The perception of real estate SEO
Real Estate SEO used to be a challenge because of it’s high cost and aggressive competition. But not, with the development of new technology, Real Estate SEO has become more accessible and easy for agents to rank in all search engines.
As the Marketing Coordinator for a real estate startup and a thorough knowledge of the real estate industry, a new door in my career opened up. I clearly saw the importance of combining both understandings and I started to develop my own real estate SEO strategies “for free”.
Today, with this new knowledge, I can finally share with my fellow realtors the importance on how to do their own marketing campaigns effectively, but most importantly, at no cost.
What follows, is a real estate SEO guide for real estate professionals. I also know the importance of making informed marketing decisions, and because of that, I want to help you close the gap between you and Real Estate SEO.
According to the National Association of Realtors, 90% of buyers start their real estate search online. Real estate SEO is vital for a successful online presence. For both, brokers and agents, higher rankings in the search engines translate into significant sales increases; specially when the real estate market is rising. In the end, whether the market is doing good or really bad, a good real estate SEO campaign will always keep your sales stable.
Real Estate SEO Challenges
Real Estate SEO
The real challenge for SEO is that agents compete against one another, yet they are united as “team members” under large brokerage firms. To better understand the challenges of SEO, we first need to understand what creates them. Agents rely on the combination of a few things like: brand recognition from their agency, personal branding, and social media presence to drive new business and close more deals.
Also, real estate agents often target specific communities or condo buildings. They often try to showcase themselves as the experts on specific buyer’s needs and wants or demographics. A few examples would be: Foreign National buyers, First time home buyers or Luxury waterfront properties.
Real estate SEO has become very complex due to the very nature of the industry. Additionally, real estate websites can be large due to the high level of functionality and ability to search, which is needed to appeal to prospect clients.
To add more challenges, keyword competition in real estate websites is extremely high. All real estate professionals are competing for the same keywords. Many SEO companies prey on uninformed agents and over promise results that can’t be traced. These companies offer expensive monthly programs that promise high rankings in keywords that won’t deliver any results.
As a result of SEO scammers, new technology has been developed to help realtors and agencies to help their SEO ranking, without the help of an “SEO expert”.
What to Look for in Real Estate SEO Strategies?
A good real estate SEO strategy should have the following:
- A Real Estate Website that is build in an SEO friendly platform such as WordPress
- Proper URL structure
- Site performance and usability
- Hyper-local, optimized content creation
- Advanced keyword Research
- Social Media Integration
- Link building
I will not get into techniques for SEO or link building. Instead, I will give you tips and techniques that target common problems that I see with real estate websites.
Real Estate SEO strategies:
- How do you choose a search engine-friendly MLS IDX solution?
- How is Google indexing listing content, and is it optimized?
- What content will attract the right clients?
- How do agents and brokerages pinpoint which keywords to target?
There are other real estate SEO tools like WordPress plugins and widgets. They are great tools that teach you how to comply with Google requirements and the way to structure a perfect blog. We strongly suggest to always develop your websites and write your blogs on WordPress. Google loves this platform because of it’s ability to keep up with the search engines’ algorithms.
For more information or for any questions in Real Estate SEO contact CREW Miami.