Real Estate SEO Experts: A Case Study of the Best Website Providers

It’s my new 36 City Challenge!

I’ve picked 36 American and Canadian Cities and am looking to see which real estate website providers are experts at SEO and have managed to get into the top ten in the search results.

The Competition Rules

I am going to keep it simple. I am going to search for two highly competitive keywords in each city. Of the top ten results, I will exclude the portals (Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com, etc.) and national brokerage brands (Coldwell Banker, REMax, KW, etc.). Instead, I am focusing on local agents and brokerages (e.g. Realty Austin, Great Colorado Homes, Toronto Realty Boutique, etc.).

The keyword I am using for each city is “homes for sale in [city]”, “realtor in [city]”. I chose these keywords based on my own keyword research in SEMRush showing that permutations of these are generally some of the most searched keywords.

And then here is an example that qualifies for my list.

Here’s an example winner (9th on the list). Remax at #7 is a national brand, and Homes.com at #8 is a portal. But Casas By Owner is a flat fee real estate company with a Real Geeks website on the first page of a search term that gets approximately 2400 searches every month!

SEO Nerds

I’m sure plenty of SEO folks saying “Ackchyually,….” right now. This is not a fool proof way of testing SEO results. I’ve narrowed it down to a few major cities. SEO results are changing all the time. I am not looking at results in the local map which can be important. My own search history may influence the results I see (though this is defitely the first time I have ever searched “Homes for sale in Edmonton”.

The point is, these are website providers whose pages are ranking one way or another for some competitive keywords. It’s not scientific. But I think it is conclusive that these are platforms and options that can work for you if SEO, content marketing, and organic lead generation is an important focus for your real estate business.

And I’ve only looked at two keywords. That doesn’t include the long tail keywords or other keywords these sites are likely ranking well for. If they can rank for keywords like these, you better believe they are ranking for 1000s of quality keywords in their market.

So let’s look at the results!

Keywords: “Homes for sale in [city]”

List of Cities

New York City, Toronto, Los Angeles, Chicago, Montreal, Houston, Phoenix, Philadelphia, San Antonio, San Diego, Dallas, Vancouver, San Jose, Austin, Calgary, Jacksonville, San Francisco, Columbus, Indianapolis, Fort Worth, Charlotte, Seattle, Denver, El Paso, Washington DC, Boston, Detroit, Edmonton, Nashville, Memphis, Portland, Ottawa, Oklahoma City, Las Vegas, Louisville, Baltimore

O Canada!

First, as an American, I had no idea how huge Toronto is. It’s the fourth largest city in North America, ahead of Chicago! I feel like I did when I discovered Lagos, Nigeria, a city I had never heard of, has a population equal to New York City. I guess I am just a backward, unworldly Texan.

It’s interesting how many Canadian agents and brokerages are doing well in their search results versus those in America. Cities of comparable size in the US-of-A seldom had local agents and brokerages ranking ahead of the portals and national brands. But not so in the Canadian cities, where local brokerages appear to have a much easier time ranking in the top 10 for their local markets.

Why would that be? Probably because of the keywords I chose. “Realtor” features numerous www.realtor.com results. Makes one wonder if it was so smart to hand that URL off to Move.Inc.

Canadians are also fiercely loyal to their native web developer, Real Estate Webmasters, who appears to have the market cornered in the Great White North.

Not so Suite?

If you are a team or brokerage making the decision about bringing on a platform, or what I like to call a “complete suite”, there are really two categories: those who focus on SEO as a strength versus those who focus on PPC campaigns and a high energy CRM to generate leads. In the latter category, you will find no BoomTown! or Kunversion websites ranking, and Curaytor and CINC make only a single appearance each on this list.

In the former category is Real Estate Webmasters, Sierra Interactive, and Real Geeks. These are not as lauded for their backend, but as websites, they are clearly SEO friendly.

WordPress!

A point of clarification. WordPress is not a website developer, but a platform. Many website developers use WordPress as the CMS from which they build your website. For example, Boston Pads listed above builds the website for Jacob Realty on a WordPress platform. If I am able to identify the developer, I mention their name here. Otherwise, I just note that it is a site built on WordPress.

WordPress is a website you can build yourself, or have a developer build for you. Or both – do some yourself and bring on a designer or developer for certain parts. It is a highly customizable website platform that can clearly hold its own weight in the SEO for agents.

Conclusion

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There are four names who make a good showing here. Real Estate Webmasters is everywhere, but they are one of the most expensive options out there.

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Sierra Interactive makes a good showing as well, and isn’t as costly as Real Estate Webmasters.

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For the most bang for the buck, there are several Real Geeks websites ranking well, one of the more inexpensive options. It is impressive how well some of their websites rank considering the cost is often within the means of even single agents. They are clearly real estate SEO experts.

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And lastly, I am a huge fan of WordPress, a solid option both for new agents on a budget and big enterprises that can be whatever you want it to be.

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These website providers can rank for SEO, but the real work comes from the agents and brokers promoting their site, generating content that can rank, and more. Getting an SEO friendly website provider is just the beginning of the journey to front page Google rankings.