Getting an eCommerce website up and running is no longer a big deal, even for small businesses. However, the real challenge starts when the website does not generate or has low sales.
A great eCommerce developer can help you build a great eCommerce store, but who can help you increase sales from your store?
You can hire an SEO expert, learn some essential yet helpful SEO tips, and implement them yourself. Learning and implementing SEO strategies on an eCommerce website becomes even easier if your website has been developed using WordPress. If you are a self-learner passionate about implementing new techniques on your eCommerce website, this blog post is for you.
In this blog post, I will share 8 SEO secrets for growing eCommerce business sales from your WordPress online store.
Are you ready? Let’s start.
Secret #1 Combine keywords strategy
What keywords will you use to attract traffic to your eCommerce website? Are you trying to rank for the short keywords like ‘scarves,’ ‘women scarves’, etc., or long tail keywords like ‘perfect pink scarves for women’ and ‘buy summer scarves for women’?
With the growing awareness among internet users, major search engines have discovered that people use long-tail keywords when looking for their desired products or services. For example, instead of searching for ‘scarves’ or ‘women’s scarves,’ they use keywords like ‘where do I get the best scarves’ or ‘sale and offers on scarves.’
So, don’t underestimate the power of long tail keywords while defining the list of keywords for your eCommerce website. Having said this, it’s always good to consider both short and long-tail keywords while preparing a list of your targeted keywords.
Secret #2 Loading speed optimization
If you think optimizing your eCommerce store’s loading speed will only help your potential customers navigate, you are not 100% correct. Search engines like Google have also started considering webpage loading speed as an essential factor in ranking a website on their search result pages. That said, if your eCommerce website loads slower than the acceptable speed, it will most likely kill your conversions.
Luckily, there are several ways to enhance the loading speed of your website if you are using a WordPress-based eCommerce website. Many free and paid plugins are available in the WordPress repository that you can install and use in your store to enhance its loading speed with just a few clicks.
If you are not using WordPress and are unsure how to improve the loading speed, just hire a web developer and get it done professionally. This small investment is worth it.
Secret #3 Blogging
Create a blog on your eCommerce store and start writing exciting content there. The more content you write on your eCommerce blog, the better attention it will get from search engines. Why is it so? Because search engines like Google love those websites or eCommerce stores that publish unique and knowledge-rich content for their users.
For example, if your eCommerce store sells women’s scarves, you could probably write and publish content on ‘How to choose the best scarves for summer’ or ‘Which type of scarves are good for winter.’
Additionally, you can include some widgets with calls to action for your products to eventually increase your eCommerce sales.
As we all know, there is no better blogging platform than WordPress. So, you’ve got another reason to choose WordPress for your eCommerce website development.
Secret #4 Title & Description tags
If you possess some SEO knowledge, you probably know about meta tags like title and description tags. The title tag is what you see as a one-liner headline in search engine results, and the meta description is shown below the title tag.
It may be interesting to know that these tags can be managed for each webpage of your eCommerce website. A few of the best plugins, like Yoast SEO, help you manage meta tags quickly and efficiently.
For the title tag, you must include your main keyword, but make sure that it is relevant to the content theme of your webpage. If it’s a product page, you can add keywords like Price:$199 or Buy Now, encouraging users to click the link from the search engine listing page.
For the description tag, you must explain the benefits of your product along with the relevant keywords.
Secret #5 Image Alt tags
Most of us know how search engines recognize images. For those who don’t know, let me share that it’s through the photos’ alt tags. The alt tag is the text that appears when users place their cursor on the images; it shows a small text.
The core function of an alt tag is to display the image name when the browser cannot download the image or, for some reason, the images are blocked. But at the same time, alt tags help search engines to let them know about the image.
It’s even better for eCommerce websites to use alt tags for all of their product images, which will increase the chances of displaying the product images on the search engine results pages when users search for those products.
If your eCommerce website has been developed using WordPress, you will notice that when you upload any product image through the image uploader, you will see an option to write an alt tag for that image. So, use it as an opportunity to improve your website’s SEO score.
The more relevant and keyword-oriented names you use for alt tags of images on your eCommerce store, the better it is for SEO.
Secret #6 Keywords oriented texts
Now, it’s time to let the creative juices flow. Be as descriptive about your products as possible. Also, remember to include the keywords in your descriptive text. No, I am not asking you to stuff the keywords; instead, focus on keyword-oriented text.
In the descriptive text of each product, you must also include the primary and long-tail keywords. Optimized text for all the product pages will help you achieve higher rankings on search engines.
Secret #7 Mobile responsive
This demands no special consideration. In the age where more than 60% of online users search for information, services, or products using their smart devices, you simply can’t ignore the importance of mobile responsiveness for your eCommerce store.
If an eCommerce website is to exist today, it must be responsive. There is no second choice. Any website that is not responsive will lose more than 30% of its total expected revenue.
Talking SEO, it has become one of the essential criteria for search engines to consider the mobile responsiveness of a website to rank them in higher positions.
Good news exists for eCommerce webmasters who have chosen WordPress to develop their eCommerce store. Almost every WordPress theme for eCommerce is mobile responsive, so you don’t need to worry about it.
Secret #8 Active social strategy
Almost everybody is on social platforms these days. Social sharing widgets on your eCommerce website’s product pages will encourage users to share your products on social websites like Facebook.
What SEO has to do with this? Search engines also consider the social score of a website as an essential factor in determining a website as trustworthy and credible to rank in higher positions of search engines.
If your eCommerce website was built using WordPress, luckily, there are plenty of free and paid plugins for integrating social widgets with your online store.