Magento Search Engine Optimisation Best Practices

Optimizing your Magento store for search engines is crucial for driving organic traffic and increasing sales. The key to success lies in understanding the best practices that will help your store rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs).

First and foremost, ensure that your store's URL structure is clean and descriptive. This means using relevant keywords in your URLs, such as product names or categories. For example, instead of having a URL like "magento-store.com/product/123", use "magento-store.com/summer-sale/sunglasses".

A well-structured URL structure not only helps search engines understand your content but also improves user experience. By making it easier for users to navigate your store, you'll increase the chances of them finding what they're looking for and making a purchase.

In addition to a clean URL structure, use descriptive and keyword-rich titles and meta descriptions for your product pages. This will help search engines understand the content of your pages and display relevant snippets in search engine results. For instance, a product page for a pair of sunglasses might have a title like "Summer Sale: Aviator Sunglasses" and a meta description like "Get the perfect pair of sunglasses for this summer at an unbeatable price!"

Curious to learn more? Check out: Add Website to Search Engines Free

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a crucial aspect of having a successful Magento website. Magento SEO is essential to improve online presence, attract organic traffic, and increase sales. With proper SEO techniques, Magento store owners can improve website visibility on search engines.

To implement SEO strategies, you need to focus on key areas such as adding primary keywords into product titles, descriptions, and headers. This helps search engines understand the specific content and relevance of your pages.

Here are some tips for implementing primary keywords in product titles and descriptions:

For example, instead of writing "Running Shoes", write "Men's Running Shoes with Arch Support." This makes it clear to users and search engines what the product is about.

To include primary keywords in H1, H2, and H3 headers, ensure the H1 tag includes the primary keyword and use H2 and H3 tags to structure the content hierarchically.

Here are some key settings to configure for URL rewrites:

These settings will help generate clean, readable URLs for your website pages, improving website visibility and user experience.

By implementing these SEO strategies, you can improve your Magento website's search engine rankings and drive more traffic to your site.

Optimizing your Magento website is crucial for search engine optimization (SEO) performance. A good product title is concise, easy to read, and contains relevant keywords.

To optimize your product pages, conduct keyword research to identify relevant keywords that customers use to search for products similar to yours. Use these target keywords in the SEO-friendly URL structure, title, and meta description, as well as in the product description.

Here are some key areas to focus on for optimizing product pages:

By implementing these strategies, you can improve the SEO of your Magento product pages and increase their visibility on search engine results pages.

Understanding Magento SEO is crucial for getting your website to rank well on search engines. This means implementing SEO strategies that help your website appear higher in search engine results pages.

Magento SEO involves optimizing various aspects of your website, starting with product pages. Conducting keyword research is a key step in identifying relevant keywords that customers use to search for products like yours.

Optimizing product images is also important, as it can help search engines understand what your product is about. Use high-quality images that showcase your product from different angles, and optimize the image file names, alt tags, and captions with relevant keywords.

On-page optimization techniques, such as heading tags (H1, H2, H3) and internal linking, can also improve your product pages' visibility. Additionally, using structured data markup can make your product pages more search engine-friendly.

To ensure your product pages are optimized, it's essential to conduct SEO audits regularly. This can help detect issues that harm your performance and fix them before they become major problems.

Discover more: Search Engine Optimisation Meta Tags

Here are some key areas to focus on when optimizing your Magento website:

Managing your Magento website's URL rewrites and redirects is crucial for a seamless user experience. You can configure URL rewrites in Magento 2 by logging into your backend and navigating to Stores >> Configuration >> General >> Web.

To enable clean and readable URLs, set "Use Web Server Rewrites" to "Yes" in the Search Engine Optimization section. This improves your website's visibility and user experience.

Deactivating the product category key in your product URL can help keep your URLs short, especially if you have categories and subcategories. For example, instead of https://yourstore.com/category/product-name, you can keep it as https://yourstore.com/product-name.

If you need to redirect old URLs to new ones, you can create a custom URL rewrite by logging into your Admin panel and going to Marketing >> SEO & Search >> URL Rewrites. Choose "Custom" for a custom URL or "Product" for a product URL.

For another approach, see: Google Product Search Ranking

You'll need to choose the store where the rewrite applies, enter the old URL as the request path, and select the redirect type (permanent or temporary). The target path is the new URL that the old URL should redirect to.

To avoid broken links and 404 pages when changing the URL key of a page, you can set automatic permanent redirects for URLs. In Magento 2, this can be done in the Store > Configuration > Catalog Tab > Search Engine Optimization section.

Here's a quick reference table for the redirect types:

By managing your URL rewrites and redirects effectively, you can improve your website's navigation, search engine indexing, and overall user experience.

Image and media optimization is a crucial aspect of Magento search engine optimization.

Using high-quality images from Depositphotos can enhance your site's visual appeal and optimize performance, contributing positively to your SEO strategy.

To optimize product images, you should compress and resize images to reduce size, use only high-resolution images, give your images proper file names, and use SEO-rich alt tags.

For your interest: Difference between Search Engine Marketing and Search Engine Optimization

Proper alt tags are essential for search engines to understand the context of your images. You can add alt attributes for product images by going to Product > Edit > Images And Videos > Image > Alt Text.

For instance, for a gym shoes image, use alt text like “Women’s gym shoes with breathable mesh fabric.” Avoid keyword stuffing, as this can be seen as spammy by search engines.

Make sure that all images on your site have alt tags, including product images, banners, and any other visual content.

Here are some tips for using alt tags effectively:

Image compression can also significantly speed up page load and improve rankings. Magento 2 has an image optimization function that can compress various types of images, including PNG, JPG, GIF, TIF, and BMP.

You might like: Next Js Image Search

Category and product optimization are crucial aspects of Magento search engine optimization (SEO). You can edit store view level meta descriptions in Stores > Configuration > General > Design > HTML Head, and these can be overwritten on a category level at Products > Categories > Search Engine Optimization.

A fresh viewpoint: Search Engine Optimization and Social Media Marketing

To make URLs more SEO-friendly, enable URL rewrites, which optimize URLs by deleting unnecessary words like "index.php." You can also choose a URL for the category according to your needs on the Search Engine Optimization tab.

Here are some key areas to focus on for category and product optimization:

In Magento, you can edit a store view level meta description in Stores > Configuration > General > Design > HTML Head, which can be overwritten on a category level at Products > Categories > Search Engine Optimization.

You can also choose a URL for the category according to your needs, making URLs more SEO-friendly. Enabling URL rewrites optimizes URLs by deleting unnecessary words like "index.php" that have a low impact on performance or site rank.

To show category paths in product URLs, navigate to Stores > Configuration > Catalog > Search Engine Optimization and choose whether to enable or disable it. This setting can be used in combination with canonical tags in three scenarios.

If this caught your attention, see: Content Marketing and Search Engine Optimization

Here are the three scenarios for using this setting with canonical tags:

In Magento 2, stores can set up metadata on the category level by locating Catalog –> Categories –> Search Engine Optimization, where admins can add meta titles, meta descriptions, and meta keywords based on specific purposes and requirements.

To improve navigation optimization, change the settings of the Improved Layered Navigation extension, which can manage too long URLs, filtering results crawling, and similar content.

Here are some settings combinations to manage these problems:

Magento 2 Layered Navigation provides shopping doers with seamless navigation that lets them quickly find what they are looking for, enhancing user experience and impacting various SEO metrics positively.

To set up SEO-friendly URLs, log in to your Magento admin panel, navigate to Stores → Configuration, and select Catalog → Catalog. In the Search Engine Optimization section, empty the Product URL Suffix and Category URL Suffix fields to clear the .html extension.

Additional tips for an SEO-friendly URL structure include using hyphens to improve readability, consistency with lowercase letters, short and descriptive URLs, and avoiding special characters.

A good product title is concise, easy to read, contains relevant keywords, and is between 30 – 60 characters long.

Product title tags and meta descriptions give relevance to your page and tell your customer what your product is all about. They are the second most crucial thing after content and largely influence your click-through rates.

A good Meta description is concise, contains relevant keywords, and is between 70 – 155 characters long.

To add meta titles and descriptions to product pages, navigate to your Magento 2 admin, click Product >> Catalog, find Edit Product, and click on 'Search Engine Optimization.'

Expand your knowledge: How to Search Keywords Locally in Semrush

You can test your title length & preview here.

Here are the key characteristics of a good product title:

And here are the key characteristics of a good Meta description:

Technical SEO is crucial for any Magento website, and it starts with on-page optimization. You can use SEO audit tools to identify areas for improvement.

On-page optimization directly impacts how search engines interpret and rank your content. This means that by implementing the right techniques, you can significantly improve your eCommerce site's SEO performance.

To make your web pages crawlable and indexable, use Google Search Console or other SEO tools to find crawl issues with your site. This is especially important for Magento users who often face issues with faceted navigations and indexing duplicate content.

Here are some ways to control crawling and indexing:

Magento users face issues with ensuring all store pages are appropriately indexed, resulting in faceted navigations, indexing duplicate content, etc.

To control crawling and indexing, conduct an audit to identify low-quality pages indexed due to faceted navigation. Implement noindex or canonical tags to remove low-quality pages from the index.

Review log files to find any low-quality pages that are being crawled. Consider only allowing pages with high search potential to be indexed. Block the crawl of low-value parameters through the robots.txt file.

You can generate robots.txt in Magento 2 by going to Content > Design > Configuration. Find the line Global, click the Edit link, and open the Search Engine Robots tab to edit custom instructions.

A default configuration of robots.txt is okay, but you may want to disallow directories such as /catalog/product_compare/, /catalogsearch/, /wishlist/.

Managed hosting can significantly improve your website's loading speed, which is essential for search engine optimization (SEO) performance. A fast-loading website can improve your SEO by increasing search engine rankings and driving more traffic.

Slow loading times can result in lower search engine rankings. This is because search engines like Google prioritize websites that load quickly.

Managed hosting providers offer features like server optimization, performance monitoring, and security checks to enhance your website's loading speed. These features help identify and fix technical issues that can slow down your website.

Managed hosting solutions also provide automatic backups, server updates, and expert support. This frees up your time to focus on optimizing your SEO without worrying about technical issues.

By choosing a managed hosting provider, you can improve your website's loading speed and overall search engine optimization.

To track your Magento store's performance, you should use tools like Google Analytics. This will help you monitor metrics such as organic traffic, bounce rate, click-through rate, conversion rate, and keyword ranking.

To set up Google Analytics in Magento, navigate to Stores > Configuration > Sales > Google API > Google Analytics and enable Google Analytics, adding your tracking ID found under Admin > Tracking Info in your GA Account.

You can also use Google Search Console (GSC) to monitor your website's search performance, indexing status, and SEO issues. Additionally, tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, and Moz provide in-depth SEO audits, including backlink analysis, keyword tracking, and on-page SEO recommendations.

Here are some key metrics to track in Google Analytics:

To track your Magento store's performance, you'll want to enable Google Analytics. This can be done by navigating to Stores > Configuration > Sales > Google API > Google Analytics, where you'll need to enter your tracking ID found under Admin > Tracking Info in your GA Account.

Having a Google certification in digital analytics can provide a deeper understanding of the platform and its capabilities. However, with Google Analytics, you'll be able to track key metrics such as organic traffic, bounce rate, click-through rate, and conversion rate.

To track these metrics, you'll need to create a Google Analytics account and set up a property for your Magento store. This involves navigating to Stores → Configuration, selecting Sales → Google API, and configuring the Google Analytics section by entering your tracking ID.

You can also use Google Analytics to enable content experiments, which will allow you to add a Google Analytics Experiment code to a product page section. This can be done by navigating to Product > Advanced Settings > Product View Optimization.

Here are the key metrics to track in Google Analytics:

Monitoring your Magento store's performance is crucial to ensure it maintains high visibility in search engines. You should track several metrics to evaluate your SEO performance, such as organic traffic, bounce rate, click-through rate (CTR), conversion rate, and keyword ranking.

To track these metrics, use tools like Google Analytics to monitor your store's performance and identify areas that need improvement. For example, if your bounce rate is high, you may need to improve your website's user experience or optimize your landing pages.

To monitor SEO performance in Magento, use SEO tools like Google Analytics, Google Search Console (GSC), SEMrush, Ahrefs, and Moz. These tools help you track keyword rankings, click-through rates, and impressions, and provide in-depth SEO audits, including backlink analysis and on-page SEO recommendations.

Suggestion: Google Search Console Keyword Research

Properly managing URL redirects is also crucial to maintaining link equity and avoiding 404 errors, which can negatively impact SEO performance. Create permanent redirects by navigating to Marketing → SEO & Search → URL Rewrites, clicking Add URL Rewrite, and setting Redirect Type to Permanent (301).

Here are some key metrics to track:

Regularly monitoring and adjusting your Magento store's SEO performance will help you make data-driven decisions to improve your store's visibility and effectiveness.

Magento offers a range of extensions and plugins to optimize your online store for search engines.

Utilizing specialized Magento 2 SEO extensions can significantly reduce your efforts and make your search optimization more efficient.

To improve your website's SEO performance, you can use extensions like the XML Sitemap, which allows you to easily exclude categories, product types, product IDs, and CMS pages from the XML sitemap.

Other extensions, such as the Canonical Tag, enable you to set up canonical tags for products, category pages, and homepage easily.

For advanced SEO capabilities, consider using extensions like the Google Page Speed Optimizer Pro, which improves site speed and overall performance without additional costs on custom development.

Additionally, the Blog Pro extension makes your Magento blog SEO-friendly to get top positions in Google search results and drive organic traffic to your blog pages.

The Advanced Product Reviews extension gets more user-generated reviews and improves your search rankings, while the Google Indexing API quickly informs Google of new, updated, or deleted pages.

Some popular Magento extensions and plugins for SEO include:

To monitor SEO performance in Magento, you can use tools like Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and SEMrush, Ahrefs, and Moz, which provide in-depth SEO audits, including backlink analysis, keyword tracking, and on-page SEO recommendations.

Keyword research and planning are crucial steps in Magento search engine optimization (SEO). It helps you understand what terms and phrases your potential customers are using to find products or services similar to yours.

By identifying these keywords, search engines can more accurately match your content with user queries, attracting more targeted traffic. This means you can increase your chances of ranking higher in search engine results pages (SERPs).

Several tools and methods can assist you in finding relevant keywords for your Magento store, such as Google Autocomplete, SEMrush, and Ahrefs. These tools provide valuable insights into popular search terms and help you identify gaps in your strategy.

To get started, try using Google Autocomplete. Simply start typing a keyword related to your product or service into Google's search bar and observe the suggested search queries. These suggestions are based on actual user searches and can provide insights into popular search terms.

You should also consider focusing on long-tail and buyer-intent keywords. Long-tail keywords are more specific and usually longer than general keywords, such as "men's running shoes with arch support." While they have lower search volumes, they often have higher conversion rates because they capture users who are closer to making a purchase decision.

Here are some examples of long-tail and buyer-intent keywords:

By targeting these keywords, you can attract users who are further down the sales funnel and more likely to convert.

On-page SEO techniques are a crucial aspect of Magento search engine optimisation. Setting title tags, meta descriptions, and URLs for individual products using the "Search Engine Optimization" dropdown is a default feature in Magento.

Optimizing product titles and meta descriptions can greatly improve your eCommerce site's SEO performance. A good product title is concise, easy to read, contains relevant keywords, and is between 30-60 characters long. A good meta description is concise and contains relevant keywords, and is between 70-155 characters long.

To add meta titles and descriptions to product pages, navigate to your Magento 2 admin, click Product >> Catalog, find Edit Product, and click on ‘Search Engine Optimization’. You'll find the tabs to fill in your meta title and description.

On-page optimization techniques can be implemented using SEO audit tools. These tools help identify areas for improvement on your website and provide recommendations for optimization.

Here are some essential on-page techniques to implement:

By implementing these on-page SEO techniques, you can improve your Magento website's visibility on search engine results pages and drive more traffic to your site.

Mobile optimization is crucial for Magento sites as more users are browsing the internet and shopping using their phones.

Choose a responsive theme, as most Magento themes can automatically adjust to different screen sizes. Ensure that your menu items are large enough to be easily tapped on a mobile device. For example, use a “hamburger menu” icon to hide the main menu and expand it when tapped, or use drop-down menus for subcategories to keep the main navigation clean.

Test your site using tools like Google’s Lighthouse to check your site’s mobile responsiveness. Manually test your site on various devices, like smartphones and tablets, to ensure a seamless user experience.

Internal linking helps distribute page authority and improves crawlability by connecting related pages within your site using keyword-rich anchor text. For example, link to a related category page for “Running Accessories” with anchor text like “Check out our Running Accessories.”

For another approach, see: On Page Seo Content

Having a responsive theme is crucial for a seamless user experience across all devices. Most Magento themes, both free and paid, can automatically adjust to different screen sizes.

To ensure your site is mobile-friendly, test it using tools like Google's Lighthouse. This will help identify any issues that need fixing.

Implementing responsive images with srcset is a great way to optimize your site for mobile devices. To do this, go to Content → Elements → Blocks or Content → Elements → Pages, then edit the content to include responsive image tags with srcset.

Using a mobile-friendly menu is also essential. Make sure menu items are large enough to be easily tapped on a mobile device. For example, use a "hamburger menu" icon to hide the main menu and expand it when tapped.

Related reading: Mobile Search Engine Optimisation

Internal linking is a game-changer for your website's crawlability and user experience. It connects related pages within your site using keyword-rich anchor text.

To implement internal linking, identify pages that are related or complementary to each other. Then, edit the content of a page where you want to add internal links.

Using descriptive, keyword-rich anchor text is crucial for internal linking. For example, if you have a product page for "Men's Running Shoes", you might link to a related category page for "Running Accessories" with anchor text like "Check out our Running Accessories."

A well-structured URL can make a big difference in your website's visibility and user experience. Magento 2 allows you to configure URL rewrites to generate clean, readable URLs.

To configure URL rewrites in Magento 2, follow these steps:

A good URL structure should be short and easy to read. You may want to deactivate the product category key in your product URL if you have categories and subcategories, for example, https://yourstore.com/category/product-name. This ensures your URLs stay short.