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12 First Steps to SEO for Your Website

By
Services for Real Estate Pros

 

Google Search

I am so often begged by Realtors and business people that I meet for just a few "tips" to doing SEO because they don't have the money available to pay for someone to do the real job for them.  I thought I'd make a very simplified guide that I can refer them to, and that perhaps it might help some Active-Rainers in the bargain. I've looked this over in December of 2012, and it still holds true except it's more important now than ever before that you don't spam your keyphrases.  There's a filter now that will throw you to the wolves if you do.  Be very, very sparing when it comes to using your main phrases on any page.  And if you have pages with very little or not original content - DELETE THEM.

Again, there is so much more to it than this, but if you do the following you'll at least be half-way to having a search-engine-friendly site that you can get some links coming into. Most of these can be found everywhere on the internet, but we all have our different priorities, and this is what I start with when I do SEO on a business website:

Google Toolbar

1.  Download the Google Toolbar.  This is something you need to use everytime you look at another site - whether it is a competitor or someone you are going to exchange links with.
Be sure the options for "PageRank" and "Page Info Menu" are checked. The only reason for not using this tool is if you are using AOL to get on the internet.  And sorry, that is too silly to even address.

2.  Go to the free Wordtracker Keyword Tool.  This keyword tool shows all related searches and the number of searches per day.  The information is derived weekly from Dogpile and some of the other conglomerated search engines which pull Google, Yahoo, and MSN together for the results.

A. Open up your email and prepare to send yourself this one. 

B. Start with typing in "Your City".  Copy and paste any results that pertain to real estate that you see.  Do it for the city alone, the city plus the state spelled out, and the city plus the state abbreviation. Don't bother with any that are less than 10 per day.  Paste this into the email you are sending yourself along with the ones below.

C. Now type in "Your City Real Estate".  Copy and paste the results that you get for any phrase didn't show up with the main search.  The free keyword tool only gives you 100 results for each phrase.  It may not show up with the city alone.  Again, use the state abbreviation and spelled out for this one.

D. Do the same for "Your City - homes, houses, property, condos, land, lots, commercial", and anything else I've forgotten to mention.  If you do it without a state, it will still pick up the ones with it, and usually there are not 100 phrases to display.

Paste all this to your email to yourself and mail it before it's lost.  You've just done half of what I charge an initial consulting fee to do.

3.  At this point, you could use Google's keyword tools to see which of these phrases had the highest number of searches VERSUS competing ads in Adwords.  This would give you an idea of how competitive the terms were.  But for simplicity, we're not going into that.

Put the phrases together in order of highest number of searches to lowest.

Here is where it gets tricky.  If you have a newer website or domain name, it's going to be nearly impossible for you to rank for the most competitive search terms.  Find a medium in the list and begin with that.

If your website has been around for years but just not optimized, you may be able to optimize the text, add a good number of quality incoming links and rank fairly quickly.  Look at your website with the Google toolbar and see what, if any, Pagerank it has.  If it doesn't show a cache and the green bar is greyed out, something is wrong and Google hasn't indexed your site.  That may require a professional's advice to find the problem.  If the pagerank bar is white or has any green at all, and there is a cache showing, you're in good shape.  A pagerank (PR) of one is the least. PR2 is much better. PR3 is well on the way, and PR4 and above is excellent.  If you've never done any link campaigns, you'll probably be a one or two.

Choose what you want to target accordingly, and then pick out the 3 most important ones.
Be realistic.  If you are a new site, you are not going to rank for "Las Vegas Real Estate".  However, you might be able to do it for a small town that has very few competing websites.  Do a search for the good terms and look at the first 3-4 sites using your Google Toolbar.  Note the pagerank.  See what Google shows as a sample of the links these sites have.  Can you hope to compete for these terms?

4. Apply these 2-3 most important phrases to your homepage.  Put them in the title, the metatag description, and the meta keyword list.  The latter is not used by Google, but is still used by other search engines.  Keep that list to about 10 maximum.

5. Use these phrases in a header (H1 or H2) tag at the beginning of your homepage.  Use them in the ALT tags of your photos and graphics.  ALL GRAPHICS SHOULD HAVE ALT TAGS- Sitewide.  This is not only important for SEO, but politically correct.  It's for people using audio readers, and on some cellphones.

6. Put about 250 words of text on your homepage that reads well and describes your area and services.  Use those keyword phrases sparingly in the text in different ways.  If the term is "Atlanta homes for sale" then use it as "homes for sale in Atlanta, GA" and "sales of Atlanta homes and property".  Vary the usage, and DO NOT SPAM the terms.  Today's search engines are smart.  They know spam from good content, believe it or not.

TIP: Make your homepage and all other pages' top banner link to your domain name and use the main keyword as the ALT text. 

7. Put your business name and address at the bottom of every page of the website and use a link with it to the domain name with the secondary keyword phrase.

8. Be sure that all links back to your homepage use the same URL.  Do NOT USE "index.html" on the end of it.  If you prefer using the "www." then choose that and NEVER link to it without that.

9.  Every page on your site should have its own title and metatags, and they should match that page's content.  This is a priority.  Try to make a page pertaining to all of the keyword phrases you sent yourself.  Use the phrase with dashes as the URL if possible. (example  www.yoursite.com/atlanta-condos.html or www.yoursite.com/atlanta-foreclosures.html)  Again, on those pages, use that particular term in the H1 tag, the ALT tags, and the text, sparingly.

10. Keep the links on your navigation to a maximum of about 25, especially on the homepage.  If you have many pages, try to create a main page for groups of them, and use those main pages as your navigation.  The more links per page, the less pagerank that page is going to have.  Do a sitemap ON the site and use the search terms as much as possible for the links on it.

XML Sitemap

11. Create an XML sitemap for Google.  A good free site to use for this is XML-sitemaps.com.  Sign up for a Google Webmaster Account and submit this sitemap.  Google will tell you all kinds of details about how they see your site from this.  You can get a list of all the backlinks that Google shows for your site, including broken links and other problems.

12. If you've done all these things, you're ready to start getting incoming links to the site.  Do some using those three most important keyphrases...not with one phrase.  One-way links are much more helpful than reciprocal ones. Do not bother getting links on pages that show nothing for pagerank with your Google toolbar.  Yes, you may lose a few this way...the toolbar only updates about every 90 days.  But you've got a huge job ahead of you, don't waste your efforts.  Blog links are usually good.  Recip links with a partner on a CONTENT page with no more than 2-3 other links is helpful. Links from pages that are nothing but links are a waste of time, especially if they are reciprocal.  Try to get some of the area businesses to trade links with you.  Offer to advertise for them with a banner if they will give you a text link on a good page of their site.  If you link to your website from your Active Rain blog or profile, try not to link back to it from the website...keep it a ONE-WAY incoming link.  Link to your site from all of your social profiles.

Learn what the "NO FOLLOW" tag is, and how to use it.

This is only the beginning of your hard work ahead.  I haven't covered all the important points of SEO, but I've touched on many.  Join the SEO forums like WebmasterWorld.com and READ. You can learn a lot from the forums, but be sure the information you get is up-to-date and from a reliable source.  Read Google's Webmaster Rules and don't try to use any shortcuts.  Build lots and lots of content, and write for your customers.

Good luck, and hopefully we'll see you at the top! :-)

###

 

(My Stuff)

Myrtle Beach Real Estate  -  Myrtle Beach Kids  -  Florida Oceanfront Property  -  Condo Insurance

 

Comments (24)

Ed Silva, 203-206-0754
Mapleridge Realty, CT 203-206-0754 - Waterbury, CT
Central CT Real Estate Broker Serving all equally

Is there a four page tutorial that explains the 12 points you just posted? A lot of info that needs to be read a few times, verrrrrrryyyyyy carefully. Thank you for the tips.

May 31, 2009 12:48 PM
Jan Chilton
Myrtle Beach, SC
Real Estate Marketing

There are no official tutorials that I know of, Ed.  Every SEO person has their own ideas, and we rely on what we've read, what we've tested, and a lot of intuition.

I keep threatening to write a book.  I'd love to teach small classes.  Maybe someday!

May 31, 2009 12:51 PM
Elizabeth Bolton
RE/MAX Destiny Real Estate Cambridge, MA - Cambridge, MA
Cambridge MA Realtor

Hi Jan ~ This is so generous of you to post! Super thorough and super helpful.  I too am glad to have it all in one place. Thanks so much.

Liz

May 31, 2009 01:03 PM
Connie Betz
Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Ambassador Real Estate - Omaha, NE
Top Omaha Realtor - Omaha Homes for Sale

Ok, I've bookmarked your post.  I'm scheduling time this week to come back and DO IT!  Thank you!  SEO is the crack that keeps me up at night. Thank you for sharing.

May 31, 2009 01:13 PM
Sara Goss
HatmakerGroup.com GMAC Real Estate - League City, TX
Realtor - Houston Bay Area, Texas

Wow! Very complicated but useful. I will need to sit down when I am fresh in the am to absorb some of this. I think multiple readings are in my future.

Thanks!!!!! I love techn. info.

May 31, 2009 01:24 PM
Jan Chilton
Myrtle Beach, SC
Real Estate Marketing

I hope it's helpful for everybody.  Thanks for commenting, all!

May 31, 2009 01:29 PM
Anonymous
Mario Finkbiner

Jan, Thank you for the very informative & useful information on SEO. Would like to twitter your link to all my tweets with your permission.

Mario

May 31, 2009 01:55 PM
#11
Jan Chilton
Myrtle Beach, SC
Real Estate Marketing

Mario, I would be very very happy for your tweets...:-)

Thank you!

May 31, 2009 01:59 PM
Kevin Cavanaugh
Keller Williams Hudson Valley Realty - Tappan, NY
Lic. Associate Broker, ABR, GREEN

Jan, thanks for posting that.  It is very informative and helpful.  Have a great day.

May 31, 2009 09:37 PM
Annette Smith
Allen Real Estate Services, Inc. - Sarasota, FL
Sarasota Real Estate Agent

Thanks Jan -- I've bookmarked all this great information so I can re-read it from time to time and catch some tips I missed the first time.  You're the best!

Jun 01, 2009 12:52 AM
Anonymous
Richard Brooks

You're a hit!! Dinner this week?  Bowling tonight...wanna join?

R

Jun 01, 2009 01:02 AM
#15
Fran and Rowena, La Canada Realtors - (818) 952-0077
Dilbeck Real Estate - La Canada, CA

Jan - this is one of the best "how to" guides around!  People pay big bucks for this information!  WOW!  Thank you!!

Jun 01, 2009 03:21 AM
Kevin Vitali
EXIT Realty Beatrice Associates - Middleton, MA
Helping Massachusetts Home Buyers and Home Sellers

Thanks for the info... I am always tring to improve my seo.  I know alt a tags are very important, i try to use on every photo.

Jun 01, 2009 03:23 AM
Irene Kennedy Realtor® in Northwestern NJ
Weichert - Lopatcong, NJ

Jan,

This is on my to-do list. Just bookmarked and will be back to turn on the Google juice. Thanks for pulling this together!

Jun 01, 2009 06:58 AM
Edith Schreiber
Luxury Homes, Move Up Buyers, 1st Time Homebuyers, New Construction - Frisco, TX
Dallas Area Real Estate

Jan,

I am trying to make a decision on a website service provider, and actually wrote a blog/post about it this morning,

Can you/will you recommend a company that sets up websites for us non-techy Realtors???

I am willing to make the necessary investment, I want a service that does not require alot of babysitting, and also one that will perform in terms of getting the site in front of people looking for a Realtor in Dallas, Texas....???

Any pointers???

Edith Schreiber - Dallas, Texas 

Jun 06, 2009 02:20 PM
Jan Chilton
Myrtle Beach, SC
Real Estate Marketing

Hi Edith,

The answer to that is going to depend on exactly what kind of site you want, how much you have to spend, and how badly you want to be at the very top of the search engines.

At this time there are two major kinds of real estate sites...the one type is based on content and information...photos, your listings, and may have some sort of inexpensive IDX attached that is either framed in from your MLS or hosted on another provider and linked to.  A good site like this might run you anywhere from $1000-4000, depending on how fancy and which company you go with.  The IDX portion might be $40 a month and your hosting for the site another $15-25.

Ranking this kind of site is going to depend on you building GOBS of content, having one or more blogs and writing in them fairly constantly (linking to the website), as well as a few press releases, link exchanges, social profiles, and other ways of building pages and links.

The second, and rather expensive kind of site is one where your web developer actually makes the IDX a part of your website.  You end up with thousands of pages, usually have a content management system for you to work on it yourself, and IF it is configured correctly, will almost certainly outrank any normal website.  The catch is if it is figured correctly.  The pages have to be converted to html or at the least static php, have no question marks, or other gobbly-gook in the URL's, and have to be programmed to create the title and description tags FROM THE MLS LISTING.  If it is missing any of these properties, it's a waste of money.  You can count on probably spending about $6000-10,000 for the perfectly done IDX site like this.  And there are probably only a handful of programmers or companies in the entire country that can do it.  Because the system CREATES content from the MLS listings themselves, you don't have to do as much work on adding pages and more pages.

I might add that if the NAR changes their rules, at some point they may stop these IDX providers from doing this type of manipulation.  Google and Yahoo may eventually decide to refuse to index the pages - after all, it's duplicate content among multiple Realtors in the same area if several are doing it.  I actually hope they DO eventually level the playing field here.  I don't feel it's fair that a regular website with outstanding content about the area and other things is unable to compete with a cookie-cutter site that serves up 3000 pages of MLS listings.

If you want to email or call me and talk more about this, I'll be glad to help you decide which way you want to go and to suggest a company or two that I would recommend.

Jun 06, 2009 03:21 PM
Hinton Dillard
Dillard and Company Realty Group - Atlanta, GA

Jan,

Beautiful, concise, to the point list with all the inside tips that demonsrtate your deep knowledge of the subject matter.

I would like to get a quote from you on my SEO work.

Warm regards,

Hinton

Jun 10, 2009 09:38 PM
Jan Chilton
Myrtle Beach, SC
Real Estate Marketing

Thank you Hinton.

I glanced quickly at your website, and it looks like your main problem is part of what I wrote in this article.  You don't have your homepage centered around one or two phrases.  Your title says Buckhead, I see Atlanta all over the place, and the left hand nav has about 25 other communities linked.  You need to center your homepage around the most important one, and have the inside pages targeting all the other ones.  Instead of having it open to say Welcome to..., make that heading be Buckhead Real Estate or Atlanta Real Estate or whatever it is you're trying to target.  Keep on topic with your text and other things like ALT tags, too.

You've got a good page-rank though.  If your incoming links are using the search term as the link, you should be off to a good start...although Atlanta real estate is massively competitive.  If that is what you're going to target, you will have to have a very large number of links and a huge amount of content to compete.

Feel free to email me if you want a consultation.  And good luck!

Jun 11, 2009 12:43 AM
Not a real person
San Diego, CA

I thought you said that it would be "a few "tips" to doing SEO" and that you would "make a very simplified guide." I'm tired just after reading all that -- LOL. I will have to bookmark this for people who ask me, though. Thanks.

Jul 29, 2009 07:21 PM
Jeff Manson
Real Geeks / American Dream Realty Hawaii - Kailua, HI

Here is a look at the top 50 markets and who is ranking on Google. The State of the Real estate Serps. It is a 3 part series of what they look like now and how agents are helping the portals kick their rears in the SERPS.. The last one will go over what agents can do to help themselves..

Dec 13, 2012 08:06 AM