The world of digital marketing is a tough one to crack into. Particularly given that there’s no definitive structure to follow, on top of the fact that online marketing and SEO trends are constantly evolving.

So, how can your online eCommerce brand enhance its SEO to get ahead?

The first approach toward improving your eCommerce SEO, is laying out a detailed proposal and figuring out an effective game-plan.

30.5% of all user traffic stems from organic searches. That’s a huge chunk lost if you don’t strategise correctly. Smart content marketing is vital to good eCommerce SEO. This means that investing in long term strategies that centre around your brand’s personal niche is mandatory.

Unfortunately, many brands try to get away without creating a detailed plan and inevitably… get it wrong.

As professional digital marketers, we’re always pushing to get ahead of the curve. That’s why we’ve rounded up some of the best eCommerce SEO trends that are set to create an impact in the soon to be present.

These tips will help you and your business maximise your SEM and ultimately improve conversions for your online brand.

Video Content and Virility

Somewhere in the world, a digital marketer proposed the question,

Why not merge content with commerce?

It has been well established in the digital community that content is paramount to a great digital marketing strategy. Over the last few years, it has become more and more relevant for eCommerce businesses.

eCommerce brands are constantly searching for new and innovative ways to be heard; particularly in the ever-growing congestion of crowded marketplaces. Thanks to the continuing popularity and usage of mobile devices, as well as WiFi/Data availability, the world of eCommerce SEO has hit a new high in terms of demand for online content. After all, content has the highest power to go viral - and a higher traction essentially drives more conversions.

The solution: what’s the most interactive, uncomplicated form of digital content for your consumers?

Video content. The evolving ease of video sharing capabilities for people of all ages means, exploring the video content platform can and will only be advantageous for your brand.  Recently, we have seen an interesting transformation in the video format from a simple traffic tool to a conversion platform. At the moment, only 16% of the eCommerce market are utilising it - with the welcoming of a new financial year, this is set to change.

We’ve listed some of the most successful ways you can incorporate video content into your digital marketing scheme:

Shoppable Videos

Shoppable images aren’t all that exciting. They’re old news. But what about shoppable videos?

A great tool created by Cinematique, the world’s first touchable video platform, allows brands to sell their products directly through video content. These brands have the ability to embed videos onto their sites. When users watch the video, they can click on products displayed that appeal to them. At the end of the clip, all the items that the user has clicked on will be available in a queue - ready for them to explore ie. purchase. Ca-ching!

Youtube also has its own eCommerce portal.  The most popular video streaming site in the world, provides businesses with the ability to incorporate external annotations into their video. They can be transported straight to your features products. This turns the viewer into a potential consumer.

 Facebook Live

Although this platform is hardly new, eCommerce websites are only just starting to welcome its extreme benefits. The most obvious benefit: you are immediately creating a dynamic, genuine connection with your users.

 Creating Facebook Live on your customer based profile means fans are immediately notified via the notifications tab, and the video will automatically stream throughout their news feed. This guarantees effective organic reach.

“With Facebook Live you can use your phone to share a moment instantly with the people you care about. This means your friends, family or fans can be there with you, and you can respond to their comments and see their reactions,” Facebook company in a statement.

The live stream means followers can ask questions in real time and receive an immediate interactive response.

Get creative with your content. Make it an informative product review or an entertaining demonstration - or just provide extra content to back up already existing content.

The point is, the Facebook Live platform is a simple brand leverage that satisfies the growing desire for interactive content.

Mobile Friendliness 

 It is basically understood that mobile affability is effective in every stage of digital marketing (the mobile now represents 60% of all digital media time) bar the conversion; the majority of people simply prefer to use a PC or laptop to complete their transaction.

However, the biggest mistake for a lot of eCommerce brands is to overlook the importance of smartphone analytics. Mobile eCommerce SEO will account for 30% of global eCommerce sales by 2018 and don’t forget, 43% of consumers will visit your competitor’s site next after having a negative mobile shopping experience.

So, what aren’t you going to do?

Neglect your mobile users.

Continuous evidence proves that there is a strong correlation between high percentages of mobile traffic and high overall website conversion rates. Just because the conversion was made on a PC doesn’t mean that’s where the decision was made. 59% of people research on smartphones.

Do not rule out mobile devices as the first and sometimes most important stop: key decisions are made during this step. Brands should no longer see mobile and PC users as a different identity – the end result still leads to the same conversion, it just involves multiple platforms/devices.

In summation, mobile friendliness = eCommerce SEO friendly.

User Generated Content

 Customers trust other customers. The easiest way to attract a customer to your brand, and get them to purchase your product instead of your competitors, is to implement customer feedback e.g. product reviews.

90% of customers admit reviews and comments from other customers influence their decision to make a purchase, and 81% of online shoppers admit to trusting information found on blogs. In this regard, it is imperative to make sure your information is both useful and up-to-date.

Implement customer reviews in a way that matches your overall site design. Only feature detailed reviews that offer more informative descriptions of the specific benefits and features of your products. This will draw in your site visitors and potentially give them a nudge to purchase a product they may previously have been on the fence about buying.

UGC (user generated content) is also a great way to feature authentic content in your social advertisements - reassure your customers of your value and gain their trust. The benefit of this is that it will also dramatically improve your visibility and in turn, assist your SEO.

How do you get customers to leave a review?

Reward them.

For example, a great draw card is to promote product discounts to those who do leave a review. This makes customers feel special. Who doesn’t love to feel special?

Another optimizing trend set to branch out in 2017 & 2018 is to mix user generated content in with product pictures.

Customers are more intelligent than ever, and whilst consumers still enjoy the feeling of luxury they get when they look at product pictures, they also realise that the product is unlikely to look as glamorous in real life. Displaying user generated images provides customers with a better context of the product. A good way to execute this would be by including product images with a stream of pictures from Instagram e.g. social pictures with relevant reference points.

Voice Search and Digital Assistants

Voice Search programs have been available to users for a while, but only recently have we seen a growth in its usage, especially through SEO.

What was once a fun way to communicate with a computerised voice system that probably couldn’t understand what you said anyway - is now a large marketing source for eCommerce brands. More people nowadays rely on voice search with every major tech company utilising their own digital assistants, e.g. Siri, Alexa, Cortana and Google Now and over 20% of all search requests are now made using voice services.

How can you benefit from this, and moreover, how can this positively impact your eCommerce SEO?

In order to receive optimal SEO from a voice search, use more conversational long-tail responses/keywords and incorporate texts for advanced Google answers. Rich answers benefit extremely well from voice searches as they can provide them directly.

Example:

Normal Keyword: Fridge

Long-Tail Keyword: Stainless Steel Double Door Fridge.

By narrowing down your market, you’re likely to find users with more buying intent. You’re also more likely to rank highly.

Chatbots & Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence and systems such as Chatbots, have come a long way. Its efficient way of combining piles of data, analytics and tracking software, mixed with its advanced intelligence, means it can perform competitive and mundane tasks much faster than any human.

It also means that individuals can now be personally marketed through a Chatbot system with tailored messaging to suit.

A recent announcement made by Facebook at the F8 Developer Conference proposed that brands will soon be able to send customer support via Facebook Messenger to Chatbots. This creates another incredible eCommerce portal through social media, as the current Messenger app garners approximately 900 million active users every single month.

This software will help bridge the gap of personalization - a highly regarded business trait that the majority of consumers have come to expect whilst online shopping- but one that online brands rarely get right.

Now To Utilise These eCommerce SEO Tips

Opportunities for businesses to maximise their eCommerce SEO are constantly arising, and in order to be successful, it is important to foresee these changes to ensure an efficient and effective digital marketing campaign.

Over half a billion people around the world have access to at least one mobile device, and most are connected to multiple appliances. With this alone, we could see digital marketing step out of its broadcast bubble and into an entirely new immersive space. Marketing will become so heavily ingrained, that we won’t be able to differentiate the distinction between advertising and the real world.

It is the year 2017, and whilst we have not quite reached that level yet, there are many ways that eCommerce brands can incorporate incredibly interactive and creative marketing schemes that will help keep you relevant and ultimately provide you with the tools to maximise your SEO.

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acidgreen is an award winning e-commerce agency  specialising in Magento, Shopify Plus and digital marketing with over 15 years of  industry experience. Our certified developers and digital marketers are highly qualified to create aesthetically pleasing Magento and Shopify Plus websites that generate the highest amount of conversions and provide the best ROI. Be sure to follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, or give us a call to learn more about our services.