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Sansonj,

It seemed like some of the responses were directed towards basic SEO strategies. I was trying to clarify by background (since the question was very vague) in order to get non-basic SEO strategies.

~jon

Hey Robert,

My long time philosophy is that Google is really smart and your best bet is to make amazing content that people want, and then trust Google to do their job."

However recently I've seen a compelling line of argument here on SEOmoz that argues on page seo is good, but it's much easier to move the needle off page.

I am absolutely here on SEOmoz to learn, and I recognize the amazing group of SEO experts here.

Here are my thougths regarding your quotes from the experts:

Kulver / competitive SEO analysis: I'm doing this myself.

Kent / RETS & Mobile: From a user perspective, there is theoretically no difference with how I receive the data (rets/idx) if it is displayed in the same way. In practice there are slight differences, since I am using a word press based IDX provider, I have some limitations to how I can display the listings.

Mobile: Agree 110% - something worthwhile is needed there.

**Copstead / Market size to big: **I have this general line of thinking that comes in handy with whatever startup I'm working on:

"What we are trying to do is impossible. Rationally it can't be done (too little money / resources etc.). But I've seen magic happen time and time again when big goals are set."

One strong SEO opinion I do have is that I don't target "keywords". Even before the term was coined, I've always been a strong proponent of the long tail.  I want to build the site's domain authority, and structure the site appropriately so that the SEO work we do lifts up the site across the board.

Bottom line is that I will not be happy if this site is not a top 3 site in Western Washington. (As ranked against all of the listing sites)

Norquay / Investment breakdown:

I like everything about this budget. I am looking for someone to execute on this type of thing. I should say that Social Media and content building must be built holistically within your organization for it to be successful (genuine, interesting, etc), but spending $1k + $1.5k on SEO based social media & content could be a good investment.

**EGOL / granular: **For reason stated above (Copstead) I don't want to focus on granular. (This doesn't mean that I won't use care when selecting anchor text.)

I appreciate the tip of list organization (vertical vs horizontal). We will make that change.

Fisher (you!)/ local & other things:

1. I agree on local.

2. Large pics on the top = travel site: It's true that no other real estate listing sites show large pics on the top and a user could be confused. However, I believe a user thinking about relocating would like to get the flavor of different neighborhoods and cities. I know I would. However, we do plan to also feature specific listings in those large marquee images over time.

3. Competitive keyword analysis. I've spent a lot of time researching this recently - too much to talk about in this format.

4. Site flawed - high bounce rate: We will continue to modify the site until the bounce rate is low or we are getting a 10%+ visitor to lead conversion rate. Depending on where we set our longer term goals.

5. Open source plugins: We are just getting started on the site and I think we've already paid $1k+ to plug in developers. I agree with you on this.

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SEOmoz: I love the concept of a peer learning organization.

I'm a big big advocate of on page SEO but want to work more on the off page SEO.

Of course I'm always happy to share what I know and I'll share when I have something good.

I truly do appreciate the advice and insight from everyone!!

Hi Robert,

I value the responses from everyone. They were all thought through and accurate. However, I believe most people spent too much attention focusing on how to improve a site that is half built and under development.

Since you have worked with people in the real estate industry, I'm sure you are aware of a site called ActiveRain; I founded that company and built it to over 3,000,000 unique organic visitors per month. I know how to build a site.

However, since I've been out of the SEO game for a few years, I specifically wanted to know how I should spend $5k per month on SEO related efforts - specifically "off-page" seo.

Hi Robert,

I'll do a response by response reply now.

"I would suggest putting some money upfront before SEO in a new website."

Are you suggesting investing more into the look + feel / design of the site? Let's assume I am doing that and I also want to work on SEO at the same time.

The site is for BrioRealty.com - we want to rank for all cities and neighborhoods in Western Washington.

Hi Robert,

Thanks for the help!

I think we have a lot of deep links to specific city pages. I am concerned about losing that juice, but I guess the 301's will mitigate that somewhat.

The site isn't built in frames.

I don't think people have many pages bookmarked.

I'm not 100% sure I fully understand your solution, but I'm still left feeling that I don't have a solid idea of which direction to go.

Best,

~jon

I'm rebuilding a real estate website with 4 subdomains that have Page Authorities between 45 and 50.

Since it's a real estate website it has 20,000+ pages of unique (listing) content PER sub-domain.

The subdomains are structured like: washington.xyzrealty.com and california.xyzrealty.com.

The root domain has a ~50 Page Authority.

The site is about 7 years old.

My preference is to focus all of my efforts on the primary domain going forward, but I don't want to waste the power of the subdomains.

I'm considering:

1. Putting blogs or community/city pages on the subdomains

2. 301 redirecting all of the existing pages to matching pages on the new root domain.

3. Any other ideas??

The site is for BrioRealty.com - we want to rank for all cities and neighborhoods in Western Washington.