Five different phone conversations, three emails from friends, an email from an SEO firm and a couple quick glances at a few different link portfolios confirm that organic rankings and search engine optimization are this quarter’s “magic bullet” for the new home industry.
More than a few builders have been working on organic rankings for months, even years, but home builder interest in improving organic rankings has never been as high as it is now. This new concentration on organic rankings is well deserved too; a high traffic website will do wonders for the bottom line and buying traffic from search engines is getting more and more expensive.
If you’re looking to get the ball rolling and improve your website’s organic rankings, here are some things to ask/consider/look-out for when hiring a home builder SEO company or in-house expert.
Real Estate & New Home SEO: Considerations
SEO isn’t Cheap and for good reason. Organic rankings for terms related to new homes and real estate are usually extremely competitive. If a company says they can increase your rankings in a competitive market for a few hundred dollars/month, they’re misinformed. If you’re in a competitive market, a couple thousand dollars per month is a low-end budget, but a good company will show you a good return on your investment. Organic traffic can easily save a company thousands of dollars each week (if the traffic was otherwise paid for).
Organic rankings don’t come quick. As a general rule, increasing rankings properly takes several months; getting high rankings for extremely competitive words can take years. Some tactics take several months to implement and mature, so plan on sticking with SEO for life and run from companies that promise drastic improvements overnight.
Rankings for high traffic terms aren’t everything. As a home builder interested in SEO, you’ll probably want to rank high for competitive terms like new homes, home builders or new homes in State, home builders in City. These are good long-term goals, but your top priority should be targeted traffic. Every experienced SEO knows that competitive terms are typically a small percentage of overall traffic; they convert less too. Hire a company that talks about the value of long-tail searches.
All terms aren’t created equal. Some keywords get tons of daily searches and others get none. Just because a word sounds popular doesn’t mean that it is. Ask for traffic estimates for every keyword you plan to target; viewing pay per click estimates for each word would be nice too. Otherwise, you could end up ranking #1 for a bunch of no-traffic, no-value words.
SEO tactics could kill your business. Some search engine optimization tactics used by a few bad apples in the industry can, as a best case scenario, get your website penalized by Google, Yahoo!, Bing and others, and as a worst case scenario, the tactics can ruin your brand. Ask the firm you’re considering what exactly they do to increase your rankings and inquire about any risks. Both good and bad SEO companies take risks, but the good ones will let you decide if the risk is worth it.
From Google’s Webmaster Guidelines – “A good rule of thumb is whether you’d feel comfortable explaining what you’ve done to a website that competes with you.”
Industry experts aren’t necessarily your best bet. It would be wise to hire a company that has experience in the real estate and new home arena, but make sure they’re well versed in more than a few industries. I know some will disagree, but an expert with only real estate experience may have “blinders” on causing you to miss out on some pretty slick and effective techniques being used in different industries.
Most quality SEO firms can turn your website into a profit machine, but as with any industry, there are companies looking to profit off you, without providing value in return. Be leery of things that seem too good to be true.
In competitive industries it would be silly to think that increasing organic rankings could be quick, easy or cheap, because if they were, everyone would be doing it. As more people hire SEOs, increasing organic rankings automatically becomes more expensive and difficult, which is why you should start working on your campaign today.
See Also:
Google Webmaster Guidelines
What’s SEO? – www.Google.com
I am a Managing Partner, Internet Marketer and Blogger at New Homes Section. Follow me on 
All great advice. There is no magic bullet (at least whitehat) to ranking well. Most people don’t realize that real SEO is a full-time job.
Very interesting post indeed
The reality is that egostistical real estate companies spend way over budget on SEO to get on the first page or top 3 of there key search terms such as Marbella property for example. When what they spend on SEO they could run a complete adword campaign reaching more customers and spending a lot let money
SEO certainly doesn’t come cheap with Real Estate websites.
.-= Geoff@UK Search Marketing´s last blog ..700+ Towns/Cities Negative Keywords for PPC =-.
SEO is a long term project that never ceases. It takes steady work but is well worth it in the end. It is a much better business strategy to invest time and money into building organic search results than to use PPC. With PPC each dollar is gone instantly, but with SEO each dollar can last for months or even years.
.-= Carmen Brodeur´s last blog ..Foreclosures at Desert Mountain Are Going Away =-.
If you find an SEO who doesn’t wander off in the first week of the project, you’ve already won the battle. I am lucky to have found Spurr Marketing when I did.
.-= Grant Hammond @ Nashville Realtors´s last blog ..April 2010 Nashville Real Estate Market Analysis =-.
Isn’t that the truth! Thanks for stopping by Grant.
I have been doing SEO for years for my real estate site. It does take time, money, and patience, but it is worth it. Organic rankings are also more clicked on than PPC. I use WestBridge Solutions and they have been great.
.-= Team Jodi´s last blog ..205 Ironwoods Drive, Chapel Hill, NC 27516 =-.
I couldn’t agree more Jodi. We explain to our clients that NewHomesSection.com does not do PPC because exactly that. Organic results are more qualified. Thanks for stopping by!
SEO is key for home builders but you must be patient!
SEO really helps a certain business getting higher productivity and faster solution. I really like the ideas of the blog as it conveys good points to readers and the like. Keep it up!
I am just getting started in internet marketing so cant afford to pay an SEO company yet. I have learned a lot from this post however hopefully in time I can apply your advice.
Good and timely information!! Getting good internet exposure is key to leads. Be weary of the phone calls from internet marketing people claiming they can get you on the first page of Google. What key word/s are they going to use. I’ll bet its not one people are searching for.
Get a good SEO, they are great…….
SEO is a great investment because if its done well then you should have long lasting high search rankings for years to come. I think the key for people wanting to achieve good results is to always focus on giving Google what it wants. You can’t “trick” the system, at least not if you are after long term results. Thanks for the article, I’m sure a lot of other people would have found it useful as well.
SEO does take some time, but it is definitely worth it. I agree that both PPC and SEO are useful to create a well-rounded online marketing strategy.
Very good information, I have a website which I SEO myself just by reading information on internet and blogs, and I think is well worth it to spend some time getting as much info as you can get from sites like this one.