Priorities after the restructure

Why it matters

Early signs are positive. A proper report gives everyone the full picture: what carried over from the old site, what's growing, and what still needs attention. It also gives Abi a clear story to take to the network.

Rankings and traffic move around for several weeks after a restructure, so a weekly view is more useful than a monthly one for now.

Next steps

1. Fibre sends a short weekly check-in while the site settles: traffic from search this week compared with last week and with before the restructure, enquiries once tracking is confirmed, and anything that needs attention.
2. At the 28-day mark in mid-October, Fibre delivers the restructure report. It compares before and after for search clicks, visits and enquiries, and breaks results down by office, local care, blog and national pages.
3. The report also shows how much traffic to old addresses is reaching the new pages through the redirects, how many pages Google has indexed, which audit fixes are done, and how AI visibility and presence have moved in SE Ranking's AI tracking.
4. We go through it together and agree any actions.
5. Once the site has settled, the weekly check-ins fold back into the monthly report.

Why it matters

The 9 high-priority issues sit on the local care, office and blog templates, the pages that bring in enquiries. Several are one template change that fixes hundreds of pages at once.

Next steps

1. Home Instead adds the high-priority issues to the Persona board with their priority.
2. Home Instead decides, town by town, whether to build or remove the 271 unbuilt local care pages. Fibre can sort the list by search demand to make this quicker.
3. Alex finishes the blog audit review so Fibre can give Persona the final list of removed posts (410) and updated redirects.
4. Persona puts the fixes live, highest first.
5. Fibre re-checks each fix on the live site and updates the audit's Status column.
6. As blog posts are published, Fibre updates the redirect plan so each old address points straight at its final page.
7. Next come the 225 redirects that take two or more hops, so every old address reaches its page in one step, as the redirect plan intends.
8. Other medium and low issues follow in the same way, fitted around other work. That includes the slow mobile templates and the internal link anchor text, which Fibre picks up as part of the office directory and linking work.

Why it matters

Yext sends each office's details to the maps, directories and apps families use to find care. Every listing should carry the same details and link straight to the right office page. Listings that still link to old addresses send people through a redirect, and it's harder to see which enquiries came from where.

Council and local authority websites, such as adult social care provider directories and local information services, are trusted places families go to find care. A listing there sends families straight to the right office or town page, backs up each office's details, and helps Google connect each office with the area it serves. That makes them some of the most relevant links a local page can earn.

We only use free, editorial listings. We don't pay for links or placements.

Next steps

1. Home Instead confirms whether it has a Yext account. If it does, it adds Fibre as a user and shares an export of every listing. If not, Yext is a subscription Home Instead would hold, and Fibre helps set it up and runs it from there.
2. Fibre helps set up Yext so every listing links straight to the correct /office/ page, then spot-checks the listings in Google, Apple Maps and Bing.
3. Fibre makes sure name, address, phone and hours match across Yext, Google Business Profiles and each office page, allowing for call-tracking numbers.
4. Local links, quick win first: Fibre finds the council and government pages that already link to Home Instead offices and gets any that point at old addresses updated.
5. Fibre then builds local links from council and government sites, such as adult social care provider directories, for each office. Each link points at the office page, or the local care page for the town it covers.
6. Every month: Fibre maintains Yext and the local links, checking listing changes and new or lost links.

Why it matters

The map results are often the first thing a family sees when they search for care nearby, and the profile plays a big part in whether they call. Each office's profile needs the right link, the right categories and service areas, and details that match the office page. At the moment Fibre has access to three offices' profiles (Wigan, Northwich and Knutsford), so the first step is access to the rest.

Next steps

1. Home Instead adds Fibre as a Manager on its business group in Business Profile Manager, which gives access to every office's profile in one go. It also confirms where profiles are held today, such as those held through Trustist, so we know where to request anything missing.
2. Fibre works through every profile: website link, business name (the office's real-world name, with no added keywords, as Google's guidelines require), address and service area settings, primary and secondary categories, services, hours, description, photos, reviews and review replies, and any duplicate or unverified profiles.
3. Fibre optimises each profile and makes sure every one links to the right office page. Changes that could trigger Google to re-verify a profile are flagged before they're made.
4. Fibre records a baseline for each office: calls, website clicks, and direction requests where the address is shown.
5. Changes go through one route only: Yext where it manages the profile, so edits aren't overwritten.
6. Every month: Fibre keeps the profiles up to date and reports on performance by office.

Why it matters

The office pages are the strongest local pages on the site. They have earned more links from other websites than any other pages apart from the homepage, and before the restructure they were what ranked when families searched for care in an office's own town. The redirects pass that value to the new /office/ addresses, and fixing the few loops and chains in the audit makes sure none of it is lost.

Local care pages now link to their office, which helps. But the office pages still sit several clicks from the homepage, and pages that are harder to reach can look less important to Google. A directory of every office gives each one a link close to the homepage, helps families find their nearest office, and gives Google one clear page listing every office. For "near me" searches it works alongside the Google Business Profiles, which do most of the work there.

Each page has one job

• Office page: "home care in [office town]", and the page every Google Business Profile links to.
• Local care town page: "home care in [nearby town]", for towns without their own office.
• Local care service page: "[service] in [town]", such as dementia care in Harrogate.

Before the restructure, Google sometimes picked a service page for the broad search, for example a home help page for "home care in guildford". Clear roles should reduce this.

Next steps

1. Fibre writes a short spec for the office directory: every office listed by nation and region with a plain link, postcode search at the top, and links from the main menu and footer. If Persona has already started the offices listing page, we'd build on that.
2. The directory lists offices by area, so families still reach the right office by postcode or location and never compare offices side by side.
3. Fibre lists the towns where a service page is ranking for the broad search, with the fix for each.
4. Persona builds the directory.

Why it matters

Structured data helps Google understand each page: which office, which service, which area, and who wrote the advice. At the moment the local care pages only carry markup from the review widget, which describes the page as a product. Office and article markup is missing useful details such as opening hours, location and author.

It comes first in Priority 2 so author and FAQ markup can be built into the same templates at the same time.

Next steps

1. Fibre runs a separate schema audit across every main template: homepage, national service pages, local care, office, blog article, and the new Meet the Experts pages.
2. Fibre delivers a spreadsheet showing, for each template, what's there now, what's missing or wrong, and what needs building, with ready-to-use code for Persona.
3. Home Instead and Fibre agree the order, starting with local care and office pages.
4. Persona builds it into the templates. Removing the review widget's product markup is already in the Priority 1 fixes.
5. Fibre tests every template and signs it off, then checks Search Console for errors.

Why it matters

Families choosing care want to know the advice comes from people who do this every day. Google's guidance asks for the same thing, especially on health and care topics: content that shows real experience and expertise. Clear expert authorship gives families, Google and AI assistants more reason to trust our advice.

Next steps

1. Home Instead nominates experts across the services and conditions we cover, for example dementia specialists, care managers and trainers.
2. Fibre proposes a Meet the Experts page and an individual profile for each person: role, qualifications, years of experience, areas of expertise, photo, and the articles they've written or reviewed.
3. Home Instead gathers bios, qualifications, photos and each person's consent.
4. Fibre assigns each expert to write or review specific informational content, matched to their area, starting with the pages that already bring in visits, such as the dementia content. Health topics reference NHS guidance.
5. Each article shows "Written by" or "Reviewed by", linked to the expert's profile. A review date is only added where it can be kept up to date automatically each time the page is reviewed. Fibre drafts a short editorial policy explaining how content is checked.
6. Persona builds the pages. Fibre adds Person schema that links experts to their content.
7. Ongoing: experts review new content and re-review key pages on a set cycle.

Why it matters

Before families search for a provider, they search to understand their options. Competitors win a lot of this traffic with plain explainers on types of care and conditions, and that's where many families first meet a brand. Live-in care is one of our weaker areas in Google, so it's where we'd start.

Next steps

1. Quick win first: Fibre proposes changes to the dementia stages page (details below).
2. Fibre reviews each page in the table against the pages that rank above it, identifies gaps and areas to improve, and proposes changes for each one.
3. Live-in care next. Google currently shows an office blog post, a 2025 live-in cost guide for South Lanarkshire, for "live in carer cost" rather than the national live-in cost page. Fibre proposes updates to the national page and a link from the office post to it, in line with the blog audit.
4. Home Instead reviews the proposals and decides what to take forward. The content team makes the changes, and an expert reviews them.
5. Each proposal includes links to the matching service and local care pages, so readers can find their nearest office.
6. When an updated page goes live, Fibre updates the redirect plan so old office posts on that subject point to it. For now they point at the advice section.

Why it matters

Families ask very specific questions: can I get dementia care at home in Harrogate, how quickly can care start, does the local office cover my village. Answering these on each local care page can help us appear for local questions in Google and gives AI assistants a clear, local answer to quote.

There are thousands of local care pages, so we pilot first. The answers need real local detail, not just a different town name, or the pages start to look like copies of each other.

Next steps

1. Fibre builds a question bank for each service and condition from what people search for in Google and ask AI assistants.
2. Fibre proposes the FAQs, setting out which answers can be shared across pages and which need local detail, such as the office covering the area, the towns it serves, its inspection rating and local support services.
3. Home Instead decides what to take forward, and experts review the answers before they go live.
4. We propose a pilot on a small set of local care pages with FAQ schema, and measure against similar pages without FAQs. Where the same answer appears on many pages, it's marked up once, in line with Google's guidelines.
5. If the pilot works, roll out service by service.

Why it matters

AI answers about care often draw on trusted third-party sources, such as NHS guidance, regulator listings, review sites and "how to choose" or comparison articles. How Home Instead appears on those sites shapes what AI says about us. Our AI tracking in SE Ranking shows which sources come up for home-care searches, so we can focus on the ones that matter most for Home Instead.

It sits in Priority 3 because it builds slowly and depends on other sites, not because it matters less. Much of it is low effort and can start now.

Next steps

1. Check each office's regulator (CQC, Care Inspectorate, CIW or RQIA) and homecare.co.uk profiles are accurate and link to the new office page.
2. Offices invite every family to leave a review on homecare.co.uk as well as Google, with no incentives and without only asking happy families, in line with both sites' rules.
3. Fibre keeps a log of the comparison and "how to choose" articles that appear in AI answers, starting with live-in care, and helps Home Instead reach out to be included on merit. We don't pay for placement or links.

Why it matters

The audit found 4,453 pages sharing a title and heading issues on 3,393 pages. Most of this can be fixed with better templates rather than page by page. It's also a chance to show trust in search results, for example an office's inspection rating in its page title, only where the rating is pulled in automatically so it never goes out of date.

Next steps

1. Fibre proposes title, heading and description patterns for each template, including where inspection ratings could appear.
2. Home Instead approves them. Persona updates the templates.
3. The content team or Fibre fixes the one-off pages the templates don't cover.

Why it matters

Real-user data showed the site passing Core Web Vitals on mobile, which is the measure Google uses. That data covers a rolling 28 days, so it still mostly reflects the old site, and we'll confirm the new templates once 28 days of data are in. Lab tests show room for improvement on office pages, mainly scripts that hold up loading and the main image arriving late.

Most families search on their phones, so a faster office page makes it easier for them to call or enquire. Speed is a smaller ranking factor than the work above, which is why it sits here, but it's still worth doing. The slow mobile templates are a medium issue in the audit, so they're also picked up in the audit clear-up.

Next steps

1. Persona works through the speed items in the audit, starting with the office page template.
2. Fibre re-tests after each change and keeps an eye on the real-user data.