Why do you need an eCommerce checklist? Ecommerce sites are continually evolving and changing to include the latest products and information. Continued site updates leave potential gaps in SEO, which add up to lost opportunities for your business. Without a checklist, you may overlook chances to rank on the first page of Google and reach out to more customers.
Galileo Tech Media’s professional team follows a detailed eCommerce SEO checklist to help clients maximize their online presence. Let’s take a look at a few of the many aspects of SEO we consider when analyzing and auditing an online store.
Start With Security
All eCommerce sites should use “HTTPS” at the beginning of every site URL to ensure all information shared on the site is encrypted. If the site starts with “HTTP,” the first step is to establish a secured website to establish trust with visitors.
Keep in mind eCommerce sites collect personal data, including financial information. Users expect sites to be secure, so they confidently make purchases without concerns about exploiting their data. Plus, the site should be ready to accommodate increased traffic from SEO.
Perform Keyword Research
Keyword research and competitor analysis set the groundwork for eCommerce success. How are people searching for your types of products? What are competitors doing to get attention? Tools such as BrightEdge and Google Search Console provide updated analytics to analyze current site performance to determine which pages are performing well and those that need improvement.
Low competition, highly trafficked keywords help eCommerce sites improve ranking in their chosen niche market. Start by viewing the sitemap to do an inventory of every page on your site. Choose organic keywords, including related long-tail and short-tail keyword phrases, to pepper into your content, title tags, and metadata. Optimize your most important pages first, then link to them in secondary pages to boost ranking.
Examine On-Page SEO
On-page SEO drives targeted traffic to your eCommerce site because they are searching for what you offer. Title tags and meta descriptions are the first things searchers find, so they have to be compelling and optimized. Adding relevant keywords to the metadata helps search engines find your content. A full description with a call to action encourages searchers to click on the result.
Every product page and category page of an eCommerce site should be optimized, including long-tail keyword phrases. Unique descriptions stand out from the competition and help more people find your products. Pages are analyzed and revised based on performance, starting with top-performing pages first. Adding schema markup ensures products are well-represented in the SERPs. Also, examine the URLs for accuracy and SEO, so visitors land on the right page.
Technical SEO
In a competitive online market, users expect sites to load quickly and provide a seamless experience, which puts technical issues on the eCommerce SEO checklist. Online stores have specific technical issues, such as frequent duplicate content occurrences when new products are added. Broken links and orphaned pages can cause consumers to surf away from your site.
As more people shop on-the-go, it is crucial for eCommerce sites to be mobile-friendly. Other factors to examine include keyword cannibalization, when a site unintentionally targets the same keyword in multiple pages or posts. Categories should be well-organized and never more than three clicks away from the main page. Our team assesses site functionality to improve SEO and the user experience.
Off-Page SEO and Link Building
Off-page SEO includes social media sharing and link building. When your site appears as a link at another site, it acts as a vote for your site. Plus, quality backlinks expose your business to a larger audience, which might not have otherwise found your products. Sharing your latest blog posts and products on social media puts them in front of more eyes.
Our team determines where competitors have backlinks to find additional opportunities for your business. Articles, reviews, and directories are all resources that link back to your site and help more people see your offerings. We also analyze your profile for spammy backlinks that could do more harm than good.
Content Marketing Strategies
Fresh content and new products keep people coming back to your eCommerce site for more. Well-written and optimized content attracts search engines and resonates with readers. Include internal links to other products and services at your site and informative external links from top sites. Examine trends and perform keyword research to get ideas for new content.
Quality content brands a business and establishes it as a trusted authority. Well-crafted content may appear in Google SERP features, such as snippets or People Also Ask. We search for opportunities to address your target audience’s questions to create content people want to read and share. The more the content is shared, the higher it ranks on the search engines -ultimately driving targeted traffic and improving conversions. Content is crafted based on the platform – Amazon SEO differs from traditional SEO in several significant ways.
Are you overwhelmed by the details on an eCommerce SEO checklist? Let our team help you find lost opportunities to rank on the search engines and reach out to your target audience in a meaningful way.