SEO for Real Estate: How to Increase Traffic + Attract Buyers and Sellers [Checklist]

Real estate SEO is the practice of optimizing a real estate agency’s website to increase traffic and earn the top spot in search engines. Learn nine expert strategies to tailor your website content, optimize listings, and build a strong digital presence to attract home buyers and sellers.

Here, you’ll find:

1. What is SEO for real estate?
2. Why use SEO for real estate?
3. The 4 types of real estate SEO
4. Top 9 real estate SEO strategies
5. Checklist for building a successful SEO campaign for realtors

As a real estate agent, appearing at the top of Google and Bing can improve visibility and attract more potential clients looking to buy and sell homes. One way to get to the first page of search engines is to use SEO for real estate.

There are several SEO strategies that apply to all websites, but we want to zone in on strategies that apply to your real estate business site.

This ultimate guide will reveal the concept of real estate SEO, the different types of SEO, and the top 9 strategies you should employ for your real estate website.

What is SEO for real estate?

SEO for real estate is a strategy that optimizes your website for improved visibility, traffic, and deals. This makes your real estate site more visible to prospective home buyers and sellers, attracting more clicks and possible deals.

It works by researching and adding specific keywords your target clients likely use (e.g., local-based search terms like “Austin, TX real estate agents”).

Why use SEO for real estate?

SEO offers numerous benefits for your real estate website. For instance, this digital marketing strategy can:

• Attract more clients
• Reach a wider audience for your listings
• Increase brand awareness about your real estate business
• Boost traffic to your website
• Grow your business and increase conversion rates
• Generate more revenue
• Appear at the top of Google without using paid Google ads

Nearly 100% of home buyers aged 24-57 use the internet and sites like Zillow to search for homes. Your real estate website and your home listings need to be where they’re searching.

4 types of real estate SEO

Before we hop into the top nine SEO strategies you need to add to your real estate marketing plan, let’s talk about the different types of SEO. Each of the strategies will fall under these various SEO facets.

On-page SEO

On-page SEO is the practice of optimizing your homepage and other web pages for search engines. Things like adding title tags, meta descriptions, using focus keywords for your content, etc.

Off-page SEO

Off-page SEO involves things off of your website, like getting backlinks to your site, increasing social media shares, and increasing branded searches. Both SEO forms are equally important to rank higher on search engine results pages (SERPs).

Technical SEO

Technical SEO focuses on the more technical side of optimizing your website for user experience. This could include creating your site map, indexing the right pages, and optimizing page speed. Conducting an SEO audit is the best way to discover potential technical issues.

Local SEO

Local SEO involves practices like creating a Google Business profile, increasing customer reviews, and creating locally-focused landing pages so your real estate business appears in local search queries.

Top 9 real estate SEO strategies

At HawkSEM, mastering SEO is fundamental to our operations. We adopt a performance-oriented, return-on-investment-focused strategy for SEO services tailored to Real Estate companies.

Ready to start boosting traffic to your real estate website? Here are the top 9 strategies we use that can improve your real estate listings’ overall SEO efforts.

1. Optimize your real estate website
2. Conduct keyword research
3. Analyze competitor websites
4. Create a Google Business profile
5. Publish quality content
6. Optimize your webpages
7. Improve website accessibility
8. Get backlinks to your site
9. Focus on local SEO

“Our process involves a deep dive into understanding the company’s essence, its intended audience, and the buyer’s profile, among other aspects,” explains Sam Yadegar, CEO of HawkSEM.

“We then craft a bespoke SEO strategy by hand, steering clear of automated software or tools to manage our programs.”

Diligently overseeing and tracking these strategies helps guarantee a favorable return on investment.

“Every SEO project under our guidance benefits from the expertise of a seasoned strategist, ensuring a personal and intelligent approach,” continues Yadegar.

“We steadfastly refrain from employing AI-generated content, as we believe in the irreplaceable value of human oversight and input in monitoring and advancing our campaigns.”

1. Optimize your real estate website

Start by optimizing your real estate website. Make sure everything runs smoothly, it’s accessible from a variety of devices, and there are no broken links.

A few steps to take here include:

• Checking for broken links on your website, whether they’re to external pages or internal pages that may need to be fixed.
• Ensuring your website has an SSL attached so you have HTTPS at the beginning of your URL, instead of just HTTP.
• Creating and submitting your sitemap to Google so it has a basic understanding of your site structure.
• Improving your website’s page load speed so your website visitors don’t have to wait for long load times.
• Implementing schema markup so search engines know what your website is all about.
• Ensuring mobile responsiveness so people can access your website from their desktops and their mobile devices.

Starting with a healthy, optimized real estate website will make the rest of the SEO tactics more impactful.

We also recommend taking time to optimize for the customer journey — use tools like Google Analytics and Search Console for insights.

“Monitoring every phase of the buyer’s journey is a critical component of successful SEO campaigns, particularly for Real Estate Firms,” says Yadegar. “At HawkSEM, we use ConversionIQ (CIQ), our proprietary software, to meticulously record each detail of the customer’s path.”

This meticulous tracking helps us identify the effective elements of a campaign and pinpoint areas for improvement. By doing so, we’re able to refine our strategies and achieve a stronger year-over-year return on investment.

“The insights gleaned from CIQ tracking extend beyond immediate campaign performance,” continues Yadegar. “They deepen our understanding of our target demographic, enabling us to leverage this valuable information across various marketing platforms, whether it’s SEO or social media. This cross-channel application of data is key to scaling our efforts while ensuring sustained profitability.”

2. Conduct keyword research

Have a target keyword in mind when you create new landing pages or blog content for your real estate website to improve your chances of ranking for said search term.

A keyword is a word or phrase that search engine users type in to search for something specific. Some examples of popular real estate keywords include:

• Home
• Realtor
• Houses for sale
• MLS listings
• Real estate agent
• Real estate agent in [city]

To find the best keywords for your real estate business, you’ll need to conduct keyword research. This process involves steps like:

• Using SEO tools like Ahrefs or Semrush to find keywords relevant to the real estate industry
• Looking at each keyword’s search volume to see how many potential people you could reach
• Paying attention to the keyword difficulty to know which keywords will be easier for your website to rank for
• Analyzing which keywords your competitors rank for (more on competitor analysis in strategy #3)
• Heading to the search engines to see what search queries auto populate when you start looking for real estate keywords

“Your core audience will always begin their search for real estate online — that’s why it’s important to be searchable and visible,” says David Bitton, co-founder and CMO of property management software DoorLoop. “Focusing on long-tail keywords relevant to property types and locations has proven effective in attracting more targeted traffic, and is the key to converting visitors into clients.”

Bitton continues, “Tapping into hyperlocal content — like neighborhood guides or local event coverage — can attract a very specific audience and signal to search engines your site’s relevance to those micro-localities.”

3. Analyze competitor websites

Make a list of your biggest competitors and start researching what keywords they rank for, how many different landing pages they’ve created, and the type of blog content they’re publishing.

This is a key step if you have a competitor or two who consistently appear at the top of search results you want to be in. What are they doing that seems to be so effective? Can you emulate these same tactics in a way that will work for your website?

4. Create a Google Business profile

All local businesses need to create a Google Business profile. Having a claimed profile on Google puts all of your contact information — website, location, phone number — directly in front of potential clients searching for a realtor.

Check out what this could look like below:

Create your own business listing, then fill it out with as much information as a potential client might need. This can be a great boost to your SEO.

Plus, clients can leave reviews on your Google Business page. Consider asking happy clients if they’d leave you a review to convince future prospects to work with you.

Pro tip: If you’re a part of the National Association of Realtors and are an official “Realtor,” then display this on your website and business listings.

5. Publish quality content

Publishing high-quality website content is another great SEO tip. Landing pages and blog posts are two types of content — but you could also publish guides, ebooks, or even video content as a way to establish your authority as a knowledgeable real estate agent.

Tony Mariotti, CEO of luxury real estate platform RubyHome says, “Create informative, engaging, and valuable content related to real estate in your target areas. Blog posts, neighborhood guides, and market reports can establish your authority and attract potential clients.”

Take several search terms you discovered in your keyword research and use them to create the best real estate blog content you can. Incorporating SEO keywords into your website content can help you rank more content, increasing your traffic and bringing in more potential clients.

“We implemented a robust content marketing strategy for our real estate company,” Mariotti shares. “By creating in-depth neighborhood guides, market reports, and blog posts, we saw a significant increase in website traffic and lead generation. Our approach positioned the company as an industry authority, resulting in more inquiries and successful transactions.”

6. Optimize your webpages

While algorithms are smart, your website needs to make it obvious what your site is about — this is where landing page optimization comes in.

There are several optimization techniques to use. A few include:

• Add page titles and meta descriptions
• Add internal linking between relevant landing pages and blog posts
• Include alt text with your images
• Incorporate strong calls-to-action (CTAs)
• Create short, easy-to-fill-out forms

James Smith, founder of travel company Travel-Lingual explains, “Meta tags are your friends. Create compelling meta titles and meta descriptions containing relevant keywords and encourage users to click through.”

Smith continues, “For example, if you’re optimizing a page for high-end beachfront properties, use a meta tag like ‘Exclusive beachfront homes — your gateway to coastal luxury.’ It’s all about finding the right balance between SEO and capturing your audience’s attention.”

Use a plugin like Yoast SEO to ensure each landing page and blog post is fully optimized for search and is ready to be published.

7. Improve website accessibility

Making sure your website is ADA compliant is another great way to improve your organic traffic, especially if some people in your target audience need a more accessible website experience.

This means you provide alternatives for those who may be blind, hard of hearing, or have other impairments so they can still use your website.

Some actions you can take include:

• Adding alt text to images so screen readers can describe them
• Implementing captions to videos for a similar use
• Keeping color-blindness in mind as you choose color schemes
• Creating intuitive navigation so your website is easy to use
• Making sure you have large text in a clear and easy-to-read font

8. Get backlinks to your site

Another strategy to get your website at the top of organic search rankings is by getting backlinks to your site. Backlinks are external links from other websites, proving to search engines your site is authoritative enough for other sites to want to link to it.

Link builder Stefan Đurđević shares a few actionable tips for generating backlinks for a real estate firm that he himself has used:

• Link insertion: Find blog content on other sites relevant to the content you have on your website. Then, ask the website owner if they can add a link to your website in their blog post. For example, if you found a blog post about “How Much Money to Save for a Down Payment,” and you have a down payment calculator on your site, a link to the calculator would be a valuable addition to the blog post.
• Guest post: Write content for other websites in exchange for a link to your website. You may be able to link to a blog post or landing page within the content, or at the very least, get a link to your website’s homepage in your author bio.
• Use sites like Connectively and HelpAB2BWriter: Writers and journalists use sites like these to get high-quality quotes for their articles. See if you find any queries that you have expert advice for. Many times, these writers and journalists can provide a link back to your website in exchange for the quote.

Link building and getting your website linked in business directories can build up your site’s authority. The number of backlinks your website has can be a major ranking factor on search engines like Google.

9. Focus on local SEO

Don’t sleep on using local SEO to attract local buyers and sellers and people looking to relocate. This, of course, includes your Google Business profile, but that’s not the only tactic.

John Pennypacker, VP of Sales & Marketing at AI company Deep Cognition, shares, “Ensure your website has a strong and well-optimized presence on local search platforms by creating pages on popular local directories, such as Google My Business, Yelp, and Bing Places for Business.”

Pennypacker continues, “Additionally, writing a blog with content related to local events or news stories can boost visibility and improve online reputation.”

A few additional local SEO tactics include:

• Building landing pages catered to each location you service
• Creating a Google Business profile for each location
• Asking customers to leave reviews on all of your business listings
• Claiming citations on other business directories (Yelp, Facebook, and Bing Places for Business)

Checklist for building a successful SEO campaign for realtors

Don’t leave any of these key SEO tactics behind. Hang onto this checklist so you can make sure you’ve ticked each strategy off the list.

Optimize your real estate website

Conduct keyword research

Analyze competitor websites

Create a Google Business profile

Publish quality content

Optimize your webpages

Improve website accessibility

Get backlinks to your site

Focus on local SEO

The takeaway

Tactics like local SEO, an optimized website, and high-quality content are essential strategies for improving your real estate website’s search engine rankings. And while you can take care of all of these strategies yourself, working with an SEO expert can help expedite the process.

At HawkSEM, we offer a number of SEO services — including local SEO — to help your real estate business website shine and increase its ranking.

Get in touch with our team to learn more about how we can help.