Increase Website Traffic with Better Real Estate SEO
Research shows that millennials make up the largest share of home buyers in 2021. This generation has grown up. They have jobs. They are starting families. They are buying houses and condos more than any other age group. The next generation is on its way, as well.
So, what does this mean for you as a real estate agent or brokerage? It means you must improve your real estate SEO (search engine optimization) strategies to increase website traffic. So much of the real estate process is conducted online now. Home searches, video consultations, virtual home tours, and even some of the contractual aspects of the transaction. Social media and websites bring buyers and sellers together. Optimized real estate SEO is crucial to your ability to generate more real estate leads.
Real Estate SEO—The Basics
First, you must have a real estate website. The site itself should be mobile-friendly and populated with quality content that is optimized with SEO keywords, tags, titles, descriptions, and links. The content must be well-written. Grammatical errors and sloppy writing will work against you. Google and other search engines are getting more advanced each and every day. AI bots and complex algorithms decide which sites and pages have the most relevant content. Having a solid base of SEO-driven real estate content is a good start.
Next, it is important to remember real estate SEO is not a “set it and forget it” prospect. You don’t just build your website and let it sit there gathering digital dust. Even if you have the most beautiful real estate website and fully optimized real estate SEO content in the world, it means nothing if you never do anything more with the site. Search engines need to see activity to know that your site is still relevant. If not, it will just fall down the search engine rankings with each passing day.
You have to keep breathing new life into your website. This is done by adding fresh content on a regular basis. One advantage you have in real estate is your property listings and also home search tools that can be built into your platform. Integrate your website with MLS feeds and home search functionality. Make sure you stay up-to-date with your own featured listings as a form of fresh real estate content.
This still isn’t enough to compete in today’s real estate market. There are many other strategies you can implement to keep populating your site with new, relevant content. This is how you increase website traffic with real estate SEO. Here are a few other methods to incorporate in your content strategy:
Real Estate Blog
The main purpose of blogging as a business or as a service provider (such as a real estate agent) is to enhance your real estate website’s SEO potential. You must write and post “original” content. It cannot just be copied and pasted from other sources and blog feed services won’t really benefit you that much either. Blogging gives you a way to keep adding fresh content with detailed articles on more specific topics related to your industry. You can provide local resources and information, share real estate tips and much more. Think about the questions you are asked every day as a Realtor® and use those as inspiration for article topics. The content ideas are endless!
Social Media
Be active on social media and integrate that activity on your website. You can include social feeds on your site. Link back and forth between your social pages and site to drive more traffic both ways. Inbound and outbound links are very beneficial to your SEO strategy. Share links to each of your blog posts on social media, as well.
Videos
Some of today’s most successful real estate brokers and real estate investors utilize videos to increase business. A good video campaign will build you up as a trusted expert in the real estate field. They will help you generate more leads and drive more traffic to your website—both from direct links and general SEO when videos are embedded on your site. Also, links out to your YouTube channel are a great way to include outbound links on your website while simply pointing them to a different marketing resource of yours.
Direct Response Marketing (Landing Pages)
Lastly, you can build direct response landing pages. They aren’t part of your main website, but they are housed under the same domain. Landing pages are designed and written to provoke a specific desired action from the visitor. Whether you want them to download a white paper or call you to set up a listing appointment, the page is written with one main goal in mind. Then, the link to that page can be featured in Google ads, Facebook ads or other social media posts. “Clickbait” is kind of a dirty word these days, but this kind of direct response marketing is a very valuable marketing tool with millennial home buyers and sellers.
We hope you find this information about real estate SEO helpful. Please check out more of our articles or contact us today if you are interested in working with us to improve your real estate website’s SEO strategy.