Real Estate SEO

Archive for the ‘Wordpress’ Category

One of the best ways to get ahead of the content challenge is to find ways to use your time efficiently. Blog when you have the time. But who has the time?

I’m at Jiffy Lube right now. This means I’m sitting in a waiting room and I have some time to hop on my Blackberry 8830 and search for a way to blog. 1 google search and I found this app which allows me to link my blackberry up to WordPress, which is the system behind this blog.

Here’s a link to the app, click here using your blackberry and the device should begin to download for you.

http://blackberry.wordpress.org/install

There are also wordpress apps for the iphone and probably apps for most smart phones. Just do some searching and ye shall find.

So, in less time than it took to get the oil in my car changed, I’ve installed the Blackberry wordpress app and written a blog post. Just think of all the places where you could find yourself with a few minutes to spare which you could dedicate to you seo campaign.

Content!
As a real estate agent, you’re not alone if you are struggling to find the time to blog. Your real estate seo compaign depends on fresh content. We’ve been chanting the battle cry for years: content is king! Content takes time. This app will give you some time to write it!

Don’t just say that you have the knowledge, show it.

How many times have you seen a website that says something like, “We have the knowledge and the experience to…” or “Our experienced and knowledgeable team is here to serve you.” Or something similar. Sound familiar?

Yes, our clients provide the same empty language from time to time and yes we do populate this type of content onto the sites we built on a frequent basis. I’m sorry to say it.

Fact is that we’re in a time when it’s pretty easy to build a website. It’s free to put up a blog on someone else’s website (like wordpress or blogspot, for example).  And just about anyone can write a sentence that says they have the knowledge and the experience to do whatever. The consumer has grown impervious to such language. Today’s consumer wants more.

We want to feel like we’re getting great information from the fountain of knowledge. We want to feel like we’re making informed decisions. We know that with a few keywords in Google, we can access lots of information sources, but we want to quickly and efficiently access the best. We want an authority.

How do I become an authority? Well, an authority is an “Accepted source of information.” At least, that’s one of the ways that dictionary.com defines the word. Well, this is where your website really can be a powerful tool in a few ways.

1. If your website includes vast amounts of information and it answers the user’s first question, whatever that may be, then they’re likely to come back again for another answer. Basic questions asked of a real estate website might be:
   1. How much does a 1 bedroom home cost in Boston? or
   2. What does it mean to be pre-approved?
2. To show that you have more than information, you have knowledge, you’re going to want to have a blog. Those of you who read this blog on a regular basis and/or already have a blog, will agree. Your blog is where you flaunt your stuff. You show what you’ve got. If you feel like you’re giving away the store, don’t worry. Give away as much information as you’re willing to type. The more you post, the more you’ll look like the authority you are.

The reality of real estate is that there are just too many realtors out there. It’s not like Coke and Pepsi who have been trying to take market share from one another for decades. You’re trying to take a few more deals from a large pool. You’re trying to rise above the crowd. Do this by showing the visitors to your site just how much knowledge you have and what all those years of experience have taught you.

I’d like to conclude by mentioning someone who embodies authority. Paul Krugman is a NYTimes columnist and Nobel Lauriate in economics. Not only does he have the years of experience and the accolades to prove his prowess, but he also writes with authority. I recommend checking out his columns and examining his writing style. Also, he’s pretty smart and insightful, you’ll probably learn something about our economy while you’re at it.

We recently featured a blog post on how to optimize your real estate blog for SEO in 10 steps. This is your personal tour inside Boston Logic’s ONE System—showing you how customizing your blog is essential to successful real estate marketing online.

Previously we took you inside WordPress as a blog platform. A platform that we highly recommend for blogging. The only thing better than WordPress for search engine optimization is a customized solution.  It just so happens that we offer such a platform. The blog is only one component of the Boston Logic ONE System, a comprehensive real estate website platform, but it is a crucial component for SEO.

It is important to customize your blog from head to toe to represent your business. Everything from the blog name, URL, titles, meta tags, images, content, links and categories should reflect how you want to have your business represented online. For example, this blog (Real Estate SEO by Boston Logic) talks about search engine optimization for real estate. The URL www.realestateseo1.com and title ‘Real Estate SEO, Our SEO blog for Real Estate Brokers, Agents, and Developers’ makes it clear you won’t be reading about dog haircuts. Notice also that you are reading a post about customizing your blog and how it’s the key to success in real estate online. All of these items reflect Boston Logic’s mission to provide market leading tools and services that enable real estate professionals to acquire, retain, and develop clients–go figure.

Here’s a bare bones example of what Boston Logic’s blog application offers (see image below). In addition to giving you all the great blogging features that a mainstream platform (like WordPress) provides, the ONE System makes it easy for your readers to find their way to the property search–the part of your website where you ultimately want all traffic to go. By having the option of a static “quick search” tool on each page of the site  (including your blog), you gently  guide visitors to your listings.

Cabot and Company, a Boston Real Estate company recently had their website redesigned by Boston Logic and are using our online marketing – SEO services. As part of our SEO services we recommended our customized blog platform and all it has to offer. Joseph Palermino, a managing partner at the company, is now a regular blogger and to his surprise, a really good and engaging writer.

Our recommendation to Cabot and Company and others is–learn your blogging platform and use it well. Write as often as you can and have fun with it – or find someone to do it for you. Our clients consistently see increased traffic and visitor retention by writing new posts and keeping loyal readers coming back for more…and you can too!

PS: here are a few more Boston based real estate companies that use the Boston Logic blogging platform;

• Avenue 3 Real Estate
• GKR Residential
• Coming soon – Boston Realty Advisors’ Blog

You may have wondered what you can do to optimize your WordPress blog for real estate seo…

If you are using WordPress for either your entire web presence or as a blog which is part of your larger website you will still want to make sure that it is fully optimized. Even if you already have an optimized website you still need to optimize my blog. Yes you do. What if you have the overall blog optimized, do you still need to optimize each page/post? Yes you do.

A great simple solution in WordPress that makes all of this much easier for you is the “All in one SEO pack” which you can install with one click through the “Plugins” section.

All In One SEO Pack

10 steps to optimizing your blog

1. Custom Permalinks: Permalinks, essentially your URLs, are now a basic part of WordPress that you can easily edit. Based on what your title is, your permalink will appear as such. My recommendation is to try to keep it short when possible and to have your keywords as they relate to your post included.

2. Meta Titles: Your meta Title, or Page title as it’s also referred to, is another essential part. It’s what ends up being the text in the blue bar of your search browser and also the text that is the first line of your site in the search results. You want to make sure that it is clear and relevant to your post otherwise you may turn readers away without knowing it.

3. Meta Description: You meta description is another part that appears in search results as text below your page title that is in essence descriptive information about what your site holds in store. You are limited by 160 characters so be sure to be precise, informative and whenever possible don’t copy text directly from your content.

4. Titles and Subtitles: Aka Headers; H1 and H2 etc. An H1 Header is your primary header. Within WordPress your post title will always be your H1 header. This further helps shows your readers and search engines what you’ve written about. Headers also help establish a hierarchy of your content. Typically your H1 title will be the largest and increase in size from there on. Makes sense right…You can easily format the type of header you want by choosing a different “class” or within the code source/HTML enclosing your text within <h2> … </h2>.

5. Content which includes your Real Estate SEO terms: I did not place this list within order of importance but more so order of flow from the top of a page to the bottom. If I had ordered it by importance “content” would probably have been first. Your content is extremely important because it sets you apart from all others (aka your competition). Your content should reflect your business, your services, goals etc. What you have to write about is precisely why people come to read your blog over and over again…you will establish loyal readers.

Once you’ve determined the focus of your blog, obviously something to do with “real estate” then you should stick to that. While you should have fun with it, please remember that you should incorporate your keywords in a natural way whenever possible. Incorporate news about neighborhoods in which you do business, your local involvement, featured properties, opinion pieces etc. People like to hear what you have to say and they certainly like knowing that they are getting the inside scoop from you (a trusted source) first.

6. Links: We have talked about getting inbound links for your real estate site before but this is about links within your blog. Including links like I have throughout this post, from a certain topic to a related topic/post within your blog or website is an important part of any site structure. You should also link out to other trusted sources/sites. This shows your readers and search engines that you get your information from trusted sources and share your information with those sources.

7. Images and ALT Tags: Really this should read “images must have ‘alt tags’”. Images are an important and rather engaging part of your blog post. Whether you include one or multiple images it’s a good practice to include unique images to help break things up visually. Since search engine robots (that crawl your site regularly in search of new or updated content) can’t see images, they need to have a “clue” of sorts…and that’s where “alt tags” (sometimes referred to as alt attributes or alt text) come into play. As you add new images WordPress will give you the option to optimize your “alternative text”…make use of that option and name your images according to what they are and not something like picture 1 and picture 2 etc.

8. Category Names: Categories are used to arrange more than one article into a common label. Similar to tags, they help organize content, both are used to label or name articles and arrange them. A good practice is to include broad keywords as part of your categories.

9. Tags: Tags are descriptions that will associate an article to various topics. Typically one-word descriptions of the most important aspects of the article with the most prominent keywords or commonly recognizable words are used. It is the tags attributed to a post that lets visitors search your site and then find relevant posts.

10. Call to action – pose a question: Similar to a sales pitch you want to have some kind of call to action in your articles. I recommend not using a “sales” approach where you try to sell your services by saying something like “if you need a realtor then contact xyz” because your content should be empowering enough so that readers will want to know more and either come back or contact you to learn more about how you can help them. You can’t twist someone’s arm and you should not beat them over the head with information. Instead you should close your posts by asking engaging questions. Remind your readers that you value their input and engagement.
Are you employing any of these strategies on your blog (even if it’s not WordPress)? What other kinds of things would you suggest to optimize that I may not have listed here?

Related Articles:

• Top reasons why you should have your own blog
• Top 10 sites to submit your blog
• Answers to common Real Estate blogging questions
• How long should my blog post be?

Thinking about a new look for your blog? Or maybe you are just starting out and are looking for some tips on how to get started. Well, here are some steps to keep in mind, from a marketing perspective, as you undergo your blog redesign.

First, I hope you are using your blog because you want to reach a broader audience and want to make a greater impact, establishing or reinforcing your online presence (depending on whether this is your first go at it or you’ve been around the block a couple of times). Your blog, like your website, is about marketing yourself or your business, ultimately, a means by which to grow your business (aka. lead generation). It should be easy to navigate, consistent with your line of business or area of expertise, and informative. With that in mind, you should not be redesigning your blog because you feel that your design just isn’t quite as fun or fancy as some others out there. Second, you want to make sure that while your design looks clean and professional, your content and layout are what will get you the most bang for your buck.

However, before you even get started you want to organize the following; (1) establish clear, definitive goals and determine what desired actions convert visitors into leads (Do you plan on using your blog to capture leads? etc.), (2) make sure to keep the HTML coding clean (if you are not familiar with these practices I advise that you consult a professional, (3) don’t forget your users and site usability, (4) remember that a blog redesign is a project and should be managed as such, (5) set up a realistic schedule and manage expectations (Rome wasn’t built in a day, and your WordPress blog won’t be either).

Once you get into the nitty-gritty of things you will want to make sure that you don’t lose what you have during your design process.  There are pieces of your website that exist now and are good for SEO, and those should be protected. I can’t stress enough – don’t lose what you have. With SEO less is not more – the content you have the better off you are. With a proper plan and layout you can keep track of what you have and what you can do without.

…which brings me to my next point…

Any site redesign is a great time to assess what you have. What is worth keeping? It’s everyone’s favorite “A” word (no, not that) – Audit. Assess what may need to be updated, was it 5 or maybe 8 years ago that some of that content was created?…right…follow what I’m saying.

Most likely you already have great content – whole-lot-a posts. On and off page SEO are crucial as part of your blog’s SEO. As a refresher, on page SEO includes your post URLs which you can easily manipulate with plug-ins like the WordPress “all in one SEO pack” or any “permalink” plug-in for that matter. Next are the page title (or Meta Title), page headers (your H1s, 2s and 3s) and of course your content, all of which should incorporate the use of your keywords. Now, depending on the kind of plug-in that you are using you may be able to update post and page descriptions as well, which we know is equally important. Off page SEO, which is huge, includes inbound links and to some extent internal linking. Make sure this is all working properly, and none of these steps get sacrificed. Typically when working with platforms like WordPress these transitions run more smoothly.

And, finally…don’t forget to test. Testing is an important part of any redesign and a crucial step that is often overlooked. Try testing in different environments to make sure that styling and functionality is consistent.

As always if you have any questions please let us know.

Happy blogging!

PS: How do you like our new look?