Ecommerce SEO strategy - What is SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the art and science of persuading search engines to recommend your content to users as the best option, without paying a marketing fee for the clicks. The higher you rank, the more traffic search sites will send your way. More importantly, the traffic you attract will be organic, or free!

Because the fundamental goal for all search engines is to get users the most helpful, relevant, and credible results to their searches, there are a few things that you’ll need to do to make sure you’re at the top of that list. As Google is hands down the most popular of all the different search engines on both desktop and mobile, I’ll focus on efforts in meeting Google’s requirements for the scope of this article.

On-page SEO

Just as the name implies, on-page SEO refers to all the different aspects of your website that Google looks for that you can control directly. This can be further broken down into two types: technical and content-based.

Technical SEO

Technical SEO refers to the website architecture and all the technical requirements that Google looks for to ensure it can efficiently crawl, index, and render the various elements of your website.

Steersman’s websites are designed with technical search engine optimization covered. We take care of website speed, mobile friendliness, clean code for easy digestion, site security, and schema that’s easy for Google to understand. Our e-commerce websites are designed to be fast and easy for crawlers to index, enabling our clients to focus on managing their content. We are also diligently making regular improvements to ensure that we implement the latest strategies and solutions, keeping our websites at the top of every list.

Content SEO

Content SEO refers to the various ways you can optimize the actual content of your website to reach and attract the largest possible target audience. With technical SEO taken care of, as mentioned above, our clients are free to focus on the content of their website. Again, Steersman has made it simple to address every possible optimization opportunity.

SEO Keywords

SEO keywords are more like short phrases your potential clients might search for that you’ll want to identify in advance and incorporate into your site’s content. Whatever questions your clients might have, you want to ensure that your site has exactly the answers they’ll need, and that Google knows it!

You’ll want to do some research before you get started to identify a set of 3-8 keywords for each of your pages so that when you start writing text, you’ll have a relevant theme that would be easy for Google to identify and catalog.

Google’s search algorithm

Google utilizes a wide range of complex algorithms, combined with numerous ranking factors, to provide its users with the most helpful information quickly. The algorithms are updated regularly, and while most of the changes are small and won’t impact your SEO strategy, some are pretty extensive. Hence, it’s essential to test and adjust your implementation regularly.

Alt text for images

Images, videos, and other visual content are essential in gaining your users’ attention when they’re on your page. Long stretches of text can be tiresome, and visuals often go a long way in helping to explain complicated concepts. Specifying descriptive information such as alt title tags and assigning meaningful website slugs can help your pages rank better in image searches, which in turn can help attract users to your site.

Keywords in URL slugs

Another great strategy to employ is to ensure that the URL of all pages on your site includes the primary keywords relevant to that page. Most of the time, the URL will be the same as the main title of the page, but if you’ve decided to shorten the title for aesthetic reasons, it’s still helpful to have the full keyword in the URL, as it will show up in Google searches along with the title and the brief description.

Keyword overuse

As with many things, there are great benefits in showing restraint. If your site is so stuffed with keywords for the sole purpose of SEO that actual content suffers, Google will know. Since the search engine’s goal is to find legitimate and relevant answers to user questions, overusing SEO keywords might lead to your site not getting indexed or ranking lower. Choose 3-8 keywords per article or page in total. If you’re having a hard time fitting one in or it just doesn’t feel natural, it’s better to leave it out.

Lighthouse performance scoring

Lighthouse is an automated tool that audits your site for performance, best practices, SEO, and accessibility, providing helpful suggestions on how to improve the quality of your web pages. It’s a good idea to regularly test the various pages of your site using this tool to ensure that you’re staying on top of any fluctuations in what search algorithms look for.

Off-page SEO

Off-page SEO refers to all the different elements outside of your actual website that affect the site’s search engine result page (SERP) rankings. While you may not think you have much control over what happens outside of your website, that’s not true. One effective way to enhance your off-page SEO is through acquiring backlinks. When other reputable sites link back to your content, it shows that your content is relevant, trustworthy, and an authority on the subject at hand. Whether you’re building a social media presence, collaborating with influencers or media on relevant articles, or even making sure your site is listed in various directories or forums, it all adds up!

Refine and update as needed

Let’s say you spent a great deal of time doing the research, writing up content, and making sure that all of your product pages are perfect. That means you’re done, right? Not really.

SEO content optimization is always an educated guess made to appease a constantly shifting algorithm. Once everything is set, you’ll want to wait a couple of months to give your content a chance and gather some data, and then re-evaluate. Are some of the SEO keywords you selected just not gaining any traction? Is one of your pages ranking for a term you didn’t intend? Is Google now looking for certain things that you perhaps hadn’t initially considered? Now is the time to fine-tune the content.

Just make sure you’re not making too many changes at once. If too many key elements are updated, Google might assume the page is brand new and cause the traffic/ranking to drop until the algorithm “rebuilds trust”. Make minor adjustments, evaluate the effect, rinse, and repeat.

Steersman for great SEO

There are many things you can do to optimize your content for SEO, and Steersman offers many ways to make this simple for our clients to accomplish. You can control various metadata elements, including titles, descriptions, website slugs, and more, which allows you to incorporate SEO keywords into content, images, and slugs intuitively for optimal ranking opportunities. For more information on how Steersman can help you integrate great SEO practices into all the various elements of your website, take a look at our Steersman Webpage and Product SEO Configurations user guide.