eCommerce Website Optimization Guide 2022

Enhancing sales through an eCommerce store is not a leisurely task. Some might even say it is significantly more intricate than promoting brick-and-mortar stores. For your sales to take a positive shift, you need to sustain your website in favor of the emerging sales trends. Business owners need to implement ingenious tips, countless processes, and cutting-edge strategies to optimize their eCommerce website’s conversion rate these days.

Merchants have to optimize their website by improving their SEO ranking, generating high-quality audio and video content, increasing social media awareness, etc. Sellers are required to follow numerous rules and regulations to improve their website’s conversion and transaction rates.

eCommerce owners underestimate the power of modifying their existing website optimization strategies. Research has shown that making minor tweaks to your website results in 50% increased sales. Marketers should be aware of the changes they need to make, as modifying the wrong elements could hurt your website. This guide will aid you in understanding the core concept of eCommerce website optimization and tips for improvements.

Table of Contents

What is eCommerce Website Optimization?

eCommerce website optimization is an efficient way of enhancing your site to increase the chances of converting potential clients to buyers. The primary goal of creating a website for your eCommerce page is to persuade visitors to shop from you. Each aspect of your website – such as product descriptions, navigation, check-out process, content, themes, layouts – is deliberately curated to foster conversion. However, the consumer conversion rate is tricky, and it is always challenging to understand what and how to alter things without undergoing a detailed CRO audit.

According to a recent survey, about 71% of shoppers believe they will get cheaper deals online than physical stores. Even with the favorable statistics, it is still an arduous task to sell your products online. That is why vendors optimize their eCommerce websites to encourage customers to buy online.

eCommerce product page optimization is entirely different from basic website optimization as the transactions and conversions happen all in one place, exactly like in retail stores. Naturally, this denotes an altogether different and specific set of rules, regulations, and practices to increase conversion rates.

Discover more leads for boosting eCommerce website optimization from our expert team

Why is SEO Important for eCommerce?

eCommerce businesses thrive by being easily accessible to the targeted audience. Fetching traffic for eCommerce sites is dramatically different from getting customers to visit your traditional stores. Consumers need to see your store or experience its scope to buy from your product range and ultimately enhance sales.

A well-designed website paired with top-level optimized content will rank on prominent search engines like Google, Yahoo, etc. Furthermore, it makes acquiring leads and higher conversion rates easier. SEO services for eCommerce website optimization is a laborious and challenging process, but you could always hire professionals to help you with the journey.

SEO Audits

Running periodic technical SEO audits is the most neglected and fundamental key to maintaining your online presence. Companies should mandate such audits at least once every six months. The duration might vary from website to website. There are free tools readily available online that could assist you with these audits. SEO audits ensure your website is up-to-date with technology and thereby relevant, clean, and valuable to your consumers.

Tips to Boost eCommerce Website Optimization

Enhance Your On-page SEO Elements

It is a type of SEO that emphasizes several different parts of your website that you can easily optimize. Some aspects concerning On-Page SEO are website formatting, images, video content, and more. Its central goal is to create a search engine-friendly site. On-page SEO automatically organizes your website content so your site visitors can navigate easily. Below are some On-page SEO criteria that you need to fulfill.

1. Use High-quality Product Images

Customers expect your website to have precise and refined product images so they can assess the product before they buy it. Product photoshoots are a sure shot way to obtain such photographs. Ensure you write clear product descriptions according to primary keyword groups. You also need to optimize meta description, meta title, site content, and H1 tag. Your product landing and category pages should have a simple SEO-friendly URL structure. Please remember to optimize your website as per the guidelines published by Google.

2. Introduce Engaging Content

Content is the fundamental foundation of the very digital marketing campaign. Google has a set of criteria that it uses to evaluate the quality of its content.

Uniqueness: This factor demonstrates the authenticity of your article. It is easy to refer to content from the internet and curate plagiarized free articles. But, you have to ensure that your content contributes something unique or fresh amidst a wide array of articles already written about the same topic.
Length: It refers to the total number of words your article has and depends on the industry niche and the dilemma at hand. For example, if you want to demonstrate your expertise on a subject, long-form content will be the best option.
Value: This indicates the number of people engaging with your post and the extent. The higher the engagement rates, the more Google recognizes your article, meaning a higher SEO ranking. Engagement rates help Google understand how relevant and helpful your writing is to the target audience.

3. Categorize the Products on Your Website

Customers don’t usually have the time or energy to scroll through your entire website to search for products. As an eCommerce store owner, you must spend a reasonable amount of time categorizing the products on your website, determined based on the product type. For instance, if you are running an online clothes store, you have to organize your products based on the type of clothing, such as tops, bottoms, dresses, etc. Product categories can have sub-categories. For instance, tops could classify as tanks, camis, printed blouses, shirts, t-shirts, etc.

4. CTR and Rich Snippets

As per research, a rich snippet will enhance CTR or click-through rates by 677%. Utilize your keywords as an alt-text for product pages. Rich snippets are Google results that include additional data. These results are more visually appealing than others. Developers can achieve rich snippets by adding texts, headings, HTML5 microdata, information, and so on. Incorporate rich snippets for each product page to promote their visibility and quickly index organic searches.

5. A/B Testing to Find the Best Version

A/B testing or split testing is gauging the reactions from several distinct sets of target audiences after changing one or more elements of your website. It is a straightforward comparison of your original site (Variant A) and revamped site (Variant B.) This website testing tells you which variant performs better and has a higher consumption rate.

Get your eCommerce store's on-page SEO elements optimized

Off-page SEO

It combines paid marketing, social media marketing, link binding, influencer marketing, and other forms of marketing purposes executed outside your website domain to improve SEO ranking. In a nutshell, off-page SEO boosts your website’s ranking and search engine visibility.

Off-page SEO and on-page SEO work in tandem to increase the efficacy of your marketing campaigns and website performances. You should pay attention to a few crucial areas to enhance the effect of off-page methodologies. One such technique is using backlinks. We have listed a few off-page SEO strategies below.

Post your products on social bookmarking sites to get top-notch quality backlinks and enhance organic traffic
Research points out that text-based reviews influence about 43% of shoppers’ buying decisions compared to photos and videos. Therefore, request your consumers to leave a review on your social media pages, Yelp, Amazon, and other platforms.

High Load Speed for eCommerce Website

Page speed is the single most critical aspect of your website. It determines whether a user will have a positive or negative experience with your website. It acts as a judgment criterion of your users before they even look at the website contents. The first impression is the best, and to ensure that you hit it off on a good note, invest in increasing the loading speed of your eCommerce website. Some common tactics to improve the loading speed of your page are compiled below.

1. Choose the Best eCommerce Hosting Provider

Your eCommerce hosting platform significantly impacts eCommerce performance optimization. As similar as they are, not all of these service hosting providers will benefit you the same way. Choose an eCommerce hosting provider based on the following criteria:

It should be highly optimized for WooCommerce, WordPress, and any other eCommerce plugin you want to use.
It offers a technologically advanced, stable, and continuously updated platform to host your eCommerce store.
The hosting platform’s servers should perform optimally and have enhanced loading speed. It means it should include features like security built-in caching.

2. Optimize Product Images for Performance

Visual content like product images is the fundamental requirement and the most valuable and crucial one. The images will capture your users’ attention and keep them engaged enough to buy the product. Top-notch aesthetic product images are a strong selling point for consumers and increase the conversion rate. Large file sizes can be a hassle to add. That is why you need to ensure that you correctly optimize them before adding them to the site. You can utilize the following ways to optimize the product images for your Website without compromising on the quality.

The first method is to optimize each product image individually on your PC or computer before directly uploading them to the online site. You can utilize product image editing software such as Gimp, Adobe Photoshop, Affinity, and so on. These editing apps or software can export a picture for the Website. It also enables you to adjust the quality before you save it for uploading.
The second method is to use an image compression plugin for WordPress. These plugins are primarily free and readily available online. They also update your product image size automatically.

3. Use a DNS-level Website Firewall

The internet is crawling with hackers who want to steal sensitive financial data and commit fraud. DDoS and Brute force are two main hacking issues faced by users. In these types of attacks, the hackers overload your current server to break in and steal information from your site or install viruses or malware. eCommerce hosting platforms provide essential protection from hackers, but they can’t prevent your website from slowing down because of the attack. Thus, installation of a Website Application Firewall is necessary. A DNS-level firewall filters the traffic on your site and blocks off suspicious attacks before they try to reach your site.

4. Update Your Website eCommerce Theme

While choosing the prettiest and fanciest theme for your eCommerce website is understandable, it may not always be the best thing for your business. Not all themes are efficiently optimized and often clutter your site, making the site slower than usual. For instance, features like web fonts, carousels, icon fonts, and sliders can decrease the speed of your site. You need to ensure that you strike a balance between speed and functionality while selecting and updating your eCommerce website theme. Experts recommend starting with a simple theme. Later on, you can install plugins to add the features your site needs. By doing this, you will have greater control over the appearance and performance of your website.

5. Responsive Web Design

All statistical data reveal that consumers use their mobile phones more than their desktops. No eCommerce website optimization is complete without this crucial recommendation. Many professional developers and website designers have years of experience creating responsive web design. The more mobile-friendly your website is, the higher the conversion rate. On the other hand, if you have an inefficient web design, your sales will drastically decrease. Mobile users are known for not having enough patience. If your site takes 3 seconds or more to load, 40% of the visitors will leave your site. You can use a responsive eCommerce theme as one of the techniques to ensure a responsive web design. The theme will accurately adjust its layout based on the screen size, device, and resolution.

Personalize Relevant Products for Customers

Personalization is the leading trend for eCommerce businesses. It means showing your customers personalized and relevant content, offers, or products. Gartner’s statistical data suggests that in the future, smart personalization engines will be implemented to identify consumer interest and enable eCommerce businesses to enhance their profits by 15%. The data collected gives you a rough demographic outline of your customers. Based on social and web analytics data, you can know who your customers are, what they prefer, and where they have been on the site. For personalization to work, it should be targeted and intelligent. Customers favor seeing relevant products on the site. Highlight related products and “consumers also viewed this product” or “customers also bought this product” to increase the conversion rate.

Streamline Your Sales Process

Customers don’t like spending too much time on the check-out process. The chances are that more than half of the potential buyers will leave your site if the check-out process is long and complex. Successful eCommerce businesses have a customized check-out process to streamline the sales process. Below are a few ways to simplify the sales process.

1, Speed Up the Transactions

Consumers are generally fickle-minded when shopping online, and any more hindrances caused by your website will only lead them to abandon the cart. You need to choose payment gateways with robust security and efficient payment processing design. Building trust in your consumers is crucial by offering them safe, reliable payment methods.

2. Display Shopping Cart Content

Customers are indecisive, and they might want to sometimes add or remove items from their shopping cart. Your eCommerce website should have easy access to the shopping cart to view the contents quickly. It helps them decide what to purchase and simplifies the shopping process.

3. Provide Real-time Assistance

Technology today has allowed eCommerce sites to provide around-the-clock assistance to busy shoppers. The support is offered either by live-chat bots or human assistants. They help you answer queries related to the shopping process and recommend products based on your preferences. Many customers appreciate real-time shopping assistance.

4. Set Up an Abandoned Cart Sequence

70% of shoppers abandon carts at the check-out process, which has been slowly increasing every year. By implementing an abandoned cart email strategy, you can decrease this number. Abandoned cart emails are follow-up emails you send to buyers who have added products to their cart and left midway through the check-out process. They serve to remind shoppers what they left in their cart to entice them to complete the purchase process. These reminder emails are a cost-effective and highly efficient way of boosting sales.

5. Reduce Cart Abandonment

An abandoned cart is just another lost and wasted opportunity to make money. You can avoid this by reminding your customers that their shopping carts are not empty when they leave your site. An effective way to do this is through promotional emails, SMS, and online notifications. Your primary goal is to tempt the consumers to buy from your site. However, ensure that these messages are quirky, engaging, and not nagging as they may delineate the prospects. Marketers also arrive at other creative and innovative strategies to notify consumers about the products they left in their shopping cart.

Get to know ingenious tips and tricks to minimize hassles during check-out

Integrate Tracking and Analytics Tool Into the eCommerce Website

Analytics and tracking tools are vital to track metrics and KPIs to give insights into what’s working and what’s not for your eCommerce. It shows you your website’s vulnerable areas and the reason behind low organic traffic or sales. Based on the data collected by AIs, you recognize what elements push your buyers to purchase the products and what factors make them abandon the process. Information is power, and you can use it to elevate your conversion rate by advancing underperforming elements. As an eCommerce owner, you can install Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager as an analytic tool for your website.

Upsell Your Products

Upselling is a state-of-the-art method backed by research findings that increases your eCommerce revenue. In a nutshell, you persuade the customer to buy a more expensive version of a product they already shortlisted with this tactic. You can implement this strategy:

During check-out
On the product page
After check-out

It’s effortless to sell to current customers than potential customers. To execute upselling effectively, you need to remember to fulfill the following criteria:

Convince the consumer to buy the upsell
Make sure they know why the upsell is worth the money
Ensure you get the pricing right
Employ social proof to make the upsell more appealing

Visibility

The success of an eCommerce ensures the organic web traffic it gets on an average basis. It increases your site’s visibility which means your site has a broader reach and is accessible to a broader audience. You can improve your brand’s online visibility by employing SEO tools for your site. These SEO tools include keywords (both long-tail and short-tail), backlinking, inbound links, outbound links, publishing relevant and engaging content on a timely basis, meta tags, header tags, and so on. Search engines rank websites according to the quality of information they incorporate. Unique and relevant content are highly desirable factors for higher SEO ranks. The SEO algorithm is continually changing, so ensure your strategies are updated accordingly.

Role of Blogging

Competent developers and marketers prioritize blogging as a part of their eCommerce website optimization strategies. Blogging has myriad benefits: Lower bounce rates, advance the brand image, improve business growth, generate backlinks, boosting niche authority. 77% of internet users spend their time reading blogs, and 60% trust companies that regularly publish blogs. You can add a comment section below the blog to increase engagement, where customers get to discuss the blog and give feedback or opinions.

Do you think eCommerce website optimization could be relevant for your eCommerce conversion rates?

Final Thoughts

eCommerce is predicted to grow by more than 3.2 trillion dollars, and with the current pandemic, the dependency on eCommerce businesses is only rising. This eCommerce website optimization guide contains all the information you will need to get a comprehensive understanding of the topic. The tips will curate a seamless experience for your users while simultaneously increasing your conversion and sale rates. Conduct meticulous research about the topic before you get started on this journey. The optimization methods will differ based on your site requirements and business objectives. Keep that in mind before creating any strategies.

eCommerce Website Optimization - Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

How can I improve my eCommerce SEO?

Some of the most exemplary methods to improve your eCommerce website are lowering the load time, maximizing optimization, and minimizing website errors. You can also make use of markup to include knowledge graphs and rich snippets, customer reviews, content optimization, and so on.

What is eCommerce optimization?

An eCommerce optimization is a practical approach towards boosting your brand’s website and allowing you to convert your leads effortlessly. Every element of your website, from design, navigation, and content, must lead towards a specific end goal: investing in your brand’s products or services.

Why is SEO important for eCommerce?

SEO is a crucial factor for all eCommerce websites. It plays a significant role in boosting a brand’s organic search traffic. Moreover, it also increases your eCommerce site rank in different search engines. It is thus an essential factor for promoting your brand performance.

What is the SEO strategy suitable for a new eCommerce website?

One of the most influential and noteworthy SEO strategies for building a new eCommerce site is doing detailed keyword research to find different types of keywords that your potential consumers might be searching for on the internet. Find a tool based on your respective keyword research.

What is eCommerce online shopping?

eCommerce online shopping is nothing but a typical kind of electronic eCommerce that ensures that your potential consumers are encouraged to invest instantly in your company’s products and services from a seller through an online platform. It promotes consumers to select specific purchases through an internet site.

What are some of the prime advantages of eCommerce?

eCommerce has endless benefits such as a quick buying process, cost reduction, instant response to market demands and buyers, and increased customer flexibility. It also lists products, has zero reach limitations, extremely affordable marketing, product-price comparison, etc.

How do rich snippets increase CTR?

Rich snippets and CTR have an interconnected relationship. They are primarily used to increase CTR by providing essential information and making your SERP list look distinctive. The structured data added to the rich snippet helps Google comprehend your website’s content and rank it higher on search result pages.

How do you execute SEO on a product page?

A few of the most significant steps to do SEO on a product page include adding a bold title centering your attention on product name along with manufacturer name in some cases. Other efforts involve choosing easy-to-understand URLs for your respective product pages, drafting a welcoming meta description, and so on.

How do you write SEO-optimized product descriptions?

The most notable tips for writing SEO-optimized product descriptions include optimizing your website for different search engines, using encouraging and persuasive words, assuming a storytelling approach, avoiding making fake and inauthentic product descriptions, and so on.

What is the navigation structure of a website?

The navigation of a website is nothing but how one designs or sets up the website, for instance, how each subpage correlates to one another. A website consists of a significant number of subpages. All of them are linked to the homepage for maximum flexibility for users to navigate your website.

An Ultimate Guide to eCommerce Website Optimization: Tips to Boost Conversions and Sales in 2022

What is eCommerce Website Optimization?

Why is SEO Important for eCommerce?

SEO Audits