E-commerce SEO tips

Posted by Josh on Wednesday, October 24th, 2007.

If you have a large online catalog, you’re way ahead of many other sites that seek to implement effective on-site SEO techniques. Why? Because search engines love content, and your catalog probably contains a lot of it.

Here are some tips for search engine optimizing e-commerce websites:

Put your entire catalog online — All that keyword-rich content will please search engines. One product per page. Include product descriptions.
Avoid logins — Any page that requires a login is almost always invisible to search engines and won’t help your ranking. Don’t protect content that doesn’t need protection.
Use keywords in product names — If you are selling small blue widgets, call them that in the product page’s main heading and page title.
Use a site map — We don’t mean the kind for users, rather the ones for search engines.
Multiple paths — Help customers and search engine by providing multiple paths to finding products. For example, let users select the product type or the manufacturer. Every path your provide creates more pages with more keyword-rich links.
Cross-link — Link from one product to another. Search engines love links, particularly those that are keyword rich. (Did you read the 3rd bullet? Use the product name for links.) Links will also help with cross- and up-selling.
Avoid “splash” — The simplest navigation works best: let users click on items in a list instead of (or at least in addition to) drop-down list boxes, expanding menus, dynamic content, etc. Search engines can’t/won’t follow such flashy techniques and may not see all of your content.
Feed your fans — Consider creating an RSS feed (via blog, from your store, or from scratch) that enable fans to be notified automatically about new products. Also some sites will publish your feed, and thus they’ll link back to you and help your rankings.

In summary, content is king. Let yours work for you by putting it online and making it easy to find.