I have a real estate site. I want to beat Zillo and Trulia for local real estate searches. Any suggestions and also how do I get white hat backlinks( not just write great content stuff but good alternative ideas).

[kpstreams]

I need some tips on outranking giants in the real estate field for local search keywords. I need sources of back link sources (white hat) and some ideas to beat them in my backyard with my Real estate site. I have a great idx plugin and am ranking first page for address searches. I want to beat them for local long tail. Any ideas?

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Kelly,

I agree with Thomas that Local SEO, Content Development and Social Media activity, surrounding your local geography, are the best tools to consider for achieving your goals of increasing your visibility for local long tail traffic. Thomas has made some good suggestions here, and I will add something more specific.

I have seen a few sites, some of them not very beautifully designed, that offer 'what's it like to live here' user generated content. I've had to look at this when writing about areas in which I don't live. You have an advantage here in writing about your own home town, it would seem. What if you wrote a good article about each of the neighborhoods in your local city/cities and then invited users to expand on the article with their take on what it's like to live there? There could be subtopics, too, like what are the schools like here, what are the restaurants like here, what are the shops like here, what's the government like here, parks, doctors, etc. Here's an example:

http://www.city-data.com/forum/san-bernardino-riverside-counties/839376-whats-like-live-palm-springs.html

That is more in the form of a forum, which you might consider, or you might do yours more like blog posts and then treat the user entries somewhat like reviews, marking them up with Schema.

Don't know if this is the perfect fit for the things you want to rank for, but it is a UGC feature I've noticed that I think is really cool. If your site could become THE powerhouse site offering this type of content in your city, that could be pretty powerful. Hope this helps!

[BlueprintMarketing]

Share high quality content both text, image and video if you use video I would incorporate Wistia not YouTube as YouTube distracts people and does not help get them to your website and have them call you or whatever your goal is. For instance you can use turnstile a method of collecting e-mail addresses prior to watching the video or after it's your choice. The reason for Wistia is it is the only business video hosting company that creates their own site maps something crucial to getting ranked. In addition if you set up your videos correctly and somebody shares them you can get links that way.

Here is a fantastic short video on the differences between youtube and this platform by distilled

http://wistia.com/learning/advanced-seo-with-distilled

you should create almost constantly on social media that is targeted to real estate in your town to earn links.

To beat the companies you are talking about you would need to the local physically and utilize Google + along with schema for a local business.

Unfortunately I don't think it is possible using a plug-in and would strongly recommend you seek out a professional search engine optimization firm.

Distilled.net

Seer interactive

Portent

SEOBOT

Evolvingseo.com

Internet marketing ninjas

if you want to go out on your own with this I can give you some information I hope will help you.

Have you thought of trying to add your site and listings to the more popular real estate sites?

It's just an idea however there is a chance you can beat them because of their proximity and also if I am going to purchase a home I want to speak to a realtor in that town I think having a presence & even word of mouth that is going to be a better fit as well.

Use the getlisted.org site is owned by Moz and is a great resource.

Local WordPress plug-ins

This may be the best one http://yoast.com/wordpress/local-seo/

You will want to utilize Schema you can create your own local address and products using

http://schema-creator.org/wordpress.php

http://wordpress.org/plugins/schema-creator/screenshots/

http://wordpress.org/plugins/all-in-one-schemaorg-rich-snippets/screenshots/

http://www.mvestormedia.com/wordpress-local-seo-yoast-part-1-single/

http://wordpress.org/plugins/dh-local-seo/

http://www9.localvox.com/5LocalSEOGuide_LandingPage.html

&

http://www.searchenginepeople.com/blog/howto-add-schema-wordpress.html

I hope this helps,

Thomas