Every e-commerce website designer understands that simply focusing on the aesthetic facet of your page will not guarantee a high search engine ranking or solid conversion rates. There are so many different factors which contribute to a first page listing and chances are those gorgeous photos may be creating roadblocks for you in terms of SEO.
So if your site is suffering from a decline in traffic, then an SEO audit should help you identify problems. Without further ado, let’s take a look at how you can effectively conduct an SEO audit on your e-commerce website.
Performing an SEO Audit
When it comes to an SEO audit, it comprises of three components, which are:
- Technical SEO Audit
- Content and Keyword Mapping Audit
- Backlink and Competitor Audit
These components are not performed in a sequence, but simultaneously instead. For instance, some keyword mapping might be necessary during the technical audit, this will help for better evaluation of title tags and meta descriptions especially in terms of optimization.
If you have tools like SEMRush or BrightEdge available, utilize them to get an overall impression of your website's visibility on search engines. Additionally, it would be a sound idea to check out Google’s Search Console, this will give you a general overview of your websites search performance. You can also use this console to fix some of the basic problems right away.
Technical SEO Audit
The technical audit serves as the foundation for your efforts regarding SEO. This audit makes sure that search engines crawl and index your site in the most effective manner. Consider this to be a prerequisite to high search engine rankings, rest assured your development team can perform a technical SEO Audit. To make this possible, we have articulated a comprehensive guide to help any business conduct an internal SEO audit.
HTTP/HTTPS
Check and verify whether your site exists on HTTP or HTTPS alone. There are times when a site migration leaves the site existing in both versions. If this is the case, HTTP pages need to be redirected to their HTTPs counterparts to preserve backlinks and prevent duplication.
Google Search Console
You will need to check to see whether your site’s profile has been set up correctly on Google Search Console. If your site was migrated to HTTPs, a new profile should have been created.
From here, you can find out your website's indexation status. If there are any red flags or warnings, this is the place to find out more about them and try to understand why there has been an issue.
Subdomains
Does your site have subdomains that need to be included while looking up traffic, rankings and other metrics? Without effective subdomains it can be very difficult for a page to receive a high search engine ranking.
XML Sitemap
If you want to optimize your site internationally, then there are a couple of questions that will need to be taken into perspective:
- Is the XML sitemap of your website up-to-date?
- If the site has translations in various languages, does it include the hreflang implementation in the sitemap?
- Does the sitemap index file contain all the sitemaps listed in the index?
- Has each and every sitemap been submitted in the Google Search Console? What are their statuses?
Mobile Readiness
These days it is imperative that every website is optimized for mobile users, if you are running an audit it is recommended to evaluate your mobile website as well. Keep in mind a majority of your users will access your website through their mobile phones. Google will also index your mobile site, so make sure your site up to date.
So many E-commerce websites such as Offer Factor have optimized their websites for mobile platforms as it is impossible to survive in this digital era without a mobile ready site. These e-commerce sites have developed mobile sites as a substantial number of users will access their platforms through their phones.
According to a study, 40% of users will bounce to a competitors site if they have trouble interacting with your website through their phone and 80% of consumers used their phones to gain information about a product or service. According to a study, 40% of users will bounce to a competitors site if they have trouble interacting with your website through their phone and 80% of consumers used their phones to gain information about a product or service. Share on X
The image above clearly highlights how this platform optimized their websites for mobile users. Mobile optimization is now a necessity rather than a luxury.
Page Speed
It is imperative you test any and all pages associated to your site to identify page speed issues. The most common issues include un-optimized images, overuse of tracking tags and render blocking JavaScript.
Internal Links redirected to 404 and 410 Pages
Ideally, none of your links should redirect to pages that do not exist. If a page is no longer available, use the 401 status code to deindex it. But to preserve backlink value, it would be better to use the 301 status code instead.
URLs
Does each URL contain the website's primary keyword? Are they separated by hyphens? These are factors which will influence your website's performance.
Redirects
To keep a backlink value intact, use 301 redirects wherever needed. Even though 302 redirects are easier to use, they do not preserve backlink value.
Title Tags
Believe it or not, Title Tags are one of the most important factors when it comes to improving your site’s ranking. For this reason, you need to meet the following criteria:
- Every page should have a unique title tag.
- The title tags should be less than 60 characters with spaces.
- The primary keyword for that page should be at the beginning of the title tag.
Meta Descriptions
Meta descriptions directly affect click-through-rate, as this is a ranking factor. Again, you will need to meet the following criteria for an effective website:
- Every page should have its very own unique meta description.
- The meta descriptions should have less than 320 characters with spaces.
- It should contain the primary keyword.
Internal Linking
Google can crawl sites better if they have navigation links, however, paragraphs with links can be beneficial as well if they are used accordingly.
Text Content
Every page should have its very own unique text content. Apart from primary keywords, it should have secondary keywords as well.
Content and Keyword Mapping Audit
For e-commerce websites, your products are your primary content. However, customers might discover your website and products if they know a manufacturer’s name. This is where keyword mapping comes in the picture. With the help of keyword mapping, you can identify primary keywords for each page depending on the content that is available.
Once you have identified suitable keywords, make sure they are used in the on-page text, H1, meta description and title tag. It would be a good idea to use it in the URL, image alt tags and image file names as well. Avoid changing existing image file names and URLs though, as it will do more harm than good as it might hamper the seamless indexing of your website.
Backlink and Competitor Audit
When it comes to the competitor audit, two questions need to be answered: what competitors are outranking you? How are they able to do so? It is important to note that search competition is not the same as brand competition. Avoid focusing on brand competitors and instead focus on those competitors that are outranking you.
It does not matter that you are ranked on the second page, while your competitor is ranked at the bottom of the very same page, as for most potential customers you are both invisible. Don’t focus on backlinks alone either. Look at the amount of text on pages that outranks yours so that you can come up with better content of your own.
You may think you are doing great, but you need to ask yourself: does your site deserve to be on the top for a specific keyword? Are you confident your content is superior to what others are offering? If you are honest with yourself, you will see how badly you need to improve your on-page content. This is exactly why these audits should be prioritized for your 2019 digital marketing strategies.
Conclusion
If you are new to SEO, all of this may seem overwhelming, in which case you should take things one step at a time. It is possible you may need professional assistance, in which case don’t hesitate to ask for help. Remember, as long as you take SEO seriously and play all the right cards, you will be able to rank your e-commerce site at the very top.
Megan Dennis is a passionate blogger. She specializes in SEO and SEM techniques. Follow @megandennis07 for more updates.
