Top 5 Ecommerce SEO Tips

Ecommerce SEO can pay huge dividends. Unlike blogging, key pages are not written as link bait but as sales tools. This copy is great once a potential client finds your site, but it does not make it easy to get deep links. These tips will help you maximize your link building and unlock the power of your home page.

#5 Dynamically update title tags

Where a keyword appears in a title tag can impact how well it ranks. My site was ranking number 10 for the search “SEO Consultant” and my title tag looked like this:

Atlanta Internet Marketing | Atlanta Web Design | Atlanta SEO Consultant

All though I had a top ten ranking for “Atlanta Web Design”, I was not getting the type of clients that I want from that search. So, I changed my title tag to “Atlanta Internet Marketing | Atlanta SEO Consultant”. The next day my ranking jumped to number six for “SEO Consultant”.

When I work on an ecommerce store, I build a script that counts the number of times a page receives a visit from a specific keyword and then automatically adjusts the title tag to put that keyword first. Over time, the best keyword will win out and garner the most traffic.

#4 Link within the active window of your site

To usability experts, the active window is the content part of the site that users most interact with when browsing. All though they may use navigational menus to get somewhere, they are expecting to see the answer to their question in the active window.

Google also realizes that you are going to put your most valuable information in the active window and puts more emphasis on this section. You have probably already heard that very little value is passed through footer links. That is because very few people read the footer and web masters do not put their best content there. This tactic goes along the same thought process.

When writing content for FAQ pages or categories link to other key pages with keyword rich anchor text. These links will pass more Page Rank than your sidebar and header navigations.

#3 Use up sells/cross sells to spread Page Rank

Create sections within your product pages that link to other products. This way you can continually pass Page Rank to your most important pages, the ones where customers actually buy your product.
Another added benefit is that your potential customer is presented with an additional navigational option besides using the back button. This is especially important if she has landed on the product page from a search engine and has not seen the category page.

#2 Link directly to product pages from the home page

The further a page is away from the home page, the less of the domain’s authority it receives. So, if a product is in the bottom of a category, the search engine bot may have to go four or more pages deep to find and index the page.
Deep linking directly to product pages from the home page will pass strong amounts of Page Rank directly to the pages that matter most. Couple this with adding up sell products to those pages, you can canvas several hundred product pages with strong domain authority.

I usually link out to around 150 products from the home page using different lists such as “Most Popular Products” or “Our Recommended Products”. People like lists, and they like being told what to do and what to buy. If you set your home page up correctly with this tactic, you can also increase conversions.

#1 Get user generated content with product reviews

It can be a daunting task and cost big bucks to write thousands of unique product descriptions. However, if you can get your users generating this content for free, you will see your long tail traffic increase tremendously.
Here are some tips for getting users to write reviews:

• Ask for product reviews on the product page
• Ask for product reviews in confirmation and follow up emails after a sale occurs
• Have a review feature on the home page that encourages user interaction by showing recent reviews and asking others to provide their opinion or comment
• Use sites like mturk to get your first reviews

Since three out of four people read reviews before making a purchase, having reviews on your site can dramatically improve sales. Allowing negative reviews to stand actually improves conversion rates as well, because it establishes trust between you and your customer.

This is a guest post by Jason Capshaw - the Atlanta internet marketing director and writer for UK Designer Sunglasses.

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