#MozCon

by @audette

The State of Ecommerce SEO

2

First a little history

3

The first SEO

4

The first SEOSEO: optimizing for search engines and cashin’ checks

5

The first SEO

SEO holdover mindsetRANK #1!BUILD LINKS!

TotallyKEYWORDS ALL DAY!

FullyOBSESS ON ALGOS!

9

SEO is full of crapCRAP

10

It worked. It was profitable.

BRANDS FOUND SEO

12

The Internet hates SEO

13

The Internet hates CRAP SEO

Which site should I torch next…

I will kill your business model

17SUSTAINABILITY

THEN:

CHASE ALGOS

NOW:

CHASE PEOPLE

THEN:

KEYWORDS W/ MOST TRAFFIC

NOW:

KEYWORDS w/ MOST RELEVANCE

THEN:

OBSESS ON LINKS

NOW:

CREATING EXPERIENCES WORTH SHARING

NOW:

OBSESS ON CREATING EXPERIENCES WORTH SHARING

THEN:

MORE LINKS MORE PAGESMORE EVERYTHING

NOW:

LESS IS MORE

THEN:

FOCUS ON RANKINGS

NOW:

FOCUS ON BOTTOM LINE METRICS

(for example)

NON-BRAND REVENUECONVERSION RATENEW CUSTOMERS

(and)

STAND BEHIND YOUR WORK

This change will create $164,160 in newmonthly revenue.

31

Is pleased32

RECS NOT IMPLEMENTEDARE WORTHLESS

PART 2CONTENT STRATEGY

PART 2CONTENT STRATEGY

KEYWORDS GET YOU HALFWAY

TIP #1KNOW CONTENT STRATEGY

PART 2SEO CONTENT STRATEGY

SEARCH RANK & DISPLAY

PAGE CONTENT

(AUDIENCE NEED)

CONVERSION

42

PART 3STAY TECHNICAL

TECHNICAL SEO IS MOREIMPORTANT, NOT LESS

Impact vs. reliability

Technical SEO is Dependable

45

Off-page

Content

On-page

High Impact, Lower Dependability

High Dependability, Lower Impact

PART 3MOBILE 25% OF ORGANIC

MOBILE TRENDS

1. Tablets used more than smartphones to visit ecommerce sites.

MOBILE TRENDS

MOBILE TRENDS

2. Tablet users look at more pages.

TIP #3MOBILE TRENDS

MOBILE TRENDS

MOBILE TRENDS

Adobe:http://plotin.us/12QMH7d

Responsive: http://plotin.us/18GrTn2

MOBILE TRENDS

The Vary header fix

MOBILE TRENDS

MOBILE TRENDS

This breaks Akamai caching

MOBILE TRENDS

1. Configure Akamai to ignore Vary: User-Agent

MOBILE TRENDS

2. Configure Akamai to cache with “is mobile” flag

Vary: User-Agent Solution

Explanation:http://plotin.us/18GtXLE

Fix:http://plotin.us/16YgXx9

TECHNICAL SEO IS MOREIMPORTANT, NOT LESS

62

Every site has finite crawl resources

TIP #2GET TECHNICAL

PART 4CRAWLING TIPS FOR ECOMM

Fix server errors (when large)

PART 4CRAWLING TIPS FOR ECOMM

Speed truly rules

Read these

66

Web performance optimizationhttp://plotin.us/183sKv2

SEO site speedhttp://plotin.us/12gKxOy

PART 4CRAWLING TIPS FOR ECOMM

Parameter handling is good

PART 4CRAWLING TIPS FOR ECOMM

Monitor indexation with XML feeds

69

70

PART 4CRAWLING TIPS FOR ECOMM

Use 304 not modified

PART 4CRAWLING TIPS FOR ECOMM

Use log files

PART 4LOG FILES

PART 4LOG FILES

PART 4LOG FILES

PART 4LOG FILES

Googlebot is spending most of its crawl allotment on two error pages, which could mean these pages return the wrong status code.

Googlebot is crawling the same page with 3 separate URLs, which could indicate a canonicalization/duplication problem.

This URL has “500” in the URL but is returning a 200 response code.

These URLs with ?utm_source and ?creative_desc parameters shouldn’t be indexed.

TIP #2GET TECHNICAL

TIP #2GET TECHNICAL

PART 5LIGHTNING ROUND!

Top technical gotchas

PART 5LIGHTNING ROUND!

1: Inconsistent Signals

http://www.llbean.com/llb/shop/51909?page=double-l-chinos-natural-

fit-hidden-comfort-plain-front

Canonical tags not part of the internal link profile

http://www.llbean.com/llb/shop/32865?page=double-l-jeans-natural-

fit&catalogId=18

Self-referencing canonical tag points to non-canonical

83

Canonical crawl path

Home Category Sub-cat Product

Navigation & internal links, external backlinks, canonical tags, XML files all point to the same definitive URLs.

PART 5LIGHTNING ROUND!

2: Pagination (always)

Self-referencing canonical tags

pp. 2-N

Annotations:

• Pages 2-N annotated with rel prev, next

• pages 2-N self-referencing rel canonical

No self-referencing canonical with rel prev/next

pp. 2-N

~/pg3?src=nav1&sessID=9

Actual canonical: ~/pg3

PART 5LIGHTNING ROUND!

4: Product Variations

88

89

90

91

PART 5LIGHTNING ROUND!

5: Faceted Navigation

http://www.jpcycles.com/motorcycle-parts/brembo/brake-calipers-and-kits

http://www.jpcycles.com/motorcycle-parts/brembo/brake-calipers-and-kits?

N=36371+28004518

PART 5LIGHTNING ROUND!

6: Product Inventory

@rimmkaufman #techseo96

@rimmkaufman #techseo97

98

Handling Expiring Products

Generate a “product not here” message

Recommend related products

99

Handling Expiring Products

301 to a related product or up a level

OR just 404 the page (it’s OK)

PART 6KEY CHALLENGES

PART 6Hidden SEO Data: iOS6

PART 6Hidden SEO Data: iOS6

PART 6Hidden SEO Data: iOS6

PART 6Hidden SEO Data: (not provided)

TIP #4PLAs Taking Clickshare

PART 6PLAs Taking Clickshare

PART 6PLAs: 33% of Non-branded PPC

PART 6Image Search for Ecommerce

PART 6Image Search for Ecommerce

PART 6Image Search for Ecommerce

PART 6Challenges

1. ~13% of all Google organic traffic is hidden.

2. (Not provided) is ~35%

3. PLAs are taking organic CTR

4. Image search traffic loss

PART 6Challenges

1. Know realities, set expectations

2. Craft titles for max CTR

3. Use schema & authorship

4. Estimate lost data

PART 6Challenges

Estimating hidden iOS6 traffichttp://plotin.us/12ViOjo

PART 7Social for Ecommerce

PART 7Social for Ecommerce

PART 7Social for Ecommerce

TIP #5Social for Ecommerce

Google+ Followers

• June: 200• July: 120,000• Sep.: 280,000• Nov.: 300,000

Being here is good

PART 7Social for Ecommerce

PART 7Social for Ecommerce

Authorship: great for product reviews and guesting

PART 7Social for Ecommerce

Google’s weighting of results can negate benefits

PART 7Social for Ecommerce

Content ownership can be complicated

3 Takeaways

3 Takeaways

Understand your target audience

3 Takeaways

Stay in front of technical problems

3 Takeaways

Understand data trends

Thank you!