We all know how important Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is for getting traffic to your website. Of course, there are many important aspects to a successful website, but SEO is one of the top factors.
For those of you using IDX Broker to display your MLS listings, I’m going to share a very simple tweak that you can make in just a few minutes that will have a huge impact on your SEO.
It’s very simple, but the truth is when I have a new client that’s hired me to work on their existing real estate website, this is often overlooked.
Real Estate Listing Detail Page Title
The title of any page is very important for SEO. This tip is not about the page title that displays visibly on the page. It’s about the page title that doesn’t display on the page, the <title> tag that’s in the head section of your website.
Moz.com has a short article about the Title Tag that you definitely should read (go ahead, really it’s a quick read). To capture the most important point, they have this to say about the Title Tag:
A title tag is the main text that describes an online document. Title elements have long been considered one of the most important on-page SEO elements (the most important being overall content), and appear in three key places: browsers, search engine results pages, and external websites.
That’s right. It’s one of the most important on-page SEO elements.
Here’s a screen shot from a single listing page on Trulia that shows the Title Tag displayed along the top of the browser window:
You can see that they display the listing address, For Sale and Trulia.com. This is a very effective and SEO friendly description of this listing page.
IDX Broker Default Title Tag
One of the great things about IDX Broker is that there are a lot of things you can do to make it very SEO friendly. Some work is required to really take advantage of those benefits, but the results are more than worth the effort.
If you look at the default Title Tag for your IDX Broker single listing detail page, you might see something like this:
That’s quite a bit different than what you see from Trulia’s website. This very important SEO on-page factor is only displaying the listing number, and nothing else. This is having a direct negative impact on the SEO ranking of your listing page.
The Solution to Optimize the Title Tag on your IDX Broker Single Listing Page
This is so easy, but so often overlooked. Follow these steps and you’ll have your Title Tag optimized for SEO in just a few minutes.
Access Details Page Preferences
From your IDX Broker admin panel, go to “Designs > Pages”.
Scroll down the page until you find the “Details” section. Click on the “Edit” link under the “Preferences” column:
That brings you to the details page, which looks like this:
Edit IDX Broker Detail Page Preferences Title Tag
Look at the box titled “Dynamic Title Text”. That field controls the output of the title tag. You’ll see the template tag {{listingID}}. That field controls the output of your Title Tag, and in this case it’s only outputting the Listing ID.
Let’s optimize that by clicking on the “Add dynamic tag” link to the right of the “Dynamic Title Text” field. You’ll see a popup with several options to choose from:
Which tags you select will be based on your preference, but I’d recommend starting with the address and then adding other tags based on your desired outcome. You can add text, punctuation, separators, etc. between the template tags to make it more readable.
Select your template tags, add your text and punctuation and hit “Save Changes”.
For our example, we’re going to add address, city, state, zip, listing ID, and our company name. We’re using:
{{address}}, {{cityName}}, {{state}} {{zipcode}} ( MLS# {{listingID}}) | AlphaBlossom for Realtors
SEO Optimized Page Title Tag Results
Making these changes results in a very effective and SEO friendly Title Tag, just like the one you saw on Trulia’s page:
and looking at the source code:
<title>1736 W 28 ST, Miami Beach, FLORIDA 33140 (MLS# M1406577) | AlphaBlossom for Realtors</title>
Important Tips to Optimize your Page Title Tags
- The ideal length for your Title Tags should be around 60 characters. Of course, it’s dynamic based on the address so you don’t have 100% control of this, but try not to add to much additional text which will increase the length of your Title Tag. It your title is too long, the search engines will truncate it with a “…”
- Keep the most important information first
- Don’t get carried away with keywords. Keep it relevant and non-spammy
- Include your branding. Consider adding your name/company name to the end of the Title
- If your changes don’t show, you may have to clear your cache
Continuing SEO Improvements to your IDX Broker Real Estate Website
This is just one very important step to improve your on page SEO. You’ll see there are other SEO fields for optimizing your site on this page, as well as many other pages. Again, that’s one of the great things about IDX Broker, but you have to take advantage of that to benefit.
We Can Help
If you’d rather spend your time focusing on your business, contact us and let’s see if we can partner together to make your website work better for you!
jososs says
Tony, Thank you! I did a couple of “tweaks”.
Tony Eppright says
Hi @jososs:disqus…glad to hear that! Hope you’ll see some benefits very soon, and planning to have more articles like this posted soon. Thanks for your comment!
Samantha Lee says
I tried to sign up on your subscription but it said ERROR: Sorry, there was an error. Please be sure JavaScript and Cookies are enabled in your browser and try again…. THANKS!!
Tony Eppright says
Hi Samantha,
Thank you so much for letting me know! I tested the forms and they’re working for me. To be safe, I made some adjustments to my caching plugin, which may have been causing some issues.
If you’d still like to sign up, please give it another shot, or email me at [email protected] with your email address and I can add it.
Very sorry for the issues…in the process of a complete new design which should get rid of any issues from the current site 🙂
Samantha Lee says
YAY! it’s working…:)
Tony Eppright says
Yay @disqus_aQpAl2SeID:disqus 🙂 Thank you so much for letting me know, and also for your patience 🙂 Have a great day!