Running a real estate business means you’re managing property listings, client showings, and real estate market updates. The last thing you want to worry about is whether potential home buyers or sellers can find your real estate website, and performing an SEO audit for real estate agents ensures you’re discoverable on search engines.
If competitors are appearing when people search for “real estate agents near me” or “homes for sale in [city]” and you’re not, you’re missing out on qualified leads actively looking for real estate services.
SEO requires multiple moving parts to work together, but when executed correctly, it improves your search engine rankings and helps you attract more clients. If you’re not sure where to start, follow this audit to get your real estate website ranking for organic search.
What Is SEO for Real Estate Agents?
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of making your real estate website more visible when people search for property listings, real estate agents, or real estate services on search engines.
When potential clients search for homes, investment properties, or guidance from real estate professionals, your real estate website should appear as the answer.
When search engines recognize that your site provides valuable, relevant content, it’s more likely to appear in search engine results, improving your website’s authority and organic traffic.
The benefits of SEO for real estate include:
- Consistent lead generation: Home buyers and sellers find your services when actively searching.
- Builds credibility: Higher website authority signals trustworthiness to potential clients.
- 24/7 visibility: Your real estate website works for you around the clock.
Real estate SEO services offer a high ROI. Studies show SEO can drive over 1,000% more traffic than organic social media, and SEO leads often convert at a significantly higher rate than other channels.
Search Engine Optimization Essentials
Getting SEO for real estate right requires focusing on several critical areas:
- High-quality, relevant content: Generic posts about “home buying tips” won’t cut it. You need high-quality content addressing challenges your target audience faces and supporting content marketing efforts.
- Technical SEO: Slow-loading pages, broken links, and a mobile-unfriendly design hurt search engine results. Use helpful tools to improve site speed, optimize images, and enhance website performance.
- Local SEO optimization: Your Google Business Profile, local citations, and location-specific content must be optimized to appear in local searches using local keywords and local backlinks.
- Keyword research: Target long-tail keywords, neighborhoods, property types, and services to reach the right audience and generate qualified leads.
- Trust signals and authority: Include client testimonials, sold-property case studies, professional certifications, and consistent NAP across reputable websites.
- On-page SEO: Ensure headings, meta tags, and internal linking follow best practices for maximum SEO success.
- Strong SEO strategy & marketing strategies: Use a long-term strategy that blends SEO efforts, strong copywriting, content creation, and local market optimization.
Learn more about how to get more clients as a real estate agent.
How Do I Do an SEO Audit for Real Estate Agents?
An SEO audit is a systematic review of your real estate website to identify what’s working and what’s missing. It evaluates both technical SEO and website content to ensure your real estate business reaches the right audience.
1. Check Your Website Speed
Slow websites hurt user behavior, organic traffic, and search engine results. If your site takes longer than 3 seconds to load, potential clients may leave before seeing your property listings.
Use these free tools to test your speed:
- Google PageSpeed Insights: Measures site speed and gives improvement tips
- GTmetrix: Offers detailed performance reports and identifies what is slowing your site.
- Pingdom: Tests load times from multiple locations to ensure consistent performance.
Common speed issues include large images, too many plugins, and low-quality hosting. Fix these by optimizing images, reducing plugins, and upgrading hosting.
2. Identify Relevant Keywords
Keywords are the search terms potential clients type into Google when looking for real estate services. You need to know which ones matter for your agency and ensure your website is optimized for them.
Start by brainstorming what home buyers, sellers, or investors search for when they need real estate help. Then use keyword research tools to check search volume and competition levels. At our SEO agency, we use premium tools like Ahrefs, but free options like Ubersuggest work too.
Avoid overly broad terms like “real estate.”
They’re too competitive and unlikely to bring qualified leads. Instead, focus on long-tail keywords, which are longer, more specific phrases like “condos for sale in downtown Chicago” or “first-time home buyer real estate agent [city].”
3. Analyze Local SEO
A local SEO strategy ensures your real estate agency shows up when people search for properties or agents in your area. Even if you handle virtual consultations, many clients prefer agents near their desired location.
Check these key local SEO elements:
- Google Business Profile: Is it claimed, complete, and actively updated with listings, photos, and client reviews?
- NAP consistency: Make sure your Name, Address, and Phone number match across your website, Google, and all local directories.
- Local citations: Are you listed accurately on sites like Zillow, Yelp, and local chamber of commerce directories?
- Location pages: If you serve multiple neighborhoods or cities, do you have dedicated pages for each area with location-specific content?
Search for your main services plus your city name to see where you rank. If other real estate agents consistently appear higher, it’s time to improve your local SEO strategy.
4. Check Title Tags and Meta Descriptions
Title tags and meta descriptions are the clickable headlines and preview text that appear in Google search results when someone looks for real estate services.
Every key page on your real estate website needs unique, engaging title tags and meta descriptions that include relevant keywords.
For example, your homepage title might be “Downtown Realty Group – Homes for Sale & Trusted Real Estate Agents in Austin, TX.”
Common title tag and meta description mistakes include:
- Missing or duplicate titles: Each page should have a unique title tag.
- Too long or too short: Keep titles under 60 characters and meta descriptions under 160 characters.
- No keywords: Include your primary target keyword naturally in both title and description.
- Not compelling: Weak or generic descriptions won’t encourage clicks, even if your page ranks well.
Review your top 10-15 pages and update any title tags or meta descriptions that are missing, duplicated, or underperforming. Then, explore these real estate marketing strategies to boost your online visibility.
5. Audit Your Content
Content draws potential clients to your website and shows why you’re the right real estate agent. Your content must be helpful, relevant, and easy to navigate, forming the backbone of content marketing efforts and supporting email marketing campaigns that keep your audience engaged.
Review your current website pages and blog posts.
Are they answering the questions home buyers or sellers ask? Do they clearly explain the real estate services you offer? Thin, outdated, or irrelevant content can hurt your search rankings and make it harder for visitors to see your value. Focus on these areas:
- Property listings: Include detailed information about homes, neighborhoods, and pricing.
- Blog articles: Create helpful posts about topics like buying tips, selling strategies, or market trends.
- Local content: Highlight information specific to the communities or regions you serve.
Remove or update outdated or off-topic content. Google may lower your rankings if your website has too much low-value content, as it can make your real estate business appear less authoritative.
6. Analyze Your Competition
Other real estate agents are competing for the same buyers and sellers you want. Understanding their online strategies helps you spot opportunities to outrank them and strengthen your own SEO plan.
Search for your target keywords and see which real estate companies appear in the top results. Explore their websites, property listings, and content to identify what they do well and where you can improve. For example:
- Keywords they target: Are there high-value terms you haven’t covered?
- Content strategy: What blog posts, guides, or property resources do they provide that you don’t?
- Local SEO presence: How many reviews do they have, and how visible are they in local searches?
- Website quality: Is their site faster, more professional, or easier to navigate than yours?
Don’t COPY what other real estate agents do, but use their strategies as inspiration to refine your SEO efforts and attract more qualified clients.
7. Check Internal Links
Internal links connect different pages on your real estate website, helping both visitors and search engines navigate your content. They also pass authority between pages, boosting your site’s ranking potential.
Review how your property listings, blog posts, and service pages link to each other. Your homepage should link to key pages like “Buy a Home,” “Sell Your Home,” or “About Us,” and related blog content should connect naturally. For example, a post about staging tips could link to your listing services page.
Common internal linking mistakes include:
- Orphaned pages: Important pages that aren’t linked from anywhere else on your site.
- Broken links: Links that lead to removed or outdated listings or pages.
- Poor anchor text: Using vague phrases like “click here” instead of descriptive text like “buy a home in [city].”
- Missed opportunities: Failing to connect related content, such as linking neighborhood guides to corresponding listings.
A strong internal linking strategy helps users find relevant information easily and signals to Google which pages are most important on your real estate website.
8. Make Sure Your Website Is Mobile-Friendly
Over 70% of Google searches come from mobile devices. If your real estate website isn’t optimized for mobile devices, you’re losing potential clients and negatively impacting your SEO performance.
Mobile issues that can hurt real estate websites include:
- Text that’s too small: Visitors shouldn’t have to zoom to read property descriptions or blog content.
- Buttons too close together: Call-to-action buttons like “Schedule a Showing” or “Contact Agent” need sufficient spacing.
- Slow mobile loading: Mobile users expect pages to load quickly and may leave if they don’t.
- Complicated forms: Contact, inquiry, or mortgage pre-approval forms should be simple and easy to complete on smaller screens.
If you’re having trouble with a mobile-friendly design, you may need to hire a professional to help you make it work. If you work with us as your SEO expert, we can connect you with a trusted designer!
9. Fix Technical SEO
Technical SEO enables search engines to crawl, understand, and index your website effectively. If there are technical issues, Google will be unable to properly access your website, and your organic traffic will decrease.
Common technical problems include broken links, missing or duplicate title tags, slow loading speeds, and crawl errors. Check for:
- SSL certificate: Your site should use HTTPS to secure client data and build trust.
- XML sitemap: A file that helps search engines discover all important property listings and pages.
- Robots.txt file: Directs search engines on which pages to crawl or ignore.
- 404 errors: Broken pages that need fixing or redirecting to relevant content.
- Duplicate content: Similar or repeated property listings and blog content can confuse search engines and harm rankings.
Tools like Google Search Console can help identify technical issues, but most real estate agencies benefit from a professional SEO consultant to properly address and resolve these problems.
10. Track Your SEO Progress
Even the best SEO strategies for real estate agents take time to produce results, so it’s essential to have a reliable tracking system in place.
Free tools like Google Analytics and Google Search Console provide valuable insights into your real estate website’s performance, though paid tools such as Ahrefs can offer deeper analysis.
Monitor these key SEO metrics:
- Organic traffic: How many home buyers or sellers find your site via search engines.
- Keyword rankings: Where your pages rank for targeted real estate search terms.
- Click-through rates: How often users click your property listings or service pages from search results.
- Lead generation: How many inquiries, contact form submissions, or appointment bookings come from organic search.
Search rankings naturally fluctuate, and meaningful SEO improvements usually take 3–6 months to appear. If you’re unsure where to start, follow a FREE SEO Checklist tailored for real estate agents.
Are SEO Audits Worth It?
Yes! SEO audits are a worthwhile investment for real estate agents seeking to expand their client base through enhanced online visibility. An audit identifies what’s holding your website back from ranking well and provides a clear roadmap for improvement.
Instead of guessing what might be wrong or making random changes, you receive a prioritized list of specific issues to fix.
This saves you time and prevents wasted effort on the wrong tasks. A professional SEO audit also gives you a solid foundation to manage your own real estate SEO if that’s what you choose to do going forward.
SEO Audit Service for Real Estate Agents
At SJ Digital Solutions, we provide comprehensive SEO audits through our SEO Health Check service specifically for real estate professionals.
This audit covers everything from technical website issues to content gaps that may be costing you property leads. You’ll receive a detailed report showing exactly what’s holding your real estate website back and a prioritized action plan to improve your rankings and online visibility.
–> Order your SEO Health Check today!
FAQs
How Long Does an SEO Audit Take?
Our SEO Health Check is completed in just three business days. During this time, we conduct a full analysis of your real estate website, review your local competitors, and deliver a detailed report with clear, actionable recommendations to enhance your online performance.
How Often Should You Do an SEO Audit?
It depends on who’s managing your SEO. If a professional is overseeing your strategy, full audits may not be necessary, as they typically provide monthly reports that track progress and identify any issues.
If you handle SEO in-house, scheduling a professional audit once a year is a wise move. This helps catch problems early and uncover new opportunities, especially since search engine optimization best practices are constantly evolving with Google updates.
Do You Offer Retainer SEO Services for Real Estate Agents?
Yes, we offer ongoing SEO retainer services focusing on content marketing, local SEO management, keyword research, and more.
Learn more about our content + SEO services for real estate professionals and agencies!