Create Custom Links That Feature Local Communities!

Let's start right out with the age-old quote that "real estate is local." While the Internet has made it possible for an individual to search for real estate listings in any city around the world, real estate is still local. Sellers live in neighborhoods, and buyers buy to live in neighborhoods. Internet searching has evolved as well, and real estate searches are more localized to not just cities, but neighborhoods and subdivisions too.

A very successful approach for the real estate website is to use your IDX plugin to create a localized page. Let's use the MLS that services Orange County as an example. It covers a very large area, and that just provides more opportunity for the member agents. However, people are searching the Web for homes for sale in much more targeted areas. Sure, you can use the city of Orange as your area of focus, but let's zoom in a bit more, to the Old Towne community.

The blue border in the image outlines the Old Towne area of Orange, CA. It's in the heart of the city and there is always plenty of interest there, as it has been designated as an historic district. The City-Data map above shows the one square mile area, and other sites tell us that there are more than 3,000 residences in this area.

What we want to do in creating a local page for our site is to feature mapping of the area, descriptions of the neighborhood, demographic data, businesses and shopping, as well as a lot of photo and video content. Think of it as creating a single destination comprehensive description of a place where people want to live and recreate. Consider this from the perspective of a buyer who has actually never been there. They're researching from afar, and the more information they can get in one place, the more highly they'll value that website.