As they heavily rely on the ever-changing online medium, eCommerces have to constantly adjust to any upcoming trends.

But can an eCommerce website keep up with the software products to optimize its workflow?

With roughly 210 million digital shoppers and 135 million mobile buyers, the US eCommerce medium is bound to grow even more than before.

That’s why there are lots of tools and services helping online retailers grow their businesses.

To do that, online organic searches are main contributors, while SEO is a topic within any business plan.

That said, there are several aspects to consider when assembling a search engine optimization strategy. The following guide can give you an idea of what to expect in 2017 in terms of SEO.

Last Year’s Google Updates to Consider

The first stop on our guide is Google.

After all, all SEO revolves around the actions the main search engine is taking. An overview of Google’s main updates and product launches is useful in order to predict trends awaiting this year.

Let’s check them out:

• mobile-first prioritization. As expected, Google is favoring user behavior and it is slightly inclining towards mobile purchases. So, Google is aiming to be more intuitive in this respect and index mobile versions higher.
• machine and deep learning. You may have encountered the phrase ‘deep learning’ as a buzzword on tech websites. It refers to a model which is similar to the human brain computing paths. What does it have to do with eCommerce SEO? These models will be increasingly used to define Google search facets and algorithms like Hummingbird. Briefly put, Hummingbird is an algorithm which enables Google to detect quality in-depth content in a niche and place it higher in organic search results. That means content is still central to SEO efforts – and not any kind of content, but the most qualitative one.
• local search continued its upwards trajectory – with moves like the Possum algorithm update or the acquisition of mapping analytics startup Urban Engines.
• Google extended its video/image marketing efforts – as proved by the acquisition of MoodStock or Eyefluence.

The main takeaway for an eCommerce website owner is that mobile optimization should be among their priorities.

That said, let’s have a look at the next point in our guide.

How to Tackle Mobile SEO in 2017

As stated above, the days of desktop-first approach are starting to fade away. These days, users can perform product searches and purchases whenever they need, almost instantly.

This is a whole paradigm shift. So before feeling overwhelmed, make sure you have these notes in mind:

• Be prepared that by the end of 2017, Google may finish testing the mobile-first indexation;
• Be in tune with new software which builds mobile versions first. Until now, the preference was for desktop versions which were subsequently adapted for mobile devices. The new trend uses adaptive logic – adapting mobile versions to desktop.
• Load speed is as important as ever. Speeding up a mobile website implies optimizing processes like compression, limiting the use of external JavaScript or caching. For a start, you can try Google’s page speed testing tool.
• Mobile ranking will also be influenced by user experience.
• An important factor is ‘crawlability’. You want to make sure your mobile pages are easily crawlable by search engines, especially if they contain loads of UGC (user-generated content). Interactive or product pages, for instance, could be hard to crawl if not addressed properly.

Bottom line is, 2017 will be quite a busy year for mobile optimizers.

But it will also come up with some solutions for you – on condition that you keep an eye on the app development news.

Keyword Research for a 2017 Ecommerce Website

In the bigger picture, keywords seem to be quite insignificant at first sight.

Until you realize they’re the first gate people have to your services or products.

If there’s fog, people walking on the street won’t be able to see a banner. Same for users who are searching for specific products. If you don’t optimize your product page on product-focused keywords, you won’t be able to cast the Internet fog away.

A useful starting point is to get on Amazon and type in some product names to notice how Amazon displays them.

One of the largest eCommerce platforms contains, Amazon contains a wide variety of product search strings.

You’ll get some ideas on long-tail keywords for your product-centered search strings.

You’ll also know for which of them you’ll face competition from big retail platforms.

Apart from this handy practice, there are always keyword research tools to employ.

Targeted Link Building

Link building is becoming a matter of quality over quantity, which is also in tune with Google’s overall preference for content aimed at humans.

But how can an eCommerce website/store/etc. benefit most from this online marketing strategy? The challenge is links should point directly to a product page.

A few places where your links could be located:

• online magazines in your industry
• review sites
• local news sites.

When people link to your site, make sure these links are product pages. This way, potential buyers will know exactly which action to take and avoid wandering aimlessly on a home page, for instance.

Place Site Structure High on the Priorities List

When Google indexes your website, it crawls all your pages it has access or links to. Naturally, an eCommerce website will have a more branched structure than a blog.

As Brian Dean indicates, there are two rules for optimal eCommerce site architecture:

1. Keep things simple and scalable. This rule refers to scalability – designing a website so as you can add categories without making navigation complicated.
2. Keep any page no more than 3 clicks away from your page. Make your site structure as flat as possible – both for the sake of humans and search engines.

But besides any of your SEO efforts, product quality and seamless user experience are the two aspects most likely to make new and old customers press that ‘buy’ button.

Our StoreFront shopping cart software will always be a reliable resource for those retailers who want to attain the above goal.

Interested in excellent customer base? Contact us at 1-800-437-0144 or via sales@storefront.net and learn how we can help.