For ecommerce businesses, especially those on the BigCommerce platform, search engine optimization (SEO) is crucial. It acts as the driving force behind online visibility, ensuring that potential customers can effortlessly discover and interact with your products.
Millions of online stores are vying for consumer’s attention, and an effective SEO strategy gives your business a competitive advantage. Your business can potentially secure higher rankings on search engine result pages by optimizing product pages, utilizing relevant keywords, and creating compelling meta descriptions.
When it comes to BigCommerce stores, it’s imperative to have a robust SEO strategy to enhance product discoverability, increase organic traffic, and ultimately boost sales.
Why BigCommerce SEO Matters?
BigCommerce is a leading ecommerce platform that offers a comprehensive digital solution for businesses of all sizes. The platform is known for its user-friendly interface, extensive feature set, and scalability. BigCommerce empowers merchants to create a manage their online stores efficiently with customizable templates, responsive design, and build-in SEO tools.
There are unique SEO challenges and opportunities that come into play with BigCommerce. While the platform provides essential SEO features, meticulous attention is required to optimize product pages, leverage relevant keyword, and fine-tune meta descriptions. Because BigCommerce is a hosted solution, some technical SEO aspects may have limitations compared to self-hosted platforms. It’s imperative to strategically navigate these challenges in order for your business to distinguish itself from competitor’s in the digital landscape.
Essential SEO Tips for BigCommerce
When it comes to implementing a successful SEO strategy for BigCommerce stores, it can be overwhelming to decide where to start. Here are 10 tips to get you started.
Tip 1: Optimize Your Store's Website Structure
The best place to start your business’s SEO journey is to optimize your store’s website structure, and this starts with establishing a clear hierarchy. Be sure to start with broad categories and then narrow them down to specific products or services as needed. When it comes to your navigation menu, it must be created with a straightforward and intuitive structure to improve the user experience and make it easier for search engines to crawl your website. Additionally, implement breadcrumb navigation on all product detail pages to help users navigate your site and provide an additional way for search engines to understand the structure.
Consider linking to “New” and “Featured” products from the homepage in order to improve page authority and visibility of the latest and best-selling products. Finally, ensure that the pagination is both crawlable and indexable, as well as link back to the brands page from each branded product to prevent orphaned products and pages.
Tip 2: Leverage BigCommerce’s Built-in SEO Features
BigCommerce provides built-in SEO features that provide a solid foundation for businesses looking to create or boost their SEO strategy. One of these features is BigCommerce’s custom URL structure, which should be utilized by businesses to create short, keyword-rich, and descriptive URLs. Be sure to take advantage of the platform’s ability to set title tags and meta descriptions for each page and incorporate relevant keywords to boost visibility.
The platform provides a mobile-responsive design, which ensures that your website is optimized for mobile users. This not only makes your website more accessible, but also can positively impact your search engine rankings as mobile accessibility is an important ranking factor. Implementing structure data, such as product schema supported by BigCommerce, can boost product listings in search results.
Additionally, the platform provides image management tools, giving businesses the opportunity to add alt text to help with search engine indexing and the understanding of a web page. 301 redirects can be managed directly within BigCommerce in order to fix broken links or when moving pages in order to maintain SEO value. Finally, be sure to integrate and monitor your site performance with Google Analytics, which is supported by BigCommerce, in order to continuously refine your SEO strategy.
Tip 3: Conduct Thorough Keyword Research
Keyword research is one of the most important aspects of an effective SEO strategy and the first step is to identify your target audience and understand their search habits. This understanding guides your keyword research so it aligns with what your potential customers are searching for. An effective way to further enhance your keyword research is to implement tools such as Google Keyword Planner, Semrush, or Ahrefs to find relevant keywords. When looking for keywords, be sure to keep an eye out for those with high search volume, but manageable competition that are also relevant to your products and services.
Analyzing competitors’ websites is another great way to discover they keywords they are ranking for, and implementing tools like Moz and SpyFu can provide insights into competitors’ keyword strategies. Long-tail keywords are longer, have more specific phrases, and often have lower competition with higher transactional intent, which can lead to attracting more qualified traffic. If your business has a physical location or specific geographic target market, incorporate local keywords to help your business appear in local search results.
Look for keyword variations and synonyms to broaden your reach. Different users may use different terms to search for the same product or service. Pay attention to search intent. Categorize your keywords based on whether users are likely to be in the awareness, consideration, or decision stage of the buying process.
Utilize BigCommerce’s SEO analytics features to track how your chosen keywords are performing on your site. Adjust your strategy based on this data. Regularly update and refine your keyword list. Search trends can change over time, so it’s important to stay updated with the latest keyword data.
Tip 4: Optimize Product Pages for Search Engines
One of the most important parts of an SEO strategy is ensuring that your product pages are optimized for search engines as this is the way that your products will show up on search engine queries. This process starts with including the primary keyword in your product title, which should be clear, descriptive, and engaging, as well as reflecting the product accurately. Be sure to write unique and compelling product descriptions that also incorporate relevant keywords naturally.
It’s imperative to avoid keyword stuffing and instead focus on providing valuable information to the user. High quality images and descriptive alt text can provide an aesthetically pleasing element to product pages, but also allows search engines to better understand and index the images. It’s also important to create search engine friendly URLs for each product page, which includes ensuring they are descriptive, concise, and include the main keyword.
Customer reviews can contribute to SEO as fresh, unique content, as well as improve trust and conversion rates among your audience; ensure to encourage and display these reviews on product pages. Internal linking helps distribute page authority throughout your website and improve user navigation, so use this strategy wisely by linking related products, categories, or relevant blog posts.
More consumers are shopping on mobile devices and Google implements mobile-first indexing for their results, so it’s important to ensure your product pages are mobile-friendly. Regularly update your product pages to keep the information accurate and current, especially when it comes to price changes, stock availability, or product variations. Finally, create a meta description for each product page that includes the primary keywords and encourages clicks from search results with a strong call-to-action.
Tip 5: Utilize High-Quality, SEO-Friendly Content
Once you’ve conducted your keyword research, it’s time to create comprehensive, informative product descriptions. When doing this, go beyond basic features and include benefits, usage tips, and any unique selling points. Additionally, regularly publish blog posts related to your industry, including how-to guides, industry trends, product use cases, and customer stories. Ensure all content is original and provides value to your audience and incorporate multimedia elements like images, videos, and infographics, all of which can enhance user engagement and provide additional ranking opportunities.
When writing the content, use a clear, engaging, and brand-consistent tone as this helps in building a connection with your audience. The structure of your content should include headings, subheadings, bullet points, and short paragraphs to boost readability. Encourage user-generated content, such as customer reviews and testimonials because they can provide fresh, authentic content that enhances trust and SEO. Content should be regularly updated, reviewed, and refreshed, especially top-performing ones, to keep them relevant and effective.
Tip 6: Avoid Duplicate, Thin, and “Page Not Found” Content
Duplicate, thin, and “page not found” content can be detrimental your website as it can push both users and search engines away. For duplicate content, implement canonical tags on your BigCommerce site to direct search engines to your preferred page version, safeguarding your SEO.
Thin content can be enriched by adding detailed product information, FAQs, and user guides to enhance user engagement and SEO value. Regularly monitor and fix 404 errors using BigCommerce’s tools, and redirect outdated or broken URLs with 301 redirects to relevant pages to maintain link equity and user experience. Additionally, carefully select and limit the number of facets creating indexable URLs. This strategy focuses on quality over quantity, avoiding the creation of excessive, low-value pages in search engine indexes.
Tip 7: Implement Product Schema Markup for Rich Snippets
Implementing product schema on your product pages can enhance your presence in search results with rich snippets. This can include details like price, availability, reviews, and ratings. When going through this process, use organization schema on your homepage and include information like your brand name, logo, and contact details to improve brand visibility in search results.
If your business writes blog posts, be sure to apply article schema to help search engines understand and display the content in a more informative way, potentially increasing click-through rates. Additionally, breadcrumb schema should be applied to your site’s navigation as it can help users and allow search engines to understand and display the website hierarchy in search results.
Be sure to regularly update your structured data and ensure that information like prices, stock statuses, and promotions are current because outdated data can mislead users and hurt your SEO. Testing and validating your structured data implementation by using tools like Schema Markup Validator to ensure it’s correctly set up and recognized by search engines. Finally, be sure to keep an eye on Google’s guidelines for structured data to ensure your strategy is in line with best practices and avoids penalties for incorrect implementation.
Tip 8: Prioritize Mobile Optimization and Performance
Prioritizing mobile responsiveness is imperative to ensure your business’s website is visible on search engines. Ensuring your BigCommerce site’s design and layout adapt seamlessly to different screen sizes, is crucial for the user experience and Google’s mobile-first indexing. Images should be compressed and optimized, and use tools to reduce file sizes without sacrificing image quality and to speed up page load times, which is especially important for mobile users.
HTTP requests can be minimized by combining files where possible and page loading speed can be enhanced by reducing the number of scripts and stylesheets. Leveraging browser caching allows returning visitors to experience faster load times by storing elements of your site in their browser cache. BigCommerce’s built-in CDN (content delivery network) helps with quicker content delivery to users, regardless of their geographical location.
Optimize your code by minifying JavaScript, CSS, and HTML, and reducing unnecessary characters from code can significantly speed up page loading. Lazy loading can reduce initial load times for images and videos as they only load as users scroll down the page. Regularly test your site’s speed using tools such as Google PageSpeed Insights and use these insights to make continuous improvements. Finally, choose a responsive, speed-optimized them for your BigCommerce store or explore Americaneagle.com’s services for a tailored custom solution and professional help.
Tip 9: Build Quality Backlinks to Your Ecommerce Store
Building quality backlinks that lead to your ecommerce store is imperative to increase brand visibility for your business. A great way to do this is to reach out to influencers and bloggers in your niche for product reviews or mentions. You can also participate in niche forums and online communities, which gives you an opportunity to provide helpful insights and information. This helps establish your business as an authority and helps your website potentially gain backlinks. Leveraging social media is a great way to share your content and engage with your audience, and while these are typically no-follow links, they can lead to increased visibility and organic link building.
Guest blogging on reputable sites in your industry is a great way to not only give you a backlink, but to also expose your brand to a broader audience. Listing your business in relevant online directories and local business listings is an effective way to expand visibility to your audience. Collaborating with other businesses for cross-promotion or co-authored content can lead to natural and mutually beneficial link exchanges. It’s imperative to ensure your listings are accurate and consistent across platforms so potential customers have a clear understanding of your business.
Monitor your competitors’ backlinks using tools like AppSumo, Ahrefs, or Semrush to identify where they are getting links and explore similar opportunities for your website. Hosting or sponsoring events that engage in community initiatives provide your business with an opportunity for local media and related businesses to link to your site. Finally, be sure to regularly audit your site’s backlinks using SEO tools to identify and eliminate any low-quality or spammy links that could harm your SEO value.
Tip 10: Regularly Monitor and Adjust SEO Strategies
One of, if not the most important, SEO tip is to continuously monitor and adjust your SEO strategies, which can be done in a variety of ways. Using analytics tools like Google Analytics is an effective way to track website traffic, user behavior, and conversion rates. It’s crucial to analyze this data to understand what’s working and what isn’t.
Regularly check your keyword rankings using tools like Semush or Ahrefs to stay informed about how your pages rank for targeted keywords and adapt your strategy as needed. It’s important to monitor your site’s loading speed periodically with tools like Google PageSpeed Insights, as slow loading times can impact user experience and search rankings.
It’s important to use the SEO tools at your disposal to assess the quality of your backlinks and identify new link-building opportunities. Google changes its algorithm updates periodically, so be sure to stay up to date and adjust your SEO strategies to align with the latest search engine practices and avoid penalties. Conduct a content audit periodically to identify outdated or underperforming content and be sure to update, repurpose, or remove content in order to maintain a fresh and relevant website.
Tracking your competitors’ SEO activities can help you understand their strategies and provide insights into industry trends and new techniques to consider for your own strategy. Use tools like Google Search Console to monitor site health, crawl errors, and indexing status.
Address any technical issues promptly to ensure your site remains search engine friendly. Set up and review conversion goals in your analytics platform as this can help you better understand the ROI of your SEO efforts and guides any adjustments to the strategy. Finally, continuously test and optimize your website’s user experience because user engagement metrics like bounce rate and session duration can heavily impact overall SEO performance.
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As BigCommerce development experts, Americaneagle.com is highly experienced and skilled in providing BigCommerce SEO services to our clients. We have a robust team of SEO professionals who leverage the tools in BigCommerce to provide you a tailored strategy that pushes your business forward. If your business is looking to build or enhance your BigCommerce SEO strategy, contact us today to get an SEO analysis and speak with one of our experts.
