There are now 7.9 million retailers online. 2.1 million of them are in the US alone. If you want to cut above these vast levels of competition, then do you know how to get your store to the top of Google? For Shopify users, there are a number of ways you can increase your SEO score. Read on as we give 9 in-depth tips on how to improve Shopify SEO. 

1. Optimize the Structure

Imagine that you walk into two physical stores. One is a neatly organized place. It may be laid out in neat aisles, with signage to tell you where different items are. 

The second type one looks like a war zone, with items scattered everywhere and no pattern or organization. Everyone has walked into a shop like this at some point. If you don’t have the time to conduct a huge search, then the sensible option is to walk out. 

When you visit a website, your layout needs to mimic the tidy, well-thought-out store. People should be able to find the items under neat headings and subheadings. A visible search option should be available to let them find what they want quickly. 

One tip to optimize your Shopify store is to employ a rule of three clicks. This states that people should be able to find any page or product within three clicks of the mouse or taps of the screen. If not, then your website is excessively cluttered and poorly laid out. 

2. Remove Duplicate Content

Duplicate content refers to any text that exists elsewhere on the web or on your own site. For example, if someone copy and pasted your blog onto another website, it counts as duplicate content. Duplicate content is not a good SEO strategy for Shopify. 

All the major search engines are generally tolerant of duplicate content on one site. However, if the exact text is used on other sites then both will be penalized. 

Shopify stores are prone to duplicate content, and this is not always intentional. Due to the nature of other websites often selling the same product, and limited ways in which you can describe them, it is easy to duplicate by accident. 

All you need to do to check your content is to run product descriptions and any blog articles through a plagiarism checker. They will scour the web and tell you any text that matches on other sites, often down to phrases and sentencing. You can then reword any parts that do occur elsewhere. 

3. Register with Google Search Console

Google is the king of search engines, and by registering on its search console, you are letting it know that you exist. Doing this will index it for you and help Google keep track of any changes. It is very easy to do, and Google itself has plenty of information to help you through the process. 

4. Optimize Titles and Meta Descriptions

Getting the right title is a great advantage when you want to optimize your Shopify store. Not only does it tell the user what the blog or product is about, but it also does the same for search engines. This means it needs to include vital keywords. 

The metadata is the blurb on Google used when your page appears as a result. Like the title, it does not just tell the searcher what the page is about, but the search engines. The more the engine understands, the more likely it is to select your content as relevant. 

Both titles and meta descriptions have a set amount of characters to be used. You should get this as close as possible, without going over, but not being too short. The title should have 60 characters and the meta description 160. 

It may seem like doing all of this takes a lot of time. There are no shortcuts, but it will pay dividends long term.  

5. Optimize Your Images

Images are much more complicated when it comes to your SEO strategy for Shopify than many people think. This lies in both the technical aspects of the image and what the images depict. 

Each image will have an alt tag attached to it. This is a shortcut for telling the search engine what the image is about. It can also be used for people who are visually impaired to find out what is on the screen. 

Alt tags should be rich in keywords. In addition, they should provide a strong description of the image onscreen. This can help search engines and push visitors further down the sales funnel. 

After this, consider the size and method of delivering images on the site. Larger images will take longer to load and slow your web pages down, which can impact your SEO score. There are a number of plugins that can optimize the delivery of images for you. 

Finally, think about the image itself. As people buying online do not get to see or feel your product, this is one of the few methods of connecting with it. Try not to use the same images as other websites, even hiring professional photographers if you have to do so. 

6. Utilize Shopify Collections

Collections are a great way to increase the user experience, which will in turn improve your SEO for Spotify. Collections are groups of products loosely related to one another, that stay in categories on your site. By showing people collections, you negate the need for them to search and trawl the site, cutting down the steps needed to make a conversion. 

Using them also offers more opportunities to add keywords to your websites. You can use them to answer questions people may have online, suggesting products that may solve the issue. 

Collecting the items together does not even have to take time. You can create your own collections, but Shopify can also make them from popular products, new ones, or ones that customers also bought. 

Finally, it also builds an internal linking system. As people move from one product page to another, it tells search engines that your website is one of value. 

7. Speed It Up

A slow Shopify store is an empty one. Speeding your website up works on two levels, both technical and physical. 

Technically, when it comes to ranking on search engines, quick sites are given preference over slower ones. If you want to know how to rank higher on Shopify and beat similar products, then loading faster than the competition gives you an advantage. 

From a purely physical level, people are impatient. If your site does not load, they will just go elsewhere. The amount of time they spend on your site is known as a bounce rate, and a high one also has a negative impact on your SEO rating. 

Unfortunately, Shopify is not as easy to speed up as other sites. This is because you have to use their servers and templates. Thus, they have control over this element. 

One of the few ways you can increase it is by compressing any images and removing unused apps. If there are any that you can do without, then get rid of these as well. 

Strip back the number of fonts on your website. You can also consider replacing some of them with web-safe fonts. Remove any image sliders in place of optimized images. 

8. Add a Blog

Blogs are a great way to pack more keywords into your website. In addition to this, informational content has started to be favored more highly than product pages in searches. This makes adding a blog a great way to get people onto your site and turn them into conversions. 

Writing a blog is not just as simple as typing and littering keywords in. If your content is poor, then people will go elsewhere. As previously mentioned, this will increase your bounce rate and have a negative impact. 

Make sure you provide quality information. You may answer questions and solve problems in your blogs. Run the text through a readability checker, so it is easy for people to digest. 

9. Research Your Keywords

Keywords are the terms people type into search engines when looking for products and information. If you don’t use the ones that people are searching for, then they just won’t find you. They need to be spread into everything from product descriptions to blog posts. 

As is the nature of people, keywords change over time. They ebb and flow in popularity. This is why researching them on a regular basis is critical. 

Getting the most popular ones is also not always the best tactic. They often have lots of competition, making them harder to rank. Aim to get keywords that have a balance between visitor numbers and competition. 

Shopify SEO

None of these Shopify SEO tips can be done immediately. Create a plan to implement the changes in conjunction with your marketing and IT departments. If you are working alone, then it may help to get assistance.

For all your eCommerce classes and training videos, Wizards of Ecom should be your first stop. We have a proven record of helping online businesses grow. Click here to see all our upcoming classes and learn something new about digital marketing.