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If you have read any of my previous Active Rain post, you are ready know I’m a bit of a movie buff. One of the Carroll family all-time cult favorites is the movie “What About Bob” starring Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfuss. In the comedy, Murray plays Bob Wiley, a multi-phobic psychiatric patient who becomes “OCD” over Dreyfuss’s character Dr. Leo Marvin who is an egotistical maniac psychiatrist. Take heart, I will not attempt Dr. Marvin’s “SEO” death therapy. I’ll stick with the 10 baby steps to better search engine optimization. :>)

Dr. Leo Marvin’s “Baby Steps” to Better SEO

The first baby step to better SEO is offering unique, keyword-rich content. It is a critical component to helping you obtain stronger search results and acquiring that much sought after traffic. I suggest you examine your site’s keyword density and also evaluate your relational keywords. Logical keywords included in any real estate website should be:

  • listings
  • broker
  • property
  • buyers
  • sellers
  • homes
  • real estate agents
  • real estate market
  • mortgages
  • lending
  • contracts
  • offer to purchase

Well, you get the picture. If you don’t, take a test-drive on Quintura.com for a list of related keywords for your market. Now you’re practicing a discipline I use everyday. As a Dakno copy writer, I determine the latent semantic indexed (LSI) keywords for my clients when writing unique keyword-rich content for their websites and blogs. Also be sure to include other typical related keywords for your “target” market.

Other important tools I use for copy writing include Word Tracker and Google Adwords.

Other Baby Steps to Better Search Results

2. Avoid selecting too many geo-targeted keywords for your site. Avoid the temptation to target a “whole slew of geographic or demographic search terms” as it will dilute the “central theme” of your site or blog not only in the eyes of the search engines but it may well confound your site visitors as well. Now you understand why the saying “Content is King” is said over and over again.

3. An old crusty domain name. If you have one of those late 1990’s domain names you’re in luck! A superior, aged domain name is another key element in the SEO game. Also remember the domain rules…make it short, memorable and free of ambiguity.

4. A website free of coding errors. This means your website should comply with WC3 standards. If your web developer doesn’t understand this element…run find another vendor. A website coded to WC3 compliance will aid you when Googlebot comes a calling to index or spider your website. If your website incorporates the use of “frames” when developed, your website might as well be invisible to the Googles and Yahoos of the web world.

5. A user-friendly website backdoor editor for title tag edits. Making easy edits to your website is a must. If the only way you can rewrite your title tags or make an edit to your webpage content is to “ask your webmaster” to do it for you, that is totally unacceptable with today’s technology. Having the ability to edit/update your title tags and meta descriptions is a must (plus your web content). Unfortunately, most real estate agent websites have the same title tag for every page of their site. That’s a missed opportunity! Just in case you’re not sure what I’m talking about, simply look in the “blue bar” of your Internet browser. If the same keyword phrase is being used for every page on your website, you’re missing a golden opportunity for better search results.

Ask yourself this question, “does every page of my website contain the same content?” Probably not, so why not change these title tags to identify the content to work better for you. If your goal is to only optimize for a particular keyword search term like “Duck real estate“, congratulations, you could achieve some reasonable search results and traffic give the lower search results.

6. A website developed to allow you to include (H3) sub headlines. Use of headline 3 tags for increased searchability (I think I made up a word) is a must. Plus, sub headlines help site visitors as well. Sub headlines allow you to “tease each paragraph” by letting the reader know what information lies beyond. Remember, offering search engines and site guest a “hierarchy of information” is the highest and best way to connect with these entities.

7. Superior back links from real estate related authority websites is a must. One-way backlinks from sites like Zillow, Trulia, Inman, Squidoo, Topix, Outside.In, Active Rain, Real Town Blog and many other industry related authority websites is an absolute must!

8. Be the neighborhood expert - offer a blog! A blog site enhances your position as the local area expert and also helps support your website with better SEO.

9. Are you offering “high-value” resources and tools? Providing your website guest user-friendly property search tools, Google maps (Street View), neighborhood pages and buyer and seller articles to keep your visitors coming back to your site time and again? How does this relate to better SEO? Websites that experience higher traffic counts generally rank better in the search engines. In the eyes of Google, does your website increase the value of the WWW? If the answer is yes, search engines typically reward your website for its contribution to the Internet.

10. Measure your site’s performance - The last baby step for better SEO recommended by Dr. Leo Marvin is to always measure your site’s traffic with an analytics stats package. I say go with the free  Google analaytics package. Another resourceful tool you can use is the Crazy Egg heat map. with Crazy Egg, you can see which liks work and which ones need to be changed for better connectivity with your site guest. Don’t forget to review the really cool ways to review your site stats with Woopra too. All of these tools help you manage your site more effectively.

So there you have it. Using these tips by Dr. Marvin will help your website baby step its way to better SEO. Be sure to leave your comments of other tools and strategies you use to enhance your site’s search engine results.

Until next time,

Bobby

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