How to choose the right keywords for SEO e-commerce

By jack123 | SEO | 0 Comments

Keyword research will probably leave you with a fairly long list of potential keywords targeted. There are dozens, if not hundreds of keywords for each product or category. But obviously, you can’t use them all for your e-commerce SEO. You need to choose the right keywords that will drive traffic and generate sales.

Choose your E-Commerce SEO target keyword based on these important key factors:

Keyword matching (relevance)

This may seem obvious, but you need to choose keywords that match your products. Don’t just focus on keywords that have a massive search volume. Prioritize keywords that have a good search volume but fall within the realm of your niche and the products you offer.

For example, don’t target the keyword “wireless security camera” if you’re only selling a video ringtone. The better your targeted keywords that match your product, the more likely you are to make conversions and sales. So make sure your targeted keywords match your products to ensure the best results for you, your visitors, and Google.

Search volume

Search volume measures the overall popularity of a keyword. The higher your search volume for a keyword, the more traffic you can get. You can get the most accurate search volume data using Google Keyword Planner.

Keyword difficulty (organic competition)

The difficulty of keywords depends on how much organic competition there is for a particular keyword. If a keyword has fierce competition, it is extremely difficult to rank for that keyword. You will probably have to invest a small fortune and wait years to climb the rankings. You can use the SEMrush Keyword Difficulty Tool to estimate the difficulty of multiple keywords in your list.

Purchase intention

For best results, you need to target keywords that have high buying intent. And here shines Google Keyword Planner. To evaluate your purchase intent, take a look at the “Competition” and “Top of page bid” columns.

“Competition” displays PPC competition. And in this case, you should target high-competition keywords! It might sound counterintuitive, but it is surely not. High PPC competition means that more people are willing to pay for ads that target these keywords, which means more money to earn from this traffic.

Users who search these keywords on Google are more likely to buy, which means a great buying intention. The same goes for “Top of page bid”; If advertisers are willing to spend more money, then these keywords make better conversions.

Remember that you cannot look at these factors in isolation. Combine relevancy, search volume, competition, and buying intent to prioritize and select the right keywords for your e-commerce SEO.

Coming up with keyword ideas for your e-comm site can be quite difficult, especially considering the number of pages you need to optimize, so you need all the help you can get. Once you have selected your targeted keywords, you can move on to optimizing your site structure.

Optimize your site architecture.

Site architecture is how your e-commerce site is organized into categories and pages. The structure of your site is very important for both visitors and search engines. If your pages are buried deep in your site or are not properly linked, search engines may not consider them worthy of indexing. 

Your users will also appreciate a good structure because it makes it easier to navigate your site. A better user experience (UX) means more sales. The structure of the site (aka architecture) is especially important for e-commerce sites, due to a large number of pages (usually thousands). And as you add and remove products and categories, the structure of your site becomes even more complicated.

The structure of the site should be a high priority in your SEO process. There are two general rules when it comes to site architecture:

• Keep your structure simple and scalable
• Make sure each page is up to 3 clicks away from your homepage

WARNING: Make sure each new page has a proper redirect page. If you don’t have one, no one will be able to find them.

Consult best with an experienced developer before working with your site architecture. Once you have properly configured the site architecture, the next step is on-page SEO.

E-commerce SEO on-page

Targeted keywords are the key ingredient of a successful SEO strategy. Thus, it is now time to add this key ingredient to your product and category pages. This process represents On-Page SEO.

Keep in mind that your product and category pages get the most traffic and contribute directly to your e-commerce sales. That’s why you need to make sure that when someone searches for your targeted keywords, your site appears on the first page of Google. There are 6 main useful elements that make up a perfectly optimized e-commerce page.

Optimize title tags and meta descriptions

Title tags and meta descriptions appear in the search as the main part of your listing record.

When it comes to your title tags, your main task is to enter your target keyword. Title tags must also attract clicks. Create something compelling that gets searchers to click on your site. A good way to do this is to add modifiers to your targeted keyword, such as:

• The best
• Cheap
• X% discount (“25% discount”)
• Free transport
• Sale
• Warranty etc.

Meta descriptions play a major role when it comes to clicks. And that means more traffic and potentially more sales. Use meta descriptions to describe your product. Write a short and engaging copy that will entice users to visit your page. Also, include targeted keywords and add a little flair to make your offer compelling.

Make your title tags and meta descriptions work in tandem – connect searchers with attractive titles, then add compelling offers to your meta descriptions. Always remember to write unique title tags and meta descriptions for all your pages. However, for an e-commerce site with hundreds or thousands of pages, it could be a bit too much. Fortunately, if you use WooCommerce (part of WordPress), unique creation doesn’t have to be a chore. A very important thing to know is that you can semi-automate this process by setting up a template using the Yoast SEO plugin. Just select the format you want your pages to follow and enter the snippet variable on the right of the menu. More so, you can do the same process with your meta descriptions.

Create keyword-rich content and category page content

Google needs quality content to clearly understand what your pages are about. That’s why the more relevant information you provide, the better. That’s why you need to create in-depth content of product and category pages. The detailed content of the page helps buyers understand your products. For example, a more detailed copy of the product consists of:

• The main features and benefits
• Specifications and details
• What is included in the package
• Reviews (yes, reviews matter)

While we are on the subject of titles, structure the content using h1, h2, h3, etc. You should have a single h1 tag that also ideally contains your target keyword. In most cases, you can keep h1 as the product name. Use other titles (h2, h3 …) to explain features, specifications, return and refund policy, sizing, and shipping times.

Use short, easy-to-use URLs

The next important item on our On-Page SEO checklist is URL optimization. You must have short, easy-to-use URLs that people can understand. Avoid cluttered, one-mile URLs with lots of random numbers. Instead, follow the structure of your site and create keyword-rich URLs.

• stablewp.com/category‐name (category page)
• stablewp.com/category‐name/subcategory‐name (subcategory page)
• stablewp.com/category‐name/subcategory‐name/product (product page)

Keyword-rich URLs help Google and other search engines to easily determine what your page is about and where it belongs in your site structure. In addition, URLs appear in search results, so a logical and easy-to-use URL structure used can lead to more clicks and traffic.

Perform image SEO

High-quality images can really enhance your product and category pages. Images can describe the look of your products. They can also convey emotions such as owning or using a product. All this can lead to increased sales. But did you know that images can also help the SEO part ?! Photos of your product can appear in Google image search, essentially doubling your exposure.

Google also uses images to understand your page. If the images are relevant, your content may also be relevant. In order to help Google understand your images, you will need to perform image SEO.

The name of your image file must be meaningful to provide context. So make sure that your file names are not “DCM0003546”, but should be something like “video-doorbell-closeup.png”. Because Google can’t read images, it relies on alternate text to find out what it’s about. Write a very short description of the image and be sure to include the target keyword whenever it makes sense.

Finally, you should consider optimizing the size of your images to make your pages load faster. You can use one of the many good WooCommerce image optimization plugins, such as WP Smush.

Internal linking – link to other priority pages

Internal links are another important key component of a perfectly optimized e-commerce page. This includes navigation menus, categories, and product recommendations. Internal links help users and robots navigate your site. But another benefit of internal linking is that it helps spread authority from pages with lots of backlinks to pages of high-priority products and categories. .

Implement the product scheme

If you want to take your page SEO to a whole new level and stand out in search results, you need to add structured data to your pages. You’ve noticed how some search results have those rating stars, price and even availability of the product?

These are called rich snippets and are a great opportunity for your site to attract immediate attention, leading to more clicks and traffic. The way to get these rich fragments is by marking the product scheme. Schema is a special code that you can enter into your pages to help the search engines you use better understand your content.

The product layout can improve your search results with:

• Prices
• Availability
• Delivery time
• Ratings and reviews

There are many ways to create structured data for your page, you can do it manually or using tools like Schema Markup Generator or Structured Data Markup Helper from Google.

Choose “Products” as the structured data type and enter the URL of the page to start tagging. You can also manually add any missing information to complete the bookmark. When you’re done highlighting, create the HTML code and test for errors using the Structured Data Testing Tool.

Be sure to correct any errors or warnings before uploading the code to your site. More so, you can insert structured data using Google Tag Manager. If you use WooCommerce, you can easily add a schema with plugins like Schema Pro.

For any further information on the matter, feel free to contact us, write a comment or go to our services page to check out our SEO optimization and online marketing services.