One of the goals of any website is to attain website traffic. This goal is often achieve with a little bit of hard work and search engine optimization. I tend to believe that it’s a lot of hard work to achieve search engine ranking, but if done with the sole intention of truly helping someone find an answer then it’s no hard work at all, all you need is a little time to do your search engine optimization yourself or pay someone to help you.
A Brief History of Search Engine Optimization and Search Engines
When you look at the History of Search Engine Optimization and Search engines in general we are looking at a very short history of about 15 so years. Search Engine Optimization to me, is a simple science and I believe no one fully understands how a search engine works more so than the person who created it. Search Engine Optimization companies guess what the big search engines companies are doing and what they’re doing to rank your website pages. I do believe some companies have guessed certain aspects of what makes a web page rank and how they’re able to attain your rankings, but they will always be at war with the search engines to determine what things work or don’t work when it comes to ranking.
Theories of Search Behavior and how they are applied to Search Engine Optimization
There are some Theories out there that are applied to search behavior and they include:
Zipf’s Law
- Which essentially states that the specificity of any word is inversely proportional to its rank on a frequency table. for example a word used often is a broader more common words vs a word used less often is a narrower more specific word.
Pareto’s Principal:
- Also known as the 80/20 Rule. Basically this rule states that 80% of the work is produced by 20% of your employees.
The Long Tail: -
- explained how a small portion of very popular products generate a sizable income; however, a large portion of semi popular products generate small amounts of income that when added together can be equal to or larger than the income generated by the very popular products
Of all the theories the one that makes sense for Real Estate Search Engine Optimization is the “The Long Tail” - Simply stated as a Realtor you should focus on other search terms that the user may be searching for besides the broad picture. For example, A user may begin searching for “Miami Beach Rentals” and end up with a more specific search term like “Akoya Miami Beach Rental” - Here the user is more interested and knows more or less where he or she would like to rent. Another example could be that you offer the consumer information about the surrounding of a particular community or area of town. Talking about schools, Parks, gyms, groceries stores and coffee shops nearby this particular area. ie. the consumer maybe more interested in a particular area based on what is available to this individual more so than the neighborhood itself.
We suggest you focus on the Long Tail Theory when it comes to search engine optimization simply because we feel your buyer is further down the purchasing decision process. The buyer is now narrowing in and seeking that specific rental in a specific building and would probably yield a more profitable individual than someone who is just beginning to search. Yes, you would ideally want search engine traffic from the broad head but the long tail search is more specific to what the consumer is narrowing in on.
Tools Available for Search Engine Optimization and Ranking
There are hundreds if not by now thousands of tools to analyze, study, take apart any website to determine how they rank or can rank better with the search engine. One of my favorite tools are simple in understanding and helping you give you a sense of direction when it comes to search engine optimization of your real estate website.
- Google Keyword Tool - Use this tool to seek out what search terms are getting searched and how often they’re getting searched. This will help you focus on the words you should incorporate into your website and the types of articles you should be discussing on your blog. Yes, you can talk about anything on the web, but if you talk about what people are searching then you will likely rank on the search engine.
- Google’s Insight Tool - This is another handy tool, because it gives you a way to compare search volume patterns across specific areas, topics, time frames and properties. It’s great because you can see geographically what types of searches your customer are performing and how much. You can focus your real estate website with all it’s many languages on those regions who are searching for you. English vs Spanish.
- Google’s Pay Per Click Advertising - I always encourage advertising on search terms that are searches but are not as popular as the broad search terms. A popular search term will yield you some traffic, but this individual is not so much ready to buy. ie. Advertise on “Akoya Miami Beach Rental” vs. “Akoya Miami Beach”. The more specific one will give bring you a customer who is now more specific as to where he/she would like to rent.
- Key Word Density Analyzer - Often you have to emphasize the objective of your page. This is often a balance of use of the keywords to re-in-force that your Search Engine Optimization of that specific keyword needs to be stated in the body or the content of the article.
Real Estate Marketing Search Engine Tips and Tricks
- Register your domain for a period of 5 - 10 Years. (If you plan to be in this business for a long time, let Google and other knows you’re in it for the long run)
- Use Your companies resources to create meaningful links back to your website. By this I mean fill out your Real Estate Profile page wherever you can with links back to your main website.
- Create Blog Entries of your own listings before they are to appear in the MLS. - This will send the message to all the search engines that you were the first to discuss or talk about your particular listing. Remember you are in direct competition with just about any real estate website out there, so be the first to leak out this information :)
- Build Specific Search Engine Optimization goals and Objectives - Always think about the long tail and focus on specific search terms and not so much on the broad terms.
- Set specific short terms goals of 3 - 6 months.
- Set up a Marketing Plan that allows you to focus on your goals and break them down into easily manageable tasks:
- 1st Month - Do one article in my blog a week for the next month. (4 Articles)
- 2nd Month - Will incorporate my knowledge of a specific geographical region into the site (Neighborhoods, Community Information) (4 Articles)
- 3rd Month - Write about specific buildings (4 Building Writeup)
- The ideal number of articles/pages you can produce in a given week is around 3. This is the magic number of articles you should try to focus on producing each week on your website.
- Seek Professional Help - The few things we ever admit is that we need help and often times this is probably the best thing you can do to achieve your goals. You are ultimately the only person who knows if you have time to dedicate to your search engine optimization on the website.
When it comes to Search Engine optimization, none one really knows the answer. It’s kind of like that question that everyone has a different view point - What’s the meaning of life?. - But will leave that other question for another day. Search Engine Optimization or SEO as it’s often referred to is a science and all the SEO companies try to do their best job at guessing what the search engine is doing to rank your website and your pages. I believe that with a little bit of time each day or each week you can achieve the same goals yourself. Not all of us have this luxury of time, so sometimes it’s probably best to hire someone to write you the content or help you build your website. We help some of our customers and build content for them, so you can focus on selling.
You can apply the principals of the long tail to your content to help you bring in a more determined consumer who is ready to purchase versus someone who is just beginning to search. We often don’t think of those other terms that are searched as valuable traffic, but those terms often generate as much profit as the broader terms when you add it all together. Remember the goal of your website is always to get as much traffic as it can so that you can then have more opportunities to offer your real estate services to these individuals.
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