The Worst SEO Issues of Online Stores in 2022 & How to Fix Them #YoastCon2022

#ecommerceseo at @siteground by @aleyda from @orainti
#ecommerceseoissues at #YoastCon2022 by @aleyda from @orainti
The worst SEO
issues of online
stores in 2022
 
and how to fix or avoid
them in a cost-effective
way

Organic search is one of the biggest traffic
drivers of online stores, even well known brands
gymshark.com huel.com allbirds.com
semrush
timbuk2.com

Google has also
been focusing
much more lately
to give products
from online stores
more direct
visibility for
relevant
commercial
queries with new
search features…

https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/ecommerce/overview
They’ve
updated/
expanded
guidelines for
e-commerce
sites to
optimize and
leverage their
features

https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/promoting-marketing/create-marketing/google/google-listings
… while also
facilitating
products
integration via
most popular e-
commerce
platforms

The biggest e-
commerce
platforms also
acknowledge this
potential and
have started to
provide more
native SEO related
functionalities..

https://yoast.com/shopify/apps/yoast-seo/
… as well as
more apps to
support the most
important SEO
configuration

Nonetheless, despite all this it’s now harder
than before to do SEO in e-commerce sites
https://twitter.com/aleyda/status/1483902545382752256

E-commerce sites characteristics make
 
them challenging to optimize for search…
A high number
of pages due to
products volume
Complex
categorization
Constant URLs
changing status
due to dynamic
inventory
Same products
information than
other Websites

… as they generate fundamental SEO issues!
 
Crawl budget
problems
Content
cannibalization
issues
Internal linking
challenges
Poor content
pages that won’t
rank

Let’s see the Top
E-Commerce SEO
Issues, and how
to Fix them…

Issue 1
 
Indexing internal
search results pages
that cannibalize
categories / facets &
won’t rank well

Some e-commerce sites still index their internal
search results pages to attract rankings & traffic..

… allowing
also their
crawling
without any
constraint

The issue here
is that we can
end up easily
ranking for
non-relevant
terms..

… also causing content duplication with meant
to rank categories/sub-categories/facets

… that end up being cannibalized in Google
search results by these other pages…

Ranking in
worse
positions
than a
category/
sub-category
that feature
more &
better linked
content

To avoid this,
some sites decide
to canonicalize
from their
internal search
results pages to
their alternate
categories/sub-
categories/facets
…

When
canonicalizing
though, it’s
important to
point to actual
“alternate”
pages with the
same or very
similar content…
not home page

Although the best
is to avoid
generating internal
search results URLs
by default and
suggest indexable
categories/facets/
products instead,
which is doable
with Shopify…

… and 301-
redirecting
internal search
results URLs that
are generated to
their relevant
indexable
categories/sub-
categories/
facets pages

Also, instead of
directly indexing
internal search
results URLs,
monitor your
internal searches
to identify
categories/
facets with
potential to
create and index

Issue 2
 
Noindexing & Not
linking to sub-
categories or facets
with traffic potential

https://twitter.com/aleyda/status/1483745474368659457
Many E-commerce
won’t assess to
index
subcategories/
facets, generating
whether thin/
duplicate content
with them or
losing their high
traffic potential…

Some sites canonicalize all their sub-categories
or facets to their main categories by default…

… or even block them from being crawled entirely

Others also noindex & obfuscate links to avoid
thin content/duplication & control crawl budget

However, subcategories & facets can connect with
popular searches with high commercial intent

If your sub-categories/facets can’t rank, your
products pages will tend to do it but worse…

…with inconsistent rankings between many
“somewhat relevant” cannibalizing product pages

… main categories will also rank instead in other
scenarios but will have poorer conversions too

Should you index a sub-category or facet page?
Index
Noindex
No
Are there enough
products at the
sub-category/facet
level to satisfy the
user need?
No
Yes
Yes
Demand
Supply
The sub-category/
facet has enough
search volume to
compensate their
optimization
This is why is
recommended
than rather than
indexing or not by
default, to validate
supply and
demand of each
sub-category/facet
to index
accordingly

Develop a keyword
research including
the identification of
the search volume
related to each sub-
category/facet…

.. as well as
establish the
number of
unique
products
offered per
sub-category/
facet to satisfy
the demand

>
If there’s demand + supply that compensate sub-
categories & facets optimization, index & optimize

… without forgetting to allow their crawling and
effectively link them through their canonical URLs

Issue 3
 
Featuring
categories/facets
with little unique
commercial content
to rank

As we saw
before,
categories/sub-
categories
connect w/
some of the
most important
searches
attracting a high
search volume…

However, many of these
pages only feature links
to products, without any
descriptive text, which
makes them hard to rank

A common approach is
to add descriptive text
at the end of the
products listings to
improve their
relevance without
hurting conversion…

The problem is that many times this content is not
really useful & doesn’t connect w/ user intent…
John Mueller:
https://www.mariehaynes.com/john-mueller-podcast-transcription/

Sometimes entire articles
are placed at the bottom
of the products listings,
with an informational
intent, not commercial

This type of text can end up confusing Google
about the nature/intent of the categories pages …
https://www.mariehaynes.com/john-mueller-podcast-transcription/
John Mueller:

Develop a keyword
research to identify
the questions that are
made in this phase of
the purchasing
journey to clarify
customers doubts
SEMrush, Sistrix

You can use
content
optimization
tools that offer
relevant
suggestions
depending on
content nature
Frase

This content can be integrated with products &
should support these pages to sell better
Confirming
users that the
products they’re
seeing are the
best for their
scenario
Clarify any
doubts around
the use and
characteristics of
the products
Inform why
they’re in the
best place to buy
these products
https://www.aleydasolis.com/en/search-engine-optimization/optimizing-content-in-category-pages-while-keeping-its-commercial-nature/
…

Blending the
content within the
products listing
design to fulfill its
role with users too

Check this
Glenn’s case
study showing
how cutting
“fluff” content in
e-commerce
categories
impacted in
better rankings
https://www.gsqi.com/marketing-blog/ecommerce-category-description-case-study/

Also, feature as
many products per
page (be careful w/
speed & UX), with
longer text
description per
product to easily
improve relevance
and avoid over-
relying on
paginations
Product 1 Product 2
Product 3 Product 4
Product 5 Product 6
CATEGORY A
Pages: 1, 2, 3… 100
Product 1 Product 2
Product 3 Product 4
Product 5 Product 6
CATEGORY B
Pages: 1, 2, 3… 60
<
Product 7 Product 8
Product 9 Product 10
* Explain why you’re
in the best place to
buy these products

* Clarify common
doubts of
customers when
buying these types
of products

Featuring more
products with
longer
descriptions is
the easiest way
to feature more
commercially
driven content in
categories/
facets, that also
support its goal

Issue 4
 
Products pages with
poor unique
descriptive content

Product pages target a very long tail of queries
that can end up generating most of your traffic

Users also tend
to share
products pages
more than
categories, so
they attract
valuable
backlinks and
direct traffic too

However,
products pages
also tend to show
little unique
content that and
Google tend to
leave them out of
their index due to
that too

Unique
descriptions
Comparisons
Instructions
Images
Complementary
Products
Similar Products
It’s why Products pages should feature specific
information to help describe and sell them
Reviews and
Q&As
Specifications

From descriptions,
images, videos,
reviews,
comparisons, and
instructions, your
products pages
should be attractive
and give compelling
reasons to buy

Title & Meta
Description
with version
and Color
Product
Description
with version
and color
Product
Heading
with version
and Color
VS
Start by differentiating similar products using
their unique characteristics within the metadata…
Product
Heading
with version
and Color
Title & Meta
Description
with version
and Color
Product
Description
with version
and color

Leveraging
automated
content
generation
tools to
advance
faster as an
input to
copywriters
Neural text, Frase, Surfer and Copy.ai

Alsoasked, Neural text, Frase, Surfer and Copy.ai
Use your own support insights, and content
tools to also create products Q&As

Incentivize
users to leave
their reviews in
products pages
with discounts
and offers

If you have many identical or very similar
products with a very short lifespan…

… Consolidate
them in “static"
products
aggregator
pages that offer
many products
of the same
type, brand,
characteristics
of different
sellers

Issue 5
 
Products pages with
backlinks and traffic
showing
inconsistent status

Some products
URLs tend to
have a very
short lifespan
and end up
generating
errors…

…these don’t only affect the site crawl health, but
the rankings & traffic attracted by these pages

It’s common when checking products URLs to find
not only HTTP errors but redirects with issues..

This is why is critical
to establish
inventory rules/
workflows within
the shopping
platform to manage
their crawling &
indexing…
https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/shopify-plus/flow2/reference/triggers/inventory-item-deleted

Before creating
a new URL,
establish
validations to
verify if the
product
existed in the
past, and use
the old URL…

When doing a product “pre-launch”, use the same
URL that the product page will have when is sold…

Feature products in the relevant & indexable
categories, but with a single URL for each…

Don’t link to
canonicalized
Product URLs
… and link to them consistently using their
canonical URLs, avoiding canonicalized ones

https://paulnrogers.com/how-to-change-the-product-url-structure-in-shopify/
If a product can be
featured in many
categories/
collections, is
better to not
include them in the
URL to avoid
duplication and
always link to the
meant to be ranked
canonical URL

Use product structured data to specify their
characteristics and improve their SERP snippet
https://developers.google.com/search/docs/data-types/product

Create and send products feeds through the
merchant center to maximize their visibility
https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/7439058?hl=en

Then,
when a
product is out
of stock,
eliminate its
inclusion in
listings, XML
sitemaps and
feeds

If it’s a temporary
status: the
product page
should be kept
indexable,
allowing users to
be notified when
is back to stock,
offering similar
products

The product structured data and feeds should be
updated and show their out of stock status too

If the product is permanently out of stock,
 
and has a new version, 301-redirect towards it
301 redirect to new
product page, while
alerting users.
 
 
Update internal links,
XML sitemaps and
product feeds

Add a
notification
explaining to
the user why
it’s being
redirected
… if there isn’t a new version, but the page has
backlinks, traffic, rankings: 301 redirect to category

Don’t do
this
Avoid
302 temporary
redirects that
don’t pass the
former page
popularity
and/or redirect
to a non-
relevant
category page
Don’tdo
this

Don’t show 404 HTTP errors for out of stock products
w/ backlinks: you’ll lose value & is bad experience

Personalize
the error
page
offering
alternatives
to make it
usable
You can use 404s/410s in pages out of stock that
don’t have traffic, rankings, nor backlinks

Internal links, search pages, XML Sitemaps &
feeds shouldn’t include unavailable products URLs

Use this flowchart to establish these rules
through the product inventory lifecycle
https://www.aleydasolis.com/en/search-engine-optimization/ecommerce-seo-issues-how-to-fix/

Set recurring automated crawls to identify still
existing issues and solve them too
Ryte, Sitebulb, Screaming Frog, Botify

Use real
time SEO
monitoring
systems to
perform this
identification
in real time,
receiving
alerts too
Little Warden & ContentKing

You can integrate
traffic and
ranking data to
only get alerts of
those pages with
a minimum value
Little Warden & ContentKing

Issue 6
 
Seasonal pages with
backlinks and traffic
showing
inconsistent status

Leave
seasonal
campaigns pages
like Black Friday,
Cyber Monday,
Valentine’s Day,
etc. always
indexable…
don’t remove or
change the URLs

…which is why is not recommended to add the
year in the URLs, even if you will in metadata

You should
leverage the
same URLs
through the
years, as they’ll
increase their
popularity and
rankability over
time, just update
content & design

… when
the specific
season
campaign hasn’t
started yet, you
can leverage to
refer others…

If you need to modify URLs, 301-redirect to new
destination, update links, & XML sitemaps inclusions

Issue 7
 
Not featuring a full
Web structure with
informational
resources

There is potential across all stages of buyer
journey: searches for brands, gifts, reviews…

Big e-commerce establish authority targeting
 
from informational to transactional queries

Some online
stores don’t target
informational
queries as they
don’t see
commercial
value… however,
there clearly is
one, to attract &
retain trust,
rankings and
customers!

You can’t expect users to purchase from you if
they haven’t seen you at the awareness stage
To attract
this…
You
also need to
target &
establish
yourself
here

It’s key to
identify & map all
the different
queries types
during the user
journey with a
relevant areas/
content type that
satisfies their
need
Guides/articles
Brand page
Comparison page
…..

Like REI does
with their Learn
area! It’s how you
connect with your
users in all stages
of their journey,
establish your
authority, attract
additional traffic
and popularity…

With useful complementary guides and
resources for existing and potential customers

To help, I’ve created this reference for e-commerce
sites, to avoid forgetting relevant queries types…
https://www.aleydasolis.com/en/search-engine-optimization/keyword-mapping-cheatsheet/

… you can also see examples of known online
stores for each and copy/paste from Google sheets
https://www.aleydasolis.com/en/search-engine-optimization/keyword-mapping-cheatsheet/

Really?

It’s how you achieve this type of organic search
growth and a matter of cost-effectiveness

Follow an agile approach by running SEO tests
with tools to assess impact before a full release…
SEOtesting.com, Ryte, Splitsignal

… or create your
own SEO A/B
Split Tests for
Free by using
Google Tag
Manager as Chris
shows here
https://www.slideshare.net/chr156r33n/how-to-construct-your-own-seo-a-b-split-tests-for-free

Assess & prioritize those w/ high impact/low
 
effort in your context
IMPACT
EFFORT
1.

To Execute
 
Now
Don’t Do
2.

To Assess
 
& Prioritize
2.

To Assess
 
& Prioritize

Use this SEO Recommendations Prioritization
 
Template in Google Sheets
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/15dD2VFzE203ZIKD-vTqlg3Wg-YQY9a-HS5J7AT-S4jA/view

Implementing the previous actions is how you’ll
minimize these most common issues..
Crawl budget
problems
Content
cannibalization
issues
Internal linking
challenges
Poor content
pages that won’t
rank

…

and
maximize your
organic search
results to
achieve your
online store
sales goals!

Thanks! Questions?
I’m Aleyda Solis

* SEO Consultant & Founder at Orainti

* SEO Speaker at +100 Events in +20 countries

* Author “SEO. Las Claves Esenciales.”

* Crawling Mondays Video & Podcast Series Host

* #SEOFOMO Newsletter Wrangler

* Maker LearningSEO.io

* European Search Personality of the Year in 2018

* remoters.net Co-Founder
orainti.com

The Worst SEO Issues of Online Stores in 2022 & How to Fix Them #YoastCon2022

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