Visibility is one of the things that eCommerce stores struggle with the most, especially when first starting out. Even websites with high-quality products and great branding don’t always appear in the top search results.
The process that affects the visibility of a website the most would be SEO, or search engine optimization. If your online store is struggling to appear on the first page of Google, stick around and read on. This information might be just what you need to help get your store over the hump.
What is SEO and Why is it Important for Website Visibility?
SEO is essentially the process of optimizing your website for search engine visibility. By mapping out a keyword strategy, implementing those keywords on specific pages, making your website crawlable, and sourcing high-quality backlinks, you are effectively telling Google that you are an authority on this subject and are worth being more “visible.”
There is a bit more to it than that, but this is one way of looking at SEO that makes it clear why it is a necessary process.
And it’s important to note that SEO is just that, a process that affects the visibility of your website. It’s not a “one time thing” or a limited service. Ideally, you have to think of SEO in long terms, at least six months to a year to get meaningful traction.
After you begin to gain a foothold in the SERPs with an SEO campaign, this is only the beginning. SEO can be likened to a neverending battle: you have to continue to fight against all of the other websites that are trying to be visible as well. There are only so many positions available on the first page of Google, only so many changes to be seen.
Without a proper SEO strategy, you have very little chance of acquiring enough website visibility to draw a large body of organic traffic.
Gaining Visibility With an Expert SEO Strategy
It’s important to note that random SEO tweaks aren’t going to make a big difference here. The primary means of gaining visibility with SEO is all in the strategy.
Here is a general outline on the steps you need to take in order to craft a meaningful and effective SEO strategy that will put your website on the map:
- Start with a deep dive on important keywords that you want to rank for. These should be terms that are related to your products and industry, and that have adequate volume to support healthy organic traffic. The difficulty of the keywords should be taken into account as well – it can take years to rank for difficult keywords even with the best strategies.
- Once you have a collection of thoughtful keywords, the next step is to implement them on your website in the content, meta titles, image alt tags, and other key locations. Certain keywords should be assigned to specific pages that have the best chance to actually rank. This can be a lengthy process, but if done correctly, will increase the chances that your SEO efforts will be successful.
- Blogging is the next step. Even for eCommerce websites, you can’t avoid regular content updates on your website. This is what builds topical authority in your niche while also providing valuable link juice to your key target pages and products. You need to be blogging with visibility in mind: write about topics your customers would want to read. The purpose of a well-made blog is two-fold: to add SEO value to your website and to improve brand authority.
- Source quality backlinks. This is one area where people struggle. Without having the proper connections, it can be difficult to source worthwhile backlinks. Beyond technical updates and professionally written content for your blog, backlinks are one of the main reasons why hiring an SEO agency is often the smart move for most businesses. Backlinks signal to Google that you are a relevant authority and that other websites trust you enough to link to you. In Google’s eyes, this kind of a “trust signal” conveys a lot of weight. Even though backlinks aren’t quite as important as they were ten years ago, they still play an important role in the overall effectiveness of an SEO campaign, especially if you are striving for increased visibility.
You will also want to audit your website regularly for 404 errors, crawl issues, spam backlinks, and duplicate content.
This seems like a lot of work just to make your website more visible, huh?
The reality is that SEO is one of the most involved channels of marketing, and requires a great deal of technical know-how and strategic thinking. Websites that appear in the top of the search results don’t get there by accident. Google wants to see that each page that is indexed provides value and meets the goals of the end user. In this case, that’s the customers you are trying to attract.
If web pages don’t properly meet the needs of the users and signal to Google what they are about, the chances of them being visible in the search engines is minimal at best. This makes SEO the most important process that affects the visibility of a website or online store.
How You Can Make Your Website More Visible With Expert SEO Services
These days, SEO is a lot more than adding some meta titles and blogging once in a while. As outlined above, there’s a lot of strategy that goes into it, and you have to continuously execute in order to see traction. This means weekly or even daily updates, constant blogging, backlink sourcing, audits, and more.
Most store owners do not have time for all that, to say the least.
This is where the SEO experts here at 1Digital can lend a hand. We understand how frustrating it can be not to appear in the search results for important key phrases. It can be a slap in the face to put so much work into launching your eCommerce website only to be invisible online.
Not to worry, this is more common than you think. All you need is a well-planned and professionally implemented SEO campaign.
If you want to be more visible online and have your website appear on page 1, give us a call. Our SEO experts would be happy to talk strategy and start you on the road to greater website visibility.