One of the great things about the Internet is anyone can open an eCommerce store and sell their goods, services, and ideas. However, this also ends up the downfall of many companies as well. Now, competition doesn’t just come from local competitors but international online retailers as well. Due to this, there are countless other online stores selling similar, if not the exact same product. To stand out from the rest of the competition, an eCommerce store needs to take advantage of these six organic SEO marketing tips.
Skip the Duplicate Content
When creating individual product pages for an eCommerce website, far too many owners repeat the same information one page after the next. Often times, an online store features similar products. A t-shirt designer may produce the same visual print on a man’s tee as on a woman’s tee. Due to this, they repeat the same description for the two different products on two different pages. The problem with this is search engines such as Google penalize repeat content. Creating original product descriptions, no matter how similar, ensures search engines do not push down search results.
According to a website audit that looked over 200 million-page crawls spanning between 2013 and 2015, around 29 percent of all websites contain some sort of duplicate content. Duplicate content, in itself, isn’t bad. A single website may share similar headers or statistics as other pages. According to Google, duplicate content is “substantive blocks of content within or across domains that either completely matches other content or are appreciably similar” (Neil Patel, 2016).
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Now, Google does not necessarily punish similar content appearing on varying pages of a single domain. However, once the content appears on multiple domains, search engines begin to question the authenticity of the content. Due to the fact, most eCommerce stores sell similar products to other retailers online, using the same product description copy may come off as stealing, or plagiarizing, the other duplicate content. To avoid any kind of search engine penalties, the best practice is to avoid duplicating anything on a single page and to create fresh, new and original product descriptions, even if the products come from a third-party manufacturer.
The Importance of Product Reviews for Organic SEO
There’s a reason why major online retailers showcase product reviews. It now only allows potential customers to see what previous customers think of the product, but it also helps improve the organic search engine optimization of the particular item as well. Search engines such as Google do not only provide links back to online stores but also offer direct-click shopping opportunities, where similar products are placed side-by-side. Product listings with included reviews tend to perform better than those lacking reviews.
In 2016 data collected by YotPo, which consists of over 150,000 businesses, 30,000 of the businesses implemented product reviews over the course of the year. The YotPo information shows the average product listing, at the beginning of the first month of published reviews, averaged just under 5,500 views per month. However, by the end of month nine, the same products with included product reviews increased to nearly 8,000 views per month. These numbers are based on Google organic page views.
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Product reviews help potential customers make educated decisions on their purchases. According to MOZ (2015), 67 percent of consumers are influenced by online reviews. So, by including these reviews with a product listing, it helps not only increase Google’s organic views, but also boost sales.
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Include Meta Descriptions For All Pages
Some confusion lingers around the idea of meta descriptions and the overall importance. While meta tags are no longer necessary, due to how search engines now crawl pages, meta descriptions play a very important role in improving organic SEO marketing and bringing in additional visitors to a given page.
Search engines often take the written meta description and use it as the product blurb directly under the listed website link in search results. Providing insights into what a product is before an individual even clicks on a link helps bring in additional views. However, it is important to not mass-produce meta descriptions for every product page. Each page needs a unique meta description, otherwise, search engines might kick in the duplicate content flag. Instead, according to Element Three (2015), the best performing meta descriptions follow five simple rules.
First, the meta description needs keyword optimization. It should still flow naturally, but the product keywords must appear in the description. The second step is the length. The description maxes out at 155 characters. Google measures the characters a bit differently now (by pixel length instead of character numbers, so an “m” counts for more space than an “l”). Aiming for 155 characters is desirable. However, only 34 percent of websites currently hit between 71 and 34 characters (the optimal length). 30 percent go over, which means the entire description will not appear under the website link, while another 28 percent don’t even have a meta description.
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Step three, as mentioned earlier, is having unique meta descriptions for every page. Duplicate descriptions hinder the listing’s SEO. Step four is simply creating a meta description. If there is no meta description created search engines pull the first 155 sentence from the product page. Chances are, this isn’t 155 characters and it may not even have desired keywords.
The fifth and final step in creating desirable meta descriptions is including a call to action. It helps propel a potential customer into clicking on the product link.
Optimize eCommerce Pictures
When bringing in organic search results, traditional text search is not the only option. Visual search through images provides an entirely different avenue for SEO marketing. Despite this, not enough eCommerce owners properly optimize product pictures.
When an image is uploaded to a website, search engines do not know what the image is. Due to this, it is important to tell the search engine exactly what the image is with the help of ALT tags. Each ALT tag needs to directly connect to the product listed. This way, when someone performs a visual search, the product’s image appears. According to SEMrush, 45 percent of all websites are missing ALT tags connected to the images, while another 10 percent have broken images that do not load at all. These are missed SEO opportunities an eCommerce website needs to take advantage of.
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Focus on Speed
There are many variables at play when it comes to how search engines (namely Google) rank websites. One of the biggest factors is how fast the website loads. Not only does Google rank these sites higher, but also visitors to a slow-moving site are more likely to back out and visit a competing site. There are all sorts of ways to boost Internet speed, ranging from removing unnecessary coding to properly formatting pictures (compressing the images down from the original, large file format).
According to Torque Magazine (2015), just a one second delay in the website loading results in seven percent lower conversion rates, 11 percent fewer views and a 16 percent decrease in overall customer satisfaction. According to the same research, two seconds is the peak load time, as at four seconds 25 percent of visitors will abandon the website.
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Mobile Friendly
More time is now spent using mobile devices than on desktop computers. Due to this, search engines now rank mobile-friendly websites higher on mobile searches. Creating a mobile-friendly website doesn’t just boost a site’s organic SEO marketing. It also helps bring in and convert visitors into leads and sales. According to Pixel by Pixel, 40 percent of customers have gone to a competing website after a bad mobile experience. Additionally, 50 percent of all mobile searches eventually lead to a sale, so ensuring a company has a mobile-friendly website will instantly pay off.
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There are many other SEO marketing tips out there a business needs to take advantage of. However, these six organic SEO marketing tips will help develop a strong online advertising presence without relying on one inbound method. By taking advantage of organic opportunities, any eCommerce store will begin separating itself from the competition.
Bio:
Teo has built and optimized hundreds of successful ecommerce stores for his clients and he teaches others exactly how to do it step by step at MyEcomClub.
