How a Miami plastic surgeon's hidden expertise became 6× more search visibility and half the cost per lead.
This Miami surgeon teaches at a medical school, leads a surgical simulation program, and speaks at conferences around the world. Online, none of that showed. His Google Ads were paying $160 to $200 a lead in one of the most competitive plastic surgery markets in the country. We rebuilt his story around his real expertise and published it everywhere patients and AI tools look: his website, procedure pages, and a library of bilingual, expert-written patient guides. Over the next 12 months his Google ranking keywords grew about 6×, and his Google Ads cost per lead fell by half, to about $80, and held there: roughly 75 leads a month on the same $6,000 budget.
~20 → ~130
Ranking Keywords
Oct 2025 → Sep 2026
$160–200 → ~$80
Google Ads CPL
Inherited account vs. steady state
~75
Ads Leads / Month
On ~$6,000, vs. ~30–35 before
30+
Expert Patient Guides
Published in English + Spanish
Snapshot
Client snapshot.
- Location
- Miami, Florida
- Practice type
- Board-certified plastic surgeon, 15+ years, medical school professor
- Core procedures
- Breast, body contouring, rhinoplasty, facial surgery
- Audience
- English- and Spanish-speaking patients across Miami-Dade and Broward (Coral Gables, Brickell, Aventura, Fort Lauderdale)
- Channels
- SEO, AI search (GEO), Google Ads
- Engagement
- Expert positioning + content + SEO + Google Ads
The Problem
A world-class expert who looked like everyone else online.
Offline, this surgeon's credentials are exceptional. He is a full-time professor at a medical school, where he leads its surgical simulation program. He oversees education at a plastic surgery hospital, speaks at national and international conferences on surgical safety and aesthetic technology, and deliberately limits his schedule so he can personally oversee every case.
Online, almost none of that was visible. His expertise wasn't driving his search presence, and when a patient or an AI tool went looking for the best plastic surgeon for a procedure, there was little to show them why it should be him.
Paid advertising felt it too. When we took over the account, his Google Ads were paying $160 to $200 for every lead, roughly 30 to 35 leads a month on about $6,000, in a Miami market where every plastic surgery click is contested.
From the Field
“He travels the world teaching other surgeons, and his website read like any clinic's. That's a story problem, not an advertising problem. Google and AI tools recommend the experts they can verify. Once his expertise was written down, organized, and published where they look, the rankings followed, and so did the leads.”
Mike Funkhouser
Founder, Practice Growth Co
Audit Findings
Why the expertise wasn't showing up.
Credentials that never made it online
His teaching, conference speaking, and advanced training were real but barely present on his site, so neither patients nor search engines could see them.
Thin search footprint
Only about 20 keywords ranked in Google. For a surgeon with his depth, that meant most patient questions were being answered by someone else.
Nothing for AI tools to cite
AI search tools recommend doctors they can back up with clear, specific, expert content. There was little on the site for them to quote or trust.
Ads without an expert story behind them
Paid clicks landed on pages that didn't make the case for his expertise, and in Miami's expensive auction that meant paying $160 to $200 for every lead.
The Rebuild
Tell the expert's story everywhere patients and AI look.
An expert story built from real credentials
We rebuilt his About page and site-wide messaging around his teaching, conference work, advanced training, and safety-first approach, all specific and verifiable.
Procedure pages with depth
Each core procedure, from breast and body contouring to rhinoplasty and facelift, got a dedicated page in English and Spanish written from his clinical perspective.
A library of expert patient guides
More than 30 bilingual articles answer the questions patients actually ask: recovery timelines, costs and what drives them, how to compare techniques, and whether traveling abroad for surgery is worth the risk.
Built for AI search
The content is structured the way AI tools read: clear questions, direct answers, and specific expertise attributed to him, which gives AI-generated answers a credible source to point to.
Paid ads on top of the new foundation
His Google Ads now send patients to pages that make the expert case immediately, so each click has more to convert on. In a Miami auction where plastic surgery clicks are among the most expensive in the country, cost per lead fell from $160-200 to about $80 and stayed there on the same budget.
Results · SEO + Google Ads
A bigger search footprint, and half the cost per paid lead.
What the keyword count does not capture is AI search. Referrals from ChatGPT, Gemini, and Google AI Overviews are hard to attribute, but the practice began hearing from patients who found him through an AI answer that named him for a specific procedure. Those consultations sit on top of the rankings growth and the paid results below.
Results · SEO + Google Ads
By the numbers.
~6×
Ranking Keywords
~20 → ~130 in 12 months
~$80
Google Ads CPL
vs. $160–200 when we took over
~75
Ads Leads / Month
vs. ~30–35, same ~$6,000 budget
Top 3
First Top-3 Rankings
September 2026
See how these numbers compare with the other plastic surgery accounts in The Plastic Surgery Ad Spend Report 2026. For the market itself, see plastic surgery marketing in Miami.
What Carries Over
Lessons for surgeons whose reputation is bigger than their website.
Your offline credentials only count online if they're written down
Teaching, speaking, and advanced training are exactly what Google and AI tools look for. If they aren't on your site in specific terms, they don't exist to the patient searching.
AI search rewards the expert with the clearest answers
Patients increasingly ask AI tools which surgeon to choose. The doctors who get named are the ones with specific, expert content those tools can cite.
SEO and paid ads make each other better
The same expert story that grew his search footprint also gave his ads more to convert on. Cost per lead fell by half and held there as the organic growth took off.
If your reputation is bigger than your website
Let's make your expertise findable.
If you teach, speak, or train other surgeons and your website doesn't show it, you're invisible to the patients and AI tools looking for exactly that. Book a strategy call and we'll show you where your expertise is missing online.
Continue exploring
Related work and reading.
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Specialties
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Combos
Specialty + service pages
Case Studies
Outcomes from similar engagements
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This Salt Lake City surgeon was marketing himself as someone who does everything: faces, noses, ears, eyelids, breasts, bodies. What he actually wanted was a practice built around body contouring. We rebuilt his website, landing pages, story, and search presence around that focus. On the same monthly budget of about $5,000, the account went from 15 to 25 leads and 1 or 2 surgeries a month to 75 leads in January 2026 at about $60 each, and 7 to 8 surgeries a month. More leads, and far better ones.
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How a Phoenix plastic surgeon went from 1 lead a month to 8 to 10 new surgical patients a month after rebuilding his website and ad strategy.
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