Every webmaster and wannabe knows what keywords are and the role they play in search engine positioning. I want to discuss the things that are almost universally missed. I may regret this as many of you compete with me for positioning in some way or another.

I personally take the attitude "let the big dogs fight over the bone I'll eat well out of the bowl while they do". In other words I do not strive to capture the biggest most unniversal keywords such as "Real estate" or "homes for sale" there are reasons to strive for such terms but if you do not optimize for an international Real estate company or directory the majority of the traffic you recieve would find you irrelevant.

I first try to talk in my articles and keywords as a BUYER not a SELLER that is one of the most important things I learned. A buyer uses a different word context than a seller in many cases. Try to make a list of terms you would use to search for property in your market area. The list would include "Boundary area Realtors" or "Grand Forks Property for sale" Don't miss the connecting words or you will fall out of the search. Don't forget the spider will look at "Realtor" which you used in a selling context and decide that "Realtors" (which your customer searched for) is not relevant to your website.

Your cusomer may search for "West Kootenay Real Estate Companies" nine out of ten or 99 out of 100 do not show up because they have not tried or found a way to write companies into their website text always think of how a querie would be formatted using the words you choose. If it would be hard to do look for easier combinations. People are basically lazy. BC is easier to write than British Columbia etc.

Another MAJOR KEY point is when a customer searches for "Real Estate" in general and do not see anyone local, they go back to the search engine and add regional names such as towns, cities, neighborhoods, rivers, lakes, directions ie: North Kettle River to try to make the search more relevant for what they are really looking for (YOU). Become a specialist at being the last dog standing in the add a keyword search. Some of the searches you hold ground on may be fairly irrelevant but you come up on many many more overall and it really pays off in tthe long run. The more searches you come up in the more relevant the spyder thinks you are and it snowballs from there.

More to come... Later
Don the Real Estate Mann