In today’s large playing field of selling your products online, you’ll have to work smart if you want your e-commerce strategy to succeed. Today, we’re going to cover 10 SEO tips for ecommerce sites for improving your site which will help increase your revenues and boost your site to the top of the e-commerce ladder. Let’s begin!
1. Compile an In-depth Keyword Research Report
Centering around your business products, services, brand, industry and demographics of your targeted customers, you’ll have to pick specific long tail keyword search terms and keyword phrases and test them on something like Google Keyword Tools to ascertain the estimated traffic and competitiveness for each keyword phrase.
Your report should include a list of the keywords for which your competitors are ranking high as having a clear idea of your competitor’s keyword strategy will give you a better idea of what keywords you should be going after. This will be the foundation for any SEO tips for ecommerce sites that you may find while looking for information.
2. Check your Site’s Structure. Make sure it is Easy to Use
One thing to remember about your viewers once they arrive on your e-commerce site is that they are there to shop and not spend a ton of time looking around at every product category if extensive. Because of this, the structure of your site needs to be user friendly (easily navigable) for your audience and not frustrate them which could lead to high bounce rates.
3. On-Site SEO is Crucial
Leaving out basic search engine optimization is not an option as basic on-page SEO still serve as the life -blood of your e-commerce site’s search ranking and visibility on the web. Be sure you optimize your Title Tags, Meta Descriptions, content structure, URL name and various Alt Image attributes as well as Rich Snippets in the most appropriate manner.
4. Create and Utilize an e-Commerce Site Blog Often
Some online merchants tend to avoid having a blog integrated to their e-Commerce site. Many seem to not find a blog useful because they don’t understand the underlying reason for having a blog nor how much traffic a blog can bring to your site. If you are one of those people, you are absolutely wrong. A frequently updated blog is crucial for every website as it lets Google Search bot believe that something new is happening on your website and will trigger indexing of new pages. A blog also allows you to talk and expand on your products and services and drive traffic over to your main product or services web page. Lastly, you can optimize these pages for more keyword phrases you are going after to increase your footprint within the search engines like Google and Bing.
5. Integrate Social Media for Services and Product Sharing
How can Social Media sharing help you? Well, people do really share products, services, news and stories, recommendations, etc, especially if it interests them. Common and highly visible sites normally used for social media sharing include Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Google+.
Social media sharing has become an integral part of spreading a company’s branding campaign and to spread the word on what they have to offer and how they are different from other products and services you may buy.
6. Customer Satisfaction and Reputation Management
The reputation of your e-Commerce website is an important factor for influencing a buyers decision on whether to buy or not from your site. Negative reviews can hurt your brand reputation, but responding to negative reviews in harsh or undiplomatic manner or being completely indifferent towards them can be even more harmful. Reply to every review diplomatically and even to those reviews that have been good. Sometimes it’s nice to know someone at the company you purchased a product is actually reading the review and taking things into account.
7. Make your Site Mobile Friendly
When designing your website to be future proof, look into a responsive web design (a more affordable solution that uses CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) technology to create a single version of a website that auto-adjusts to display properly on all devices except the oldest cellphones) or mobile friendly site. No business can afford to ignore the fact that more than a billion people primarily access the Web from mobile devices. The design of your website can be kept simple but should be such that it can be opened and navigated easily on most mobile devices.
8. Catchy Content Marketing
Offer something more through your content marketing articles. Let your viewers learn something new and catchy to keep them hooked and wanting to read more. Wondering how can you do this with an e-Commerce site? Just keep your product niche in mind. Flashy product images, or interesting stories, new milestones, etc will hopefully increase page stickiness whereby users stay around longer on your website.
9. Acquire Authority Backlinks Only
It is important to remember that any backlinks you acquire pointing to your site should be high in trust and reputation and from authoritative websites only. Don’t try quick hit backlinks from spam networks or low trusted sites which ultimately may kill your website within search and land you in the bad graces of Google and a sandbox of your choosing. Many have learned the hard way with Google’s Penguin 1.0 and Penguin 2.0.
10. Form Relevant Social Media Channels for Increased Visibility
Don’t ignore an incredible looking Facebook or Pinterest page or Twitter background promoting your brand or website of products and services that you offer. A good strategy is to make it personal in order to gain increased referral traffic and visibility from a target audience who can convert to better overall leads.
Have any other SEO tips for ecommerce sites you’ve worked on? Let us know. If you’re looking for a professional SEO agency to assist in your goal of increasing website traffic, don’t hesitate to contact us.
About the Author: Brad Fogel
