eCommerce website design

Here are some tips to help you with your SEO on product pages in your ecommerce website.

Have a good title for your product

Use words that people will use to try to find your product. This can include the brand name if applicable. e.g. Gingerbread Man Quilting Template

It is worth taking the time to write a unique product description.

If you use the manufacturer’s description of the product, then the copy will be the same as many other websites worldwide. It is a missed opportunity for you to differentiate yourself from other shops. Google does not like duplicate content, so that it won’t help your rankings either. Take the extra time to write your description of the product and include some information you have gained from your experience with the product.  If you are not a writer, then making some notes with the key points you feel should be included and get a copywriter to put together a well-written product description.

While it is true that a picture or a photo says 1000 words, Google cannot see the images, so use words to describe the product.

Images – alt tags

Having great images is essential. But did you know the importance of including the alt tag and naming your image file well? The alt tag gives an alternate text if the image cannot be displayed or displayed for other reasons, e.g. if a user uses a screen reader because they have a visual impairment. The alt tag should not just be a repeat of your product title. For more details: SEO for images.

For example, a good Alt tag for the photo on the left would be 3 Sewn Felt Gingerbread men Christmas ornaments with red hearts and 2 green buttons on their fronts with a ricrac white ribbon on hands and feet, a not so good one: gingerbread men.

You can see if someone was searching for Christmas ornaments and gingerbread men; the alt description will help.

Do also name your image files properly as well, e.g. gingerbread-man-template.jpg rather than IMG0123.jpg.

Write an inviting meta description.

See the wording above beginning, “Our Gingerbread man template… ” That is the meta description, it is the wording that shows on a google search, and you skim read it to decide if you want to click on that click. Make those words inviting.

Consider adding reviews.

They are a great way that for creating unique content for each product.

Use friendly URLs with relevant keywords.

i.e. Make sure you have your permalinks set up, e.g. https://www.carolsquilts.co.nz/shop/seasons/gingerbread-man-template/ rather than https://www.carolsquilts.co.nz/shop/12/Sku12345/

The schema for products

The schema is additional code that passes on more information to google:

• The Product schema tells the search engine more about the product.
• The Offer schema includes more information on price and availability, like currency and stock.

You can see it in use here.

It shows the price of the product and if it is currently in stock. I like to use the Yoast Woocommerce plugin, which does this for you for WordPress Ecommerce sites.

Social Media

The Yoast Woocommerce Plugin also provide the Open Graph Product tags for social media. You can also set additional images if necessary. Each social media network has different requirements.

When someone shares a product on Facebook, you want the image to look good, not small and grainy. The Open Graph information also means, for example, that if someone pins one of your product images, it will include the price of the product and if it is out of stock. It will also show anytime it is on sale. See the example below of the gingerbread man quilting template pinned with its product description!

If you do all of the above, that will go a long way to getting your Woocommerce Product Page SEO sorted.

Post Script: Tagging and your Ecommerce Website

It may be tempting to create lots of tags on your Ecommerce website. I suggest you don’t unless you have several related products that will fit the tag. Also, try to limit the number of tags you add to each product. Remember, the creation of a tag also created a tag archive page. You may consider setting tags to no-index in Yoast.

Thinking about a tag cloud?

• It can look like keyword stuffing, which is not good for SEO.
• It spreads page rank through the site, which can be good or bad.

Google is interested in looking after your visitors, so if the tag cloud sends people deeper into your site to find what they want, it is a good idea.  A tag cloud should include only tags that already have lots of content. I suggest at least 3- 4 products for product tags or 3-4 posts for standard tags.

Here are some reasons why you may want to consider adding e-commerce to your site

The growth of online shopping - serving your customer better

With the Covid 19 pandemic, many more people are using online shopping. They are becoming comfortable doing online transactions. This trend will continue. Now is a great time to better serve your customers by adding ecommerce to your website. Even if you are in a service industry which relies on face to face service, adding an ecommerce shop may be beneficial. For example, beauty and hair salons can have an online shop for purchases of products between visits; dentists can offer an online shop for specialist toothpaste, floss and brushes.

Widen Reach and Engagement

When you add ecommerce to your website, it may also provide an opportunity for you to reach customers within a wider geographical area. This can allow you to expand your business without adding a physical store to other locations. Additionally, you can more easily market to your customer database if you captured their email addresses.  It is the same reason why so many physical stores offer loyalty cards to market to their customers directly.

I recently visited an artisan store that sold mostly to tourists until last year. Fortunately, they had worked to develop a good database of overseas customers who receive their newsletter over many years. Although they do not have many overseas tourists due to Covid restrictions, they have made online sales from repeat customers worldwide.

Convenience and Customer care

An online store means your customers can always make an order, even late at night. Certain seasons of life are hectic and online shopping can make life easier. I appreciate avoiding the traffic and busy queues during busy times. It also offers the convenience of shopping late at night without interruptions.

For all the above reasons, adding ecommerce to your small business website may offer your business additional marketing opportunities, widen your customer base, and makes it easier to market your products and offers to your customers.

Five things to think about before setting up your online store

Do you have payment options set up?

There are many payment options for online selling. You should choose one that will be easy for you to administer and likely to be used by most of your customers. You can offer more than one payment option. Make sure you look into any applicable fees for each one.

Have you worked out delivery options?

If you are selling online you will need to figure out how to get your products to people. This may be via a collection service or by delivery. You’ll need to decide whether you are going to deliver yourself, pay someone to do it or use the postal or courier system. As has been seen during Covid-19 you should also be prepared to deliver or offer collection under difficult circumstances in order to keep trading.

Do you have good images of your products?

When people are ordering online they can’t see and touch the products on offer like they would in your store. While this may not matter for some items for others it is very important. So your online store images need to be high-quality so people can feel confident ordering.

Can you write good product descriptions?

Again, because people can’t view the products in person your descriptions will be important. Make sure they are clear and answer questions people might have such as what is it made of, size and colours. If you aren’t great at writing consider employing a professional writer to complete your descriptions.

Do you need to amend or add to other parts of your website to publicise your online store?

If your ecommerce add on is new, then review the rest of your website to ensure it mentions the online store. You might also like to create an FAQ page to answer general questions about delivery, pricing and returns in one convenient place.