How Search Engine Optimization Helped Capture More Traffic


The Client: GreyBeard Realty

Chip Craig is the Owner of GreyBeard Realty, which was formed in 1999. This Agency is located in Asheville, North Carolina and began as a rental management company. The business quickly shifted from rentals to include real estate sales. Today sales make up 50% of the company’s business.  GreyBeard is an office of almost 20 employees that is still growing. Chip’s goal was to grow his online business to reach customers who were searching from out of state locations and weren’t familiar with his brand name. Chip knew that the way to do that was through optimizing his SEO performance and encouraging people to spend more time on his site. The longer visitors stayed on his site and searched his listings, the more likely he would be to generate more leads and opportunity.

The Challenge: Capturing More Natural Search Traffic

Union Street Media first built and optimized Grey Beard’s site in 2005.  The original site saw great success in lead generation and they already enjoyed good placement for many terms. But, we knew a protracted and regular effort could improve their placement even more. So, GreyBeard signed up for Union Street Media’s Internet Marketing program that is specifically tailored to each client’s business needs. This program helps to develop and execute a strategy to improve the website’s online visibility and performance. Internet Marketing includes a standard program of search engine optimization, reporting and analysis, and recommendations that the customer will be presented on a regular basis. It also incorporates strategies related to social media, blogging, website enhancements, content development, and incoming link building. The program is designed to foster ongoing improvement rather than one-time engagements that won’t have long lasting effects. GreyBeard Realty wanted to increase the amount of traffic to their website and boost their lead volume.

The Results: Significant Improvement in a Down Market

Greybeard Realty began utilizing our Internet Marketing program on their website in January 2009, and saw a significant increase in search engine performance on top of the success that they already had. In a dismal year for real estate in North Carolina, traffic from search engines increased by 30% and they had their best year ever. Their website quickly responded to our Internet Marketers’ efforts and continued to improve as we continued working on it. Our Internet Marketers spent some time researching keywords that visitors were using  to search for properties in their area. They selected keywords that had high search volume but very low competition. These keywords allowed us to focus our efforts on the most achievable terms first. Once those keywords were selected, we teamed up to develop additional targeted content for the actual site. Using their great knowledge of the area, they drafted helpful and informative site content that we extensively optimized. The Internet Marketers build out Recommended Searches for specific towns of interest and then worked with GreyBeard to develop rich content and blog posts to accompany those searches. The blog increased the amount of keyword rich content on the site. It’s written by GreyBeard and reflects on their market and expertise.  Our Internet Marketers helped them optimize it for maximum search engine performance.

Fast forward to the end of 2010, and we witness a significant increase of traffic to their site. The increase in site traffic is most dramatically seen as page views and time on site.

  • Site visits up 30% over year before
  • Page views up 55% over year before
  • Pages viewed per visit is up 20%
  • Average time on site is up 14%

Because of GreyBeard’s enrollment in our Internet Marketing program, their site began to pump out qualified leads for them to follow up on.  Over the course of the year GreyBeard saw 20% more leads and a record year for the company despite the down market!