Getting more traffic to your webshop can be a daunting task, but it is essential for the success of your online business. There are many different strategies you can use to increase traffic to your webshop, and in this article, we will go over some of the most effective ones.
One of the most important things you can do to get more traffic to your webshop is to optimize your website for search engines. This means making sure that your website is easy for search engines like Google to find and understand. To do this, you need to focus on search engine optimization (SEO).
There are many different aspects of SEO, but some of the most important ones include:
- Keyword research: This involves finding the right keywords to use on your website to help it rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs).
- On-page optimization: This involves optimizing the content and structure of your website to make it more relevant and useful to both search engines and visitors.
- Off-page optimization: This involves building high-quality backlinks to your website from other reputable websites.
But how does Search Engine Optimization works?
Discover the popular keywords, the basis of search engine optimization
By discovering which keywords of the products in your webshop are the most popular, you lay the foundation of search engine optimization. These keywords come back in the categories, product titles, product descriptions, labels, filters, meta information, rich snippets, etc. The keywords form the spider web of your webshop. Keywords can be found by doing research and also by just thinking logically. With a tool like Keywordtool Pro or KWFinder.com you can find all kinds of keywords that are popular in your industry. Try one month, find all the words and then cancel the membership.
You can also find all keywords related to other keywords. You may discover that people use completely different keywords than you have in mind. Many words have synonyms. And of many keywords, people use more of a descriptive search; a lawnmower or “a device for shortening grass”. Search engine optimization is all about solving problems. People Google because they have an issue. They buy the solution from you.
Unique product descriptions and search engine optimization
Google values the best solution and authenticity. By writing unique and optimized product descriptions, your webshop becomes much easier to find than webshops that copy each other. Try to comply with the standard guidelines for SEO as much as possible:
- keywords in the meta title tag
- h1 tag for the title
- at least 100 unique words in the short description
- keywords in the urls
- at least 300 unique words in the long description (keyword density 3 – 5%)
- keywords in the meta description
- links to related products, incl. a good title tag
- keywords at the beginning of sentences
- add tags (in Woocommerce)
- keywords in the h2 and h3 tags
Focus on both exploratory viewers and buyers
When shopping online, there are many more people who orient themselves than actually buy a product. Many webshops and stores are very focused on the pure sales process. They miss the orientation process in the customer journey. There is little experience, there are only products with a price tag, waiting for you to buy them. Personally I think these are very boring shops. You can see that these types of stores also have a lot of trouble staying afloat. The trick is to inform exploratory viewers in such a way that reciprocity and customer loyalty are created. Because they are so well informed and free of charge, they are more willing to buy from you. There is a gun factor. As a result, you can also be a few euros more expensive than your competitors. You don’t have to compete on price (which costs many webshops).
User generated content for search engine optimization in your webshop
In addition to carrying out SEO optimizations yourself as an administrator, you can also have users add content to your products. This can be done, for example, in the form of customer experiences. You can also use a social stream of, for example, Instagram posts. Posts that have been tagged based on your products. If you find it difficult to come up with creative content for your webshop yourself, you can also use guest bloggers, for example. Someone writes a piece about your products and shares in the proceeds. You can provide the piece of text with affiliate links so that you can measure that a sale has actually gone through that blogger.
Images and search engine optimization for webshops
It is important for images that the keywords are reflected in the file names and ALT tags. Search engines such as Google and Bing search the file name and the so-called alt text to recognize images. Also make sure you use recognizable photos because Google is getting smarter through machine learning and artificial intelligence. Search engines are getting better and better at understanding what’s in a photo without looking at the file name and descriptions.
Keywords in the main navigation of your webshop
The main navigation of your webshop is usually at the top of every page. That is why it is the ideal place to process the keywords. You automatically create referring links on every page of your webshop. Many web shops have words such as ‘Home’, ‘About us’, ‘The store’, etc. in the main navigation. However, these are not the words you want to score on. It is much better to place a number of popular categories of your webshop here.
Automate inbound traffic through social media
With a tool like MeetEdgar or SocialBee you have the option to automatically post articles on all your social media channels. For example, you can write a nice article for all categories within your webshop. You will then soon have 10-50 articles that you can use, for example, 2 times
Another effective way to get more traffic to your webshop is to use social media. Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram can be powerful tools for driving traffic to your webshop. To do this, you need to create engaging content that your followers will want to share with their friends and followers. You can also use paid advertising on social media to reach a wider audience and get more traffic to your webshop.
Conclusion
Getting more visitors to your online store is one of the 4 components for e-commerce success. You need to get relevant traffic to your store to make sales.