What are the real benefits of e-commerce SEO?

Key takeaways

If you think that social media is king these days, we suggest you think twice. A BrightEdge study discovered that 68% of online experiences start in search engines.

That’s why Search Engine Optimization (SEO) remains a hot commodity for eCommerce sites.

Increasing visibility is just scratching the surface. Ranking high on search engine results pages (SERPs) provides these unique benefits:

• Get real traffic numbers and attract high-quality leads
• Increase revenue to maximize your marketing budget
• Replace short-term momentum with long-term value
• Identify content gaps with competitor benchmarking

Engaging with people who specifically searched for your product. That’s the advantage of being visible in search rankings.

Now, the question is how you will attain these benefits for your online store. We’ll discuss each key point in detail, along with the corresponding eCommerce SEO best practices. Let’s start off with the pain points you might encounter as an e-commerce store.

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Common eCommerce pain points (and how SEO solves them)

There’s a vicious cycle happening in the eCommerce space. Most online stores are still stuck addressing common problems.

Yes, common problems. As cliche as they’ve been, these pain points are a real pain.

For example, Shopify lists audience targeting and product positioning as prominent eCommerce issues. But those are common, much-talked-about issues in this space, right? Sure, but most businesses don’t know how to address these pain points.

Enter the magic and science of an eCommerce SEO campaign. Mitigate visibility risks and avoid wasted budget with SEO.

We handpicked the most common eCommerce SEO-rated problems. These are based on our experience as digital marketers for more than a decade. And of course, we provided solutions for each. Take a look and jot down notes:

1.    Poor visibility among competitors on search engines

In 2024, eCommerce has surpassed $4.1 trillion in global revenue. This niche is thriving and reaching. And what do you think comes with a thriving market?

Competitors. Boatloads of competing eCommerce sites fighting for search rankings.

With competition comes a higher search volume and keyword difficulty. What can you do to overcome these hurdles? Here are our recommendations:

• Use a keyword research tool. Don’t play the guessing game when brainstorming keyword ideas. There are free versions of tools like AnswerThePublic and Moz Keyword Explorer. Even as simple as Google Trends can help you.
• Optimize your on-page SEO elements. Make it easier for search engines to crawl and index your eCommerce store. Incorporate relevant keywords into your meta tags, headers, and image alt texts.
• Analyze your competitors’ keyword rankings and content formats. Run an SEO competitor analysis to identify keyword and content gaps. You can leverage dedicated competitor analysis tools like SpyFu and SE Ranking.

You don’t have to target the same exact keywords as your competitors. Play it smart, spot gaps, and create unique content.

2.    Dependence on paid ads driving up acquisitions

Paid advertisements should not be your primary source of traffic. Otherwise, your marketing budget will be gone before you know it.

It’s not just about your budget, though. This isn’t advisable even for large-scale websites with plenty of money to spend.

Relying on ads could drive up customer acquisition costs (CAC). That’s not sustainable, even for enterprise websites. Ad fatigue, competition, and direct costs all contribute to this problem.

Now, how can you avoid this pitfall? Take a look at these practices:

• Optimize your product and category pages. Ensure that each product or category page contains a target keyword. Moreover, make unique descriptions in your eCommerce site’s product pages.
• Spread the authority juice via your internal links. Do you have high-performing pages? These landing or product pages might have high-ranking, relevant keywords. Use them as internal links on your other pages to distribute their authority juice.

A properly executed SEO campaign can reduce your CAC by 87.41%.

3.    Low ROI on generic marketing campaigns

They say that Search Engine Optimization (SEO) delivers an ROI of $250 per $1 spent. But why is your eCommerce website still lagging in expected ROI?

This might have something to do with the uniqueness of your marketing campaigns.

By uniqueness, we don’t mean being ultra-creative all the time. Your SEO campaign should integrate these critical elements:

• Target the right audience for your brand. Create buyer personas and detail their preferences. Find keywords that address their pain points.
• Align your content with search intent. Do you want to generate high-quality leads? Then, it’s all about brainstorming keyword ideas that target search intent. We recommend using keyword research tools like Semrush’s Keyword Magic Tool.

Unique marketing means utilizing targeting techniques to your advantage.

4.    Difficulty in scaling operations due to insufficient organic traffic

Some websites take the shortcut of scaling through paid advertisements. But take away the ads, what do they have left? Suddenly, their traffic on search engines becomes non-existent.

Here’s a quick reality check: SEO requires patience and commitment. Find relevant keywords and consistently churn out content. Don’t count the days; just follow your SEO strategy.

You don’t how to get started? These two practices can help bring organic search traffic to your eCommerce website:

• Optimize your eCommerce site architecture. Maybe, it’s not about the content. Your performance might be suffering from slow site speed and mobile incompatibility. A site audit tool like Sitebulb or Dyno Mapper visualizes your entire site structure. Analyze your site architecture with these tools to improve user experience (UX).
• Diversify your eCommerce keyword research targets. Don’t just focus on commercial keywords with high search volume. Instead, target valuable keywords with little competition. This way, you increase your website authority with every high-ranking target keyword.

Remember, your eCommerce SEO efforts should not just focus on content. You must have SEO-friendly URLs, fast site speed, and a user-friendly site structure. Then, you can scale your campaign as you start acquiring organic traffic.

5.    Seasonal sales spikes without consistent revenue streams

Let us present you with two sets of problems.

The first problem is a good one. You experience a sudden surge of traffic on your seasonal eCommerce product pages. That’s okay; you just switch to a more powerful hosting provider.

Now, here’s the bad problem. You only acquire high traffic when your product or service is in season. During other times of the year, you get little to no traffic.

This means one thing: you don’t have a consistent revenue stream. That’s not sustainable for any eCommerce website. What are you going to do now?

Here’s how you can prepare for your off-season:

• Create evergreen content. Don’t just focus on your product and category pages. We recommend creating a blog section that provides helpful and informative content. This blog could cover how-to guides, product demos, client testimonials, and case studies.
• Continue doing eCommerce keyword research. Your keyword research isn’t a one-time process. You should find keywords that align with current trends. Then, you can incorporate these keyword ideas into your product pages.

Don’t leave your website high and dry after a seasonal surge. Carry that momentum through evergreen articles and content optimization.

Data-backed benefits of e-commerce SEO

Once you overcome the pain points, you’ll then reap the rewards. And in eCommerce SEO, the rewards are absolutely rewarding.

We’re not stating claims just because of hearsay, though. There’s data that backs up these eCommerce SEO benefits.

1. Real traffic numbers

SEO brings more traffic to an eCommerce business. E-commerce websites on Google’s first page capture 70% of clicks compared to 30% for the second page. That’s a real statistic from Baclinko’s study on Google CTR.

Without SEO, your eCommerce category pages might only rank on the second page or less. With SEO, your website can rank high for a primary keyword with a high search volume. The difference is night and day.

How does SEO boost your website on search engine results pages? These sub-benefits should encourage you to dive deeper into eCommerce SEO:

• Mitigates technical SEO issues such as slow loading speed and faulty site structure
• Fixes on-page SEO problems like missing keywords on meta tags and descriptions
• Enhances your keyword research through eCommerce SEO tools like Google Keyword Planner

Create a blog post that your audience is genuinely interested in. Spot potential technical SEO errors before they happen. An effective eCommerce SEO strategy can increase your traffic on search results.

2. Revenue impact

Leveraging eCommerce SEO to boost rankings isn’t an overnight sensation. Some eCommerce sites become impatient with the process. That’s why they divert quickly to paid advertisements for more immediate tangible results.

But let us tell you this: SEO will eventually pay off for your online store. Take note, we used the word “will”, instead of “could”. That’s how confident we are of eCommerce SEO.

Numbers back that up too. Ranking for high-intent keywords can increase eCommerce revenue by up to 30% in 12 months.

How does eCommerce SEO do that? Let’s give you a quick scenario:

• In SEO, you create buyer personas for your eCommerce website. These personas cover specific preferences, interests, and even seasonal pain points.
• Next, you use those personas to guide your eCommerce keyword research. Instead of going in blind, you intentionally find keywords that align with your personas.
• Now, you create content around your high-intent keyword research. You utilize the best eCommerce SEO tools for content creation, including SurferSEO.
• Finally, you rank high on search results, particularly for high-intent keywords. This will give you customers a bigger purpose when visiting your site. They’re more likely to purchase upon visit, increasing your conversion rates.

See, the process is there for you to follow. Come up with a plan, do the work, and wait patiently for the results.

3. Speed to value

As we mentioned, patience and commitment are crucial in eCommerce SEO. You might see significant results within 6-12 months, which we know is quite a long period. Don’t get worried, though.

82% of marketers say that SEO has a positive impact on their marketing campaigns. That’s more than enough assurance that SEO works for your product pages.

But we’re not here to underestimate the benefits of paid search results. After all, you need it for a large-scale campaign. However, eCommerce sites without a proper SEO foundation shouldn’t rely on ads.

Search engine marketing has many moving parts, including technical SEO and on-page SEO. Be guided by this three-step course to keep you on your feet:

• Build momentum as you go. Don’t stop on the first or second milestone. If you rank high for a target keyword, create more content around related keywords.
• Fix technical SEO issues as quickly as you can. An erroneous eCommerce site architecture could pull down your rankings.
• Monitor your target keyword rankings. Use tools like Google Search Console and Google Analytics to track your keyword performance.

Speed versus sustainability. Short-term visibility versus high domain authority. Paid search versus organic SEO.

4. Competitor benchmarking

As in traditional avenues, your eCommerce store also faces competition in search engines. How can you ensure that your online store is performing better?

You can only do that by analyzing your competitors’ movements. Otherwise, you can’t pinpoint the good and bad in what they do.

Competitor benchmarking is one of the best practices in eCommerce SEO. Here are the reasons why:

• Identify target keyword and content gaps. Are there topic clusters that your competitors haven’t addressed yet? It’s time for you to do keyword research on those topics.
• Understand how competitors rank for higher keyword difficulty and search volume. How do your competitors structure their product pages around certain keywords? Do they use a certain keyword in their title tag and meta description?
• Perform a site audit on other websites. You can use tools like Screaming Frog and Lumar. Evaluate their page speed, internal links, link-building techniques, and site structure.

Study other websites to get valuable information for your eCommerce website. After all, other eCommerce sites are already benchmarking you. Why not follow the trend and reap the unique benefits?

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Key strategies to benefit from SEO in e-commerce

Cost savings vs. PPC

The immediate results of pay-per-click (PPC) ads are tempting. There are PPC expert tips that could help maximize your ROI.

However, organic search results still bring more revenue to eCommerce sites. If you don’t believe us, these data points should convince you:

• SEO produces higher conversion rates than paid traffic. A Higher Visibility study discovered that organic traffic converts better than PPC, especially for eCommerce sites. Target user intent even in your product and category pages. This gives you high-quality leads that are more likely to convert.
• Long-term savings lean towards organic ROI. The ongoing costs of maintaining a PPC campaign drain your marketing budget. You get a 25% higher ROI when you invest in eCommerce SEO.
• SEO increases your average order value (AOV). Optimize your product pages and get your internal links right. Then, you increase the revenue you get from a customer’s order.

Create a unique meta description on every product and category page. Check the relevance of your internal links. These simple SEO practices can increase your long-term ROI.

Long-tail keyword impact

Long-tail keywords have a lower search volume on search engines. Yet, 70% of search queries use this kind of keyword.

Why are long-tail keywords crucial for your category and product pages? Let’s dive into their unique advantages next.

Why long-tail keywords matter in E-commerce SEO

• High purchase intent: Long-tail keywords reflect specific buyer intent. One example is “organic dog food for senior dogs near me“. You’re targeting a very specific pain and location.
• Less competition: These keywords have lesser keyword difficulty and a higher chance of ranking high. Ranking on the first page of search results could boost your website’s authority. Thus, you get a stronger chance to rank high when you engage with high-volume keywords.
• Higher conversion rates: How do you type a search query for a product you’re genuinely interested in? Most of the time, you enter very specific keywords because you really want that unique item. And when you find it on eCommerce sites, you buy it right away. That’s how long-tail keywords increase conversions on your category page and product pages.

ROI of long-tail keywords

• Cost-effectiveness: A Krabi hotel reduced its CPC when it shifted to long-tail keywords. That’s a true story that reverberates around successful eCommerce sites. Do a site audit and transform broad keywords into long-tail ones. Then, see your conversion rates increase and your CPC decrease.
• Sustained traffic: com successfully attracted sustained traffic through long-tail keywords. These keywords targeted unique interests, which boosted their traffic on search results.

Examples of long-tail keywords driving impact

Long-tail keywords are ranked within the Top 5 SEO strategies worldwide. There’s a simple reason for that: it works.

Integrate long-tail, specific keywords to your title tag and meta description. Target conversational queries in your blog post, category page, and product pages. You can even use them as anchor texts in your internal links and link-building ventures.

Your online store should have a long-tail keyword bank. We drafted examples of each in-demand eCommerce niche:

Fashion and apparel:

• Generic: “best running shoes”
• Long-tail: “best Nike running shoes for wide-footed athletes”

Electronics and gadgets:

• Generic: “noise-cancelling headphones”
• Long-tail: “wireless, noise-cancelling headphones under $100 near me”

Home and kitchen:

• Generic: “best two-door refrigerators”
• Long-tail: “most affordable two-door, no-frost inverter refrigerators”

Beauty and skincare:

• Generic: “affordable moisturizers”
• Long-tail: “most affordable anti-aging, no-scent moisturizers for sensitive skin”

Sporting equipment:

• Generic: “motorized treadmills”
• Long-tail: “most affordable motorized treadmills for small spaces”

How eCommerce stores can leverage long-tail keywords

As you can see by now, long-tail keywords should be visible on your product pages. Search engines should crawl them on your title tag, meta description, and blog post content.

But how exactly can you maximize these keywords’ visibility power? We handpicked four ways to get you started:

• Identify customer pain points. It’s not just about the visibility of your category page and product pages. Long-tail keywords tell you more about your audience’s preferences. A pet store could discover a keyword like “affordable dog bed with thick cushion“. Use tools like Google Search Console, Semrush, and Ahrefs to research trending queries. You can also use Google Keyword Planner for your ad campaigns.
• Optimize product and category pages. Boost your category page and product pages with the simple practice of integrating long-tail keywords. A keyword like “lightweight and durable travel bag with insulated pouch” can address numerous pain points. Let’s say that users visit this product or category page. They can also see other relevant products in your recommended section. It’s a chain reaction that could increase your conversions.
• Streamline your content marketing approach. Create a blog post around the keyword “best lightweight and insulated water tumblers for hiking“. Put up a product or category page in your recommended section or internal links. Then, promote your content on social media and link-building platforms. Diversify your reach with just one long-tail keyword. Even the best content marketing agencies do this strategy.
• Encourage user-generated content (UGC). Word-of-mouth marketing is a very reliable approach. Provide incentives for customers who leave reviews on your website or social media. These reviews contain natural language searches that improve your site’s credibility.

Tools and techniques to find long-tail keywords

Long-tail keywords aren’t that difficult to find. Similar to technical SEO tools, there are keyword platforms you can leverage.

We recommend these free and freemium tools for finding long-tail keywords:

• Go to Google Auto-Suggest and People Also Ask sections. Type a keyword on the search bar and Google naturally provides long-tail suggestions. You can also go to the People Also Ask section to discover trending queries.
• Collect search phrases from AnswerThePublic. Even a seed keyword can generate long-tail suggestions on AnswerThePublic. For instance, typing a broad keyword like “knee support” generates long-tail variations, including conversational queries.
• Leverage eCommerce keyword tools. Semrush can help you find product-related long-tail keywords. Ahrefs is used to identify questions related to your niche. Ubersuggest provides long-tail variations for a seed keyword. The most important thing is that these tools offer freemium versions.

However, these tools require specialized expertise, subscription costs, and continuous monitoring. Can your budget and in-house staff handle these requirements?

If not, we suggest outsourcing to eCommerce SEO services providers like us. They provide on-page optimization, link-building strategies, content marketing, and technical troubleshooting. It’s a more cost-effective, surefire approach to boosting your eCommerce store.

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In summary

Content is king, but you can’t ignore the basics of eCommerce SEO.

Do you have duplicate content that could confuse search engine bots? Does your category page have the proper keyword-infused title tag? Does your site architecture offer fast page speed?

Duplicate content, broken links, missing schema markup  — these are basic miscues that pull down your rankings. Leverage free tools like Google Analytics to spot these issues before they affect website performance.