SEO FOR E-COMMERCE: IMPROVE POSITIONING AND INCREASE SALES IN ECOMMERCE

 

Today we will see all the practices to be applied to improve the positioning of e-commerce on search engines. Practical tips to do SEO on e-commerce and optimize small and large online stores to increase traffic and turnover.

 Most e-commerce owners and managers understand little or nothing about SEO and search engine optimization (rightly so), and thus risk creating online stores through which it will be very difficult for them to obtain a good number of sales.

 Today we will see how to solve this problem thanks to SEO services for e-commerce, or all those practices and tips that will help you improve the positioning of your ecommerce. Below we will see all the SEO optimizations that can be implemented on an online store in order to increase visits and sales.

 Design it correctly

 This is an essential part of SEO, valid for all online realities, from institutional sites to personal blogs, but particularly important for an industry such as e-commerce, where the sites and structures at the base must boast certain characteristics. This first phase of design , closely related to the second of structuring, serves to lay the foundations of your online project , from the hosting plan that will be used to the keywords for which you will optimize your content and images.

 Choose a good host

 When a non-expert starts to structure their e-commerce, they usually pay very little attention to the choice of hosting, underestimating its importance. The infrastructure of the site , or the server on which it is hosted, is instead one of the most relevant factors for e-commerce, because many elements depend on it.

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First of all the speed of the site , which makes the shop more or less usable, but also the safety , obviously fundamental when it comes to online sales. Market analysis will help you choose which type of hosting to use, based on the estimated monthly traffic, and good hosting will allow you to increase the average duration of the site, decrease the bounce rate, guarantee security and guarantee an up -optimal time.

 Choose a good CMS

 For each e-commerce its own CMS . Philosophical maxims aside, there are many different CMSs in the world, from free to proprietary ones: just knowing how to choose the right one. My general advice is to choose one of the two solutions proposed below:

 1. WordPress + Woocommerce for online stores with relatively few products , around a hundred

 2. Prestashop / Magento when it comes to building shops with numerous items available (I prefer Prestashop, but they are tastes).

 Study the keywords

An error often made in the management and implementation of e-commerce is the failure to analyze and study the keywords to be used. This is one of the most important steps to take and must be done carefully and competently, because it will determine the success of the shop.

 First of all, it is necessary to analyze how much competition there is for the products you are trying to sell, and therefore how difficult it is to be able to position yourself with the exact match keywords of your articles. After that, it will be necessary to carry out an accurate keyword research , or to draw up a long list of related keywords and long-tail keywords  which will then form the urls of your products, your categories and your articles.

 This initial design phase is essential that it is carried out before the creation of the site, so that the product data sheets are inserted with correct URLs and SEO optimized: but this is something we will see later. To do this we are helped by numerous keyword research tools that we can use to structure our online shops.

 Create a good structure

 The product hierarchy and site structure is one of the most relevant elements for obtaining a good organic positioning of your site. The structure of e-commerce , together with the authoritativeness of the site (quantity and quality of incoming backlinks) and the creation of unique product sheets made with a good copy, already make up 80% of SEO and will help you ensure that your shop is positioned in the best positions.

 Precisely for this reason, the structure of the site must be designed down to the smallest detail , trying to connect the various products together, to divide them into carefully chosen categories, to position them close to the home page and so on. Now I show you in detail how to properly structure an e-commerce.

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Products close to the home page

 The home page is the most authoritative page of the site, therefore it is important to be able to place the products as close as possible to the home , especially those to which you are most focused. This means that creating a structure with too many sub-levels can lead to a difficulty for crawlers and users in understanding the hierarchy and identifying products.

 What I suggest you do is first of all to go to the products of your e-commerce in the home of your e-commerce, those in evidence, so that they receive more link juice, which favors their positioning. Furthermore, as regards the structure of the products, it is always better to have them no more than 2-3 levels apart.

 Crosslinking

 What is meant by crosslinking ? This is nothing more than the practice with which the different products link, or rather link, to each other. This practice is useful both for creating good internal linking and for showing visitors and customers other products they may be interested in.

 A good link between articles can be obtained in two ways: through the implementation of related products and through a good use of the company blog, which we will see later.

 Tag structure

 Proper use of tags is a particularly useful tool  when it comes to SEO in e-commerce. By correct we mean the use of a conscious tag , which is capable of linking different products together, so as to also improve the navigability of the site.

 The important thing is that the tags are used wisely. Here are some tips for using them in the best way:

 ·         Don't use keywords as tags

·         Don't stuff your articles / products with dozens of unnecessary tags

·         Start using tags only when you have a fair number of products (wait to have more or less 5 articles for each tag)

·         As a reference you can keep 3-4 tags per product

 Optimize it on the SEO side

 Here we are at the most interesting, most juicy part of this article, or the tips and practices to be implemented on the SEO side to improve the organic positioning of your e-commerce . In reality, the previous phases, such as the design of the structure and the analysis and research of keywords, or those that we will see later, such as link building , are part of SEO, but here we will analyze in detail the on-page SEO , or the improvements that can be applied to individual content.

 Zero point: unique and original descriptions

 What's the most important thing about an e-commerce? Obviously the items you sell inside. And what should SEO do? Many people will tell you that it must bring you visibility, but the truth is that it must bring you an increase in income, or an increase in the sales of your products .

 Precisely for this reason it is necessary that the product sheets of the goods you sell are treated in detail , that they present effective and persuasive descriptions , that they are drafted through SEO copywriting practices and that they present numerous images that show their aesthetics in all its detail. Only in this way will you be able to make your products stand out from those of the competition.

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Title tag

 The title tag is the code that indicates the title of a particular page and is an important SEO factor . The Tag Tile we insert is the one that will be displayed in the SERPs, or in the Google search results.

 The title plays a fundamental role in on-page SEO and for this reason it must be treated with particular attention. What you can do is:

 ·         Pay attention to the length of the title, in order not to risk that important parts are cut in the SERP

·         Make sure the title tags are unique for each different content / article / page

·         Be clear, specific and, if possible, persuasive

·         Enter the keyword as far left as possible

 SEO friendly url

 Well yes, both in e-commerce and in websites of any other nature, the optimization of URLs is fundamental. During the insertion of the products and in the creation phase of the various institutional pages / landing pages, you will have to make sure that each URL is clear, short and understandable.

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Rel = canonical tag

 The term "canonical" defines the "real" product page, the one that Google will have to take into consideration. If you are dealing with E-commerce full of identical product sheets , you can use this parameter to indicate to Google which of these will be the reference one, so as to prevent being penalized.

 In a nutshell, if there are many products that have mostly the same descriptions, you will have to identify the best performing and best optimized one and use the rel = "canonical" tag to refer all the other items to that particular product.

 Noindex

 When we are faced with thousands of product cards all the same, even the rel = "canonical" tag could not be enough to get us out of trouble. So what to do in this situation? The alternative is to use the noindex value, follow and assign it to the meta robots.

 In this way you will avoid indexing thousands of identical contents and you will be able to direct search engine bots to a site with a cleaner, tidier and more focused structure on the most important contents .

 H1 and H2

 Often I found myself in front of online stores that had a completely flat text, without the h1, h2 tags and so on. Of course these should not be used at random, filling the text with their insertion, but using the titration tags , from H1 to H6, inserting the keywords with which you are trying to position yourself, will give an excellent boost to your positioning .

 Not only that: the use of these tags makes it easier for visitors to your site to read, which is particularly important if you have a blog.

 Optimize images

 L ' SEO Image Optimization can be understood in two different ways, namely as the inclusion of numerous pictures of great quality, which portray the article in detail, showing it to be in front, behind and to the side, so as to positively influence decision-making of the customer , or like the optimization of dimensions, weight, title tag, etc., to improve its positioning .

 Usually only the second optimization is intended, which corresponds to the insertion of images curated on the SEO side, which carry the alt and title tag with the keyword and which have a very low weight, to make the page load faster, but to increase turnover is essential to optimize images even in the first way.

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 Duplicate content

 It often happens that I shiver when I visit e-commerce that present, for dozens and dozens of products, the exact same descriptions, sometimes even the exact same title tags , changed perhaps for 1 letter / number. The serious problem is that there is a risk of heavy penalties using duplicate content, for this reason it is essential to use unique texts for each individual product (unless the rel = canonical and noindex tags are used correctly).

 Link building

 It would be nice to believe that links no longer have value in positioning, unfortunately this is not the case. Backlinks are still an extremely important parameter, which determines, for a good 40%, the positioning of a site. This is especially true in e-commerce, where links play an important role.

 Precisely for this reason it is necessary to implement a blog, to try to earn / get spontaneous links, and to design link building campaigns, so as to increase the authoritativeness of your site. The links, however, are somewhat “burning “material, which if you are unable to handle it can bring more problems than benefits.

 If you do not have experience in the design and management of link building campaigns, contact an SEO NYC  consultant who will help you manage this precious resource, so that he can help you make the most money possible and, above all, avoid your site suffering heavy penalties.

 Guest post

 The Guest Blogging is today an excellent resource to be exploited, is to be known that to earn some valuable links to your store for free. Publishing articles for free on other portals will also help you build interesting relationships between Webmasters, a truly valuable asset, both online and in everyday life.

 Company blog

 Having a corporate blog, more commonly known as a corporate blog, well cared for within your e-commerce, can give an important boost to your business , both as regards the organic positioning of your products, and as regards brand awareness .

 The reasons that should lead you to choose to open a blog inside your online store are manifold:

 ·         Organic positioning of the site for long-tail keywords that bring profiled traffic

·         Obtaining valuable backlinks that increase the authoritativeness of the site

 Use social media

 Do Social Networks Directly Affect SEO? NO. Do they influence you indirectly? Yes, and they can give important pushes to their content, especially in realities like these. Thanks to social networks, you can get important sources of visits, which will help you position your e-commerce.

 Facebook

 Facebook is currently the best showcase where you can advertise your articles, especially if related to certain niches. On this Social you will find thousands of people daily potentially interested in your articles and products.

 All you have to do is take care of social media marketing activities correctly, creating creative copies that will attract new customers to your page. My advice, agrees with 90% of the experts, is to go and focus on visual content, mainly video .

 YouTube

 I'm biased, being a big fan and supporter of SEO YouTube, but I think this platform is much more than just a social network. YouTube is the second most used search engine in United State and hosts millions of views every day.

 If you know how to use this platform correctly, perhaps by relying on someone who deals with YouTube Marketing, you will get great visibility and you can significantly increase visits to your e-commerce.

 Pinterest

 Personally Pinterest is a Social that I do not suggest to everyone indiscriminately but which, if applied to the right niches, can bring a lot of target traffic . For example, if your e-commerce deals with DIY (do it yourself), furnishings, design or more generically sales of aesthetically beautiful items, then you can get an important source of traffic from its use.

 The only problem with Pinterest is that, in order to be exploited correctly, it requires pinning many images, from 10 to 20, every day. Obviously you will have to fin not only the images of your articles, but also images of third parties: as long as they are beautiful and in theme with the niche of your shop.

 Improve the UX

 The User Experience is one of the most interesting and stimulating elements to take care of, and at the same time one of the factors that can help you make a difference compared to your competitors. Below we will see how to improve the usability of the site and the user experience, elements that increase the time spent on the site, trust and, indirectly, sales.

 Increase your speed

 It doesn't really matter if the PageSpeed , or the speed of loading the pages , directly influences the organic positioning; what matters is that, if a site is slow, you can be sure that your potential customer will prefer to browse a faster one, often abandoning your own even before it has loaded.

 Reviews

 Now will I say a rather uncomfortable truth, ready? If you are afraid of the reviews it means that your product / service is of low quality.

 This is reality. If in your e-commerce you will always be sincere with the customer , you will insert real photos of your products, you will write descriptions and specifications consistent with the product sold and this will be of good quality, then you can be sure that your reviews will be filled with stars.

 However, if you are not sincere with the customer and you are trying to offer him a low-alloy article, be sure that the reviews will be drastic.

 Their inclusion, however, can help many potential customers to conclude sales, because their reading positively influences the customer's decision-making process. After all, reviews are the best source of social proof .

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Dynamic list of best-selling products

 A dynamic list of the best-selling products, as perhaps those on offer or more recent, if inserted in the home of your site you can help yourself, and not a little. Google, and especially its crawlers, love dynamic pages, which update and change, so it will appreciate this kind of list.

 Mobile site

 Searches from mobile devices are now becoming almost all of the searches performed. Every day 80% of searches are done through a mobile device. This means that not having a responsive site, optimized for tablets and smartphones, greatly affects the user experience of most users.

 An unresponsive site will be abandoned within seconds, which will dramatically decrease your sales.

 Increase sales with Digital Marketing

 We talked about on-page and off-page SEO for e-commerce, we talked about User Experience and structuring, but you can still do something more to improve sales on your ecommerce. These last points are not strictly related to organic positioning, but they are powerful Web Marketing tools that will allow you to conclude more sales.

 Integrate a newsletter

 Compared to a decade ago, the communication techniques and tools through which you reach your customers have changed considerably. Today there are Social Networks, Google Adwords and so on, but a tool still widely used and still very profitable is email marketing.

 Integrating a newsletter into your e-commerce, perhaps highlighting it in the blog, is an excellent strategy for obtaining the emails of possible customers, who will be able to be contacts for special offers and discounts, so that even old customers return to buy at your shop.

 And to date, integrating a newsletter system is extraordinarily simple: just use one of the many services, such as that of Mailchimp, and integrate the banners on the site with plugins, or take advantage of Facebook, where you can create posts for collect mail.