Real Estate SEO – Ranking in Google Local Pack
Another goal for your Real Estate business should be to rank in Google local pack for your area. The Google local pack is the pack of businesses that show up separately from the normal search results when a business or industry is searched on Google. Ranking in the local pack is extremely valuable for real estate businesses. When you rank in the local pack your business is listed at the top of Google’s results page for searches for “real estate agent” that are made near your business. The local pack looks like this:
As you can see ranking in the local pack for your area will make your business highly visible to potential clients. Ranking in the local pack includes a link to your business’ website as well as showing customers your location on a map. On mobile, the local pack gives searchers the option to call your business directly from the results page. The desktop also offers searchers the option to get directions to your business, again directly from the search results page.
It is easy to see how valuable this position in google search is to any business in any field. Recently, the number of local pack spots has dwindled from seven available spots to only three spots. This has increased the competition greatly. There are three big components your business’ website needs to earn a spot in the local pack. Organic content, natural links, and reviews/citations are the three components you are going to want to have on your website.
Organic content will help your website climb rankings not only in Google search, but also in Google local packs. It is a big ranking factor that will help your website gain the Google algorithm’s trust. It shows that you are knowledgeable source of information on the subject of real estate. Your content must be unique to your website. If Google finds the content to be copied, your ranking will drop. As well as being unique it needs to be well written. It is imperative that titles of blog posts and pages contain the keyword that you wish to rank for. This will help google identify the geographic region your business serves. In addition to blog posts and informational pages relating to real estate, you will want to list your business’ physical address in the footer of each page. When you add the address make sure that it is consistent everywhere online. Every coma, period, and abbreviation must be the same no matter where you list your business’ address. This consistency helps google pinpoint where your business is and better place it in a local pack.
A byproduct of having quality organic content will be natural links. Natural links are the second major component of ranking in the local pack for your area. Natural links are formed when another website, that has authority, links back to your resource because they find your resource beneficial for their visitors to view. When other websites are willing to share your recourse with their visitors, it shows Google that your content is quality, and worthy of one of those top three local pack spots. If you try to cheat the system by getting unnatural links, your website will be punished by Google. Meaning you will loose any chance of gaining a local pack spot or even a front page ranking in search. So the key here is just to lean on your organic content to create your links naturally.
The final piece to the local pack puzzle are your business’ reviews and citations. Reviews and citations show google that your business satisfies its clients. It is important to make sure your business satisfies all of your clients needs and provides outstanding service. You must have positive reviews from past clients in order to get the ranking you desire. Citations are third party websites that direct clients in search of a realtor to your business. Citation websites include, Yelp, Yellow Pages, and other similar websites. You should register your business with as many citation sites as you can. Google will look at your business’ presence on these sites to determine how much authority your website has compared to your competitors. When registering your business with these sites, make sure that you list your business’ address the same exact way you listed it in the footer of your website; down to every coma, period and abbreviation.
If you desire for your website to rank higher in Google search, and rank in the local pack in your area, feel free to reach out to our SEO specialist at jacob@otlsm.com. He will be more than happy to respond and answer any questions you have about our processes and general SEO questions.