Most medical device companies have websites that look professional but perform poorly in search. The product pages have specs but no clinical context. The blog exists but hasn't been updated in months. The technical foundation is solid enough, but nobody has connected the dots between what search engines need and what the site actually delivers.

This checklist is what we use internally at Buzzbox Media when we audit medical device websites. It's the same process we applied to INFAB's lead apron page optimization and the framework we use across every healthcare SEO engagement.

Work through it systematically. Every item you check off moves your product pages closer to the search traffic they should be capturing. Every item carries a link to the primary source behind it, so you can verify the rule rather than take our word for it.

What changed since this checklist was first published

This page was first published in March 2026. Four things on it stopped being true between then and now, and all four were tactics that medical device marketers were actively told to prioritize. If you built an SEO plan off an older checklist, these are the items to revisit first.

Four rules that changed

  • FAQ rich results are gone. Google restricted FAQ rich results to authoritative government and health sites in August 2023, then retired the feature outright. Per Google's Search Central changelog, the FAQ rich result stopped appearing in Google Search on May 7, 2026, and the documentation was removed the following month. FAQPage markup no longer earns you a bigger listing.
  • HowTo rich results are gone too. Google deprecated HowTo rich results in September 2023, dropping the How-to search appearance, its rich result report, and Rich Results Test support. HowTo is absent from the current structured data gallery. This page dropped its own HowTo markup for that reason.
  • INP replaced FID as a Core Web Vital. Interaction to Next Paint became a Core Web Vital and First Input Delay was deprecated on March 12, 2024. If your performance reporting still tracks FID, it is measuring a metric Google retired.
  • AI crawler control became a real decision. Google-Extended is a robots.txt token that governs whether your content trains Gemini models and grounds Gemini answers. Google states plainly that it does not affect inclusion or ranking in Google Search, which means you can decide it on business grounds rather than SEO grounds.

One thing that did not change: there is still no shortcut file. Google's AI features documentation states that Google Search does not use llms.txt or similar machine-readable files, and that maintaining one will neither help nor hurt your visibility in Google Search.

If you want numbers on what answer engines actually do with a medtech site rather than guidance about it, here is what we measured about AI citation across three engines and 195 calls, with both datasets published.

On-Page SEO Checklist

  • A unique, specific title on every product page. Google publishes no character limit for title tags. What it says is that the title link "is truncated in Google Search results as needed, typically to fit the device width." Front-load the device name and its primary use so the meaning survives truncation, and skip the corporate boilerplate. "Lead Aprons | INFAB" works. "INFAB Corporation - Products - Radiation Protection - Lead Aprons and Shields for Medical Professionals" does not.
  • Accept that Google may rewrite your title. Title link generation is fully automated, and Google substitutes its own when your title is boilerplate, stale, or missing information, drawing on headings, og:title, and anchor text. If Google keeps rewriting a page's title, treat that as a signal that the on-page heading and the title disagree.
  • Meta descriptions written for the snippet, not for a character counter. Google states there is "no limit on how long a meta description can be" and that snippets are truncated to fit the device. Google also says snippets are "primarily created from the page content itself" and that it "sometimes" uses the meta description "if it might give users a more accurate description of the page." Write one unique, specific description per page and expect it to be a suggestion.
  • One H1 that names the device and what it is for. If your H1 reads "Products," a search engine has nothing to match against. Name the device category and its clinical use.
  • An H2 and H3 hierarchy that covers the real subtopics. Materials, clinical applications, sizing, certifications, comparisons. Each heading should map to a question a buyer actually asks.
  • Descriptive alt text on every product image. Google's image documentation calls alt text "the most important attribute" for image context and grades it on a scale from missing, to "puppy," to "Dalmatian puppy playing fetch." The device equivalent is "INFAB Revolution lead apron, navy, front view," not "IMG_4532." The same page warns that stuffing keywords into alt text "may cause your site to be seen as spam."
  • Internal links with anchor text that describes the destination. Link to related products, sizing guides, certifications, and clinical application pages. Every link should make sense to a human reading the sentence around it.
  • The right class of Product structured data. Google splits Product markup into product snippets and merchant listings. Merchant listings are for pages where a customer can buy directly and require name, image, and an Offer carrying a price. Most medical device pages quote rather than sell, so product snippet markup, which needs a name plus one of review, aggregateRating, or offers, is the correct choice.
  • Organization and Breadcrumb structured data. Both are still in Google's supported gallery, unlike FAQ and HowTo. If you are going to spend engineering time on schema, spend it on types Google still renders.
  • Mobile layouts tested on real devices. Specification tables and comparison charts are the components that break, and they are the components buyers most need. A spec table that requires horizontal scrolling on a phone is a spec table nobody reads.
  • Product claims that match the cleared indications for use. FDA's 21 CFR 801.4 defines intended use as the objective intent of the persons responsible for the labeling, and says that intent "may, for example, be shown by labeling claims, advertising matter, or oral or written statements." A product page is that kind of statement, so its claims should trace to the cleared labeling.
  • The word "cleared," not "approved," for 510(k) devices. 21 CFR 807.97 states that a substantial equivalence determination "does not in any way denote official approval of the device," and that any representation creating an impression of official approval "is misleading and constitutes misbranding." It is a common copy error, and it is the one on this list with consequences beyond rankings.

Content Checklist

  • Clinical context on product pages, not specifications alone. Who uses this device, in what procedures, for which patients, and how does it compare to the alternative. Surgeons and procurement teams are evaluating fit, not reading a datasheet.
  • Comparison content that is honest about tradeoffs. "Lead aprons versus lead-free aprons" captures buyers who are actively evaluating. A comparison that never concedes a weakness reads as marketing and converts like marketing.
  • Clinical application guides by specialty. The same device is used differently in orthopedics, interventional cardiology, and general surgery. Specialty pages match how clinicians actually search.
  • A physician resource center. Instructions for use, clinical summaries, white papers, and peer-reviewed publications. FDA treats brochures, pamphlets, and similar materials as labeling, so this content belongs in your review process, not just your CMS. See FDA's device labeling overview.
  • A publishing cadence you can actually sustain. Google explicitly rejects word count targets, asking in its helpful content guidance whether you are "writing to a particular word count because you've heard or read that Google has a preferred word count?" and answering "No, we don't." The same document says refreshing dates without changing content will not help.
  • Named authors with real credentials. Google "strongly encourage[s] adding accurate authorship information, such as bylines to content where readers might expect it," and describes trust as the most important element of E-E-A-T. Note that Google states E-E-A-T "isn't a specific ranking factor," so treat it as a description of what good content looks like rather than a dial to turn.
  • Risk information presented alongside benefit claims. FDA has a draft guidance, Presenting Risk Information in Prescription Drug and Medical Device Promotion, describing the factors it weighs when evaluating promotional materials. It remains a draft, so treat it as insight into FDA's thinking rather than a binding rule, and route the judgment call to your regulatory reviewer.

Technical SEO Checklist

  • A sitemap, if your site is large enough to need one. Google's sitemap documentation says you might not need one if your site is "about 500 pages or fewer" and comprehensively internally linked, while large sites, new sites with few external links, and media-heavy sites benefit most. Most single-product manufacturers are under the threshold and should fix internal linking first.
  • A robots.txt that you understand is not an index control. Google is explicit: robots.txt "is not a mechanism for keeping a web page out of Google," and a blocked URL "can still appear in search results" without a description. Use noindex or authentication for pages that must stay out.
  • Noindex on the pages that genuinely should not rank. Internal price lists, distributor portals, and staging URLs. This is the control that robots.txt is not.
  • HTTPS on every page, image, and script. Google announced HTTPS as a ranking signal in August 2014, describing it then as "a very lightweight signal." Today it is better understood as a baseline expectation than a ranking lever, since Google's current page experience guidance says aspects beyond Core Web Vitals "don't directly help your website rank higher."
  • A monthly broken link crawl. Discontinued products are the medtech-specific version of this problem: the SKU goes away, the links do not. In our INFAB project, all 8 original internal link URLs returned 404 errors and every one had to be corrected before deployment.
  • Redirects on retired product URLs. Devices get discontinued and superseded more often than most catalogs get rebuilt. Map the old URL to the closest current product rather than to the homepage.
  • Largest Contentful Paint at or under 2.5 seconds. The threshold is published on web.dev. Heavy, uncompressed product photography is the usual cause of failure on device sites.
  • Interaction to Next Paint at or under 200 milliseconds. Same source. Product configurators and spec filters are the usual culprits, because they run JavaScript on the main thread in response to the exact interaction a buyer cares about.
  • Cumulative Layout Shift at or under 0.1. Same source. Reserve space for images and embeds so the page does not reflow under the reader.
  • Canonical tags where duplicate URLs exist. Google ranks the consolidation methods by strength, redirects first, then rel=canonical, then sitemap inclusion, and notes that "none of them are required." Filtered and sorted catalog URLs are where this matters. See Google's guidance on consolidating duplicate URLs.
  • Hreflang if you sell into multiple regulatory regions. Cleared indications and available models differ by market, and serving the wrong regional page is a compliance problem before it is an SEO problem.
  • A deliberate decision on AI crawlers. Decide whether Google-Extended is allowed, document why, and record who decided. Because it has no effect on Google Search, this is a licensing and competitive question, not a ranking one.

Off-Page SEO Checklist

  • A claimed and complete Google Business Profile, if you have a physical location. Manufacturing and distribution facilities qualify. Photos, hours, and category accuracy do most of the work.
  • Industry directory listings, chosen carefully. Google's spam policies name "low-quality directory or bookmark site links" as link spam. Genuine industry and association directories are fine. Bulk submission services are the thing being described.
  • Paid placements qualified with rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow". Google says buying and selling links "is a normal part of the economy of the web for advertising and sponsorship purposes" and that it is "not a violation of our policies" when the link is qualified. The violation is the unqualified link, not the sponsorship.
  • Clinical publication mentions tracked and pursued. If your device appears in peer-reviewed studies, those citations carry authority that no directory can match. Your clinical affairs team already knows where they are.
  • Conference and society links claimed. Exhibitor listings, session pages, and sponsor pages routinely link out and routinely get forgotten. Ask.
  • Manufacturer association memberships listed. Member directories at industry associations are legitimate, relevant links from domains that exist for exactly this purpose.
  • No rented subdomains or subfolders. Google's site reputation abuse policy, announced March 5, 2024 and effective May 5, 2024, targets third-party content published on a host site to exploit that host's ranking signals. Google broadened it in November 2024 to apply regardless of first-party oversight. If someone offers to run a content section on your domain, this is the policy that applies.

How to Use This Checklist

Don't try to do everything at once. Prioritize by impact:

  1. Fix the regulatory language first. "FDA approved" on a 510(k) device is the one item on this list with consequences beyond rankings.
  2. Start with your highest-traffic product pages. Fix on-page issues on the pages that already have some search visibility. The return is immediate.
  3. Add clinical context to specification-only pages. In our audits this is the gap we find most often, and it is the one that separates a page a surgeon reads from a page a surgeon leaves.
  4. Fix technical issues. Broken links, retired product URLs, and Core Web Vitals failures affect the entire site rather than one page.
  5. Retire the tactics that no longer pay. If FAQ schema was on your roadmap for rich results, move that effort to structured data types Google still renders.
  6. Build the content engine. Blog, resource center, clinical guides. This is the long game, and it compounds.

The Bigger Picture

SEO for medical devices is not the same as SEO for consumer products. The buying cycle is longer, the audience is more technical, and the regulatory environment adds constraints that don't exist in other industries. A checklist gives you the structure. Understanding your market gives you the strategy.

The regulatory constraint is the part most SEO advice skips, and it is the part that changes the work. Every claim on a product page is potential evidence of intended use under 21 CFR 801.4. That means the SEO team and the regulatory reviewer are working on the same document, whether or not they have met. FDA's guidance on communications consistent with FDA-required labeling is the document that defines the boundary, and it says information consistent with the required labeling "is limited to information about the approved or cleared uses of a product."

If you're looking at this checklist and seeing more unchecked items than checked ones, that's normal for medical device companies. Most have invested in product quality, regulatory compliance, and sales infrastructure, but underinvested in the search presence that drives inbound leads.

The good news: every unchecked item is an opportunity. Your competitors probably have the same gaps, and four of the items above are ones most of them have not noticed changed.

Read our complete Healthcare SEO Guide for the strategic framework behind this checklist, or learn about our medical device SEO services and medical device web design.

Want a second pair of eyes on your site?

Bring one product page and we'll work through this checklist against it together, including the regulatory language most SEO audits skip.

Book 30 minutes and we'll tell you which items matter for your site, in priority order.