Shopify SEO 101: Comprehensive Guide & List

The concept of SEO is familiar to many people. No matter what kind of a presence you have on the internet, the use of SEO most likely will be beneficial for your presence.

As you may already know, SEO stands for “search engine optimization,” a term used to describe optimizing a website to ensure it ranks higher on the search engine results page and brings more visitors.

But today, what we will talk about is slightly different from the SEO you know and love. Today, we will talk about Shopify SEO.

The popularity and use of Shopify are becoming more and more popular each day, and if you are a Shopify user yourself, you must know about Shopify SEO since it can help you a lot.

You should note that even though you know the “regular” SEO a little too well, there can be some points on Shopify SEO that would make a difference. So, keep reading to get to know Shopify SEO a little too well, too!

What is Shopify SEO?

As we mentioned earlier, Shopify is a platform that requires different stuff than the other ones. In other words, things will change in SEO when it comes to Shopify. Shopify SEO is a term used to describe those changed aspects of SEO that you use on Shopify.

You should note that as we mention Shopify SEO, we do not talk about something entirely different. Of course, regular SEO and Shopify SEO have many common points. However, if you want to become the best Shopify version of your site, you should pay attention to all the details which comprise Shopify SEO.

While it might not seem like a big issue at first glance, the significance of Shopify SEO is, in fact, immaculate.

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Why is Shopify SEO Important?

As you may already know, Shopify is an e-commerce site, and it is a trendy one. This sentence alone should signal you the most critical reason why Shopify SEO matters, but still, let’s not risk it and talk about it.

Shopify SEO is important because it will be your chance to rank higher on search engines. You may ask why that matters, and the reason is that there is no better place on earth than the second page of search engine results to hide a body. That’s true; nobody is going to look at it there.

You will need to rank high to be visible, get clicks, and make sales. Your Shopify page should be in front of people’s eyes, especially those with purchasing intent.

Moreover, ranking high with your Shopify website will enhance the trust bond with your customers and possible customers. People trust Google, and if Google trusts you enough to rank you high, it means you win the trust of everyone who trusts Google, which is billions of people!

So, to keep things clear, your goals are in line with what Shopify SEO brings to you. Everything that is going to help to achieve your goals should matter to you. If you own a Shopify store and want to be better at it, you need to know the Shopify SEO tips and tricks.

Shopify SEO Tips for More Customers

We must once again mention that Shopify SEO is very much like the regular SEO practices that you are familiar with. However, knowing simple yet efficient tips and tricks would step up your Shopify website more than you can imagine.

The following are some of the most important tips and tricks for succeeding on your Shopify SEO journey.

Master the Basics

There are many small details on Shopify SEO. But is it wise to focus on the small details while you have not mastered the basics of Shopify SEO? To get one step further, you would want to ensure that everything essential is perfectly optimized and ready for improvement.

If your technical background regarding SEO basics is strong enough, the search engine will read and find what you are trying to explain and rank you higher on the search engine results page.

But, what are those significant basic technical issues?

Let’s see them briefly.

Headings

Headings will be your number one tool to signal what is your website is about on your Shopify page. If you choose descriptive headings, you will explain to Google and your possible visitors what is going on there.

You should remember that you should use only one H1 heading and stick to a character limit of 50 to 60 characters on your H1 heading. Moreover, using H2 headings to product names is something you might want to avoid on the collection pages on Shopify.

Another fundamental mistake you need to avoid is using logos or images in H1 heading tags.

Site Structure

When it comes to Shopify SEO, site architecture plays a crucial role. You need to offer a nicely planned site structure to your visitors to help them find what they need in the quickest way possible.

Ensure that your site structure is well-suited to the hierarchical nature of e-commerce sites. For example, if you have a category named “women clothing,” the subcategories would be “dresses, street style, shoes, accessories, pajamas….”

Do not build your Shopify site in a complicated manner. You would want to help people find what they need to have a better user experience and hence, increase your website rankings.

URL Structure

Another Shopify SEO basic for your Shopify website is URL structure. As you may already know, your URL needs to be as clear and descriptive as possible for search engines to make sense of it.

Additionally, people tend to see complicated and meaningless URLs as unsafe, and you know that nobody would want to click on a link that appears unsafe to them.

See More: Technical SEO

So, the best thing to do would be to keep your URL brief, easy to read, descriptive, and all in lowercase.

However, the URL structure in Shopify is entirely strict, and you cannot change it except the URL slug part (the end of the URL). What you can do is focus on the URL slug and optimize it in the best way possibl

Image Optimization

On any given Shopify website, images play an incredibly significant role. We know that image quality and optimization are important in SEO in general, but you have to be extra careful in Shopify.

Of course, people would want to see a clear image of what they are buying. In fact, if your images are not optimized, no matter how hard you try on other aspects of your Shopify website, you are not going to make it through.

The main thing to focus on Shopify image optimization is to ensure that their load time is as short as possible, and search engines can understand what is going on in the images.

For achieving the details above, you can include your images in the XML sitemap. Additionally, compressing images would help you to optimize your images. Shopify does not automatically compress images, which would improve your website quality for SEO immediately.

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Avoid Duplicate Content

After the basics and technical aspects, it’s time to focus on more detailed tips for Shopify SEO.

We all know that duplicate content is a nightmare for every kind of SEO out there, but did you know that duplicate content is number one in Shopify SEO’s no-no list?

A crucial point in duplicated content in Shopify SEO is that it is all about the URL structure.  In other words, duplicate content in Shopify SEO means if there is a similar or same URL content is present in two different URLs.

As you may already guess, if there are two identical or similar URL content, the search engine will have difficulties understanding what is going on, and Shopify does not tolerate this.

See More: Content Optimization

If you are using the automatic URL that was assigned by Shopify, it is most likely that you will experience this problem. Luckily, you can adjust your internal linking structure to get rid of this problem caused by URL structure.

Optimize Keywords

Optimizing the keyword use on your Shopify website can be one of the best things you can do. At the end of the day, are there any other ways to find people interested in your products other than using the words they use to search for products?

One thing you need to know for optimizing keywords is which keywords are working on your Shopify content. To learn about them, you will need to perform keyword research, which includes finding keywords people tend to write for your products and content.

Keyword research goes beyond that, too. You need to know about the volume of searches. For example, you might have found a keyword that you want to focus on in your Shopify content.

But, how can you really optimize them if you do not know how many people are searching for that specific query with the keywords?

One rule of thumb is choosing keywords with both high search volume and low search competition rates.

Another detail you might want to pay attention to is the existing rankings. You can overview the first several results on the search engine results page and see which keywords seem to work the best.

Once you complete all of the things we mentioned, there are no reasons to think your keywords are not optimized in your Shopify website.

Optimize Meta Descriptions

Another detail that would help you to optimize your Shopify for SEO is, of course, meta descriptions. The value of meta descriptions in SEO cannot be overlooked by any means, and this includes Shopify in a great sense.

In the most basic words, meta descriptions are brief summaries of your webpage content. You can observe meta descriptions right below the webpage link on the search engine results page.

Perhaps you heard that Google stated, “meta descriptions are not a ranking factor.” While it is technically true, there is an indirect influence of meta descriptions in rankings is clear as day. It is a well-known fact that good meta descriptions are related to higher click-through rates, which is most likely to increase your rankings in SERPs.

If you already did not, optimizing your meta descriptions on your Shopify website would have a good impact. Here are a few things that can help you to optimize your meta descriptions:

• Be descriptive and accurate.
• Try to include your target keywords (the ones that you want to rank on) but avoid keyword stuffing.
• Fit to the meta description character limit (around 120 to 150 characters)

Optimize Product Titles and Product Descriptions

A key component of Shopify SEO is how you want to represent your products. Of course, the one way of representing what you have to offer is through product titles and product descriptions.

In Shopify, you would want to be extra careful about what you name your products and how do you describe them.

It goes without saying that product titles and product descriptions are your way to tell both your visitors and search engine about what you are selling. But have you ever considered that there is more than that in product titles and product descriptions? Because there certainly is.

We mentioned how duplicated content in Shopify is a big issue on URLs. The same issue is present regarding product titles and product descriptions. You have to write unique product titles and product descriptions if you want to succeed.

It is known that duplicated content is a reason for lower rankings on search engines, which is something you would definitely want to avoid.

But what if I am selling the exact same product or similar products with someone else, and we accidentally write the same product titles and descriptions?

Of course, situations like this happen. To avoid it, you need to focus on unique product descriptions and titles.

So, make sure that you have a title and description that anyone else cannot use. Of course, you do not have control over it, but make it unique, make it something that could not be thought of by anyone else. Of course, while doing that, you still need to be descriptive and accurate.

Support your Shopify with Content

Everything regarding your products on Shopify matters a lot. And for this reason, many Shopify users put all their effort and time into optimizing them.

In reality, there is more to focus on in Shopify that would improve the quality of the website tremendously. One aspect that is beyond products is content creation.

Typically, the contents that Shopify users create are in the form of blogs. It makes so much sense because blogs are not getting old anytime soon, and they are the best to educate your consumers or people who intend to purchase but are not sure about it.

Of course, you would want to create content about something related to your products. This would allow you to reach a larger audience that might be interested in your products. On your Shopify products page, you are only reaching people who have purchasing intent.

Blog content is your chance to convert people who have only search intent to purchasing intents, followed by being a customer of yours.

You would still want to optimize your blog posts for SEO to increase visibility and make your Shopify store succeed more.

Increase Dwell Time

Another tip for Shopify SEO is to increase dwell time. Dwell time is a term used to describe the time spent on any given website or webpage. In other words, dwell time is an indicator of the time people spend on your website.

It is a well-known SEO fact that a high dwell time is good news for your website and, of course, Shopify account. Focusing on increasing dwell time will help you enhance user experience (because people will not spend time somewhere that is not good, so you have to work on user experience) and increase your rankings.

But, what can you do differently on your Shopify site to increase dwell time? Well, we have some tips.

Having a simple and understandable navigation structure will help dwell time. People would most likely not spend so much time understanding your site’s structure, and if they do not like it or if they find it challenging to use, they will leave it.

If you create an easy and manageable navigation structure, it means that people can find what they need quickly and can spend more time looking at your content. Getting from one part of your website to another should not be rocket science; in fact, it should be as easy as possible.

Another tip to improve dwell time is using internal linkings. For example, under specific categories, you can put internal linkings that indicate “similar products,” “complementary products,” or “you might also like” linkings.

Internal linkings will allow your visitors to interact more with your content. If they like what they are seeing, they will click on the internal linkings. Keep in mind that if you do not implement appropriate internal linkings, the user will most likely not bother to navigate through your website and see other stuff.

They can do that, but why decrease your chances of increasing dwell time while you have the opportunity? It is also known that internal linkings have other SEO benefits than increasing dwell time so, it is a win-win situation!

Another tip to increase dwell time is encouraging your visitors to interact with your content. This might be a blog post comment, share, or leaving their contact information (if you implement a contact form).

There are no possible ways of interaction being a bad thing for your website. If people are interacting with your content, they are most likely enjoying it; at least, it would be the first thing Google will indicate.

Be Careful about the Apps

If you ever had a problem with your Shopify site and notified Shopify regarding the problem, the chances of you getting an answer that indicates “use an app” are astronomical.

However, just because Shopify said you so does not mean that it is the right thing to do. Sure, some apps can help you regarding the problems you are facing with Shopify.

But they are terrible for your page load time.

Having a short page load time is one of the main SEO knowledge. Remember, people have little to no patience when it comes to waiting for websites to open. Think about yourself. Do you wait for a website to open, even though it takes only several more seconds than usual?

No, you do not. Because there are other alternatives, and they can offer you similar or identical things.

If you face a problem, look for alternatives other than using an app on your Shopify site. Of course, there can be situations in which apps increase your click-through rates and conversion rates, but you need to calculate the risks and benefits wisely.

Shopify SEO is an important concept that every Shopify user needs to be aware of. The following are some of the most frequently asked questions about Shopify SEO that might help you to understand it better.

Shopify sites come with an automatic SEO package. In other words, some aspects of Shopify web pages are optimized for SEO. However, those will not be enough if you want to win the competition regarding website rankings.

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