Keyword Rich Editing to Optimize Your Listing
Just writing a pleasant, informative listing is not enough to get noticed on the internet of 2020. There’s so much competition that you need to SEO optimize your listing to stand out, which means learning about keyword-rich editing. BOOMSTR has a team of SEO experts who can do it for you, but we’ve put together this guide if you prefer to try out the DIY route.
RELATED: How to Write a Great Property Description for a Vacation Rental
In This Article:
What Is SEO?
SEO stands for “search engine optimization.” It refers to the practice of increasing the quantity and quality of traffic to your website through search engine results.
In the words of SEO master Neil Patel, “SEO is the magic you have to work on your article in order to make Google very likely to include your post as one of the top results whenever someone searches for that keyword.”
In other words, there are specific phrases and formats that search engine algorithms look for in their searches, and they’re more likely to rank your listing higher if it includes them.
Note that it is vital that SEO writing sounds natural. Search engine algorithms have mechanisms to detect when keywords are being shoved into a listing just for the sake of SEO, and they actually penalize pages for doing that instead of boosting their rank. Abusing SEO without regard to quality writing, is known as “black hat SEO,” and it’s a big no-no.
That being said, knowing how to optimize your listing in a healthy way, so it ranks highly for SEO is essential, because higher search rankings lead directly to more business.
How Do I Find Good Keywords?
First, think of what search terms you want to rank for. This step takes a little creativity because it requires you to imagine the customers you want to attract. The search terms you come up with should be pretty general, enough to where your potential customers will actually be typing those things in without having any idea about your property. For example, “vacation rental homes in Flagstaff.”
Enter the search term in your search engine and look at the top few results. Identify terms that often appear in all of the results. Make a list of 5-10 of these common terms. The terms should be specific enough to where they clearly apply to vacation rentals.
Now go back to your search engine and enter the term, but do not actually search for it by pressing enter. Take a look at the list of suggested searches that drop down from each term. If you see any terms that you could easily fit into your listing, add them to the list of 5-10 words you have written down. Do this for each of the typical search terms you wrote down.
You now have a list of words and phrases you can use to optimize your listing.
4 Tips to optimize your listing
In addition to the key phrases you identified in the previous step, there are specific details you should mention to optimize your listing further and attract renters. Here are 4 especially important tips.
Mention Local Hotspots
Use names of local landmarks and locations as much as possible (while avoiding black hat SEO). For example, instead of writing “ranch house across from a great golf course,” you should write “ranch house just across North Pima Road from Greyhawk Golf Club and next to Longhorn Trail.”
Use Customer Testimonial
Search engines generally rank pages that include highly relevant quoted text higher than those that don’t, so including quotes from your past customers is a fantastic idea.
Highlight Specific Amenities
Search engines look for pages that mention a lot of specific details that will satisfy customer intent. So mentioning things like the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, the specific amenities in the house, and the exact area of the rental is an easy way to rank highly.
Don’t Skimp on Photos
The photos in your listing are probably the most critical part. Not just because people are quickly drawn in by pretty pictures. Google actually prioritizes pages with high-resolution and detailed photos.
A photo taken on a phone camera just isn’t going to cut it for SEO purposes. Don’t skimp on hiring a professional photographer or borrowing a DSLR camera to take your vacation listing photos.
RELATED: 6 Photography Tips to Showcase Your Vacation Rental
BOOMSTR offers a service to frequently update your website, blog, listings, and social media with search engine optimized content. It can be time-consuming to optimize your listing yourself, but those who are really determined to take a stab at it can try and see how it goes.
SEO IS AN ENTIRE INDUSTRY, AND THERE ARE COUNTLESS TIPS WE DID NOT GET TO MENTION HERE! IF YOU HAVE ANY FAVORITES YOU’D LIKE TO MENTION, DROP US A LINE ON OUR FACEBOOK!
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