Why real estate websites need SEO
As a real estate professional, there are many ways to attract new leads to your website and SEO is just one way you can connect with your next client. You’ve probably heard about “optimising your website for SEO” but what SEO actually mean?
You should have a basic level of understanding of what SEO is and how it works to increase your brand awareness to your local property-loving community. Let’s make it simple for you and your website.
What is SEO?
The acronym stands for Search Engine Optimisation, but what it actually does is increase the likelihood of your website being on the first page of search results when someone does a google search relating to real estate.
Why do you need SEO?
Basically, it will help you put you in front of 70% of vendors and investors searching for an agent/agency online to list their home with. Or to put it simply, so you can attract more leads.
How do you get and increase your SEO?
Let’s have a look at some of the simple ways you can increase your website’s SEO to improve your website ranking and bring you more leads!
1. Use keywords
Keywords are the foundation of your website. They need to be incorporated into your website title, heading, description, and pages throughout your website. Your website provider will have taken care of the basics when they created your website, but it doesn’t hurt for you to check in with them to make sure your website is optimized as best it can be.
Keywords are essentially what people type into their google search engine when looking for property-related information. Think about what you type into a search engine, and they will be your basic keywords.
Make your keywords local and relevant in your website pages, property listings, and blog articles. If you’re not sure what to use, have a look at this Keyword Magic Tool to get ideas on what keywords to use for your website as well as any paid marketing campaigns. Alternatively, check out Google’s keyword planner.
2. Update your website content regularly
Listings on your website are updated regularly but don’t rely on the change of listings to take the heavy lifting of keeping your content fresh. Take the time to look over your website at least quarterly to review every page – especially profile pages about your team.
Having content regularly updated on your website will keep your site fresh in the eyes of search engines, and will increase your SEO.
3. Use a blog
Having a blog is no longer a “nice to have” – it is a must-have for every real estate website.
But why should you have a blog? Your website is your opportunity to give comfort to potential sellers, buyers, and vendors as to why they should engage with you. Having local, relevant content on your website means you can start building your relationship, trust, and credibility as a local property professional.
If you don’t have a blog page set up already, get in touch with your website provider and have one set up. Once your blog is set up, start writing some posts and start sharing them in your emails and social media posts to drive traffic back to your website.
If you have a blog with no content or old posts from years ago, you’re not alone. Many real estate business owners start off with the best intentions of writing an article every week, but quickly find out it takes time, patience, and skill to create a good article.
4. Localise your content
Edit your content and add local information to increase your SEO. This is a great way of competing with larger media organizations that may have a similar article to yours, however when serving up relevant, local content in search results, there is a better chance of online property seekers to contact the local property professional, and increase your SEO.
5. Share your content
Sharing your content across all of your marketing channels will increase your brand awareness, and drive traffic back to your own website, thus increasing your relevance to the end-user, as well as increasing your SEO.
Sharing your content is easy through emails, social media posts, and through the network of your team members. The more shares of your articles through your network, the more relevant search engines will view your website and will increase your SEO.
6. Google your business
Open up a browser and search your business on Google. Are you there? Is there a Google Business listing displayed? If it’s not, get your business into Google asap. It’s a simple process to do, and this will increase your website SEO.
Have a look at this link and get started setting up your business on Google. This will also mean your business can be found on Google Maps, plus you can ask your customers for reviews to increase your profile when users are looking for you.
Last words
SEO is an ever-evolving process – don’t fall into the trap of thinking that once you have localised your content and update it every few months, your search engine rankings will increase. These tips will certainly help your website, so keep updated with your content and your website, and keep attracting your local online property seekers.
