The eCommerce industry has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years. Currently, there are more than 20 million eCommerce websites around the world, with more being created each day. The sheer number points towards massive competition in the market.
However, a very small percentage of these websites actually makes a revenue of more than a thousand dollars annually. In such a scenario, it is easy to drown in the sea of unsuccessful ventures. The only thing that can save your website from this fate is smart eCommerce SEO.
You can now take the help of an SEO services company to optimize your eCommerce website for maximum results. This is crucial because the tough competition in this market needs to be beaten with expert strategizing.
By the end of 2021, the eCommerce market is estimated to generate above $4 trillion in sales annually. If you want to harness this exponential growth, you must get on board with eCommerce SEO as soon as possible.
Before diving into the tips and tricks of how to understand and apply eCommerce SEO to your website, let us first discuss what it is and how it helps.
What Is eCommerce SEO?
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of optimizing a website to ensure high rankings in search results and more organic traffic instead of paid ones. The same can be applied to eCommerce.
eCommerce SEO refers to the act of improving your online store with the aim to increase visibility in SERPs and attract more traffic, which in turn will lead to more sales and revenue for your business. With this strategy, you can avoid paying hefty amounts in paid campaigns and instead work towards targeting organic visitors who are more likely to purchase your products.
This can be done in several ways. One of the basic SEO methods is through targeting keywords. If you use the right keywords, your website can reach the top of search results on Google.
The idea is to build and market your website in such a way that any user looking to buy similar products or services can find your website easily when they search with the associated keywords.
Even if you have the best offerings, your business cannot take off unless the right customers find you. This is where eCommerce SEO comes in. You can create a strategy that attracts target audiences and leads to more conversions. This method is much cheaper than Product Listing Ads and paid efforts, thus it can be adopted by small businesses as well.
Benefits of eCommerce SEO
There are several benefits of eCommerce SEO, using which you can drive up website traffic and create wonders for your business.
- It helps to build brand awareness by ensuring your products feature on the first page of the search results. This lets audiences remember your brand name and builds recall value.
- It directs target audiences to your products and helps you find the right customer base.
- It lets you capture long tail keyword searches, which are responsible for more than 40 percent of total searches.
- Through regular optimizations, you can improve the content and user experience.
- It helps control paid search costs and focus more on capturing organic search, thus elevating your website’s quality score on Google.
- It improves your website’s click through rate (CTR) and leads to more conversions.
You can avail all these benefits and more by simply optimizing your eCommerce website for search engines. Now, if you’re wondering exactly how to do that, we have some tips and tricks for your benefit.
Also Read: 12 Must-Have Features for an Ecommerce Website
Top 5 Tips and Tricks for eCommerce SEO
The following tips cover almost all aspects of your website and can help you optimize your content and experience to fetch more users through search engine results.
1. Focus on content
The basis of all SEO strategies is your content. In eCommerce websites, you can optimize the content in every area, from product descriptions to metadata. However, make sure not to overuse a keyword as Google might punish stuffing and duplication.
There are several aspects of content you can fix.
- Include keywords in product descriptions but place them wisely and conservatively.
- Avoid duplicate product pages, content, or listings.
- Optimize titles, meta descriptions, and detail areas.
- Choose to write entertaining and compelling product descriptions, without removing any essential detail.
- Segregate your products into relevant categories.
- Keep your language and tone audience-friendly, depending on which niche you’re targeting.
For example, if you sell gadgets, you can get more technical, but if you’re selling fashion items, your language must be conversational and friendly.
2. Use keywords wisely
As you know, keywords work wonders in SEO and help to fetch you most of the traffic. However, the key is to use them wisely. It is not a good idea to blindly use keywords wherever you can and as many times as you want.
Perform in-depth keyword searches before selecting the ones that work best for your audience. Keyword tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMRush, etc., can give a list of keywords that have fetched the maximum traffic for a particular product. You can then include these in your content and even URL.
Make sure you place keywords in anchor texts, but don’t repeat them multiple times. You should also pick the ones that have high monthly search volumes and high intent. For eCommerce sites, long tail keywords can give you an edge over competitors. Think about how users would phrase their queries and include that in your content.
3. Improve the website
You can attract traffic through keywords and content, but when an interested buyer visits your website, it’s the user experience that matters. A bad website design or UX can discourage people from making the purchase or returning to your listing. This is how you can ensure the website functions perfectly.
- Ensure data security measures. As eCommerce websites store buyers’ addresses, contact details, and even bank account information, security is of utmost importance. Any neglect or breach would send alarming signals through your target audience.
- Your website should be mobile-friendly. The best thing is to develop a mobile app for shopping.
- The interface should be easy to navigate, and the purchase flow should not have many steps.
- Include internal links in product descriptions and suggestions.
- Make sure your website does not have broken links in the content.
- Your website should have a quick loading time.
4. Provide high-quality images
Shopping sites are based on visual representations. Hence, the images on your website must be of high-quality. Include multiple images of the same product, and videos wherever possible. Recently, videos have become popular in eCommerce websites to give users more idea of the product.
360-degree images are also a good idea for certain categories of products, like furniture, decor items, etc. While including images, ensure you optimize image captions and ALT tags for better results.
Track your progress
The final step towards a successful eCommerce SEO plan is to track your progress. This can be done through website analysis, regular SEO audits, and using keyword tools to find the highest performing words.
You should also track your competitors to find out which keywords and strategies are working for them. Share your product listings on social media, with links that lead to your website. Also, analyze your website’s performance and where most of the traffic is coming from. Based on the results, you can create new marketing plans.
Conclusion
SEO is not a one-time activity. You should keep optimizing and updating your website, based on the results of your previous campaign. With proper planning, exposure, and quality products, your website can surely become popular and highly profitable in a short time period. And if you’re unsure of how to implement eCommerce SEO, you can always ask an expert!
