The new year is well and truly underway, and with it comes new and improved techniques for conquering the online business world. In the complex field of SEO, you need to have a firm handle on a broad scope of topics and keep yourself updated. As a busy online entrepreneur, mastering SEO for eCommerce is most likely at the bottom of a long list.

But, if you’re serious about driving more traffic to your online store, it’s something you need to pay close attention to. There seems to be a constant stream of new strategies that promise to propel eCommerce business to new heights. There are only a handful of essential tactics that online business owners must stay on top. A recent blog post discussed the six social media trends for eCommerce in 2018, but what are the steps you need to take to maximize those trends?

The entire goal of SEO is this: making your online store easy to find. Sure, it is vital to publish top-notch content, but what use is it if people can’t find you? In the vast world of the world wide web, millions of shops are available for consumers to choose from. The key is being the one shop they find first and most consistently. 

Here are four fundamental SEO for eCommerce tactics you need to master to boost sales on your online store.

1. Go organic

Make sure social engines can find your site’s content quickly. Important pages must be visible and accessible to reach from the homepage. Use a tree structure for your pages that will reflect on your URL. If you lay everything out in a neat and organized manner, the more likely a consumer can avail of your products or services.

You can also set up an XML sitemap, which gives search engines information about all the pages within your site. An RSS feed provides search engines updates that allow them to track and record your content in their index. Both will keep your record fresh as they appear in the search results.

Moreover, experts have observed that people are using abstract keywords less and making use of complete sentences more in the search box. Consumers no longer enter “Paris hotels Eiffel tower” and instead asks, “Affordable hotels in Paris near the Eiffel Tower.” It is now increasingly more efficient to use the question-and-answer format and long-tail keywords when writing content such as product descriptions. It will enable search engines such as Google to find your content and extract the relevant parts.

2. Get to know Schema markup and use snippets

Source: Link-Assistant

Imagine that your website is your pantry and you’re preparing a meal for a bunch of hungry guests. You expect to make quick work out of it, grab what you need, and get cooking. But when you scan its contents, you see containers full of food items you barely recognize. Not only will this slow you down, but you can also easily mistake one thing for another and end up with a funky-tasting dish. You need to place labels on each container that will tell you exactly what the contents are.

A Schema template is just like a label-maker you would use to organize your pantry – it lets search engines better interpret your content. A Schema markup will not directly impact your rankings, but it will help tag entities within your content such as people and products.

While Schema tells a consumer what they can find in your content, snippets affect how your content is displayed in the search results. It determines whether a person will want to choose your content above the rest. Make sure to curate your product descriptions and images to answer consumer questions.

3. Consider the user’s perspective

The people who visit your site are the bottom line of your entire SEO strategy. Make sure to look at your site from their eyes. Conduct a search query, monitor your site’s speed, and make sure your site is easily accessible across all devices.

Write content that is worth the readers’ time, and also create visual content that will attract their attention. Recent statistics say that people are 55% more likely to remember information when paired with a relevant image. This is even more important in eCommerce where people assess the value of your product or service mainly based on visual content such as photos, videos, and other graphics.

Words may be essential to provide details and draw attention, but it’s what consumers see that will most likely convince them. You can also create embeddable images, which are well-designed images that other sites can easily embed into their content and will link back to your shop.

4. Strike up a conversation

Search engines such as Google are more likely to pay attention to your content if you have an active community on your website. Encourage comments by engaging with sites that have similar content or are relevant to yours. Google claims that it is better for people to comment on your site itself rather than on social media posts.

Most consumers seek to make an informed choice by reading the reviews of products, places, and services. Let your customers speak up by giving them the option of leaving feedback and ratings. One effective way to encourage customers to leave reviews is offering incentives such as coupons. Several online shops give their customer thirty percent off their next purchase if they leave reviews on a certain number of products. This may seem gimmicky, but between two shops selling the same product, shoppers are more likely to buy from the one with the most feedback.

SEO for eCommerce businesses is essential in today’s competitive market. These tips may seem like the same old boring strokes, but tactics that worked back in 2017 are looking to become more effective in 2018. There is a definite move towards creating long-term relationships and establish influential contacts. The goal is no longer to merely gain profit but also build credibility in a fast-growing industry.

Like any business venture, it is the goal of eCommerce entrepreneurs to provide the best service in the most convenient way. More and more people are becoming tech-savvy and reliant on the internet as a place to get answers. While spending more time look at a screen may not be the healthiest thing for their eyes, it is good news for eCommerce.

Great product images create a great user experience and a better search performance.

Let Pixc do its magic on your photos. Start today for FREE.

Author Bio

Callum is the head of marketing at Warble Media. They are a website design and digital marketing agency based in Dubbo, NSW, Australia.  

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