How to Optimize an E-commerce Website

There is a considerable difference in SEO (Search Engine Optimization) for E-Commerce sites as opposed to optimizing for traditional static websites. In this article, we are going to look into all the important factors affecting the optimization of an E-commerce site. Since Google uses a majority of the market shares today, a great deal of the optimizing work we do involves matching Google’s algorithm and trying to get a better ranking in Google; in this article, we use Google as the basic example of a main SE (Search Engine).

1. Optimize URLs First Due to the dynamic nature of E-commerce websites, the URL below might seem like nonsense to the human eye, especially since it has a path ID and a randomly generated session ID appended to it. Problems with session IDs differ from situation to situation involving various spider bots. Many SEs simply ignore URLs with such variables, meaning that those URLs will not get “crawled.” If you have an E-commerce website with 1000 products, your time and effort will be wasted if the product pages cannot be indexed by SEs. Googlebot might find pages with IDs in them, but imagine this scenario:

Day 1 – Gooblebot crawls a page with this session ID:www.domain.com/index.php?sessionid=1234

Day 2 – Googlebot crawls the same page with a different session ID:www.domain.com/index.php?sessionid=5678

If Google decides this site has duplicate contents, the site will probably be penalized. So what shall we do? The best solution is put keywords in the URL without showing complicated session ids or product ids. We call it optimized URL. These kinds of URLs will get indexed by general search engines, and SE can pick up keywords from the URL. It can greatly help improving the ranking of each page.Below is a URL following the implementation of URL optimizations. It contains product keywords and a category name. All of these words can be used by SEs to analyze the page and determine its function. And of course, the optimization will help improve the ranking for these keywords.

2. Title & Meta TagsWe use our own website as an example. Our website ranks #6 with the keyword phrase “E-commerce Toronto.” We have been working on improving this keyword phrase, since one of our major businesses is involved in serving clients with E-commerce requirements in the Toronto area. In this case, both “E-commerce” and “Toronto” were used in the “Title” and “Meta Description” areas (see the source codes below).

As you can see in the image below, Google shows “Meta Description” next to “Title,” highlighting both keywords in bold. With that said, optimizing an E-commerce site is still important today even though it is speculated that the overuse of Meta has led Google to discard the entire process. From this example, however, as long as you respect Googlebot and make good use of the “Title” and “Meta Description” spaces, your website and Google will be mutually compatible. To clarify a frequently asked question, an E-commerce site usually does not allow the setup of different Meta tags (including Meta Keywords and Meta Description) and Titles for different pages. However, it is feasible to develop this kind of feature in your existing E-commerce system. I would recommend that you look for a firm with the ability to work on your existing E-commerce system. In our own E-commerce system, we have worked out a solution to meet this requirement, and the ranking results for our client were amazing.

3. Picture Name and AltIt is inevitable that a webpage, especially an E-commerce site selling hundreds and even thousands of products, will use pictures. Therefore, it is a good chance to make good use of the picture names and Alt words. For instance, if you use a product name as a keyword in a page, it is wise to give the same name to the picture as you give to the product. Remember, also, to add “Alt” to the pictures, since “Alt” enables a search bot to identify an object even if it cannot read pictures. In most cases involving an E-commerce site, Alt should be automatically added once a product is uploaded. To see if your E-commerce site has this feature, place your mouse on top of any product picture. If you immediately see a yellow popup box next to the mouse, you can be certain that you have Alt in the system. Otherwise, try to speak with your E-commerce solution provider and get this fixed.

4. Domain Name and PathRedirecting is not popular with Googlebot, so if you decide to use an E-commerce system, it is wise to let it remain in the root folder instead of making it redirect to a subfolder or sub-domain. On the other hand, if your domain has been there for over a year and the E-commerce has been set up to redirect, don't change it. It is better to keep it as is than rework the path.

5. Google XML SitemapIsn’t it nice to tell Google exactly which links your E-commerce system contains? You can even tell Google if there are links you would prefer Google not to index. There is one saying in the SEO world – “If you make searching bots’ lives easier, your life is better.” Since you simplify the job a searching bot must do, an SE is better able to do things according to your preferences. Let’s face it, however – the more products you have, the more complicated it becomes for you to submit the links. You might be selling hundreds of products, but how can you manually add each link to Google in an XML file? Again, in this case, you need to get in touch with your E-commerce provider so that a program can do the work automatically. Software is created to automate things and make the lives of people easier. For example, by making a file to collect all of the product links, and by doing some CRON jobs, you can automatically feed the Google sitemap system.

6. Linking StrategyIt is not a secret that your website can increase its ranking by building quality inbound links. Many people, until they realize what a quality inbound link is, spend thousands of dollars and receive no result in return. For an E-commerce website, you have to make sure you are doing the right job. Here are some examples:

1. Exchange links with sites closely related to your products or services. If you are selling sports products, it does not make sense to exchange links with a flower website. Google will not give that link much credit, as it has a low relevancy in Google’s algorithm. On the other hand, if you exchange links with another website offering sports services, it makes sense to Google. Google thinks the link on that site is a quality link, which is good for visitors. So everything Google makes the Internet more related, and helps prevent spamming by manipulators.

2. If possible, link to a specific page instead of a homepage. This will boost the ranking of one specific page.

3. For a site selling physical products, don’t forget to put your link in famous shopping bots, like Froogle, the Yahoo! store, etc. Google gives much credit if you use the right link to your site. Again, don’t try to manipulate; do it in the right way.

7. Statistics MatterStatistics might have nothing to do with SEO, but if you are working hard to improve your rank, you need to get any possible stats to know if you are moving forward or just staying still. This tool can tell you how many visitors you get every day, what pages they are interested in, where they come from, and many others. The other kind of stats tool involves checking your ranking closely. There are many useful tools in http://www.seochat.com/, and they have made life a great deal easier for people working on SEO. In this article, I briefly cover some basic rules in optimizing an E-commerce website. There are many others, but the basic ones have been covered by this and other SEO articles about static website optimizations. The optimization of an E-commerce website is challenging, but interesting. If you are facing furious competition in your industry (yes, each industry is competitive), it is better to start as early as possible, since E-commerce optimization is only the first stage. It is wise for you to grab the chance and make your website stand out! It is said that the top is beautiful, and it is!

Author: Eric Chen, Executive director of Topsky Technologies. Eric is a specialist in Internet Marketing and software related fields. His expertise covers search engine marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), E-mail marketing, blog marketing, affiliates marketing, joint venture, and more others. He is also active in application software development. His vision guides the software development trends in his company. His corporate website is http://www.topsky.ca/, and he can be reached at eric@topsky.ca.

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