A Complete Guide To Ecommerce SEO
Thinking of scoring at the top of search engines as an e-commerce platform? Many e-commerce sites may prefer paid search and social media to get on the top of the Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs). However, these strategies require expenses and commitment, which means that they may not be sustainable in the long run.
Another strategy? Why not go for Search Engine Optimization (SEO)? Even though SEO is cost effective and has the best return on investment of any e-commerce marketing strategy, most online stores are built with little or no regard for it.
So, how exactly are you going to put your presence out there for everybody to know about your products and services? Here’s a guide to help you get started.
What Is SEO And Why It Matters
SEO is made up of different components. There’s technical SEO, On-Page, and Off-Page SEO. Small or startup businesses may also explore other essential SEO services that fit their budget.
Technical SEO is focused on the non-content element of your websites. These factors allow your websites to be easily read by search engines and get favorable feedback from users. They’re loading speed, security, and responsiveness, among others.
On-Page SEO, on the other hand, refers to the content of your website. Strategies included here are keyword research, keyword optimization, and quality content.
Lastly is the Off-Site SEO. This strategy is focused on strengthening your authority and credibility by building relationships with other websites. This includes white hat SEO tactics, such as using high-quality backlinks and avoiding link baiting at all costs.
Combining all of these factors would result in an SEO plan that gives you accurate results. The results are felt and seen in your brand visibility, user engagement, client loyalty, and ultimately, your ability to reach the end target of your sales tunnel- repeat customers!
Without a great SEO strategy, your brand will end up getting buried underneath layers and layers of SERPs. This will definitely hurt your presence and would end up with you being forgotten by your customers. Thus, taking time to sit in and plan your company’s next SEO strategy may not be enough. You also have to pair it with continuous SEO optimization strategies as algorithms may change as fast as a bolt of lightning.
Now you know what SEO basics are and its importance to a business with an online presence, the next question worth answering is, is it applicable to e-commerce businesses?
SEO And E-commerce
If you think that SEO is all created equal, that might not be 100% true. Though an SEO strategy has an overarching goal to increase your visibility, it takes a different shape when it comes to e-commerce.
It’s important to know that an e-commerce site is different from any other type of websites. Its main goal is to allow buyers and sellers to create transactions on goods, services, and digital products. Also, its focus relies on using money to seal these transactions.
With all these basics covered, you’re now ready to dive deeper into the right way to approach e-commerce SEO. You may also get the help of e-commerce SEO services, like those offered by Matt Jackson, if you’re looking for expert and revenue-oriented results.
Keywords Are Everything
Keywords are crucial to SEO, but they can never be emphasized enough when talking about e-commerce SEO. It’s because people usually already have an idea of what they want to buy before searching. This means that you need to know these very words that will allow you to get on top of all the other search pages.
Though there are many tips out there on keyword search for e-commerce, you should remember that your keywords should be product-focused.
This means that instead of just using the term ‘dress,’ you need to ensure that your keyword also reflects your product categories and even your homepage. Thus, it may be better to use ‘wedding dress’ to ensure that your site is ranked for all the right reasons.
There are additional tips that to rank better, you have to improve your keywords and try to compete instead for lesser competitive terms. After all, there are many brands of wedding dresses globally that you need to compete against.
Thus, it’s always suggested to include the head keyword on the target keyword and include long-tail variations and synonyms related to it. Therefore, adding the term ‘eco-friendly’ to your keyword ‘wedding gown’ can help you rank better and be found more accessible by searchers. Long-tail keywords are great opportunities for SEO, and there are many reasons why you should focus on long-tail keywords in your SEO strategy.
Besides allowing you to rank better, using this type of keyword will enable you to tap into an audience that embodies the so-called buyer intent. The buyer intent reflects the stage of the sales funnel wherein individuals aren’t looking for options anymore. They have limited their choices and are now ready to buy.
Create A Site That Screams Navigability
Even though you might already have visitors with buyer’s intent, they might be put off by the fact that your site requires too much effort from them to navigate.
This point means that visitors and e-commerce site users don’t like a site that would take them forever just to arrive at the check-out page. Many designers would even suggest limiting the number of clicks it’ll require users to go from point A to Point B—think three for maximum.
You should also ensure that the add to cart button is located in the area of your website where customers can easily spot them. Pair this up with an SSL certification, and you’ll have buyers lining up to purchase products from you.
Other sites are a mere click away from yours, so don’t give your customers a chance to go to your competitors.
Optimize Everything
Once you’re equipped with the knowledge on keyword research and design your e-commerce site, the next thing that you should focus on is optimizing other elements of your site.
Optimizing your site includes optimizing your title tags, meta descriptions, images, and even implementing schema markup. Optimizing these areas can help your page in increasing click-through rates (CTR) and page speed.
Key Takeaways
There are many ways to increase your site’s visibility. You can go for paid advertisements, social media marketing, or you can also go for SEO. As discussed, to have an effective E-commerce SEO plan, you must know the basics of SEO. Tweak them a little bit, and you now have an SEO strategy that not only gets you on top of the pages but gets you ranked for the right reasons.
