Patience and the Art of SEO

Successful real estate firms, both large and small, understand the importance of having a website that offers users well-written, useful content, and a straightforward navigation. Most also know that optimizing their websites for search engines is a critical component of their sites' ability to attract new leads.

One of the more frustrating aspects of search engine optimization (SEO) is the fact that it can take several months for your efforts to pay off. It can cost thousands of dollars for professional SEO services, so it's hard not to get nervous when results are slow to come.

Unfortunately, most experts in the field know that it can take upwards of six months for a site to rank for some of its key terms.

So, what can you do to speed up your rankings? By practicing good SEO techniques such as having keyword-rich meta titles, unique content, and user-friendly architecture that keeps visitors on your site. It's also important to have reputable websites pointing to your site, ideally with optimized anchor text. And of course, you need time.

Google aims to provide users with their desired search results, so in order to be successful, they have to sift out spam sites that offer nothing of value to visitors. This is one of the reasons that the age of a site can have a major impact on its rankings in the search engine results page (or SERP). Spam sites tend to pop up suddenly, and not last very long. Google wants to make sure that your site is legit.

Rather than checking the SERPs every day, focus your energies on blogging, commenting on other people's blog posts, and writing pieces for select article syndication sites. This will help you create a diverse back link portfolio, which will in turn increase your online authority.

On your site, work on improving lead conversion, as this is really what you should be thinking about more than getting to the number one position of Google (which in many cases is not a realistic goal). Remember that ranking high on the SERPs and getting many hits on your site will do no good if users aren't compelled to contact you about your services, so make sure that you spend a lot of time on improving user experience on your site, rather than worrying about your rankings.

In addition to attracting more potential clients, creating your real estate website for the users' benefit will also pay off in the search engines. Google and its competitors tend to reward quality sites in the long run, so if you put your visitors first, you'll get results in the search engines as well.

You also need to keep in mind that SEO is an ongoing endeavor. Search engines change their algorithms, and new ones like Bing come online every now and then as well. It's impossible to know exactly what they're looking for, except that they want sites with relevant content and established online authority. SEO is also not permanent; it requires maintenance to stay competitive.

To stay in Google's good graces, you'll want to continue educating yourself on the latest SEO techniques and technologies. Tweak your site regularly using data from Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools, and above all, be patient. If your site is informative, well designed, features unique content, and has quality external back links, you should be well on your way to creating a website that both clients and search engine spiders want to visit.