About SEO North
One agency. One vertical. One person accountable.
SEO North is an independent search engine optimization agency based in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, founded and operated by Isaac Adams-Hands. We provide specialized SEO services exclusively to addiction treatment and behavioral health operators across North America.
The founder
Isaac Adams-Hands
Isaac Adams-Hands is the founder and SEO Director of SEO North. He has spent more than a decade working in search engine optimization, with the last several years focused exclusively on the addiction treatment and behavioral health vertical. His background spans web development, web design, technical SEO, and content architecture, which is why SEO North engagements cover the full stack: server configuration, site speed, structured data, site architecture, and clinically reviewed content, not just keyword lists.
He has worked inside multi-facility treatment networks on core update recoveries, network-wide cannibalization cleanups, content pruning at scale, and local SEO programs across dozens of markets. That day-to-day operator experience, rather than agency account management, is what clients are hiring.
Isaac also operates MedicallyReviewed.com, a physician review network. Every clinical page SEO North produces passes through a named, licensed physician reviewer before publication, which is the review layer Google's quality rater guidelines expect for Your Money or Your Life content in healthcare.
Why we only do this
Behavioral health SEO punishes generalists.
A generalist agency can drive organic traffic for a plumber, a retailer, or a SaaS platform with a standard playbook. The same playbook applied to a treatment center fails quietly, then fails loudly at the next core update. This vertical has rules that generalist agencies learn at their clients' expense. We built the practice around them instead.
Google holds health content to a higher bar
Treatment content sits in the most scrutinized quality category Google has. Search engine rankings without clinical review are borrowed, and every core update collects.
LegitScript and accreditation shape what you can say
Outcome promises and unverifiable claims are not just ranking risks. They are certification risks. Our copy standards are written with both in mind.
The metric is admissions, not traffic
A treatment center does not need a million informational visits. It needs qualified traffic and lead generation from people ready to seek care in markets it actually serves.
What we walk into
Six problems we find on almost every treatment center audit.
Most operators are not invisible because they lack website content. They are invisible because past strategies were built on tactics Google now actively penalizes.
Domain-level suppression
Years of unvetted informational articles published to chase traffic volume now read as harm-adjacent, dragging down online visibility for the entire domain, including core admissions pages.
Core update exposure
Organic traffic built on thin, unreviewed content in a YMYL category disappears at each major update, and recovery without verified clinical trust is slow or never comes.
Sister facilities competing with each other
Multi-facility networks launch separate sites without content boundaries, so sibling brands fight over the same local and brand queries and split authority between them.
LegitScript and accreditation risk
Outcome promises, unverifiable clinical claims, and sloppy medical phrasing put certification, accreditation standing, and legal safety at risk, not just rankings.
Unqualified traffic inflation
High session counts look impressive in a monthly report, but low-intent visits produce zero admissions. Traffic that never converts wastes budget without moving census.
Invisible local map footprints
Most admissions start locally. Neglected Google Business Profiles, incomplete service categories, and weak location pages leave facilities invisible in the exact markets they serve.
How the work runs
Four phases, in order, every engagement.
No publishing calendars for their own sake and no ranking hacks. The sequence exists because building on a suppressed or broken foundation wastes everything layered on top of it.
Audit and identify
A full SEO audit across technical, content, and compliance before any keyword research or content creation begins. We map domain suppression, cannibalization between sister facilities, crawlability problems, rendering issues, XML sitemaps, and the competitor landscape you are actually up against.
Stop the bleeding
Harmful, low-quality content is pruned or restructured. Technical debt gets fixed, site speed and page experience are brought up to standard, and internal cannibalization is eliminated so rankings hold through the next core update instead of resetting.
Clinical and local authority
Admissions-centered content with physician review through MedicallyReviewed.com, supported by schema, tuned meta descriptions, ethical link building, digital PR that earns high-quality backlinks, and Google Business Profile work that captures high-intent local searches.
Iterate on intake data
Strategy is refined monthly against actual intake calls, qualified inquiries, and target payer mix, not pageviews. Reporting ties SEO work to the KPIs a treatment center actually runs on, so visibility compounds instead of plateauing.
The facts
SEO North at a glance
- Legal name: SEO North Inc.
- Founded and operated by: Isaac Adams-Hands
- Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada (Metcalfe)
- Serving: Treatment operators across Canada and the United States
- Specialization: SEO for addiction treatment and behavioral health, exclusively
- Clinical review: Licensed physician review via MedicallyReviewed.com
Not to be confused with
SEO North is an independent Ottawa agency. We are not affiliated with North SEO, a separate agency in Vancouver, British Columbia, with Straight North, a large general-market agency in the United States, or with seonorth.digital or any other similarly named company. If you found us by searching for "SEO North," the Ottawa agency founded by Isaac Adams-Hands, you are in the right place. Our only websites are seonorth.com and seonorth.ca.
Fit
Who this works for, and who it does not.
Specialized behavioral health SEO produces the highest return when it lands on the right operational foundation. We are deliberate about where that is true.
A strong fit
- Established operators with one or more accredited facilities
- Leadership focused on census, bed-fill rate, and target payer mix
- An active admissions team equipped to handle higher call volume
- Willingness to prune legacy content that holds domain authority back
Not a fit
- Pre-launch, unaccredited, or startup facilities
- Organizations wanting one vendor for PPC, web design, and social media
- Buyers shopping for the lowest-cost vendor or a short-term ranking spike
- Teams unwilling to invest in a verified physician review layer
How the practice runs
No account managers. No juniors. No handoffs.
In-house marketers rarely have the specialized tools or vertical depth this work needs, and freelancers rarely have the availability. An agency model only beats both when the senior person actually does the work. Here, that is the entire model.
You work with Isaac
Strategy, audits, and the monthly work are done by the person whose name is on the practice, not delegated down a bench.
Few clients, by design
A deliberately small roster of established operators. Depth over volume is the whole model.
Physicians sign the clinical work
Named, licensed reviewers on every clinical page through our MedicallyReviewed.com network.
We say no early
If we are not the right fit for your stage or budget, you will hear it on the first call, not after a retainer.
Common questions
What operators ask before the first call
How long does SEO take to fill beds?
Stabilization work often shows movement within the first two to three months, because fixing suppression, crawl problems, and cannibalization releases visibility the site already earned. Building new authority on competitive admissions terms is a six to twelve month arc. Anyone quoting faster in this vertical is selling a ranking spike, not a channel.
What is included in an engagement?
Everything organic search depends on: technical SEO, site structure and clear navigation, site speed, keyword research, content optimization and physician-reviewed content creation, local SEO and Google Business Profile management, schema, link building and digital PR, and monthly reporting. We do not sell Google Ads, social media, or web design as standalone services, though we coordinate closely with whoever runs your paid channel.
How do you report results?
Reporting is built around your KPIs: qualified intake calls, admissions-intent conversions, and movement in the markets you serve, with call tracking tied to organic sessions so you can verify site visitors against actual inquiries. Rankings and traffic are context, not the headline.
Why not hire in-house or use a freelancer?
An in-house hire covers one skill set and needs advanced tools, training, and time to learn a vertical that punishes errors. Freelancers bring inconsistent availability and scaling challenges when a core update hits every property at once. A specialist practice carries the tooling, the vertical pattern library, and the accountability in one place. When in-house is genuinely the better answer for your stage, we will tell you that on the first call.
Does SEO reduce our dependency on paid ads?
Over time, yes. As organic visibility compounds and high-quality backlinks accrue, cost per admission falls and paid spend can narrow to the campaigns that genuinely need it. Organic search becomes infrastructure your facility owns rather than rented attention.
Next step
Talk to the person who does the work.
Book a 30-minute strategy call with Isaac. You will leave with a clear read on your visibility, whether or not we work together.
Book a strategy call