SEO facts every Estate agent should know

Search engine optimisation is the process of increasing your websites rankings on the search engine results pages. SEO can help your site move up in the rankings leading to you gaining more visibility through your online efforts.

What is SEO really about and why do you need it?

Who’s online?

As of March 2013:

• 43.5 million Adults (86%) in the UK are using the internet.
• 7.1 million Adults (14%) have never used the internet.
• Men (88%) were more likely to be internet users than women (84%).
• By region, London had the highest rate of Internet users (90%) and Northern Ireland had the lowest (79%).

Who’s using these search engines?

• 92% of people use search engines frequently
• 93% of online experiences begin with a search engine.
• 80% only look at organic results (ignoring the paid search ads)
• 78% of buyers do their research online before taking action
• 46% of people connect through smartphones
• The average adult in the UK spends 22 hours and 15 minutes on the internet each month (that’s an increase of 65% compared to just 3 years ago).
• 22.7% of that time is spent accessing social networks and blogs.

What Search Engines should you focus on?

Google dominates the search engine market, receiving more than 92% of search engine traffic in the UK.  The runner up is Bing with just over 3% of the search engine traffic.

This also shows us that if you chose to use paid search then you should focus your spending towards Google.

Other noteworthy information:

• 41% of businesses are gaining customers from using social media.

A successful SEO campaign works hand in hand with a social media strategy. It’s never been more important to be targeting customers socially as well as through SEO.

Research shows that 41% of UK firms are successfully achieving new customers through their social networking efforts. Social media isn’t only good for gaining new clients, 48% use social platforms to engage with their existing customers.

Your SEO efforts will boost your social marketing, helping your business gain new customers through two different channels.