Monthly SEO Report

St. Margaret's at Mercy

Site: stmmercy.org Reporting Period: August 1 – 31, 2026 Market: New Orleans, LA

Performance Overview

Organic performance remains incredibly strong. Website traffic increased by 7.4% this month, the site's average tracked search position improved to a highly visible 5.1, and St. Margaret's currently commands the highest AI search visibility of any tracked local facility.

Traffic (Google Analytics) (Aug)
1,923
+7.4% vs July (1,791)
Avg. Tracked Position
5.1
Improved from 6.3
Keywords in Top 3
25 / 40
Stable no change in count
Local AI Visibility
64.7%
Highest of any tracked local brand

At a Glance

Core site metrics for August 2026.

Total ranking keywords (site-wide)453
Tracked keywords (this report)40
Traffic (Google Analytics), July1,791
Traffic (Google Analytics), August1,923
Google Ads Sessions45
Google Ads Key Events (Conversions)16

Keyword Rankings

All 40 tracked keywords, New Orleans / desktop, sorted by current position. 15 improved this period, 22 held their position, 3 shifted slightly.

Keyword ⇅ Position ⇅ Change ⇅ Volume ⇅ Ranking Page ⇅

Website Traffic

Real traffic and page performance from Google Analytics.

Total Sessions
1,923
+7.4% vs July (1,791)
Total Page Views
3,198
Total for August
Active Users
1,530
Total for August

Traffic Sources

Sessions broken down by primary channel group.

Channel Performance Notes

  • Organic Search is the leading driver of traffic, bringing in over 51% (986) of all sessions.
  • Direct traffic is exceptionally strong (832 sessions), indicating strong brand awareness and returning visitors.
  • AI Assistant is beginning to register as a measurable traffic source, aligning with our AI visibility efforts.

Views by Page

Top 10 pages by Views (Google Analytics), August 1–31, 2026.

These 10 pages account for 2,436 of the month's 3,198 total views counted at the site level.

Page Performance Notes

  • Home (/) pulls 863 views — expected, and it's also where nearly all the top branded and "nursing home new orleans"-type rankings point.
  • /communities/st-judes/ is the #2 page and matches where several #1 rankings live (st jude nursing home, nursing homes downtown).
  • /careers/ at #3 is a strong showing — solid, steady traffic to a page that helps keep the facility staffed.
  • /hospice-care-new-orleans/ pulls meaningful traffic (156 views) and now has fresh internal linking support from the new hospice article, which should help it going forward.

Google Ads Performance

Campaign engagement and key events (conversions) generated through paid advertising during August.

Key Events (Conversions)
16
Total for August
Ad Sessions
45
Total for August
Engagement Rate
75.56%
Highly engaged audience

Campaign Breakdown

Performance metrics by individual campaign.

Campaign Sessions Engaged Sessions Engagement Rate Key Events

AI Search Visibility

How often the facility is surfaced in ChatGPT, Gemini, and Google AI Overviews for New Orleans senior-care questions (20 tracked prompts, 215 answers, August).

Highest visibility in the market. St. Margaret's — across the name, "St. Margaret's at Mercy," and "St. Margaret's Family of Care" — appeared in 64.7% of the 215 AI answers tracked this period, average rank 2.4, nearly 2.2x the closest named competitor.

Visibility vs. Named Competitors

Presence rate across tracked AI prompts.

What AI Models Say

Recurring Positive Themes
  • Household model design, ~90% private rooms
  • ALS House — eye-gaze (PEAC) technology, only facility of its kind locally
  • Joint Commission Gold Seal of Approval
  • 4.5/5 average rating across ~37 reviews (per OpenAI's synthesis)
  • Strong staff-to-resident ratio (strong ratio noted by AI)
AI models consistently point to the household model, the ALS House's specialized technology, and Joint Commission accreditation as what sets the facility apart.

Work Performed

Major marketing initiatives and content developed during the August 1–31 reporting window.

How to Talk to a Parent About Hospice

stmmercy.org/article/how-to-talk-to-a-parent-about-hospice/

We wrote, optimized, and published a 2,998-word guide written to catch families at the very start of the hospice decision — before they're searching for a provider, while they're still searching for the words to start the conversation. That's a real, high-volume gap: the site's current hospice terms (hospice new orleans, hospice in new orleans, new orleans hospice care) are all bottom-of-funnel provider searches, and none of the site's existing pages spoke to the earlier, more emotional stage families go through first.

It targets a cluster of long-tail informational searches this account wasn't ranking for at all (how to talk to a parent about hospice, difference between hospice and palliative care, when to start hospice conversations) and is built with clear "X is..." definitions and a full FAQ section — the exact structure Google and AI answer engines pull from for featured snippets and AI Overviews. It cites Medicare.gov, NIA, NHPCO, and CDC, which strengthens the page's own authority and, with a named author byline, feeds the site's overall Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness (E-E-A-T) signal.

Internally, it links straight into /hospice-care-new-orleans/ and /services/hospice-in-home-services/ — the two pages carrying the site's existing hospice rankings — which reinforces their topical relevance and should help lift those terms over the next reporting cycle or two as the new page gets indexed and starts passing authority through.

Paying For Senior Care: Options Families Should Know About

stmmercy.org/article/paying-for-senior-care/

We wrote, optimized, and published a 4,238-word guide walking through how families actually fund care — Medicare, Medicaid, VA Aid and Attendance, long-term care insurance, home equity. Cost is consistently one of the first questions a family has, and it's a large search category (does Medicare cover assisted living, Medicaid nursing home costs, VA aid and attendance benefits) that wasn't represented anywhere on the site before this.

This one is built as a hub: it links out to nearly every major service page on the site — both communities, long-term and short-term residency, respite care, therapy, and hospice — so it spreads internal link equity broadly rather than to a single page. That kind of cross-linking strengthens the whole site's structure and helps Google (and AI models) understand how St. Margaret's full range of services fits together.

Like the hospice article, it leans on sourced, quotable claims (Genworth's Cost of Care Survey, Medicare.gov, the VA, IRS Publication 502) and a full FAQ section, positioning it well for AI Overview citations on cost-related questions — a category families research early and often before ever searching for a specific facility.

Items Needed

Action items required from the St. Margaret's team to proceed with upcoming website updates.

1. Merchant Processing Information Required

In order to add the ability to process payments on the website for the upcoming non-profit comedy show tickets, we need your merchant gateway information (e.g., Stripe, PayPal, Square, or authorize.net API keys).

Please provide this documentation at your earliest convenience so we can configure the ticket purchasing functionality.