An innocent question regarding SEO for real estate posted in the real estate tech support group I am a member of resulted in a few very interesting responses. A few contributed by John Smith [name changed], from what I gather a realtor and maybe also a coach (although I could be wrong) demanded special attention, and made me feel compelled to address them in a more public forum than just the thread in question.
In an attempt to offer SEO advice to a new to SEO agent, John recommended the following, and I quote: [names changed and link redacted to protect the guilty, emphasis mine]
” Don’t forget to keyword the number one agent’s name, company and website in the area you target and do a nice blog about how wonderful they are and you will own their search results and they will thank you for having such a nice blog about them. Also; special events work good to blog on for search but provide links. Jeopardy SEO rocks as well; think in terms like you are answering a question on jeopardy; What is a short sale, what is an reo etc. Hardly anyone knows the jeopardy angle. Work the apex of the longtail and not the top for more serious buyer’s.
Here is an example of how I have the top 3 results for one of the top agent’s in our area, note the titles and keywords, I keep it cordial and they appreciate it. The idea is to own virtually every search anyone could possibly make for real estate, even things like movers you want to be at the top. Hope this helps: [link]“
I clicked the link provided and lo and behold, a Google search for a specific top ranking agent in his market, let’s call her Jane, does indeed bring up John’s content in the top three positions. Two of them videos and one a blog post on his site. John claims that this is a standard practice across all industries and I assume honestly thinks that there is nothing wrong with this practice.
For what it’s worth, here is my take on it:
Even if this sort of hijacking of one’s pr was not frowned upon by Google, it would still be wrong on many levels, too many to go into in detail. One of them, of course, being the basic indecency this underscores, but heck, we are all pragmatists now and decency is apparently a matter open to interpretation.
So let’s say you engage in this sort of practice, and Google ignores it and so you are getting away with it for years. What is a consumer searching for that specific agent (in this case Jane, who looks nothing like John, if only due to gender differences), supposed to think or do once they land on that top search result? Are they really going to all of a sudden decide that they weren’t interested in doing business with or contacting Jane, and will now call John Smith instead? I am truly confused why anyone would think that this sort of thing is not only ok (ethically and Google TOS-wise speaking, of course), but actually useful.
So for all the agents that might run across a recommendation of this nature, please think about what you are doing and the image you are putting across, and if that doesn’t mean anything to you, think about the small fact that if you do get reported for hijacking someone else’s PR – you will be delisted, no questions asked, as well you should be.
You’ll also be looked at as a schmuck by your peers, as well you should be.
And if you happen to be someone who’s page rank is being hijacked in this manner, by them doing a complimentary post about you – feel free to hit that report button. Don’t let the complimentary or congratulatory nature of the post deter you from analyzing why anyone in their right mind would be giving public props to their competition in this particular manner, and then check the Google Results for you name. It should paint a pretty accurate picture of what is going on. They are not trying to be nice – they are hijacking your work. Treat it as such.
Important:
Daniel Rothamel in a comment to this post on my blog contributed the following, regarding this practice being quite probably in violation of the Realtor Code of Ethics, and I quote: "
While I'm no expert on the REALTOR Code of Ethics, I'm pretty sure that John's statement that: "Don’t forget to keyword the number one agent’s name, company and website in the area you target and do a nice blog about how wonderful they are and you will own their search results" is in direct conflict with the REALTOR Code of Ethics (specifically SoP 12-10(3) ):
Standard of Practice 12-10
REALTORS®’ obligation to present a true picture in their advertising and representations to the public includes the URLs and domain names they use, and prohibits REALTORS® from:
1) engaging in deceptive or unauthorized framing of real estate brokerage websites;
2) manipulating (e.g., presenting content developed by others) listing content in any way that produces a deceptive or misleading result; or
3) deceptively using metatags, keywords or other devices/methods to direct, drive, or divert Internet traffic, or to otherwise mislead consumers. (Adopted 1/07) "
You be the judge.
Thoughts?
Photo by kibuyu, via Flickr Creative Commons.
If you are struggling with your real estate website's performance in Google, follow this links for some normal human tips on SEO for real estate that are simple and won't get you penalized by anyone.
And here is another usefull article on how to keep people on your website, once you get them there:
Wordpress real estate websites - visitor retention practices.
Originally published on my blog at hamedia real estate marketing blog.
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