What is the difference between SEO and E-commerce SEO?

When your company is competing with millions of other companies online, the search engine algorithms are the kings to determine your rank on the SERP. Once online business owners have understood this, the entire concentration is on implementing the right SEO strategies for business growth.

But if you own an eCommerce platform, you will realize soon that the common SEO tactics won’t work much for eCommerce platforms. It is essential to work on the common factors that influence the site’s ranking like

• Keyword research
• Backlinks
• Efficient content management

But that’s not the ending of optimization for the eCommerce platforms. The truth is, the story begins from this point.

In this article, you will get to know how standard Search Engine Optimization is quite different from eCommerce SEO tactics. Specialization can be the key to success while other eCommerce platforms continue to struggle despite applying the latest SEO strategies.

Difference #1: Specific guidelines for quality rates on eCommerce sites

Google is undeniably the most popular search engine in the global arena. That is why SEO experts always perform research based on the algorithm and results on Google. Before delving deeper, know more about the quality raters.

When Google releases some new algorithm updates like Penguin or Panda, the search engine itself starts analyzing whether the change is a positive one or a negative one.

To execute the research, Google uses an army called the “quality raters.” These raters will possess particular guidelines to learn how to rate the different websites they come across for a particular search.

Depending on the ratings, the engineers of the search engine will refine the algorithm further to create a new version. Then they will check again whether the results become more refined. This can be a never-ending loop. But this is also the most critical process behind all the significant changes in the website rankings.

• Satisfying main content or MC is a necessity when Google surveys an eCommerce platform. There will be also a supplementary content section, but that’s secondary. MC will cover the product description, images, and reviews that will be unique to your URL. So, the products will low unique content should not receive the high- quality ratings.
• Providing information about the product is the primary need of an eCommerce platform. It is not the same for other websites where direct reference to the product or service is not mandatory.
• 600 user reviews are necessary to make your website appear trustworthy. But how in the wide world will you secure that? Well, there comes the strategies of SEO particularly for eCommerce websites.

Thus, the above factors will definitely show the primary distinction between the standard and the eCommerce SEO strategies.

Difference #2: The category page is vital for eCommerce sites

By now, you have figured out what Google will like when it checks out the product pages. But what about the category pages? And this brings you to the second point o difference between eCommerce SEO and standard SEO.

• A category page is not for providing information about the product. Instead, it should enable the users to buy from a certain category. No such necessity will be there for the standard websites.
• This section will focus on the importance of supplementary content or SC. Google will apply crawlers to check on the product opinions as well as the layered navigation.

Therefore, the search engine optimization strategies for the eCommerce platform will vary from the standard websites of the different companies.

Difference #3: Effective interlinking

One of the best ways to build up the SEO and bring traffic to the products is with the implementation of smart internal linking. The following practices show how these tactics will be different from the standard forms.

• Maintain a minimalistic link depth. The depth implies the number of clicks necessary to take the user from the homepage to the target web page. For instance, click on the homepage, then click on the category page, and then read the product description. It's possible to link popular products to the home page too.
• Clean and simple navigation is important for allowing more users to go through the website. Users shouldn’t find it difficult to search for products or categories. Complex navigation will lead the target audience to simpler eCommerce sites.
• Create links to the most important categories directly from the home page or the menu section. You can maintain simple sub-categories too but with ease of access.
• If you have nested categories don’t forget to set up the breadcrumb navigation.,
• The popular and bestselling products should be right there on the landing page or as a natural link on the home page. These should be also there on other products page to boost the hype.
• You can use tags. But avoid using tags that are identical to some categories.
• CTA is a must, anchor tags are necessary, and use the keywords to avoid the cliché “click here.”

Blogs are also among the top SEO ranking factors for e-Commerce sites.

Difference #4: Images matter

Do you think that images matter a lot for all websites? No. the highest importance of images will be always on eCommerce sites. And thus, optimizing the image will be another factor to consider if you own an eCommerce platform.

The final appearance of the picture will matter a lot in influencing the decision of a potential buyer. No wonder the site owners often use professional photographers to click the best photographs of the products.

• Why don’t you utilize the chance of naming the images? Instead of adding numbers or some standard names, use the keywords. It’s a smart way to secure a better rank on Google.
• Add some helpful ALT text for the target audience. It is another effective way to boost SEO. It is also possible to add some keywords in the ALT texts.
• Can you add multiple products on the pages with the images? It is a great way to add more keywords to the images.

But you have to refrain from uploading a huge image file of the product. If the image takes time to load, you cannot expect the target audience to be patient enough to wait for its loading.

It's possible to lose clients in this time lag. So optimization of the eCommerce site also includes compressing the image file for quick loading. Ideally, the image file size should never exceed 1 MB.

At the same time, you need to make sure that people are bit seeing the grainy photographs. resolution of the pictures should be high enough to maintain the good quality of the image.

Difference #5: include rich snippets

Although snippets are now a vital factor in SEO, it's not mandatory for standard websites. But if you have an eCommerce platform, the rich snippets can make you stand out in the crowd.

It's time to explore the SEO tools and services like the schema markup that will help your company to stand taller than the competing organizations. A little bit of visual interest can work magic for the page on the text-based search pages.

Rich results will always personalize the page when these appear on the SERP. Actions like

• Addition of a photograph
• Addition of a star rating
• Review snippet

And some more will add to the glory.

These can be small changes, but significant enough to draw the attention of many potential customers.

The snippets should include

1. Product details. Of course, it should be a product that is very popular n the site.
2. Local business. The physical store should be popular among the locals as well.
3. Logo. It's the best for branding. The business logo represents a brand and a faith at one point in time.
4. Review snippet. Sharing the comments of the customers adds value to the product.
5. Breadcrumbs. The breadcrumb-rich results will aid in easy navigation when you set up categories.
6. Sitelinks search box. Aloe everyone to search from the catalog of Google.

Thus, it's evident that the way of planning SEO for the e-commerce platform will be quite different than planning the optimization of the standard websites.

Importance of eCommerce SEO

And now, the most critical part of the discussion. Why should you learn about these differences before applying optimization?

Well, you may be spending money on optimizing the web page for your eCommerce platform. But if the SEO experts do not have specialization in eCommerce SEO, they won't know the simple but significant differences between standard and eCommerce SEO.

 The effect will be low traffic despite spending money on SEO. You will keep on looking for the loopholes without knowing that the primary drawback is in the SEO tactics. The above information will help you to gather knowledge about the differences.

You can now discuss the needs specifically with the SEO experts. Applying the right strategies will work out well for the platform. Knowledge is essential to make the right decisions.

If you want to climb higher on the SERP, start applying specialized tactics for optimizing the pages.