Real Estate Local SEO

[bronxpad]

My site hovers on page 2 of google for the key search phrase. I have a blog that gets updated often, I have genuine links coming in, I promote on all social media channels, I do email campaigns, I have a site map, I have my local address on what I believe are the most important sites like Yelp, Manta, Google Local etc.

All this and my site is still on page 2 while other sites with less of everything are on page 1.

What is missing?

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Joel,

Without actually being able to see your specific business, the cause of your lack of first page rankings is hard to judge. Some things a Local SEO would look at in reviewing your situation might include:

• Your proximity to the centroid of business (are you located within the main cluster of businesses on Google Maps for your key search phrase or are you far away from the cluster)

• Potential existence of duplicates. This comes up frequently in industries like real estate, law and the medical field because multi-partner practices took Google up on their guidelines that stated you could have 1 Place Page for the main practice and a unique Place Page for each partner, as well. This has all gone to heck now, and no one I know is recommending doing this anymore because of Google's tendency to merge similar listings, sapping rankings, and also, their official refusal to remove duplicates. See:

http://localsearchforum.catalystemarketing.com/hot-topics-catalyst-blog-archived/8-google-places-duplicates-�-have-doctor-dentist.html

and

http://localsearchforum.catalystemarketing.com/local-search-general-discussions/861-dr-dupes-google-local-user-edits.html

So, that may be an issue affecting your ability to rank.

• The consistency of your citations across the web. If you work for a mutli-partner firm, there is a chance their may be mixed up details out there about you or your partners. Lack of consistency can definitely hamper rankings.

• Your domain age. If other firms are older than yours (web-wise) they may have a slight-to-moderate edge over you, even though you are making greater efforts than they are. Also, real estate is one of the toughest verticals, particularly if you are in a populous area (a big city). It can be tough for newer competitors to break into established SERPs that already have a ton of strong businesses in them.

Those are a few things to consider. It sounds like you are doing a lot of things right, Joel. I recommend you check out 51 Blocks' local competitive analysis tool to be certain you are actually doing more than your competitors appear to be doing:

http://www.51blocks.com/online-marketing-tools/free-local-analysis/

It's free and a very cool tool.

This is as far as I can go without seeing your actual business in action. I hope these ideas are good food for thought.

[GoodAtMarketing]

Local as in city or state, earn links from the areas you want to rank in.

[bronxpad]

Thank you, when you mean local IP do you mean from the USA or from the State that I am in. Reason I ask is most people i know don't host in the state.

[ZephSnapp]

Hi Joel,

If you are looking for local citations, Dana DiTomaso just did a webinar on this form of link building yesterday.  I don't think the video is up yet, but keep your eye out for it.  We found it to be very helpful.

[GoodAtMarketing]

Hi Joel,

Have you considered earning local links?

If you're trying to rank for something in Google places all you need is a ton of relevant citations, from good directories.

If you're  trying to rank for local organic results you need local organic links. You can look up local sites (that have local IP's and get them to link to you. You can also do a charity in your office and invite other Companies to join. After the event, write a press release about it. Then ask these companies if they want to leave a quote about the event (this works great). Lastly syndicate the PR to your site and ask them to share it with their audiences, or link to it from their site.

This is just one example of gaining links. Good luck.

Hope this helps.