After talking to agents and brokers, it seems like many of you want to take advantage of search engine optimization (SEO), but aren’t exactly sure what it is or how to best utilize it in your marketing efforts. You’ve come to the right place!
What is SEO?
SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization.” It is the process of clarifying your presence on the Web so that search engines (and presumably homes shoppers) can easily identify what you are all about. Basically, it means that different search engines (i.e. Google, Bing, Yahoo) have two ways to classify search results: ads that are paid for and organic results (when pages naturally sort to the top based on keyword/content matches). The goal of SEO is to get your site(s) to the top of search engines without having to spend your marketing dollars on it.
There are multiple factors in the way search engines rank results. Here are five tips on how to get started boosting your rank as well as how to monitor your efforts.
1. Focus on page content
Be clear and focused on what you are all about on your site. If you sell real estate in Atlanta, than make sure your page revolves around homes for sale in Atlanta, market conditions, local trends, etc. Leave anything off the site that doesn’t relate directly. If you want to give consumers a look at your personality, link off to your blog or social media sites, but keep your Web site directly related to real estate in your area. That way, search engines will have no trouble figuring out how your site should be categorized and ranked. Furthermore, pick a domain name for your website(s) that reflects this.
2. Identify keywords before beginning
You should know what you want your “keywords” to be before you begin. Like we just talked about, content is important. When consumers are searching for homes, say Long Island homes for sale, do you come up? Or does your competition? Decide what you want to rank for (if you are a smaller brokerage perhaps choosing “Garden City homes for sale” is a better term for you) and make sure to include that in your content, tweets, blogs, etc.
3. Stay involved in social media
There’s a myth flying around that social media and SEO are in competition with each other and you need to choose one to focus on. This is absolutely incorrect! In fact, search engines are now including tweets and Facebook statuses in search results pages. They each play a role in your marketing success and we love to see strategies that include them both, just like how we talked about including keywords in your tweets and posts above!
4. Alter your Meta Tag Kewords
I know this sounds techy, and maybe a bit scary, but stick with me… it’s an important factor in boosting your SEO. Meta content is like the guts of your Web site. They are words that can’t be seen to people when they come to your site, but can be read by search engines to understand what your site is about (html code). To view yours, right click and look for the “view source” in the menu.
Talk to your webmaster about what keywords you want to be included and research other high ranking sites to see what they are including. This would most likely be your business name, common misspellings of it, area you are located in, real estate, free home search, etc. Most search engines do have a cap of how many metatag keywords you can include, for example Google’s is around 200 characters, so definitely prioritize what you think is searched the most often in your area by potential home buyers.
5. Track your progress
Download Google toolbar. You can turn on PageRank in the settings and see Google’s determination of every sites importance, including your own. Your changes won’t instantly alter your page rank, but overtime you can use this to measure your progress.
Have you Googled any of your listings lately? Where do they fall on Google’s search results… or can you even find them? Most real estate searches happen online so make sure your listings are easy to find. If you have trouble, chances are potential buyers will as well. It is important to make finding you and your listings as simple as possible and optimizing yourself on search engines is a great way to start the process.
Hopefully this helped clear up some confusion on SEO, or maybe inspired you to do more research on how to best use it to your advantage. We definitely think it has a place in every marketing plan. Let us know if you have any SEO advice for fellow REALTORS!
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