Una Bērziņa, Author at Blog

As of this year, 51% of shoppers turn to search engines to look for inspiration for their next purchase. For US shoppers, the first stop on their shopping journey is Amazon, closely followed by Google. Outside the US, Google actually beats Amazon. Search engines are where most of your potential customers hang out, so build your store in a way that matches search engine standards. SEO can help you make sure you and search engines are on the same page (and that page is #1) which is why SEO is so important. In this post you will learn: What SEO is and how search engines work. The SEO glossary. Ecommerce SEO tips for beginners and best practices. Where to find Affordable SEO tools. When it comes to online marketplaces, you're trying to rank for at least two search engines—general ones, like Google, and marketplace search engines, such as eBay Cassini. To get a more in-depth SEO understanding of marketplaces, I suggest reading our guides: eBay SEO guidelinesEtsy SEO step-by-step guideBonanza SEO hacksAmazon SEO guide What exactly is SEO? SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. I'll clarify how these search engines work. It is in search engines' best interest to provide users with relevant and comprehensive content. In order to make their service the #1 choice for internet users, each search needs to be made into a one-stop event. To do that, there are carefully built algorithms that arrange results according to the user's needs. Search engines use bots to predict what content their users are looking for. These bots—also known as crawlers—roam the internet and analyze all the content they can find. The crawlers return to their engine and add the collected information to their search index. That index is then used to help the search engine's algorithm estimate how relevant each piece of content is to search queries. The algorithm determines how high a page will rank for certain keywords. Let's see what Google thinks is the most relevant content for the search query “print-on-demand shirts.” An example of how search results appear on search engines As shown, Google lists our homepage as the #1 non-paid search result on the subject. Being in the top positions of search results can boost your sales by driving organic traffic to your site. The top 3 results receive 75.1% of all clicks per search—if your site isn't in this range for your targeted keywords, your SEO needs a bit of work. SEO glossary. Before we jump in and learn the SEO basics, let's go over the most important SEO terms that you should get familiar with. Search index—a library of data that search engine crawlers have collected all over the internet. Search engine algorithms use this data to curate lists of the best search results. Keywords—the main words of your content. Let's assume you've created a product page for a Christmas t-shirt. Your potential target keywords could include “Christmas t-shirt, festive shirts, Christmas tops, Holiday merch”, etc. Search queries—what internet users type in search engines to find what they're looking for. A query can be a single keyword or a phrase that contains several, e.g.: "Christmas t-shirts" or "where do I buy Christmas t-shirts". The best way to differentiate between search queries and keywords—keywords are used by the content creators (such as yourself); search queries are applied by the users who search for content. Search intent—the user's motive behind a search query. For example, if I google “chocolate cake recipes”, I'm looking for short instructions on how to make a delicious dessert, not a whole recipe book. Search engines try to guess these intentions and curate lists of results that match the user's wishes. Search volume—the metric that represents the average monthly searches of a keyword. You can use search volume to also check the approximate level of interest in a subject matter or product. Keyword difficulty—the metric that describes how difficult it would be to rank for a keyword or search query, with a number in the range from 0–100, 0 being the least difficult. The higher the difficulty, the bigger the competition to get in the top 10 search results for that keyword. Keyword cannibalization—when multiple pages from your domain are trying to rank for the same keywords. You end up competing with yourself, and the ranking positions for your pages will be unstable. Backlinks—links from other sites leading to your page. Backlinks can increase traffic driven to your site, boost your domain authority (your page's credibility and competitiveness) and increase your chances to rank higher in search results. Backlinks can be acquired: organically—other pages linking to your content by choice. manually—you reaching out to other pages(aka linkbuilding, see below). Linkbuilding—the process of acquiring backlinks manually. While you should always focus on creating content others would like to link to without you having to ask for it, intentionally building links is still good practice. Get the best out of your content by marketing it. Reach out to other sites relevant to your page and offer it as a valuable (linkable) resource. Linkbuilding leads—authors or editors of pages where you would like to place a link to your site. Meta tags—the description of your page that appears in the search results. The two main meta tags are the meta title and description as shown below. Example of how meta titles and descriptions look like If you know code, you can play with meta keywords, robots, content type, and other meta tag features that can only be accessed in the page code. OG image—short for “open graph image,” the picture that appears in the post when someone shares a link to your page on a social media platform. Example of where to find an OG imageSource: Facebook Image tags / Alt text—data that explains the visual content in words. Google crawlers can only read written information, they can't translate pictures. Alt text is also used to provide information for visually impaired users. Most platforms, like Wordpress in the following example, have built-in media library features that allow editing file information including alt texts. Wordpress image file information editorSource: Wordpress Ecommerce SEO tips: 4 SEO best practices To put the SEO glossary into perspective, I've created a game plan for you to get the most out of search engine traffic. 1. Do keyword research. Research should be your first step for creating new campaigns, landing pages, or brainstorming product and content ideas. The goal is to find keywords with all of the following: High search volume (1000 and higher)Low keyword difficulty (below 20)Relevance to your product/content. A lot of popular keywords have a high difficulty score. To rank for these, you either need to be an industry leader or heavily invest in advertising. You're more likely to gain traffic by focusing on keywords with low difficulty and high search volume. To illustrate that, here's a keyword every retailer would like to rank for, “women’s clothing.” "Womens clothing" keyword metrics overviewSource: Ahrefs It has a tempting search volume of 34K, meaning it's viewed approximately 34 thousand times a month. It may sound like a good way to reach customers, but let's look at your competition first. "Womens clothing" search results on Google The first non-paid results belong to Koko Shop, Calvin Klein, and Urban Outfitters with a sprinkle of ASOS in the featured questions. These brands are household names and therefore Google gives them the upper hand when it comes to huge keywords. As a small business trying to rank for “women's clothing,” it will take a lot of time and effort that might not pay off in the end. I recommend sticking to a balance of high volume and low difficulty. Let's look at “summer clothes.” "Summer clothes" keyword metrics overviewSource: Ahrefs This could easily fall under “women’s clothing,” but as you see the difficulty plummets. Even though search volume is almost 4 times less than for “women’s clothing”, 9K is still huge. If you're ambitious and feel like conquering difficult keywords, go for it! if you succeed, you'll boost your domain authority and traffic to your store. Just stay realistic and be mindful about where your efforts go. 2. Optimize product listings. For online store owners, product listings are the most important pieces of content on their page. It's where users can best get to know your product and make a decision on purchase. To make sure your products stay visible on search engines, these are the sections you should pay attention to. 2.1 Product title. No matter the search algorithm, all marketplaces and ecommerce platforms have one thing in common. The first 2–3 words used in the title are the most important ones and will determine what you will rank for the highest. Most platforms offer limited character count for titles, so choose your words wisely. This means you should be going for the middle ground between generic and specific keywords. Find terms that describe your product and give it a chance to be discovered. Product titles aren't the place to get fancy with your vocabulary—keep things simple. Example of a product listing title on Etsy marketplaceSource: Etsy Here, the first 3 words “personalized pet bowl” are general, but describe the product perfectly. As sophisticated as it may sound, no one will ever search for "decadent animal feeding receptacle." 2.2 Product description. This is where you can get a bit more creative. Use your keyword research and imagination to come up with catchy but search-friendly descriptions. In this section, highlight what makes your product exclusive. Here's an example of a well-crafted product description on Etsy for crochet baby sandals. Example of a product listing description on Etsy marketplaceSource: Etsy The store owner describes the item using product specs that also double-up as keywords to rank for. When writing a description, look for features that make your product stand...

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