Ecommerce SEO Guide 2021 : SEO Best Practices for Ecommerce Website

SEO gets your free, organic visitors. And yes, this also applies to your eCommerce store.

A high search ranking for your store doesn’t simply mean more visibility to web users, it can mean more sales of your products.

Here’s a fun fact – more than 40% of web users start their buying journey with a Google search.

What does this mean for your eCommerce site?!

For perspective, the biggest online store(Amazon) in the world grossing over $1000 every second gets 37% of its sales from search engines.

The good news is your eCommerce store can rake in those numbers, or at least come close.

In this article, we’ve compiled an SEO checklist for optimizing your eCommerce store. Whether you’re a complete beginner or you have a few years of experience running an eCommerce website, these checklists will improve your eCommerce SEO and consequently your web rankings.

But first, here are 2 must-dos for increasing your search rankings

eCommerce SEO Must-dos

  1. Secure your website with HTTPS: On your online store, security matters. Security does not only mean encrypting your customers’ credit card details, it means personal information such as names, address, contact numbers, email addresses associated with your customers.

Before you ask why this step is necessary for your increasing your search rankings, know that 85% of online shoppers avoid unsecured websites like a plague.

More than this, Google states that it factors HTTPS as a ranking signal. Even though it wouldn’t be the strongest ranking factor and this does little to boost your store search ranking, securing your website with HTTPS is crucial for ranking your eCommerce store.

  1. Run a site audit: Use SEO tools to run a site audit for potential technical SEO issues. Conducting a site audit lets you know if your store is working as you wish. you identify site errors and fix them. Also, you avoid a lot of indexation mistakes novice eCommerce store owners make on this store.

By carrying out a proper site audit you establish a clear, cohesive site architecture – placing important product and category pages in the right places. When carrying out a site audit, you have a great opportunity to fix issues with website speed. It’s no secret search engine favor fast loading websites over slower websites.

Now that you know the absolute must-dos for your website, let’s dive into SEO checklist for your eCommerce store.

SEO checklist for an eCommerce store

Research

One of the fastest ways to get high search rankings is knowing what you want your website to rank for. This is easier said than done. However, with eCommerce websites, it is much easier to determine what search terms you’ll like your store to rank for.

For example, if you run an online store selling necklaces, then you, most likely want to get found under the search term “necklaces.”

Since “necklaces” is a generic term, you’ll face strict competition for ranking spots from other websites selling necklaces.

In this case, finding “rare gem” keyword variations or long-tail keywords for the more generic term “necklaces” is the way to go.

Here’s where keyword research comes in handy

Keyword research for eCommerce

Use keyword tools to search for “rare gem” keywords that your website can possibly rank high for. When research “rare gem” keyword variations, it’s important to consider relevant keywords to your brand and products, the search volume, and the ranking difficulty of these keywords.

The strategy here is – “rare gem” keyword variations have little competition and give you a great chance to outrank your competitors.

Research your competitors

Another great way to find rare gem keywords to rank for is by researching your competitors.

Here’s how.

Make a list of a few of your competitors. Pop their websites to find out the list of keywords they are ranking for. Ideally, you’ll want to avoid keywords where your competitor has a high domain and page authority than you. It will be too difficult trying to outrank your competitors with such keywords.

You can also find out where your competitors get inbound links to their websites. And attempt to get those web pages to link to your website as well. This plays a key role in your building efforts.

Carrying out comprehensive research helps you find tips and keyword gems to help you rank your website. So take it seriously.

On-page optimization

On-page optimization includes all the steps you can carry out within your web pages to improve your website rankings. When it comes to on-page optimization, you are solely responsible for updating and improving these actions. Here are a few on-page optimizations to carry out on your eCommerce website;

Optimize your product pages for keywords: You can optimize your product pages for one keyword by sprinkling them strategically on your headers, image files, subheaders, paragraph copy, meta title and descriptions, and also your URL.

Optimize your product pages for user experience: An important ranking signal for Google is how web visitors perceive your website. If too many visitors click off your website as soon as they land on your web page, this is bad. It signals a high bounce rate. And Google responds by dropping your search rankings. It’s important to keep your web visitors happy by designing a user-friendly, fun, and easy-to-navigate website. Your visitors should encounter no functionality issues, especially with checkout pages.

A smooth and seamless running website encourages customers to regularly visit. And also prevent losing rankings from bounce rates.

Optimize your website for mobile users: It’s no secret that a bulk of web searches today are done on mobile devices. Your web visitors will most likely be searching for your products using their mobile devices. It’s a no-brainer to include a responsive mobile version for your store to avoid losing out on customers.

Crosslink and cross-promote your products: Presenting customers with a product that is related to what they are searching for not only keeps them on your website which sends ranking signals to search engines, but can also increase your chances of selling more products.

Content marketing: Inserting a blog in your eCommerce website allows you to include more keywords that don’t make it in your product descriptions. Moreover, a blog allows you to provide more value to your customers by sharing tips and useful information about the products you are selling.

Content marketing is a great way to rank for keywords and offers a great opportunity for casual web visitors to fin your store. However, make sure to publish high-quality information and implement important SEO strategies to make sure you command a high ranking for your website.

Integral Media – SEO Melbourne & PPC Management Melbourne

Suite 2/149 Chapel St, St Kilda VIC 3182, Australia

+61386781709