An absent SEO strategy update might be what’s keeping your e-commerce website from getting the traffic you need for sales. If the last time you had an SEO audit was months ago, you might be behind in search engine rankings. That doesn’t look good if only 0.63% of visitors click pages on the second search engine results page.
E-commerce websites need regular SEO audits because of the highly competitive nature of the online retail industry. A complete SEO audit addresses technical and content issues that may affect a website's performance in search engines. It goes beyond having landing pages that load quickly. It’s about having relevant content that attracts search engine crawlers.
With competitors struggling for the top spot, a weekly SEO audit may be the key to staying ahead. We’ll review why doing these e-commerce website audits weekly keeps you ahead. Also, you’ll learn which aspects to focus on when running them.
The best way to appreciate a weekly SEO audit is to realize its benefits. Besides reviewing your website’s performance, search engines regularly update their algorithms to produce better search results. An example is Google’s CORE update for March 2023.
Audits generally reveal how well something adheres to a set structure—in this case, search engines. Hence, these are the benefits of running one for e-commerce sites.
Did you know that the chances of having a bounce on a mobile site increase by 123% as the page load increases to 10 seconds? You may have optimized page speed during website design, but it does not end there. An SEO audit will reveal technical issues, including loading speed, that affect your e-commerce site.
You’ll know how efficiently your servers run and carry the load from site visits. That also leads to speedy operation and content load times.
Something as simple as poorly written code could cause server overload.
The more user-friendly your e-commerce site is, the longer online shoppers stay. That increases your chances of making sales, as they spend more time reviewing products in your catalog.
Page content, like graphics, navigation, and layout, affects the user experience. While you’ll generally optimize them during website design, an SEO audit can help you gauge the site’s performance in this regard.
You’ll know how to optimize page content and the overall site structure. Remember, the goal is to get shoppers to buy from you.
Target keywords may change over time, especially as new product iterations hit the market. An e-commerce website audit can quickly reveal if you are in touch with the relevant keywords. Moreover, keywords are instrumental for search engines in determining relevance.
Aside from keyword research and optimization, an SEO audit can reveal keyword stuffing and duplicate content. These errors reduce the relevance of your website to search engines. That is a blow to your content marketing efforts.
Duplicate content on multiple web pages is not a good outlook. Also, content format (H1, H2, paragraph length, etc.) is essential to SEO efforts. An audit will check these things and ensure you have them optimized.
Reviewing and implementing recommendations from the SEO audit should result in increased organic traffic. That is because you’ll have better visibility in search engine results. While increased organic search traffic does not equal conversions, it is crucial to getting a good conversion rate.
The benefits of regular SEO audits cannot be overemphasized. It helps you review essentials like site speed, duplicate content, keywords, user experience, organic traffic, etc. However, questions about how often you should conduct an e-commerce SEO audit still need to be answered.
We know it can get expensive, especially if you outsource the task. Nonetheless, regular optimization for search engines will be worth the cost.
Here are a few important reasons why e-commerce sites should run SEO audits weekly:
Search engines are constantly on edge to deliver relevant search results to queries. Things have advanced past keyword research, although it remains the basis of a search-engine-optimized website. It is common to see high-performing platforms lose website traffic because of a significant search engine update.
A regular SEO audit will keep your website's content up-to-date and aligned with the current algorithm. This applies to other search engines besides Google.
Have you clicked on an item only to receive the error message “page not found?” That is one of the many technical and critical SEO issues that can affect e-commerce websites.
There are cases of broken links, structured data markup, compromised site security, responsiveness, etc. An on-page SEO audit checks responsiveness. Sometimes, a simple image optimization might be all you need to increase page speed.
Google uses mobile-first indexing for search results. You can be out there expanding your eCommerce and even introducing AI while your site keeps dropping in search results. That will lower the organic traffic.
What is the user experience for mobile users? An SEO audit allows you to test the mobile responsiveness of your website content, landing pages, and more on mobile devices. The better the mobile performance, the more search engines like Google favor your site.
It is easy to get overwhelmed with updating products, adding more pages, and focusing on selling. However, user experience and security can quickly fall off the chart without regular testing. Security issues can accumulate over time.
These things can affect your visibility in search results and your organic traffic. Hence, perform regular audits to identify and sort them out early.
There are better approaches to optimizing your content than using keywords with high search volumes. Long-tail keywords help you rank higher, as there is often less competition.
Regular SEO audits that include keyword research can help you identify the relevant ones for your business. Also, they keep you up to date with any changes.
Search engines give more preference to sites with backlinks. That is because they regard these links as endorsements, making you an authority in the niche.
Besides revealing broken links, an SEO audit can help review your backlink sources. You can also use it to review competitors’ backlinks and learn their linking strategies.
Another excellent application of an SEO website audit is identifying backlinks from farms or spam directories. Identifying and removing them can boost your standing in search engines, as they frown on shady backlinking.
You’d agree that an SEO audit will improve the content by removing errors. Whether it is image SEO or keyword research, your content will have better relevance.
Other areas for improvement include headings, meta descriptions, title tags, structured data, meta tags, etc. Besides improving existing content, you’ll prepare future content better.
Auditing your internal links when you post new content might become cumbersome. Adding internal link optimization to your weekly SEO audit is one way to avoid this stress.
Internal linking (internal links) improves site crawling by the Googlebot. It is one way to boost the visibility of your priority pages.
Implementing a weekly SEO audit is beneficial to your site. However, significant events may break up this routine. That means you don’t have to wait for the next audit week.
Here are a few events that should prompt an SEO audit:
A comprehensive SEO audit often has a content and technical component. Both play crucial roles and should be completed as regularly as possible. So, what do you look out for in a content and technical SEO audit?
A technical SEO audit deals with the following:
On the other hand, a content SEO audit will deal with the following:
You can use an SEO audit tool or contract an agency to review your website. It is best to outsource it if you do not have the required expertise in-house.
There is no one-size-fits-all approach regarding things to check during a site audit. Nevertheless, we have an audit checklist to give you a head start. It includes the following:
There are SEO audit tools designed for these. Most are user-friendly for beginners.
Regular SEO audits are a must to maintain relevance and boost the visibility of your website. Search engines update their algorithms, and continuous content uploads can result in technical errors.
Weekly audits might sound too frequent, but they could lead to better organic rankings and visibility. One way to beat the competition is to put in extra work!