Real Estate Blog - Meta Tags

Home : Blogs : Abraham Chaffin - Cambria Real Estate : Cambria Real Estate Blog

Meta Tags

Meta Tags - What's a Meta Tag? There are a number of different meta tags - The main three you are worrying about for search engine optimization are:

Title
Description
Keywords

Before you setup your meta tags with keywords you need to figure out what search phrase you are targeting. The major one you want to target in this case is "real estate". The idea is you want to come up #1 or at least on the first page of whatever search phrase you are targeting. For most of us kicking out Realtor.Com, Yahoo, MSN, RealEstate.Com and Newsweek for top position is a little beyond our powers. So we get more specific. What geographical area are we dealing with? If it is a county that is your region of choice you would specify the county. A city? Use the city name. A region? Use the region title and then put the words real estate after it.

My target market is Cambria, the town where I live and work so we will use that as an example. If you don't want to use "Cambria real estate" you can use, "Cambria homes for sale" or "Cambria condos" etc. My preference is real estate.

A great way to find related keywords is the keyword tool built into the Google adwords. If you have a Google adwords account just log in, click on tools at the top, then click on keyword tool. Enter a phrase like "Cambria real estate" then hit "get more keywords". And voila you have a list of related keywords that you can use. This will come in more handy as we go on.

The Title Tag is the most important meta tag to setup. Each page on your website should have a slightly different title, though you can use your key phrase if you so choose e.g. "Cambria Real Estate". For your home page or main site page use your primary search target phrase plus another major related keyword.

To get another major related keyword use the Google adwords tool to find related keywords to "real estate". When I just did it the top 3 were "real estate listings" "real estate agents" and "real estate agent". So a great title to a website would be "Cambria Real Estate Listings" This has your key phrase target and a strong related keyword modifier on it. It's tight and straight to the point which is what you want. If you want to hit multiple key phrases do it with a different page and title it accordingly.

The Description Tag is the second most important meta tag. Each page should have a slightly modified description for premium optimization. Around 20 words is good for the description. The tighter you can get everything the better. You want to target exactly what you want to rank and get up there. Get keywords from the Google adwords tool mentioned above and make sure you use the words you put in the description and title tags in the body of your page. If your site is about listings talk about listings on the page.

Some hot real estate keywords are: listings, agents, agent, listing, broker, residential, brokers, mls, agency, era, property, homes, commercial, find, sales, etc. Sprinkle these words into your description in a concise manor not repeating yourself. A good description might look something like this. "Find Cambria real estate listings and homes for sale. Search the MLS for commercial investment property and featured properties from our agency." This includes many hot real estate keywords in it. Just make sure to elaborate a little or at least mention these words in your main body to maintain emphasis.

The Keywords Tag is least important though if done right can help boost your search results. In listing your keywords make sure you include the words in the body of your page. A good thing to do is start by using the keywords from your meta title and meta description. A keywords tag for the page I have been creating might look something like this "Cambria, real estate, listings, find, homes for sale, search, mls, commercial, investment, property, properties, agency"

There is no exact science to it and no one has all the answers as these things change frequently. This is a basic outline of what has worked for me so far. Any additions in the comments are welcomed as I am free to always learn more.

Hope this helps and good luck!

Cambria Real Estate

Posted by Abraham Chaffin - Cambria Real Estate on 06/03/2007 03:16 AM

Comments (63)

active rain

63 Comments on Meta Tags

JUN

2007

I rushed to go tell Cyndee and you beat me to it! Thanks..had to bookmark and will surely read this in the am when I can soak this in...thanks!

Great Post Abraham. I have trouble varying from Keyword to Descriptions, and not repeating. It is tough, but all that work does pay off eventually!

Abraham,

Great post on META tags - I knew Cyndee would find a guru! It always amazes me what a wealth of knowledge we have around here and how willing people are to share!

Rita

No problem - just a little guide. Hope it all makes sense.

Feel free to ask any questions and I'll try to answer.

Abraham - thank you - I guess I'm the slow one in the class - because I' still confused on what to put for "tags" on my AR posts - can you please give me some additional insight :-)

Think of a tag as a simple category name. People can categorize their posts with any tag that makes sense.
A tag cloud will be generated with more frequently used tags being larger and darker.

Personally I only use tags that are very specific to what I want to target such as cambria or cambria real estate everything else that doesn't fit into my main categories I throw into my active rain tag. This probably isn't the best thing to do but I haven't learned better yet =D Other people are more general and might make a different tag for each post.

Read Active Rain on Tags

A side note to think about is- the more links you have on a page the more it detracts value from other links. So you might not want a super long list of links to tag pages that aren't relevant to your content.

Hope this helps!

Tags

The first one is the most important and should be your main keyword. I put as many tags as I can and try to keep them to the areas I want to push up on the long tail.

For example:

LONG BEACH REAL ESTATE, LONG BEACH HOME, DOWNTOWN LONG BEACH CONDOS, LAKEWOOD PLAZA, ALAMITOS BEACH, WRIGLEY HEIGHTS, LONG BEACH REALTOR, etc.....

Just keep plugging the keywords you want to rank for.

Make sure that each tag that you use is mentioned at least twice in the post or on the web page.

Oh, and by the way, I own the long tail and it is more effective for lead generation than your main keywords are.

And you should use a header tag with your main keyword in each of your posts.

<h1>Long Beach Real Estate</h1>

Good informative post...I'll have to read it more thoroughly again.

This is excellent information. I especially like the idea of using google adwords....ive done that myself....

boy, this is a very in demand subject and a very tricky one too.

Abraham, that was the best explanation I have read, and so simple. I didn't realize that meta tags was the overall word for all the title, description and key words. You cleared that up for me.

Super post---I just copied and pasted it in an email to myself so I can work on it when time permits. Thanks for explaining so clearly.

Good summary. I think the title tags and descriptions can get you a long way with SEO.

The one thing that I would add is that you also want your title tag to be written in a way that it will attract attention and make someone want to click on it. It needs to work like a good headline.

I usually do a Google search for the keyword that I'm working on and look at the results and try to figure out how I could stand out. You only have a few seconds to catch someone's attention before they click on someone else's page and never come back to click on your link.

Thanks for the insight. It helps an amateur like me compete with the big boys. I have bookmarked this page. Mike C

Thanks Abraham, I believe that is the best description of what a Meta-Tag is that I have ever read. I guess I just haven't paid enough attention. It is like they say " when the student is ready the Teacher will arrive "

THnaks Abraham, great post!

Regarding Laurie's comment on the h1 tags, I noticed a substantial difference when I added that to my web site's title last year.

Thank you very I will go back and check mine. Never thought about each page having a slightly different title. Genius!

Excellent information on tags, thanks for posting. I am bookmarking this for future reference and I just subscribed to your blog.

Hi Abraham! Just dropped in to bookmark this post after I read it. I hope to find some time to update my websites with your ideas. There is always one more thing to do. I love they way you write...easy to understand. I think I will subscribe to your blog also! I need all your Internet help!lol

Great post, most do not have a clue on the usage or impact meta tags can have on website visibility.

Good Stuff, Abraham. And the comments on this one are going to be great food as well.

Whoa...

Information over load ... I'll have to come back.

You guys are putting this stuff out there faster than I can learn it :)

TLW...ROAR!

great explanation. I didn't understand all the different levels and which ones were most important. this helps

Abraham~ I agree that your lesson above was very clear! Another bookmarked, and subscribed:)

I will save this info. I post blogs, then try to figure how to categorize the tags.

Nice little SEO primer! Thanks!

Wow great post,I will keep this in mind and bookmark for later us, keep up the good work We need people like to keep this thing alive. Ar is now only on year old, its amazing and so powerful. Meta tags are not as important as backlinks and anchor text

Wonderful and informative post Abraham. Bookmarked and rated! Thanks for taking the time to splain this stuff.

Now we just need to apply all that we've learned! Great information. Thanks for sharing it.

Please view our website: WWW.REINNH.COM, browse, click and comment.

Hey!

I thought Meta tags were pretty much ignored by Google.

They died out in 2002!

Frank

Great post and comments! Thank you for sharing this information as I was a little unclear as to how to best utilize these tags.

Now look....featured! WooHoo and congratulations! I thought this was a very good post!

Good info. Solid, informative and succinct. Just the way I like it. :)

Thank you for such a informative yet simple post.

Thanks for the great advise, I will get on changing each page as now most are the same.

Thanks for sharing. This lays it out very well for me.

Very informative, Abraham. Thank you.

Thank you Abraham for sharing some great tips and for keeping it simple. Have great day.

Thanks Abraham you are the best, i am going to follow your advise and practise on my website.

No problem - Glad you guys all got something out of it

Meta tags do play a Very large part in where you rank in SEO and also how people see you on Search results. Your Meta title is what they click on and most of the time the Meta description is what they see under it.

Thanks for all your positive feedback.

Abraham - good post, a lot to absorb! I bookmarked it though, so I can go back and back and back until I find success! Thank you.

I thin kit is important to have a great webmaster who is skilled in position your website!!

Thanks Abraham, I just went in and refined some of my meta tags and keywords. Apreciate this very much!

Hi Abraham - many thanks for the time and thought that went into writing this post. This is great info and you put it in such a way that I can actually understand most of what you wrote. Most of the time, posts like this are written so that I don't grasp all of it, but this one, even I can understand most of it.

Many thanks!
Ann

The only one should really worry about is the title tag. The rest are really optional anymore. -Charles

I really appreciate you posting this (especially for all the computer challenged people as myself). I definitely know how to google, pay bills online and to blog, but the science of SEO overwhelms me time and time again

Abraham:

Thank you. have been struggleing with the differece between Title and Descriptor Tags. Know I thnk I have it Title - Web site; Descriptor - pages on the site.

JUN

2007

Bob - for further clarification - Title and Description tags are generally placed on every page and should be different for every page. The Title tag is the Title of the page - if it's your home page it should be the title of your site. Description tag is the description of the page - if it's your home page it should be the description of your site.

As far as meta tags not being relevant any longer, that is not true. My website was dead in the water at page 10, I was able to get it to page 6 with keywords. I didn't get to page one until I put meta tags on each page. I was there within a couple of days of having done it.

Don't believe everything the experts say.

thank you this post is great and the comments all add to the post - really deserves a bookmark - thanks for taking the time to share ;o)

thank you for the valuable information

An in depth report on meta tags. This is really useful. Where did you find this info?

I've compiled most of this information over the years from other sources but now it just resides in my head. Some of these things I have come up with by trial and error as well monitoring the websites I handle. I am a SEOptimizer so I am paid to know these things =P

JUN

2007

Abraham - Great info. Now this is what I love about AR. There is someone here who can answer almost any question! Thanks for sharing!

Abraham, nice post. I believe there is another post on Active Rain that goes into a little more detail on the number of words you can use in the title, description and keywords. I believe Laurie Manny wrote it. You might check out her posts. Just a thought.

JUN

2007

Paula: Glad you got a lot out of it =)

David: There is definitely more to it with more particulars. Many of the figures people come up with are approximates and vary from SEO to SEO. Purpose of this was to be as simple and straight forward as possible which is generally my style. Thanks for the tip though and feel free to post a link to where you are referring to.

JUN

2007

Thanks for the post. I am a newbie and appreciate the help.

OCT

2008

help me. I am paying so much need more affordable web leads. Please contact me 904 338-4601.

David Cool, REALTOR & Mortgage Broker

JAN

Great, easy to understand post! This was one of my questions I needed answered as a newbie. Thanks

JAN

I never realized what a science blogging has become. I've got a lot to learn, but it's coming. Thanks for the info!

By the way, do tags work when posting these comments?

JAN

I have been looking for some good info on meta tags and somene suggested this post to me. Great post! I have it bookmarked so I can use it to help me in my meta tag endeavors.

OCT

It took a while for me to really understand how important this can be.

OCT

Thanks for the info!

This blog does not allow anonymous comments