Most people think they need a referral. They do not.

Medical aid is the first question

Every enquiry to a physio practice contains some version of "will my medical aid cover this". Answer it before it is asked.

• Whether you bill the medical aid directly or the patient claims back
• Which schemes you deal with regularly
• Whether you charge at scheme rate or above, and by how much
• That no GP referral is required to see you
• HPCSA or AHPCSA registration and practice number
• Cash rates for patients without cover, which is a large share of the market

People search the condition, never the profession

Nobody wakes up wanting physiotherapy. They wake up with lower back pain, a frozen shoulder, a torn hamstring or a child with a sports injury. A page per condition — what it is, what treatment involves, roughly how many sessions — is the entire search strategy, and a single Treatments page ranks for none of them.

Be careful with claims

You are bound by HPCSA or AHPCSA rules on advertising, which permit factual information and prohibit guaranteed outcomes or comparative claims about other practitioners. We write to that standard, but final copy should be checked against your council’s current guidance before it goes live.

People search the body part, not the profession

Very few people wake up and search for a physiotherapist. They search for the thing that hurts — lower back pain, a frozen shoulder, a runner’s knee, sciatica. Each of those is a page, written about the condition, and it is how practices in this field get found.

• A page per condition you actually treat, in the words patients use
• Whether you are accepting new patients
• Medical aid — which schemes, and whether you charge scheme rates
• Whether a referral is needed, because most people do not know
• How soon someone can be seen

“Do I need a doctor’s referral?” is the biggest silent blocker

A very large number of people assume they cannot see a physiotherapist or chiropractor without being referred, and quietly do nothing. Answering that question plainly, high on the page, converts more visitors than any other single sentence on a practice site.