What is SEO eCommerce? - [All you need to know]

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What is SEO eCommerce?:

SEO eCommerce, also known as eCommerce SEO, is the process of optimizing an online store or e-commerce website to improve its visibility and ranking on search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo.

The goal of SEO eCommerce is to attract more organic traffic to the e-commerce website, increase conversions, and ultimately boost sales.

“SEO should increase revenue or address larger business needs: increasing MQLs, driving e-commerce purchases, or becoming a larger percentage of incoming opportunities to offset paid media costs” – MarketingProfs

SEO for eCommerce:

In order to effectively implement SEO eCommerce strategies, it’s important to understand the unique challenges that come with optimizing an online store.

Such websites typically have a large number of product pages, which can make it difficult to ensure that each page is optimized for the right keywords and phrases.

Additionally, they often have dynamic content, such as product descriptions and customer reviews, which can make it challenging to maintain a consistent focus on SEO.

“Organic is the only channel that drives reliable long-term traffic. It can become a primary revenue generation channel when a holistic, effective organic marketing and SEO strategy is implemented” - Conductor

How to improve SEO of eCommerce website?:

To overcome challenges and improve the SEO of an eCommerce website, there are certain best practices that should be followed of which the most important ones include:

1. Conducting keyword research:

This involves identifying the most relevant and profitable keywords and phrases for an e-commerce website. This research should take into account factors such as search volume, competition, and user intent [or search intent].

2. Optimizing product pages:

Each product page on an e-commerce website should be optimized for the target keywords identified through keyword research. This includes optimizing the page title, meta description, headings, and content.

3. Creating descriptive product descriptions:

Product descriptions should be detailed and informative, using keywords and phrases naturally throughout the text.

4. Building high-quality backlinks:

Backlinks are an important factor in SEO e-commerce as they signal to search engines that other websites consider the e-commerce site to be a valuable resource.

Building high-quality backlinks can help to improve the authority and ranking of an e-commerce website.

The best method for building backlinks is to use a blog as a platform on an e-commerce website and to link it as necessary to the product pages through value-driven blog content posts written on niche topics and also linking to blog post pages if guest blogging is adopted.

Internal linking between various pages on an e-commerce site is another important consideration for better search engine optimization.

“A highly optimized inbound marketing strategy blends content marketing, organic social, and SEO while helping fuel the demand generation funnel” – Conductor

5. Ensuring mobile-friendliness:

Many consumers now shop online using mobile devices, so it’s important that eCommerce websites are optimized for mobile viewing. In other words, mobile SEO is gaining popularity.

As per the Digital 2023 Global Overview Report by Meltwater and We Are Social, the share of web traffic by devices is as follows: mobile phones (59%), laptops and desktop computers (38.99%), and tablets (1.98%).

SEO tips for an eCommerce store:

Here are the best 6 SEO tips to rank e-Commerce websites:

“Total U.S. ecommerce sales from mobile devices are expected to hit more than $431 billion, a nearly 20% increase over 2021” - channable and Marketing Dive [2022]

Overall, SEO eCommerce is a critical component of any successful online store.

By following best practices and consistently optimizing for search engines, eCommerce businesses can improve their visibility, attract more traffic and ultimately increase sales.

That being said, SEO isn't a "quick fix" for ranking; it's an ongoing process that requires constant effort and monitoring.

Do you know? - “The B2B eCommerce market is predicted to create revenue of $18 trillion by the end of 2026, with a CAGR of 19% between 2021 and 2026” – Retail Dive and TreviPay

Benefits of SEO for eCommerce:

Here are the top 7 benefits of SEO for e-commerce businesses:

1. Increased visibility:

SEO helps your e-commerce website to rank higher on search engines, which means more visibility for your products and services. This increased visibility can lead to more traffic, more leads, and more sales.

2. Better user experience:

SEO is not just about ranking higher on search engines, but also about providing a better user experience for your customers.

A well-optimized website with proper navigation and structure can make it easier for users to find what they're looking for.

“Google prefers pages that prioritize user experience. So you should consider both on-page SEO factors (like SEO-friendly content) and technical SEO factors (like page speed)” – Semrush

3. Cost-effective:

SEO is a cost-effective way to drive traffic to your e-commerce website. Unlike paid advertising, you don't have to pay for every click or impression. Once you've optimized your website, the traffic will keep coming in.

4. Long-term results:

SEO is not a quick fix, but it's a long-term strategy that can provide long-lasting results. Once you've optimized your website, you'll continue to rank higher on search engines, which means more traffic and more sales.

5. Brand awareness:

SEO can help you build brand awareness for your e-commerce business. When you rank higher on search engines, more people will see your brand name and logo, which can help to increase brand recognition.

6. Competitive advantage:

With so many e-commerce businesses out there, SEO can give you a competitive advantage. By optimizing your website better than your competitors, you can rank higher on search engines and attract more customers.

7. Measurable results:

With SEO, you can track and measure your results using tools like Google Analytics and Google Search Console.

This means you can see exactly how much traffic you're getting, where it's coming from, and how well it's converting into sales.

Therefore, the benefits of SEO for eCommerce cannot be underestimated, especially when paid campaigns are getting expensive including huge competition in a post-pandemic era where things are moving online so rapidly than ever.

“The goal for SEO shouldn’t be to get them to buy right now, it should be to get them to follow along to the point where buying your product isn’t just a possibility, but the only path they consider taking” - audienceplus

FAQs [SEO eCommerce]:

Is SEO important for eCommerce?:

Yes, SEO is highly important for eCommerce. It can help increase visibility, provide a better user experience, drive traffic to your website, build brand awareness, give you a competitive advantage, and provide measurable results.

Importance of SEO in eCommerce:

The importance of SEO in eCommerce is that it acts as a free traffic driver to e-commerce online business stores.

In other words, you don’t need to pay anything unlike in paid advertising when SEO is implemented consistently, following SEO trends and monitoring.

“The current $492 billion global social commerce industry is expected to grow three times as fast as traditional ecommerce to $1.2 trillion by 2025” - Accenture via Channable

Pro-Tip: It is less expensive to have an internal SEO team [at least with 1-3 members, including for content production] than to outsource to SEO services or agencies. Of course, this depends on your business commitments and goals.

Here's related information that might be useful to you – SEO for Social Media [12 Key Insights] to improve reach and boost engagement.

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P.S.S: Please don’t forget to forward this blog post to your network so they can get the best tips, practices, strategies, education, resources, & tools to help their businesses grow [sharing is caring].