding new therapist directories. Which is sort of the whole point of this whole project at TherapistSearchReport.com.
Psynio surged out of nowhere in early April into the top 15, held for a couple weeks -- then dropped out entirely, right around the time its site started returning a server error. Because I'm writing this a number of weeks delayed, I don't really know what happened there! What made it shoot up so high? And what made it immediately drop? A cease-and-desist? Something else? It would all be speculation, but I am definitely curious.
Dr. Leonardo became super popular -- and is now consistently a top therapist search result. It's a website-builder platform that puts therapists on its own subdomains (yourname.dr-leonardo.com), climbing steadily in our analysis starting in April. They appear to be creating these subdomain websites for therapists without their consent -- they offer a "claim" button to let you claim your profile, and they state on their website: "Dr. Leonardo obtains data about healthcare providers from U.S. government and other public databases." I really wish I could find when they started publishing these pages -- Was it recently? Or was it a while ago, and they were just recently indexed and prioritized by Google?
Frustratingly, and we've seen this before, but -- Dr. Leonardo has boilerplate "Office Hours" for each therapist profile. 9 o'clock to 5 o'clock, Monday through Friday. That is super unfortunate, to say the least.
Vemra popped up from near-zero in late May. And then it dropped back quickly. They appear to be building out a giant directory of all sorts of professionals, so who knows where the data came from. But they say that they have information on over 58,000 "counselor pros".
Welli also surged in late May. Unlike Vemra, Welli lingered a little longer before fading. Even for unclaimed profiles, they have a button that says "Schedule online". When you click it, it says:
"We'll handle the scheduling
Sign up and we'll contact the office on your behalf, find available times, and confirm your appointment."
A question for Welli is: Why are you offering to schedule for therapists that you have no relationship with?
Okay, so those are the highlights. And the main takeaway is this:
Therapists do not exist to help you with your SEO.
If you are going to create a therapist directory with profile pages for thousands and thousands of therapists without their consent, please stop and ask yourself:
- Is this helping the person seeking a therapist actually find a therapist?
- Do incorrect hours help or hurt their ability to schedule therapy?
- When you offer to "help get in touch" with the therapist, are you hoping the individual may use your service instead?
- Does introducing a layer of communication confusion and friction (since you do not actually have a professional relationship or agreement with the therapist) increase or decrease the chances that the client will quickly get scheduled with the therapist?
Seriously, it's sort of crazy that this keeps happening. And happening. And happening.
Therapist directories should only be listing profiles of therapists that have consented to it. Then the profile will have up to date information as well!
"Claiming" a profile should not even be a thing!
So again: Therapists do not exist to help you with your SEO.
And with that, we're back on schedule -- thanks again for sticking with us through the catch-up. Hopefully we can stay more consistent in publishing new editions each week. Since we offer this as a free resource to the therapist community, we can't make promises, but we will do our best.
Top 30 Websites for Therapists
These domains show up the most when searching for a specific therapist by name.
| Website | Domain Popularity | Search Result Position | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Score | 1 week | 4 week | Average | 1 week | 4 week | |
| linkedin.com |
74.8
|
▼ 0.1 | ▲ 6.1 |
6.1
|
▼ 0.3 | ▲ 1.5 |
| psychologytoday.com |
68.6
|
▲ 1.1 | ▲ 4.4 |
2.7
|
▲ 0.1 | ▲ 1.9 |
| facebook.com |
33.4
|
▲ 2.2 | ▲ 1.4 |
14.9
|
▼ 0.7 | ▼ 0.4 |
| instagram.com |
31.8
|
▲ 1.4 | ▲ 0.7 |
13.6
|
▼ 0.5 | ▲ 0.2 |
| zocdoc.com |
26.4
|
▲ 0.8 | ▲ 2.8 |
5.6
|
▼ 0.4 | ▲ 1.0 |
| headway.co |
20.7
|
▲ 0.1 | ▲ 3.1 |
5.9
|
▲ 0.3 | ▲ 0.8 |
| healthgrades.com |
15.6
|
▲ 0.4 | ▼ 1.7 |
13.8
|
▼ 1.2 | ▲ 1.9 |
| dr-leonardo.com |
15.4
|
▲ 1.5 | ▲ 4.4 |
9.7
|
▼ 1.1 | ▼ 0.1 |
| therapyfinder.com |
14.2
|
▲ 0.6 | ▲ 1.5 |
10.4
|
▼ 0.7 | ▲ 1.1 |
| youtube.com |
12.5
|
▲ 0.3 | ▲ 0.3 |
24.0
|
▼ 1.1 | ▲ 1.3 |
| mind-diagnostics.org |
12.4
|
0.0 | ▲ 1.2 |
3.4
|
▲ 0.2 | ▲ 0.6 |
| therapyden.com |
11.2
|
▼ 0.6 | ▲ 0.4 |
9.2
|
▼ 0.3 | ▲ 0.6 |
| usnews.com |
9.9
|
▼ 0.9 | ▲ 6.2 |
10.8
|
▼ 0.7 | ▲ 5.7 |
| growtherapy.com |
8.8
|
▲ 0.5 | ▼ 0.4 |
7.6
|
▼ 0.2 | ▲ 6.3 |
| npidb.org |
8.8
|
▲ 0.1 | ▲ 0.6 |
17.6
|
▼ 2.1 | ▼ 2.5 |
| therapist.com |
8.3
|
▲ 0.2 | ▲ 0.9 |
5.8
|
▲ 1.0 | ▲ 2.1 |
| yelp.com |
8.0
|
0.0 | ▼ 0.9 |
13.4
|
▼ 0.7 | ▲ 2.6 |
| medicalnewstoday.com |
7.9
|
▲ 0.8 | 0.0 |
12.4
|
▼ 1.2 | ▲ 1.7 |
| helloalma.com |
7.8
|
▲ 0.6 | ▲ 1.7 |
5.7
|
▼ 1.0 | ▲ 0.8 |
| mapquest.com |
7.8
|
▲ 0.3 | ▲ 0.1 |
12.4
|
▲ 0.6 | ▲ 2.3 |
| openpathcollective.org |
7.2
|
▲ 0.2 | ▲ 0.4 |
6.8
|
▼ 0.6 | ▲ 3.3 |
| sharecare.com |
6.7
|
▲ 0.3 | ▼ 0.2 |
21.6
|
▼ 1.4 | ▼ 4.4 |
| webmd.com |
6.5
|
▲ 1.0 | ▼ 0.6 |
20.6
|
▼ 0.4 | ▲ 0.6 |
| therapysolutionsforkids.com |
6.4
|
▼ 1.1 | ▲ 4.8 |
8.8
|
▲ 0.7 | ▲ 7.9 |
| psychhub.com |
6.0
|
▲ 0.2 | ▲ 0.8 |
8.3
|
▲ 1.0 | ▲ 2.1 |
| 7cups.com |
5.8
|
▼ 0.3 | ▲ 0.2 |
10.3
|
▼ 1.8 | ▼ 0.8 |
| healthline.com |
5.3
|
▼ 0.3 | ▼ 0.3 |
9.8
|
▼ 0.4 | ▲ 1.2 |
| researchgate.net |
4.9
|
▲ 0.4 | ▲ 0.4 |
15.7
|
▼ 0.6 | ▲ 2.0 |
| clientsecure.me |
4.8
|
▲ 0.2 | ▲ 0.2 |
7.8
|
▼ 0.1 | ▲ 0.8 |
| rula.com |
4.2
|
▲ 1.0 | ▲ 1.2 |
7.1
|
▲ 1.0 | ▼ 0.9 |
Back to normal up top: LinkedIn the most visible, Psychology Today owning the top of the page. The steady climber of the past few months, Dr. Leonardo, sits in the top 10 at a new high.
Top 10 Biggest Shifts in Domain Popularity
These therapist directories and other websites are now appearing more (or less) frequently when people search for specific therapists' names.
Compared to 1 week ago:
| Website | Score | Change |
|---|---|---|
| facebook.com | 33.42 | ▲ 2.17 |
| dr-leonardo.com | 15.42 | ▲ 1.50 |
| instagram.com | 31.83 | ▲ 1.41 |
| psychologytoday.com | 68.60 | ▲ 1.10 |
| therapysolutionsforkids.com | 6.42 | ▼ 1.08 |
| webmd.com | 6.50 | ▲ 1.00 |
| usnews.com | 9.92 | ▼ 0.91 |
| medicalnewstoday.com | 7.92 | ▲ 0.84 |
| zocdoc.com | 26.42 | ▲ 0.75 |
| therapyden.com | 11.20 | ▼ 0.60 |
Compared to 4 weeks ago:
| Website | Score | Change |
|---|---|---|
| usnews.com | 9.92 | ▲ 6.25 |
| linkedin.com | 74.80 | ▲ 6.10 |
| therapysolutionsforkids.com | 6.42 | ▲ 4.84 |
| dr-leonardo.com | 15.42 | ▲ 4.42 |
| psychologytoday.com | 68.60 | ▲ 4.40 |
| headway.co | 20.70 | ▲ 3.10 |
| zocdoc.com | 26.42 | ▲ 2.84 |
| healthgrades.com | 15.58 | ▼ 1.67 |
| helloalma.com | 7.83 | ▲ 1.66 |
| therapyfinder.com | 14.17 | ▲ 1.50 |
A calm week -- mostly small gains, led by Facebook and Dr. Leonardo recovering. No new name rocketing in this time.
Domain Presence in the Top 10
This is a breakdown of the most common domains found at each search result position. The first 10 positions are the most critical, as they appear on the first page, so this breaks it down for positions 1 through 10.
| Website | Search Result Position | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
#1
|
#2
|
#3
|
#4
|
#5
|
#6
|
#7
|
#8
|
#9
|
#10
|
|
| psychologytoday.com | 37.0% | 16.9% | 7.5% | 4.7% | 5.4% | 4.1% | 5.3% | 5.9% | 5.1% | 6.4% |
| mind-diagnostics.org | 5.8% | 2.5% | 1.6% | 1.4% | 0.9% | 0.5% | 0.4% | 0.3% | 0.2% | 0.1% |
| linkedin.com | 4.0% | 9.4% | 16.6% | 11.3% | 10.0% | 6.4% | 4.5% | 5.2% | 4.9% | 3.7% |
| zocdoc.com | 2.9% | 5.4% | 6.6% | 4.6% | 3.6% | 1.5% | 2.0% | 1.6% | 2.1% | 1.1% |
| growtherapy.com | 2.7% | 2.3% | 0.7% | 0.7% | 0.2% | 0.7% | 0.7% | 0.5% | 0.5% | 0.6% |
| headway.co | 1.5% | 4.2% | 3.9% | 3.1% | 1.9% | 1.4% | 0.8% | 0.6% | 0.6% | 0.7% |
| helloalma.com | 0.9% | 2.5% | 1.5% | 1.0% | 0.7% | 0.7% | 0.2% | 0.2% | 0.3% | 0.2% |
| therapist.com | 0.9% | 2.3% | 1.2% | 1.2% | 0.6% | 0.7% | 0.7% | 0.5% | 0.9% | 0.5% |
| instagram.com | 0.6% | 1.3% | 1.6% | 2.9% | 3.0% | 2.6% | 2.7% | 3.0% | 2.5% | 2.2% |
| facebook.com | 0.3% | 1.2% | 1.7% | 2.5% | 3.1% | 4.0% | 2.6% | 2.7% | 2.4% | 2.2% |
| dr-leonardo.com | 0.1% | 0.9% | 0.8% | 2.0% | 2.5% | 2.5% | 2.4% | 2.3% | 0.9% | 1.8% |
| therapyfinder.com | 0.1% | 0.7% | 0.9% | 1.3% | 1.4% | 2.0% | 2.4% | 1.0% | 0.9% | 0.8% |
| All Others | 43.2% | 50.4% | 55.4% | 63.3% | 66.7% | 72.9% | 75.3% | 76.2% | 78.7% | 79.7% |
Psychology Today holds the #1 spot for therapist searches, its share back up into the high 30s after dipping through June -- steadier ground than it's had in a while.
That's it -- and more importantly, that's the whole backlog cleared. The report is caught up and back on its weekly schedule.
If the past few months are any guide, new websites will keep showing up for therapists' searches with no warning. The simplest way to know when one shows up for you is to sign up for a free personalized search report -- we'll watch your name each week and flag whatever's new.
Thanks again for your patience.
Jon
