We’ve all heard that Google loves a steady flow of fresh, high quality, original, editorial content. It sees this as a sign of life, and quality within your domain. Beyond this, your vendors and applicants love well written article content, and Google loves what those users love, so you can score a double benefit.
That said, you need to avoid flooding your site with generic, externally supplied newsfeeds or content which will be duplicated across many sites, as this is likely to actually punish your SEO performance. So with all this in mind, what you are going to need is a very simple, easy, and free content management system to add articles…
Once you have that, you might want to focus on local area guide content. You can even add these area guides onto the relevant property search results pages themselves. This is a smart and advanced SEO practice, for various reasons, notably the way it reduces your duplicate content ratio with the major portals who have the same property descriptions, and the way it encourages “one more click”, as it’s a logical place for humans to see those guides and click on them.
Or, you can write meaningful advice articles for your vendors, on how to prepare their house for sale, or how to instruct an agent, etc. The huge benefit of doing this, is that it makes your website a more effective at trapping vendor enquiries. Rule number 1: optimise for your end customers, Google will see them coming and staying, and your SEO will look after itself.
Finally, be extremely wary of “writing content” for Google. In fact, don’t, (rule number 1!). If you find yourself thinking, I’ve got to make sure I mention those town names in the first paragraph, for “keyword density” or some such concept you heard your SEO consultant advise, then tread very carefully.
You can bet money on the fact that Google’s natural language assessment engine can smell “optimised content” better than you can fake. Don’t dance for them. Just put them completely out of your mind and write for your vendors. Really.
