Behavioral health marketing built for operators, not agencies.

It depends on what you treat. Google and Meta require LegitScript certification for addiction treatment ads in the US. LegitScript's checklist says locations that only offer mental health treatment don't need certification. If you treat substance use and aren't certified, we start there, because paid search and Meta ads for addiction services aren't available to you until you are.

Behavioral health is the umbrella category. It includes mental health, substance use, dual diagnosis, eating disorders, trauma, and adolescent programs. Mental health marketing is a subset focused on outpatient therapy, psychiatry, and lower-acuity conditions. The ad rules and payer dynamics are different. We do both, but we scope engagements differently.

Yes. Most behavioral health operators need both. In our experience, paid search brings in admissions sooner while SEO takes months to build, so we run them in parallel with one shared plan.

Paid campaigns can start as soon as your accounts are approved. Google says most ads are reviewed within one business day, and Meta says its review is typically completed within 24 hours, but addiction advertisers need LegitScript certification first. In our experience, a certified program running paid search can see first admissions within 30 days, a clear lift shows in months 2 to 3 once intake is fixed, and SEO takes 4 to 6 months for long-tail terms and 12 months or more for head terms.

Larger organizations. Our engagement model works best for behavioral health operators doing $3M+ in annual revenue with an existing admissions team. For solo practitioners or very small practices, we can consult on setup, but full-service engagement is usually not the right fit.

All four. Each has a different buyer journey and cost per admission. In our experience, residential admissions take longer to close and involve the family more, while IOP and PHP need more inquiry volume. We set campaign structure by the program mix that fills your census.

Dual-diagnosis positioning needs clinical credibility plus messaging that speaks to both substance use and co-occurring mental health conditions. We build separate campaign tracks for the substance use side and the mental health side, then bring them together on landing pages that show your integrated clinical model. The substance use track needs LegitScript certification to run on Google and Meta.

Yes. Adolescent ads and landing pages are written for parents and guardians, not for teens. We build the creative, intake scripts and follow-up for the parent who makes the call.

Yes. Meta bans ads that assert or imply someone's health condition, but its own policy examples allow a plain service line such as "Bulimia counseling available". We write eating disorder creative to that standard and aim it at the person searching for care, often a parent or partner.

Yes, and we approach cash-pay differently from insurance-forward. Cash-pay programs need higher-intent lead sources, clearer pricing in messaging, and a sales process built for private-pay families who compare programs on outcomes and amenities. We adjust the funnel to match.

For in-network facilities, we show accepted carriers clearly so the inquiries that come in are more likely to pass VOB. For out-of-network programs, we lead with financial guidance, single-case agreements and pre-authorization help, if your program offers them. Insurance messaging is easy to get right and often overlooked.

Yes. Referral partnerships build more slowly than paid or SEO, but in our experience they often bring the best-fit admissions. We build outreach lists of licensed therapists, physicians and interventionists in your service area, then run structured outreach and relationship-building sequences.

A large one. In SAMHSA's 2024 TEDS report, 50.4% of admissions were referred to treatment by the client or friends and family, not by a doctor, court or other program. Landing pages, ad creative and phone scripts need to work for the family member who calls, and for the patient when they call themselves.

Alumni are a credible source of referrals. We build alumni check-ins, event scheduling and testimonial capture with signed releases. We do not set up paid referral rewards. Federal law (EKRA) makes it a crime to pay anyone to induce a referral to a treatment facility for services covered by a health care benefit program.

Yes. Clinical credentials are among the strongest trust signals in behavioral health. We build staff profile pages, medical director bios and case-study content that ranks for clinical specialty searches and gives AI search tools clear facts about who treats patients at your facility.

Yes. Faith-based programs need messaging that reflects the program's spiritual approach without turning away the broader search audience. We build parallel messaging tracks: one for the faith-aligned audience, one for the clinically-first audience, each routed to the right landing page.

The main federal rules are the TCPA for autodialed or prerecorded calls and texts, HIPAA's rule that patient authorization is needed before using health information for marketing, the FTC's guides on endorsements and testimonials, and the federal law against deceptive marketing of substance use disorder treatment. We build campaigns with these in mind from day one, and your counsel signs off on anything that touches patient data.

We do not use personally identifying details or protected health information in marketing without documented consent. Testimonials require signed releases. Case studies use aggregate outcomes, not individual patient data. Google treats addiction and mental health counseling as a sensitive health category and blocks advertiser-curated audiences such as Customer Match for it, and we build every setup to those rules.

Cost per admission, VOB rate, admissions by source, average length of stay (as available), inquiry-to-admission close rate by admissions team member, and cost per admission by level of care. Weekly written reports, monthly review calls, and live dashboards for anything urgent.

Residential needs longer content, richer clinical proof, more family-focused messaging and a bigger creative budget, because each admission is worth more. IOP is a faster funnel: shorter landing pages, quicker call scheduling and tighter geographic targeting. In our experience, PHP and IOP usually cost less per admission than residential, but the range varies widely by region and payer.

Yes. Veteran-serving programs have their own messaging conventions, and some take part in VA community care, which VA describes as an option "when care is not available through VA". We build campaigns that reach veterans and their families through the channels they use, with copy that respects the community rather than trading on it.

We focus on treatment centers doing $3M to $30M a year and charge one flat fee for services. Every campaign reports to admissions, not leads. We cover the full behavioral health service line, including substance use, dual diagnosis, adolescent, eating disorders and mental health. See our agency comparison guide for how we stack up.