If you want to generate traffic from Google, it’s vital that you keep on top of the latest SEO trends and Google algorithms to ensure your eCommerce website is generating lots of sales, but this can be incredibly difficult with so much contrasting information on the web on how to SEO an eCommerce website. In this blog post we’ll aim to tackle some of the most common SEO myths to help you get great rankings on Google.
SEO Myth #1 – You Can Rank A Website Without Links
You have probably heard the saying content is King. It’s a saying we even use on our website but it’s not the only thing you need to get a website ranking on Google.
While we are happy to agree that content is very important, we even offer a content marketing service, content isn’t everything and having high quality links pointing to your website is still a HUGE ranking factor.
Unfortunately the saying “If you build it, they will come” isn’t true! You need to get people to see your content and it won’t magically appear at the top of Google. There are many websites competing for the same keywords and if another website has already written great content and got all their on-site SEO in place just like you but they happen to have more authority (inbound links) then they will get found first. The problem is there is more competition than ever and just relying on content won’t cut it.
Make sure that you have great content and a great link-building strategy.
Most business owners are happy to work on their own content, links are always the area that we see lacking when working on a new website and normally the area that needs work to get great rankings.
SEO Myth #2 – SEO Is A One Time Job
This is something we hear a lot, we get phone calls, asking us to help with SEO. When we explain that it’s not a one-off task and a long-term monthly investment people are confused. I think this is because people read on the internet that they need to update their content, title tags and other metadata. The problem is that this isn’t the only work and even if it was sometimes we have to tweak that information multiple times to get the results we want.
SEO efforts should be ongoing because search engines and your competitors are constantly changing and updating. Your business, its vision, values, goals, and products will change over time and so should your SEO strategy so you can continue to drive the right people to the right pages at the right time and maintain great rankings.
It also takes time to build the number of links needed to get a good authority score and it’s better that Google see a consistent level of links coming in than them starting and stopping.
We recommend that you continually analyse your website’s performance as well as your competitors so you can look for opportunities to target in the future and exploit those opportunities successfully.
SEO Myth #3 – The More Keywords The Better
Keywords are an important part of any SEO strategy. You must make careful decisions about which keywords you’d like to target in order to monitor your success. It’s also important to ensure that the keywords you choose for your website are the correct keywords for the page you are targeting. Some keywords should be directed to a blog post, some to a page, some to a category and others directly to your products, you need to think about the intent of the keywords.
Stuffing your keywords into your text is actually a BIG mistake and can have a negative effect on your organic search results. Google is smart enough to determine whether or not your content is the right content to serve the person looking for it.
Our advice when writing content is to think about the visitor and what information they would like to see on that page. If you can’t get the keyword mentioned naturally, it’s probably the wrong page. We always say if you were reading this page what questions would you have? Make sure you’re focused on providing a solution for your customer and Google will take care of the rest.
Conclusion
SEO is a minefield of misinformation and contradicting theories and the information you find on the internet is more often than not out of date or inaccurate. There are many different elements you need to put in place to improve your organic rankings. Because of how competitive the internet is now, we highly recommend working with an eCommerce SEO agency who is constantly testing and trying techniques to grow your business.
If you need help generating more traffic to your website the first step is to sign up for our FREE Website & Marketing Audit we can look at your website and provide you with actionable insights you can use to improve your website and grow your business..
