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SEO and GEO Audit for a Real Estate Website: Sitemap Recovery and the Best Google Position of the Year in Month One

We started with a technical audit: Google had been unable to read the sitemap for more than a year and a half, and 9.29K pages were outside the index. We removed the blockers, split the keyword set into three audiences and prepared pages for AI assistants. The first full month brought 3,791 clicks, the best of the year, and an average position of 11.4 instead of 15.3.

Project type
SEO and GEO audit for a real estate agency
Market
Indonesia
Timeframe
August 2026 - present
Google clicks in September 2026, the best month of the year
3,791
average position, August vs September 2026
15.3 → 11.4
non-indexed pages at the start
9.29K
SEO and GEO Audit for a Real Estate Website: Sitemap Recovery and the Best Google Position of the Year in Month One

Challenge

The client: a real estate agency that works with three audiences at once: property owners (management), guests (rentals), and buyers (sales). The goal is ambitious: double organic traffic and reach the top for commercial queries in all three segments.

What made it hard

  • Fierce competition. The market targets foreigners, and agencies, aggregators, and large portals all fight for these queries.
  • Most of the site outside the index. At the start, 3.17K pages were indexed, while 9.29K remained unindexed. In other words, Google was ignoring more than two thirds of the site.
  • The sitemap had not worked for more than a year and a half. Google reported "Couldn't fetch," meaning it could not even read the sitemap. New listings and pages were found slowly or not at all.
  • Mostly branded traffic. The site was found by people who already knew the agency, while new clients went to competitors.
  • Moderate domain authority. A DR of 28 means competitive queries have to be won on quality and technical cleanliness.

Three different audiences with different intent complicate the structure: a page for a buyer and one for a tourist looking for a week-long rental have to be different.

What we did

We started work in August 2026 with an audit, because without a technical foundation any content would have stayed invisible.

Technical audit

  • Our first priority was the sitemap and the reasons Google could not read it.
  • We went through the mass of unindexed pages: which ones are valuable and which are technical duplicates or empty pages.
  • We reviewed the site structure from the perspective of the three segments so each audience has its own clear path.

SEO for commercial queries

We split the keyword set into three segments: owners, guests, buyers. For each, we identified the key commercial queries and the pages that should rank for them.

GEO

Foreigners increasingly ask AI assistants where to rent or buy property. So we are preparing key pages for AI systems to use in their answers: clear facts about services, areas, and the rental and purchase process.

Measurement

We track average position, clicks, and CTR in Google Search Console every month and compare them with the history for the previous year.

Results

Google Search Console data for the year (clicks per month): from 1,646 in October 2025 to 3,553 in August 2026, when we started.

The first full month of our work, September 2026, delivered:

  • 3,791 clicks, the best month of the year (+7% vs August);
  • an average position of 11.4 instead of 15.3 in August, the best of the year;
  • in early October the average position holds at 10.8.

The top priority at the start was removing technical blockers: a sitemap Google had been unable to read for over a year and a half, and thousands of pages outside the index. The project is ongoing, and the goal of doubling organic traffic remains in progress.

What makes this project special

A competitive international real estate market with three different audiences in one business: owners, guests and buyers. Much of the potential was hidden in technical problems, so the very first full month already set a clicks record and the best position of the year.

Monthly clicks from Google
01.1k2.1k3.2k4.2kOct 25Nov 25Dec 25Jan 26Feb 26Mar 26Apr 26May 26Jun 26Jul 26Aug 26Sep 263.8k

We started in August 2026. In September clicks grew to 3,791 and the average position improved from 15.3 to 11.4. Source: Google Search Console, October 2025 - September 2026

Published: · Updated:

Questions about this project

What drove such a fast result in the first month?

The main reason was technical: Google had not read the sitemap for more than a year and a half, and thousands of pages were out of the index. After we fixed the sitemap and the indexing structure, the site started ranking higher: in September the average position improved from 15.3 to 11.4, and clicks grew from 3,553 to 3,791, the highest in a year.

What does the sitemap error "Couldn't fetch" mean?

Google cannot read the sitemap, so it has a harder time finding new and updated pages. In this project, that had been going on for more than a year and a half, and it became one of the audit's first priorities.

Why do so many pages fail to get indexed?

Most often it comes down to technical duplicates, empty or thin pages, and crawling problems. At the start, there were 9.29K unindexed pages here vs. 3.17K indexed, so we are going through them and separating the valuable ones from the junk.

How do you promote an agency that works with owners, guests, and buyers?

Each segment has its own queries and its own intent, so we split the keyword set and the site structure into three directions. A page for a buyer should not compete with a page for a week-long rental.

Can you compete with large real estate portals?

You can, but not through domain authority; you do it through technical cleanliness and precise pages for commercial queries. We cannot guarantee a top position, but we show the monthly trend in rankings and clicks.

Do foreigners look for property through AI assistants?

Foreign buyers and tourists increasingly start their search with an AI assistant. So we prepare key pages for AI systems to use in their answers about renting and buying property.

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