Experiments & Expressions

Getting started with search engine optimization

Many SEO firms that I’ve dealt with (yes, the same ones that call at 2:00pm on Friday afternoon!) seem to make search engine optimization or high search engine ranking an obscure lofty goal that only they can achieve. Granted, it can be very time consuming, but it’s still very doable. Below I outline some strategic tips to optimize your real estate website that will hopefully get you up to the first page or even the first spot.

Magic SEO Ingredients

The magic ingredient to top search engine placement is… Hard work. Other key ingredients to get you there are:

• Good content
• Good inbound links

Yep, that’s it. There’s no special tricks that you need to use or special programs that you need to buy. If you continue on, you’ll see why good companies charge a pretty penny for their services. Let’s start with some definitions…

What’s Good Content?

If you’re talking about heaven and hell, “good” has to be absolute. When talking about search engines, good is very relative. What is it relative to? Well, it seems to be just about everything. The quality of your content is ranked based on a whole bunch of factors by Google and other major search engines. The goodness of your site and content are valued based on both on and off page factors. However, not to fear. Here it is in a nutshell:

Good content is unique, authoritative, frequent, and relevant.

Make it unique

Unique means don’t go pirating text verbatim from other websites. Let your own creative juices flow. If you don’t have any, at least use your own words, paraphrase and cite the site. Copying content not only infringes on others’ copyrights, but it also devalues your copied content and your site. You may see short term gains, but it’s not worth it because you’ll lose out over the long haul.

Make it authoritative

Who knows your market better than you do? Hopefully, no one. But even if you’re not at the top of the game (yet), be sure you let people know that you’re on your way up. Show off your knowledge of your market in a way that is beneficial to your readers. If you have the only information and the best information for your market, your readers will appreciate you and the search engines will move you up.

I should explain this one a little more. Having authoritative content doesn’t automatically move you up. Better ranking is a result of more voluntary inbound links, more readers as determined by feed and search engine “spyware,” and frequently updated content (see next point).

Make Frequent Additions

Search engines like sites with frequently updated content. This doesn’t mean just changing a title or adding a picture. Change means adding new pages or new articles as often as you can. These pages will let search engines robots know that your site is alive and growing. They will then visit you more often.

I’ve found that Google robots will visit daily if I make daily changes. If I slow down, they slow down. This has played a role in search engine placement as well. The more frequent the changes, the higher the site moves in placement for certain keywords. Try it with your site and share your results!

Make it relevant

Keep your content relevant to the theme of your website. If your site is about Idaho real estate, be sure your article ties in to Idaho real estate. For example, a properly themed article could discuss market conditions, home mortgages, or buyer tips.

What’s a Good Inbound Link

Think of it this way, links are like business references. Good businesses refer good businesses. So, you want good websites linking to you (if you’re a good business, that is!). Here’s the nutshell again:

Good inbound links are natural and abundant.

Make it natural

You can’t really force nature, can you? Natural links are links that occur naturally through voluntary linking through peers or visitors who think your site is worthy of mentioning. Because it’s voluntary you’ll see varying anchor text, varying page placement, and hopefully written in context (like within a paragraph rather than a link at the bottom of a page). It’ll be natural.

Change up your links

Well sometimes you have to encourage people to link to your site. In doing so you may provide them with some HTML code with your keyword-laden anchor text with a great description that properly contextualizes your link. Unfortunately, if everyone uses that same link, search engines may recognize this as link spam and eventually devalue the link. Providing link options may be more effective.

Avoid Bad Sites

Link farms, free-for-alls, and the like are typically worthless when it comes to building your link strategy. They’re considered “bad neighborhoods.” So don’t be associated with them. Don’t link to them. And don’t link from them.

Make it plentiful

This is yet more hard work that will pay off in the long run. The more websites that point to you, the better. Contact websites that have similar themes to yours and ask them to link to you. In most cases you have to give them something in return. So start a reciprocal link page or directory.

Keep in mind, however, that links from link directories or reciprocal links aren’t as rank-powerful as one-way links coming from another well-themed site.

Anything else?

Of course! There’s always more complicated and more technical details of search engine optimization and ranking. But this article is not about making you an expert on SEO. It’s about giving you an adequate overview of how to place high in search engines. By now you can at least make a better decision of whether you will do it yourself or hire it out.