For a website to have an optimized eCommerce page for products has always been important.
It’s even more essential during hard times when many of us are logging on to seek out products that they have instead of getting to a brick-and-mortar store.
With many products competing for real estate within the search results pages (SERPs), it’s imperative your brand is on Page 1 in Google.
And ahead of consumers who are making use of a plethora of various search terms to seek out the products your brand sells
An optimized product page can’t only drive traffic but help convert browsers into buyers
In order to beat out the competition, you’ve got to make sure your product pages are optimized for max exposure.
Here are some guidelines for SEO product pages, also some downfalls you would like to avoid.
Table of Contents
10 Dos of Ecommerce Product Page SEO
1. Implement a Keyword Strategy
Keyword research is the foundation for product page optimization.
When conducting keyword research, always use product-focused topics that users are checking out.
Don’t fixate on volume.
Instead, brainstorm about relevancy and what is going to actually convert.
If you’ve got data from other channels like paid search, use it in your keyword and topic research and incorporate ad copy with high click-through rates (CTR) into meta descriptions.
Product pages have transactional intent so confirm your landing pages are optimized for searchers able to buy because you would like to sell the things on your site.
For example, someone trying to find a selected product like “Series S60l & Expression E52 paintbrush” strongly indicates they’re able to purchase it, thanks to the detailed nature of their keyword.
2. Optimize Titles & Meta Descriptions
Title tags and meta descriptions are vital in product page optimization.
Make sure you include details, like:
-The brand of the merchandise.
-The name of the merchandise.
-The model number.
-Other important information.
Home Depot does an excellent job of including the foremost important elements in their title tag and meta description.
It also uses structured data to spotlight reviews with star ratings and price which leads us to subsequent tip…
3. Markup Product Pages with Structured Data
Having the right structured data type can help your brand show up as rich snippets.
All pages on your website that have a product should have a product schema, and review schema, which can:
-Drive more impressions and clicks.
-Improve your CTR and drive more sales.
4. Add FAQ Content
Having high-quality content that meets the requirements of users is vital for ranking high in SERPs.
If users don’t find your content useful, your bounce rates are going to be high, and customers might not buy from you.
Most categories and product pages are light on optimized content and don’t have an FAQ section that’s marked up with FAQ structured data.
Instead, they have a tendency to believe user-generated content (UGC), which may be a mistake.
Suppose I even have an issue with a few products and don’t want to speak to a chatbot or call customer service.
If the brand in question has built an FAQ section with answers to questions users commonly ask, I – and customers like me – can easily find the knowledge we’re trying to look for.
That, in turn, helps the brand sell more products.
5. Always Write Unique Product & Meta Descriptions
I cannot tell you ways repeatedly I even have seen an eCommerce site use an equivalent product description for all products.
This misses a big opportunity.
Each item can rank for branded and non-branded keywords and will therefore include a singular description to take advantage of.
Give consumers great information to encourage them to click on your listing then drive more traffic and sales.
6. Share Real Testimonials & Customer Reviews
Genuine testimonials from customers who have tried your product speak volumes to in-market consumers trying to work out whether or to not buy from you.
That’s why it’s so important to let customers share their experiences together with your products and the way they’ve helped solve problems.
Product pages with customer reviews convert 58% more visitors than their review-free counterparts, so this could be a no brainer.
But there are other advantages, too.
Reviews help build trust – especially if you’ve got an endorsement from a star.
They also provide new and unique content Google wants. Just make sure to mark them up with review schema, too.
7. Test Landing Pages
Tools like Optimizely and Google Optimize provide an intuitive way to testing even the slightest variations within product pages, which you should definitely do to work out the perfect configuration.
Changing the location of your call to action, for instance, could maybe drive more conversions.
Test your page layout options to see the impact.
8. Use High-Quality Video & Imagery
One of the drawbacks of shopping online is you can’t physically touch or feel the products you’re considering to purchase.
High-quality images and videos, however, can bridge that gap by providing end-users the knowledge they have to feel confident in their purchases.
Recently, I looked for a cordless drill.
Home Depot ranks very high for this term and its landing page is crammed with good content like:
-Videos that answer common questions.
-Q&A with other customers.
-Imagery of what a specific kit includes.
This was an excellent user experience because I wanted to understand what percentage of batteries came with the drill and if it contains a bag.
9. Minimize Page Load Times
Your product pages must be optimized for mobile.
Fast-loading webpages will get your content ahead of your audience faster and supply a far better user experience.
In turn, that helps increase sales, revenue, and pages per session – and it gives you a leg up on the competition.
It also decreases your bounce rates.
10. Audit Your Product Pages for Technical Issues
Product pages can often be duplicated due to faceted URLs, which may cause tons of problems for SEO, like:
-Duplicate content.
-Wasted crawl budget.
-And split link equity.
To avoid these issues, audit your pages to ascertain which technical and content elements got to be optimized if any.
Elements to look out for include:
-Duplicate title tags and meta descriptions.
-Slow page load times.
-Broken links.
-Thin content.
-404 pages.
-302 redirects.
-Missing structured data.
10 Don’ts of Ecommerce Product Page SEO
1. Do not make Use of Product Descriptions from the Manufacturer’s Website
This is one of the common mistakes I see in optimizing product pages.
A lot of the manufacturer descriptions aren’t compelling and aren’t optimized for search.
If you instead take the time to write down better descriptions, it’s going to alright be the difference between being found and being invisible.
The more detailed information, the higher.
But remember you do not want duplicate content, which can hurt your SEO efforts.
2. Don’t Remove Your Seasonal Pages Once the peak Period Is Over
This is a standard mistake I see brands make.
If you’ve got a product page that’s seasonal and it’s built up rankings, traffic, and sales over time, don’t get rid of it.
It may seem sensible to get rid of seasonal pages as they serve no real purpose for many of the years.
However, if you are doing this, it’ll leave you with an equivalent uphill battle every year: once more, trying to regain the authority your site needs to rank for seasonal terms.
And by the time you are doing this annually, it’ll likely be too late.
Amazon may be a great example of the way to do that well.
They have a dedicated Black Friday URL (https://www.amazon.com/Black-Friday/) that only gains authority over time.
Amazon can then update the page because of the peak Black Friday season approaches.
3. Don’t Use Automated Optimization
Dynamically populated product pages with the name of the product as the title tag, followed by brand, isn’t a best practice.
Instead, including important information within the titles, you can’t automate can help your site rank for targeted keywords.
All titles and meta descriptions should be unique.
Also, note using automated descriptions and just changing a couple of variables could even have a negative impact on your CTR.
4. Don’t Remove Out of Stock Pages
Sometimes products rub out of stock.
But should a product be temporarily unavailable, you should still keep the URL live – especially if the page has rankings and traffic.
As with seasonal pages, this will seem counterintuitive to some site owners.
However, a more profitable strategy is to leave these pages live and supply links to other, relevant products until the item is back available.
5. Don’t Use the incorrect sort of Structured Data – Or None in the least
Structured data can help your site rank within the rich results and obtain more traffic and sales.
A lot of brands don’t implement structured data, i.e., reviews and product data.
You having Product data can help your website rank for good snippets.
6. Don’t Make Use of Weak Calls to Action or Forget Them Entirely
Oftentimes many brands don’t have strong calls to action (CTA), but clean and straightforward CTAs are a must-have for any website.
As mentioned before, the main purpose of your product page is to drive revenue and sales.
If it takes users too long to seek out the way to purchase your products, they’re going to instead visit your competitors’ sites – especially if your site takes over 3 seconds to load.
7. Don’t Optimize for Low-Volume Keywords
I just like it when a CEO asks an SEO, “Why are we not ranking for XYZ keyword?” and therefore the answer is XYZ has no search volume.
Think sort of a customer, do your research, and use data to form decisions about which keywords to use.
For example, if I’m optimizing for “LOL Surprise Baby Dolls in stock”, it won’t be worthwhile because users aren’t really checking out this term and once I do rank for it, I won’t get many sales due to the low volume.
8. Make sure you Don’t Miss the Opportunities for Internal Linking & Backlinks
Links still matter for eCommerce.
Oftentimes brands build links to their homepages and category pages but ditch product pages.
But these pages can rank – especially for longtail keywords that have high purchase intent and may dramatically increase revenue and sales.
That’s why you ought to always support product pages with efforts like internal links and even paid social to enhance visibility and performance.
9. Don’t Set the incorrect Price
With prices rising on products high in demand, not having the proper pricing strategy can cause consumers to not buy your products.
We all know the laws of supply and demand, but paying $100 for a bottled of water is ridiculous – and may even get sellers in trouble with the law.
10. Don’t Forget Mobile Optimization
We sleep in a world where consumers use their mobile devices to seek out products online.
In fact, over 82% of internet buyers within the U.S. shop through mobile devices – and 35% are mobile- shoppers only.
Not having a god product page that is mobile-friendly can cause users to not even consider buying products from your site.
Wrapping Things Up
Optimizing product pages is extremely important to drive qualified traffic to your website, which may become sales.
Following SEO best practices – including optimizing your page titles, descriptions, and body content, build up internal links, and decorating your pages with structured data – can cause more customers to go to these specific pages.
This yields a better chance of a purchase since those consumers were directed to what they were originally buying