Real estate is a very competitive niche when seeking to gain visibility on the internet.
Real estate professionals need to understand that search engines are frequently making algorithmic changes which make the goal of ranking for specific keywords a moving target. What may be best practices at one point in time can change instantly with updates from the major search engines.
For this reason it is essential that real estate professionals either make a considerable commitment to stay abreast of the latest search engine changes, or that they work with a technology partner that does.
Website Equity
Similar to real estate, the best strategy for long term equity growth is for a real estate professional to own, rather than rent, a search engine friendly, fully responsive Internet presence. Just as real estate professionals spend years building their reputations in the marketplace, a strong website will build its own Internet reputation resulting in a type of “authority” from the search engines that will manifest itself as highly ranked pages from search engines and greater visibility to the real estate searching public. In January 2015, Google did an update requiring websites to be mobile-friendly for SEO.
Dominance of Mobile
Currently over 40% of Internet searches are conducted on mobile devices, but that number is expected to grow to over 80% by 2017. Google has increasingly demanded that websites must be mobile-friendly to maintain top ranking going forward. For this reason, agents must have a “responsive” site that adjusts the layout of the web page to suit the varying screen sizes of smart phones, tablets, phablets, etc. Google aside, users reject sites that don’t display on mobile devices.
Do you really want to lose over 40% of you potential leads simply because your site is built on an outdated platform that does not conform to the expectations of today’s smart-phone obsessed public?
SEO Diversification
There are strategies that produce lots of paid leads quickly and there are strategies that produce a reliable stream of consistent leads over time. They both have their place in a balanced Internet marketing campaign. Pay-per-click campaigns can produce a good volume of leads in a relatively short period of time. Organic search leads take a much longer time to generate but have no linear connection to how much you are paying for a campaign.
The key is to strategically utilize both approaches to build a solid lead pipeline that continues to produce more and more sales over time.