Shopify store SEO - a guide

A Shopify store is a website - there's no arguing with that. But when you look at it from an SEO perspective, it isn't exactly an ordinary one. In this article we'll present the principles of the wonderful Shopify platform - what makes it unique and how it works - followed by a guide to SEO for a Shopify store.

Introduction

The online market is one of the wonders of the modern world - the raw potential it offers across so many fields for success, livelihood and business growth is hard to grasp. Among those fields is ecommerce - a dynamic, ever-changing world with many currents built on different online store platforms. Among these platforms, one clearly leads the way: Shopify.

Before we get to work - what is Shopify?

To understand how to do SEO for a store built on the Shopify platform, you first need a basic introduction to the revolutionary tool it is. Shopify is a platform for building and managing online stores, made by the Canadian company of the same name. At its core, it aims to give efficient, accessible solutions to people who want to market an online store, without needing an in-depth understanding of building and designing websites. Before we get to the guide to SEO for a Shopify store, let's explain how it works.

What makes Shopify unique?

Unlike a classic online store (E-Commerce, for that matter), Shopify uses a simple but revolutionary payment system - a small change that changes the rules of the game. When building an online store, one of the biggest challenges a store owner faces is the payment system. Setting up payment processing takes planning, bureaucracy and, above all, a huge waste of resources. To spare store owners this difficulty, Shopify comes with a built-in payment system that connects to well-known payment providers. In practice, instead of typing in credit card details on every purchase, customers can pay with accelerated checkout options such as PayPal, Apple Pay or Google Pay, using payment details they have already saved.

Is that all?

It doesn't sound like much, right… But trust us - not having to build a payment system is a big deal in the world of online commerce. It's no accident that Shopify is considered the largest online store platform today. And that's not all. Beyond the payment system, Shopify offers its users more tools to spare people who want to build an online store, but can't meet all the requirements, from other difficulties. Here is a short list of these advantages:

• Ready-made themes for your store design: instead of designing a store from scratch, you can open a store based on more than 100 different themes offered as part of the services available to Shopify users.
• A domain through Shopify: instead of struggling with a domain (the site address) and hosting for your store, Shopify lets its users buy hosting and a domain efficiently and easily through the system.
• Data management: as a site management platform, Shopify lets its users manage their store data in an accessible, simple way.

How does this relate to SEO

Now that we understand where Shopify comes from, what it is and how it works, we can finally get to the juicy part. At a glance, marketing a Shopify store isn't fundamentally that different from classic digital marketing. The basic elements revolve around the same tools: social networks, parallel websites, paid advertising and, finally, the cherry on top: SEO. However, SEO in particular raises an obstacle you won't find in most situations where organic site promotion is done.

So what's the catch?

When you market websites, SEO is a standard stage. The steps usually don't change: you do keyword research, check search volume, build a plan for applying SEO to the site's content, check the data every so often, adapt, and so on. When it comes to promoting a Shopify store, however, you'll face a challenging problem: this isn't a content site, it's an online store - where the emphasis isn't on a lot of content.

Problem, problem. What do we do?

Don't worry. In the modern tech world, especially in a field like ecommerce that generates revenue for so many stakeholders, no fundamental problem stays a problem for long. To do quality SEO for your Shopify store, use the following 3 tips:

• 1. Content in the product description: you can't put a huge amount of content in the product description itself, for fear of driving away a potential customer who doesn't want to read too much. However, you can slip in a keyword here and there, from time to time, to keep a solid SEO foundation for the site.

• 2. Make the most of the product image: did you know? Every image uploaded to a website has a name, and that name feeds into Google's SEO calculation. Have you put two and two together? Give the image a name that is a keyword, and you'll keep promoting your store organically without weighing down the customer visiting the product page!

• 3. A blog with content articles: this is another creative solution. Create a short blog that presents reviews and analyses of the various products you sell. The blog isn't meant to get exposure on its own, but its posts will contain the content you need for optimal SEO. A blog lets you add as many words as you like without hurting the site's usability. A perfect solution, isn't it?

Summary

As you can see, SEO for a store built on the Shopify platform is a special process. It isn't all that different, but it does require deep thinking and informed planning of the promotion process itself. To succeed, use the tips we've presented in this article, while taking into account all the other characteristics we covered. Happy optimizing!