The Basics of SEO for E-commerce

SEO for e-commerce is not that much different than SEO for anything else, but it does have some unique aspects you'll want to bear in mind.

With quite a few new players in the e-commerce game lately, the importance of getting your site noticed and ranked above the others is crucial.

The fundamentals of SEO, such as great content, quality inbound links and a good social media campaign, undoubtedly apply for e-commerce sites, too. But there are other important strategies that need to be applied in regards to SEO for e-commerce sites.

Related: 5 Hosted E-commerce Software Solutions

5 Best Practices in SEO for E-commerce

Unique content – Don't make the mistake that most newcomers to e-commerce make when building their product pages, that is simply copying and pasting an Amazon or other product description they find somewhere onto their pages. This doesn't sit well with Google, and you won't rank well. Make unique content for your pages!

Reviews and social proof – Very often the factor that tips the sale in your favor is the inclusion of product reviews and other social proof in the form of testimonials. These are gold: use them!

Use redirects on dead product pages – Too often when a product is no longer being sold, the page lives on, though usually in the form of a 404 error page. This is a bad on-site SEO signal to Google, and will hurt you. Instead, us a simple 301 redirect to send that traffic to new or current pages.

Related: 5 Mistakes That Can Kill Your Sales Conversions

Use unique imagery – Use unique images on your pages too. Like duplicate content in the form of text, using the same images found on Amazon won't help you. If you can tackle some image editing, it's simple enough to alter the images enough to make them unique, and perhaps adding a message of your own.

Use diverse content – Make an effort to use as many different types of content as possible. Infographics, customer video testimonials, and product demos can all lead to a richer customer experience in Google's eyes.

Using these small changes together with traditional on-page SEO can lead to your pages leapfrogging over the competition. All it will require is a little more work!