Estate agents
Websites for independent estate agents
The portals own the listings. An independent agent's website exists to win valuations, with street-level knowledge the portals can't fake.
Two different jobs
Buyers browse the portals while sellers choose an agent
The sites compete for different people, so they should not try to do the same work.
What the portals do
- Show every listing in the area, whichever agent holds it.
- Let buyers filter homes by price, bedrooms and area.
- Send the buyer to whichever agent lists the home.
What your site does
- Show sellers that you know their street and what has sold on it.
- Explain how the agent values a home and what the fees cover.
- Make booking a valuation as easy as sending a text.
A seller searching for an estate agent in Marlow, Cookham or Twyford is usually weighing a few names and has probably already seen the one on the board down the road. They search for the agent and the village, open two or three sites, and decide who to invite round. The agent whose site shows they know the streets, and who makes it simple to ask, gets the first visit.
That is why we would not build a home-worth calculator for an independent agent. The portals have more data than any single office, and a calculator tells a seller nothing about the person who will stand in their hallway. A short form that books a visit from someone who knows the road does more, and it starts a conversation instead of ending one.
The pages that win valuations
Local knowledge, set out where a seller can find it
The valuation page
The most important page on the site. Short form, the address first, a named person who will visit, and a plain account of what happens at the valuation and what it costs to sell. It should be one tap from every page, and it should work on a phone in a kitchen.
A page for each village and part of town
Written by people who work the patch: which roads people want, which school catchments matter, how the commute to London actually runs, what moves quickly and what lingers. A seller can tell within a paragraph whether the agent knows the place.
Pages for sellers and for landlords
How selling works, what to prepare, how long it can take, and how you market a home. Lettings and management need their own pages, written for landlords, with fees stated plainly.
The people
A seller is hiring a person to sell the most valuable thing they own. Names, faces, how long each has worked the patch, and who will be at the door.
Proof that you are who you say you are
Residential agents have to belong to an approved redress scheme, and showing which one is a basic trust signal. So are any professional body memberships and a clear complaints route.
What it costs
Published prices, before VAT
A single-office agent working a focused patch can run on Towpath, £2,400–£3,800, with local SEO and Google Business Profile set up properly. An agent covering several villages, with a proper page for each, needs more pages and a content plan, which is Reach at £4,500–£8,500.
Hosting, care and small changes from The Form start at from £95 a month. Monthly SEO runs from £650 a month, and for an agent it mostly means keeping village pages, the Business Profile and reviews moving. The work sits under Local SEO & Google Business Profile, and Ranking in more than one Thames Valley town without doorway pages explains how we approach the village pages.
Three patches
Where independents compete
- MarlowA small, prosperous riverside town where sellers compare agents on how well they know it, down to the individual roads.
- CookhamA village where every sale is somebody's neighbour's business. Local depth beats a glossy brochure, and the pages should read like it.
- TwyfordA commuter village on the Elizabeth line and the Henley branch, small enough that a well-built local site can own its searches. Buyers there search by commute.
Questions
What agents and branch managers ask
- Rightmove and Zoopla already show our listings. Why do we need a website?
- The portals are where buyers browse. A seller deciding who to invite round tends to look at the agents' own sites too, and yours should make that decision easy.
- Should our own listings be on the site?
- Yes, where your property software offers a feed we can use. Buyers should be able to see what you have, and the site should lead sellers to the valuation. Listings give the site life, and valuation requests are what it is for.
- Won't village pages look like doorway pages?
- They would if the only change was the village name. Each page needs things only someone who works the patch knows. Hattie Clarke explains where the line falls in her Soundings note on ranking in more than one town.
- What trust signals matter most?
- Your redress scheme membership, which residential agents must hold, any professional body memberships, your named team and an honest account of your fees. Reviews help, and we will set up a routine for asking for them properly.
- What does an estate agent's website cost?
- A single-office agent with a focused patch can fit Towpath at £2,400–£3,800. An agent covering several villages with a page for each is nearer Reach at £4,500–£8,500. Hosting and care from The Form start at from £95 a month, and SEO retainers from £650 a month. All before VAT.
Start a project
Tell us what the website needs to do
A short note is plenty. Tell us what you sell, where, and what isn't working, and you'll get a straight answer within a working day, even when the answer is that you don't need us.