Zocdoc went from absent to cited in AI answers in 4 months
A template rewrite across tens of thousands of listing pages, 80 guides engineered for AI extraction, and third-party reinforcement.
The challenge
Zocdoc covers 250+ specialties and 18,000+ insurance plans, but organic had declined two years running and directories and review sites were outranking it.
AI Overviews and AI assistants were answering “find a doctor” questions by recommending insurance-company directories. Zocdoc did not appear.
What we did
- Programmatic on-pageWe designed universal H1, metadata, FAQ and schema templates once and rolled them out across every dentist, primary-care and therapist listing page in 4 weeks.
- Content built for AI extractionWe wrote 80 long-form, fact-checked guides with structured comparisons and natural-language FAQs, each briefed against a specific prompt patients ask.
- Third-party reinforcementWe earned links and placements on the publications AI assistants were quoting for healthcare questions.
The result
Within 4 months Zocdoc was present in 660 of 1,062 insurance-intent prompts, 10 Taco-authored URLs were being cited by ChatGPT, Claude and Grok, and 1,099 keywords ranked inside AI Overviews.
Zocdoc’s own back-end data showed the new mid-funnel guides driving bookings. The engagement ended when Zocdoc decided to build the in-house function it had proved it needed.
| Guide | Surface | Status |
|---|---|---|
| How to find a good dentist | ChatGPT + AI Overviews | Cited |
| How to choose a primary care physician | AI Search citation source | Cited |
| How to choose a pediatrician | AI Search citation source | Cited |
| What is virtual primary care | AI Search citation source | Cited |
| Chicago Invisalign cost | Local + AI Overviews | Cited |
Selected guides now cited in AI answers
“Looking at the back-end data, these are mid-funnel, upper-funnel pages. They’re actually driving bookings through.”