Popular Home Features That Internet Consumers Are Searching

Roost.com has a free form keyword search on their real estate site that lets people type in what they are looking for to narrow down their home search results.  Interestingly, they just released the top 10 things that their users type into this box.  Here is the list:

1. Pool
2. Garage
3. Hardwood
4. Waterfront
5. View
6. Basement
7. Tile
8. Deck
9. Condo
10. Shop

They then compared this to the top 10 words real estate professionals most frequently used to describe homes.

1. New
2. Large
3. Great
4. Beautiful
5. Open
6. Huge
7. Finished
8. Spacious
9. Custom
10. Newer

It is interesting to compare these two lists.  The first is 90% nouns, or actual things that a person wants in the home.  Compare that to what words are most being used in marketing text, none of them are actual features of a home, all adjectives. 

I don't think it is entirely fair to compare these lists side by side, because 'great' could be used to describe each of the items on the first list, thus making it more popular then say 'hardwoods' which can only be used in cases where there are actually hardwoods present. 

But the idea of this list is at least important to think about when writing marketing text that is going to be found online.  This type of writing for marketing purposes might be different than a brochure that is left in the home at an open house.  At the open house you are trying to sell that home at that time to that person- maybe more descriptive words are appropriate.  With Internet market text, you are trying to get the home to come up in front of the person and making sure you have text that is feature rich, verses adjective rich, may help this happen more frequently.