If you’re in doubt about how important SEO is for your eCommerce business, you should know that 93 percent of all online activity starts with a search.
Even if you have successfully established your eCommerce business, you may have neglected your SEO strategy.
However, if you want to take your business to the next level, you have to consider how you can benefit from eCommerce SEO now.
So, read below, and you’ll discover the top 10 SEO tips for eCommerce businesses. Let’s dive in!
1. Produce Great Content
SEO is all about improving your website’s search engine results. However, search engine algorithms are designed to improve the user experience.
That’s why you can’t produce content that delights the search engines at the cost of your audience. Google’s algorithm uses the quality of the content on your website to determine search engine rankings.
If your eCommerce website features products and services, you may have overlooked the value of blog content. You can’t simply produce long and boring descriptions of your products.
Create content that’s interesting and engaging for your target audience. Don’t forget to include your target keywords.
2. Add Meta Descriptions
If you don’t already know, the meta description is the 155 character section displayed on the search engine results pages. Basically, it provides a summary of each web page.
Search engine algorithms ‘crawl’ the meta descriptions for information to determine how your web page ranks.
That’s why it’s important to ensure your meta descriptions are accurate and unique. You can be penalized for using duplicate information in this section.
Provide your target audience with clear and comprehensive information about your web page. This way, you can improve your SEO ranking and increase your Click Through Rate (CTR).
3. Make It Easy for Users to Leave Reviews
Trust is important for any online business. A significant reason why eCommerce businesses fail is the lack of trust.
If you don’t provide your customers with the opportunity to leave reviews on your products or services, how can you hope to build trust between you and your customers?
We know that nearly everyone reads online reviews. In fact, 84 percent of people trust online reviews as much as they trust friends.
However, there’s more to reviews than just building trust. If you encourage your customers to leave reviews on your website, this provides you with free and relevant content that can boost your rankings.
4. Quality Link Building
Many eCommerce businesses are worried about leading customers to their competitors.
Why would you share your traffic with other websites?
By linking to a website with authority and credibility in your industry, you positively associate yourself with a big hitter. It’s always about the quality of links, not the quantity.
This is called outbound link building. However, the real money is on the inbound link building.
As you establish yourself as an influencer in your niche, other website owners will start to notice you’re linking to their pages. Most likely, they’ll return the favor.
Don’t be shy about reaching out to influencers on social media or via email to ask a backlink.
5. Don’t Let Your Website Slow You Down
According to the online magazine Total Retail, many eCommerce websites are ‘disturbingly slow.’
There are a number of reasons why your website may be slow. Have you cluttered it with too many videos and images? Have you included too many plug-ins?
If you don’t improve the loading speed of your website, you’ll be punished by Google’s algorithm.
Again, it’s not only about adopting practices that please the search engines. Nowadays, your consumers have high expectations for the performance of your website.
Nearly 50 percent of them expect your web page to load within two seconds. Every time you allow your pages to load for yet another second, you risk losing another seven percent of your customers.
6. Stop Your Dependency on Pay Per Click (PPC)
Are you spending your marketing budget on pay per click (PPC) advertisements?
Sure, it’s the quickest way to improve your ranking on search engines. The catch is you have to pay for it!
Now that you’re concentrating on your organic SEO strategy, you can gradually reduce your spending on PPC.
7. Mobile Responsive Website
Nearly 60 percent of eCommerce market share comes from purchases on mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets.
What if your target audience cannot access your website with a mobile device?
You can’t afford to miss out on such a large customer base.
Plus, Google penalizes websites that don’t provide a mobile-friendly experience.
8. Benefit from Image Searches
Do you take advantage of the potential of optimizing your image descriptions for SEO purposes?
You can search for images online. According to research, 63 percent of users click on the website where the image originated.
What if you don’t provide a relevant and unique description for the product images on your website?
You need to ensure you have edited the alt tags and included important keywords to improve your search results.
9. Track Your Competitors
Do you know the competitors in your niche? Who are the other big players in your market?
You can think about SEO as a game. You’re competing with other eCommerce websites for a top spot in search results.
Check your competitors by going “incognito” or using “private browsing” depending on the Internet browser you use. Look out for tricks and hacks they have mastered – and try to incorporate them in your SEO plan.
10. Promote Yourself on Social Media
Even though social media marketing is different than SEO, they’re somehow related.
Think of social media as another source of traffic to your website.
When you write a blog post, share it on your Facebook page. When you launch a new range of products, post photos on your Instagram page.
Learn More about eCommerce SEO for Your Business
Now that you know the importance of SEO for your eCommerce business, it’s time to implement our tips for improving your search engine rankings.
Do you want to discover more about how to develop your eCommerce SEO strategy? Check out our SEO services here!