Question 1

Why can we not name Botox in our Australian ads?

Accepted Answer

Because it is a prescription-only medicine, and the Therapeutic Goods Act prohibits advertising prescription-only medicines to the general public. This is not an AHPRA rule and it is not discretionary — it applies regardless of how the treatment is delivered or how well established the brand name is, and it catches botulinum toxin products along with other prescription medicines used in aesthetic practice. The prohibition covers ads, your website, social media and any other public-facing promotion, so a clinic that keeps the name out of its Google Ads but leaves it across its treatment pages has not solved the problem. What clinics use instead are non-specific descriptions — anti-wrinkle injections, injectable treatments, muscle relaxant injections — but the substitution has limits: if the surrounding copy makes the specific product unmistakable, or the page functions as promotion of that medicine, the circumlocution will not save it. In practice we build campaigns and pages around the clinical concern and the consultation rather than the product, which is compliant and also converts better, because the patient books an assessment rather than shopping for a brand.

Question 2

Can we use patient reviews or ratings in our ad extensions?

Accepted Answer

No, and this trips up accounts managed from overseas where seller ratings and review extensions are standard practice. Section 133 of the National Law prohibits testimonials about clinical care in advertising a regulated health service, and an ad extension displaying patient reviews or a star rating drawn from patient feedback about clinical care falls within that. It does not matter that the reviews are genuine or that the platform generated them automatically — by running the extension you are using them in your advertising. The distinction that matters is between reviews existing independently on a platform, which is generally acceptable, and you incorporating them into promotional material, which is not. So the practical rules are: disable review-based extensions on healthcare accounts, do not quote reviews in ad copy, and do not build landing pages around curated testimonials that the ads point to, since the landing page is part of the advertising. What you can use in extensions instead is factual: practitioner qualifications, services offered, locations, booking availability, billing status and accreditations.

Question 3

How should we plan budget around Australian seasonality?

Accepted Answer

Australian healthcare demand is more seasonal than most markets, and flat monthly budgeting leaves money on the table in both directions. The most pronounced pattern is skin: interest in skin checks and sun damage assessment rises heading into spring and through summer, which is a large recurring category for general practice, dermatology and dedicated skin clinics. Allergy and respiratory demand tracks the pollen season and varies significantly by state. Elective and cosmetic procedures often cluster ahead of summer and again in the pre-Christmas period, then drop away sharply over the January holiday period when much of the country is away and enquiries go unanswered. The end of the financial year in June creates a distinct pattern for anything with a tax or health fund dimension, and health fund extras resetting at the calendar year drives dental and allied health demand in the new year. We build budget curves around these rather than dividing an annual figure by twelve, and we pull spend back hard over the holiday shutdown, since paying premium prices for enquiries nobody will answer for two weeks is the most avoidable waste in Australian healthcare accounts.

Question 4

What does google ads for doctors cost in Australia?

Accepted Answer

We quote clients in Australia in AUD. As a guide, Google Business Profile management starts around AUD 95 per month, SEO publishing around AUD 140 per month, and full-service retainers from about AUD 420 per month depending on scope. Those figures are converted from our India list at an indicative rate and include the uplift for servicing an account across timezones, currencies and a different regulatory regime; your quote is confirmed in writing after the free audit. Where this service involves paid media, that budget sits outside our fee — in Australia treatment-intent clicks typically run AUD 6–30. Cosmetic surgery and implant dentistry sit at the top of that range, while skin checks and allied health convert far cheaper — the mix, not the spend, decides your cost per patient.

Question 5

How long until we see results in Australia?

Accepted Answer

The first movement — profile views, calls, direction requests — usually shows inside 30 days, because the earliest wins come from fixing what is already indexed rather than waiting for Google to re-evaluate new pages. Meaningful ranking and pipeline change typically lands between 60 and 90 days. Competition in Australia is high, so we sequence the work to produce early traction on winnable, specific searches while the harder head terms build over two to three quarters. We report monthly against patient actions — calls, enquiries, booked consultations — not against impressions.

Google Ads for Doctors in Australia

The same service, run for this market.

The plays that work in Australia.

Compliance-first ad copy

Suburb-tight geo-targeting

Billing-qualified messaging

Seasonal category planning

What the rules mean for google ads for doctors.