Shopify is one of the best platforms out there for an eCommerce entrepreneur to set up their online business. Getting more traffic to your Shopify store is always top of mind for any business owner.
This is where SEO marketing comes in because when done well, it can deliver consistent, high-quality traffic without having to pay for it. Search engine optimisation (SEO) is the process of generating more organic (ie not paid) traffic from search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo.
For example, when you search for something on Google, you see ten organic results on a search engine results page and a handful of paid ads depending on the popularity of the search terms you enter.
E-commerce SEO is the process of ensuring that your Shopify store pages appear in the top ten organic search results for the search terms your potential customers are likely to enter. There are more SERPs out there but the further you get from the first page, the less traffic you will be able to attract to the website.
Simply put, SEO is the process of helping search engines consider your site more relevant than others. When a specific query is searched to generate more organic traffic to your web site. So to start your eCommerce SEO journey, you first need to find out some basics that will be very helpful for your site.
First, you need to get a paid plan (since Shopify doesn't allow search engines to index trial account stores) and you need to secure an attractive custom domain for your Shopify store which will help your store to become much more powerful.
SSL, which encrypts the data sent between your users and your site, and double-checks next to make sure your Shopify theme is fast-loading and mobile-friendly.
Finally, you'll need to set up Google Analytics and Google Search Console separately to track who's visiting your store and what keywords it's ranking for, respectively, then you'll need to submit your XML sitemap to GSC.
Once you've laid this foundation, here are some SEO marketing tips you should use for your site.
1. Create a good site structure
The content of your Shopify store is very important to your SEO success. The easier it is for visitors to find what they are looking for and the more time they spend browsing your site, the higher search engines will rank it. A good web site structure helps users navigate your site more easily and helps search engines crawl it better. A good quality, SEO-friendly site structure pays attention to its hierarchy. So this means that the main sections (known as "collections" in Shopify) are at the top, with subsections below them, and then product pages (known as "products" in Shopify).
However, never create unnecessary sections and sub-sections on the site because easy user navigation is always a priority. Also, note that Shopify doesn't make a distinction between categories and subcategories so to create a subcategory, you must create a "collection" page and then nest it within a hierarchy.
2. Conduct keyword research
Keywords help search engine users easily find your Shopify store and help search engine bots index your content. This is why you need to select keywords in the keyword selection field that appeal to both human audiences and search engines and have a solid SEO marketing strategy.
Keyword research is the process of identifying the keywords your target audience is using to find products like yours in the SERPs, how many people are using a particular search term each month, and how much competition there is for that particular keyword.
The first step in doing keyword research is “What search terms should I use to find the products I want to sell The latest social media trends in your product niche can give you insights into these buyers and personalities, online forums.
Also, remember that search engines crawl title tags, meta descriptions, URLs, image alt-text, etc. to make sense of a site's content before indexing it. So you should search for a word or phrase that describes your Shopify store. See what these top leaders are using to get ideas for their keywords..
Also among keyword research tools -
There are a number of free keyword research tools for any beginner to choose from, including Keyword Explorer, UberSuggest, SEM Rush, and Google Keyword Planner.
3. Optimize your web content
After knowing which keywords and terms to target well, the next steps are to include them in your title tags, meta descriptions, URLs, image alt-text, homepage, product descriptions and blog content wherever appropriate. Optimizing the website.
So, make sure you insert your keywords naturally into the copy (be it the homepage or product page or blog) and you're careful not to make it awkward or too obvious for readers because that will drive them away.
Refrain from copying other's keywords as the unethical practice of inserting inappropriately large number of keywords into any of the above site elements in an attempt to disproportionately attract search engines can get your site blacklisted sooner or later.
Another major problem that can get your site blacklisted by search engines is duplicate content. So you need to write unique descriptions for your product or collection pages instead of just copying them on the manufacturer's websites.
Also, you should avoid any plagiarism or taking other's content in your blog content.
4. Link building
A study found that the more backlinks a page has, the more organic traffic it attracts from Google. Backlinks are a step that is one of the most important factors in your store's eCommerce SEO success because they convey to search engines how credible and trusted other websites are to your site.
A good place to start link building is to find out which sites are currently linking to your competitors' sites. Because they are likely to find your site relevant enough to link too.
You can use various tools to identify these sites and you can then contact them and request to include links to your pages in their content.
5. Content Marketing
Some site visitors will come to your store ready to buy right away.
That's why having educational content like blog posts helps you retain them and set them firmly on their journey to buying from you in the future. Also with link building mentioned above, it is much easier to get links to informative content from other websites than directly to your product pages.
The first step is to identify a target readership and then write unique, engaging and compelling content that will appeal to both search engines and human readers for SERP rankings.
The more shares, link-backs your blog content gets, the better. This is where consistency comes in. You need to update your blog content regularly to keep your readers coming back to your site.
Ultimately, SEO marketing plays a very important role in the e-commerce success of any Shopify store, and although the results often take a while to start showing, they are always totally worth the effort.
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