Originally posted on https://www.jasonfox.me/local-seo-for-real-estate-agents-the-ultimate-guide/
If you are a real estate agent there is no doubt that you have been successful at, invested in or thought about building your online web presence and your local SEO search results.
The idea of having people find you online and give you a call to help them buy or sell real estate sounds amazing. And there are thousands of brands, SEO, coaches and the like that are constantly telling you that you need to be online, you need a website, you need to blog and be on Social Media.
I know that many of you have tried these things and have not had any success. For that I apologize. I am one of those thousands of people that have been telling you this.
I am not saying it does not work… on the contrary I have success with it in my own business. But like any marketing strategy it takes time and effort.
If you think it is something you would like to incorporate into your marketing strategy then this guide will help get you started.
WHAT IS REAL ESTATE SEO?
…The process of increasing the quality and quantity of your traffic or visitors to your Real Estate Website by increasing the visibility of your real estate website to users of a web search engine, such as Google, Bing and Yahoo. SEO refers to the improvement of unpaid results and excludes direct traffic/visitors and the purchase of paid placement. Otherwise known as Organic Traffic. Wikipedia
WHAT IS LOCAL SEO FOR REAL ESTATE?
The same as Real Estate SEO but focusing on specific locations rather than just across the entire web. Making Local SEO much more effective for real estate agents, teams and offices.
In 2016, it was simply putting a location in front of a search term.
Non Local SEO Search Term:
- Real Estate
Local SEO Search Term:
- Seattle Real Estate
Since 2016, Google has seen a 92% growth in searches for “best real estate agent,” (Source: Google Data, US, 2018 vs. 2017) and a 61% increase in searches for “homes for sale near me.” (Source: Google Internal Data 2018 vs 2017)
Now Google knows where you are and will find the search term that is located near you.
If you want to rank for the local search terms then you need to tell Google where you are. It can guess… but it is a robot. You should probably make sure you tell them.
LOCAL SEO FOR REAL ESTATE SEARCH RANKING FACTORS
WHAT IS GOOGLE MY BUSINESS
It is Google’s way of letting us tell their robots where we are. Or, what local search terms we should rank for. If your office is in Seattle. Then you should have the opportunity to get ranked for search terms with the word Seattle in front of them.
*I can not guarantee that you will rank for your Local Search Terms if you Google Your Business… but, I can guarantee that will have a better chance if you do.
Google explains their product as:
“Engage with customers on Google for free: With a Google My Business account, you get more than a business listing. Your free Business Profile lets you easily connect with customers across Google Search and Maps.”
If you’ve ever typed the name of a business into Google and seen an informative mini overview of the company appear on the right-hand side of the screen, then you’ll have seen a Google My Business profile in action. Essentially, it provides a snippet of information about your company for the user. It should include your name, address and phone number as a minimum requirement.
A Google My Business profile for real estate also gives you the chance of appearing in map results. This means that if a user local to your business searches for a real estate business in your area you have a chance of appearing in the map result.
Since the largest percentage of Local SEO Ranking Factor comes from your Google My Business account you should take a few minutes to make sure that it is set-up and optimized.
69 percent of home shoppers who take action on a real estate brand website begin their research with a local term, i.e. ‘Houston homes for sale,’ on a search engine.” ~ National Association of REALTORS®’s recent Digital House Hunt study
Google My Business for real estate is a big deal. The last 5 clients I have built websites for have not had Google profiles. According to BrightLocal, “42% of local businesses don’t have their business information claimed”. I suspect that percentage is higher with real estate agents.
The very first thing you should do if you want to eventually rank on Google for anything is to “Google My Business”.
You can build SEO without it if you really know what you are doing. But if you really know what you are doing why wouldn’t you?
And now more than ever, “Google is about to revolutionize the way consumers find real estate agents”, according to Inman News.