Blogging and the Internet go way back – so far back, in fact, that the first official blog was recorded only a year after the Internet went public in 1993, though the term “weblog” wasn’t used until 1997. 

Fast-forward to today, millions of people, companies, and brands have an online presence in the form of a blog. Blogging helps you attract leads, keep your audience engaged, stay top of mind, and tell your story as each post continues to drive traffic over time. Because of the introduction of SEO for real estate and how searching online has changed over the years, blogging best practices have also shifted. 

The Basics: Blogging for Real Estate

With so many great benefits, you might be wondering what you should put on your blog so it can be an effective channel in your content marketing strategy for real estate. The answer largely depends on who you are as a real estate agent or company. Just as your clients and the areas you service are unique to you, what you write for your blog should also be unique.

That being said, there are a few real estate SEO best practices that should be applied across the board to best optimize your blogs, like doing keyword research beforehand, writing a well optimized, branded, and relevant title tag and meta description, and adding alt text to images. 

Keep reading to learn more about how to blog, what topics to cover, and how to extend a blog’s lifecycle. 

7 Tips to Have the Best Real Estate Blog 

  1. Share your expertise about an area. With the major shift toward hyperlocal content, blogs are the perfect channel to detail favorite restaurants, hidden gems, popular attractions, what the schools are like, and more, so that buyers looking to move to an area know what it’s really like to live there, especially if they can’t visit before they buy or they’re buying sight unseen. Including posts on the county, city, town, and even neighborhood level gives readers the insight they need to determine if the area is right for them. 
  2. Highlight your company’s personality. When blogging first became popular on the Internet, it was mostly seen as an online diary where people could share more about themselves and share their thoughts about a certain topic. In a way, this is still true for real estate blogging. Blogs are a less formal way of communicating with your audience and give you the opportunity to have a little fun with the topics you share. Consider writing a blog showing a team-building adventure you had or featuring an agent spotlight, detailing what they do to help buyers and sellers, but also what they like to do in their free time. Demonstrating a balance between being knowledgeable and being relatable can increase trust between you and your audience. 
  3. Be a resource for buyers and sellers. Blogs are a great way to give answers to common buyer and seller questions. Buyers are looking for information about a market, area knowledge, and the home buying process, while sellers are looking for agents to help them sell their homes and anything they can do themselves to increase their chances of their home selling fast and for the best price. Use your blog to give your audience the resources they need to get started, but remember to place a call to action in your blog to encourage them to reach out (more on CTAs later). You can also serve as a resource for people who aren’t necessarily buyers or sellers and stay top of mind well before and after someone becomes a lead and closes on their home by blogging about events happening in your area. In this way, blogging is a great way to effectively nurture your sphere of influence and feed content into other channels, like email newsletters and social media posts.
  4. Create community connections. Blogging about local businesses helps establish you as the go-to resource for anything and everything about your area. Highlight local businesses for Small Business Saturday or create a list of your team’s favorite restaurants with links to their website. Doing so builds community connections and also strong authority for your own website. Also, the local businesses you blog about might give you a shout-out, a recommendation on social media, or recommend you with word-of-mouth referrals. When other businesses link back to your website, it’s called backlinking and it’s one of the most effective SEO tactics.
  5. Include a call to action. Becoming a resource and sharing information is great, but you also want to encourage leads to reach out if they have questions. Adding CTAs in the introduction or end of a blog post points readers toward contacting you with questions, strengthening your relationship with them. 
  6. Set a schedule.  The importance of a content calendar cannot be understated. With a content calendar, you can easily keep track of topics you want to blog about, highlight important events, and be able to keep your blog active all year long. It’s also important to determine your blogging frequency — some companies prefer to blog once or more a week, while others prefer once or twice a month. What matters most is being able to stick to your schedule and continue to drive traffic to your website, while starting to earn trust and drive return visitors to your website.
  7. Share on relevant social media channels. If you have a blog, linking the blog posts on your social media channels will help drive traffic to the posts and get them in front of people who might not usually find your website. Plus, sharing on social media is a great way to extend your blog’s life cycle and boost SEO, especially if you only post a blog a couple of times a month. 

Blogging can be one of the best assets for your business. Taking the time to write a few blogs each month will drive traffic to your website right away and potentially for years to come, working for you while you’re busy with showings and clients. One key thing to note is to be sure take a look at your website analytics from time to time (or partner with someone who can help!) and make sure you’re keeping your audience’s interests in mind when you choose what to write about and where to share your blog content.

Want more information about leveraging blogging to improve real estate SEO and establish yourself as a local expert? Contact us today for specific recommendations to help you stand out and sell more homes.