BigCommerce has grown to prominence as one of the best eCommerce platforms available, with a robust suite of features and plenty of room for app integrations and custom development options. However, this is only the first leg of your eCommerce journey.
If you want to actually promote your store and get more customers, you will need to market your business correctly. A professional BigCommerce SEO company that has a deep understanding of the platform and an extensive digital marketing background will be able to help you put together a campaign that will grow your business in a positive direction.
Although you may have concerns about hiring an agency to do your SEO, once you realize how much there is to tackle when it comes to making the right optimizations and forming the correct strategy, you will see that it is practically a necessity.
Starting an eCommerce business is tough, but marketing it and growing it can be downright daunting. The right BigCommerce SEO services can help alleviate some of the problems store owners struggle with when it comes to eCommerce growth and actually standing out in the search engines.
We have put together this essential SEO guide for BigCommerce merchants, and anyone who is curious about taking the plunge by hiring a professional for their digital marketing.
The Benefits of a BigCommerce SEO Company
The big question is, what can an eCommerce SEO company do for you that you can’t simply do yourself after a bit of research? Has search engine optimization really become that technical and complex that you need an entire agency just to pull it off?
To put it bluntly, yes.
While minor SEO tweaks are simple enough to perform, and with the help of Bigcommerce SEO apps like FavSEO and ReloadSEO it’s relatively easy to get a handle on the basics, but even after all these years, the bulk of all SEO work still has to be done manually. This work has also become exceedingly complex, requiring a great deal of technical expertise, eCommerce knowledge, and a strategic mindset.
In short, there is a massive difference between performing a few changes on your website and conducting an effective eCommerce SEO campaign. Just about anyone with a decent understanding of the BigCommerce backend can make a few quick adjustments to on-page content with the help of a guide, but there is a whole lot more to SEO than simply adding a few keywords to your pages or changing a category title.
A skilled BigCommerce SEO company will be able to perform deeper levels of keyword research using industry-leading SEO tools and leaning on years of experience. This allows for a greater chance at uncovering valuable ranking opportunities, which can lay the groundwork for a much more effective SEO strategy.
Let’s take a closer look at the key elements of an effective SEO campaign and you will begin to see why a talented marketing agency is not only important, but could very well be a necessity if you are serious about taking your BigCommerce store where you want it to go.
In-Depth Keyword Research
One of the biggest benefits of having a dedicated SEO team on your side is that you will be able to leverage decades of collective experience when it comes to keyword research.
You may have a general idea as to what keywords you want to rank for, but chances are they are not keywords that are all perfectly suited from a strategic point of view.
Rather than merely selected a bunch of industry keywords that you want to rank for, eCommerce SEO experts will carefully select a mix of keywords that have different kinds of search volume and intent behind them. This would include product keywords, location-based keywords, long-tail keywords, and extra-long-tail keywords.
Finding the proper keywords for your SEO campaign is a must if you want your strategy to produce results in terms of better rankings.
For instance, where a store owner might select “men’s dress shirts” as a keyword they want to rank for, it would make more sense from a strategic point of view to target “best dress shirts for men,” “designer dress shirts for men,” or “best dress shirts for men near me.” These different keyword variations may have lower traffic volumes but are easier to compete for and may have better eCommerce search intent behind them. The result is that they are not only easier to rank for, they help your site build brand authority while driving more qualified traffic that converts better.
Keyword research is the backbone of any successful SEO campaign, and this is one area where having an agency pays off. No matter how much you think you know about SEO or your industry, chances are that an elite SEO company will have a far greater wealth of expertise to draw from.
On-Site SEO For BigCommerce Stores
Taking care of all of the different on-site SEO fixes and updates for your BigCommerce website is another reason why hiring a dedicated agency is worthwhile.
First of all, it is unlikely that you are even aware of all of the different parts of your website that need updating, nor how to update them properly. A professional SEO agency will be able to go in and make the correct changes to your meta titles, category page descriptions, product listings, URLs, and even your homepage if necessary, based on an overarching strategy that is already in place.
This means that each change is performed for the sake of a greater purpose and not just because it’s assumed to be the right thing to do or because it looks better. Professional digital marketers will only make adjustments if they are in line with the strategy that has been created and if they know that the changes will make a difference in terms of boosting your website.
Technical Adjustments
On the technical side of things, SEO can get rather complex. Whether it’s combing your website for dead links, making sure that you have the proper redirects in place, ensuring that your eCommerce site is being crawled correctly by Google, and a number of other things, it’s easy to see why just this area alone warrants a professional touch.
While the content and usability of a website is important from an SEO perspective, a store that is hampered by technical issues will not rank well. One of the primary reasons to hire a BigCommerce SEO company is to have a professional team that is constantly looking after your technical SEO in order to make sure that it is in order.
It’s important to note that this is not a one-off process either. Like most aspects of SEO, these technical adjustments will need to be made throughout the life of your website. From disavowing spam links to catching 404s, as well as updating various server errors and other problems, you are always going to need a professional eye on your online store in order to make sure that it is functioning properly.
User Experience Updates
This is a big one that many store owners may not even be aware of at present.
Over the past few years, Google has been trending toward a more user-centric kind of SEO. What this means is that when crawling your website, Google is looking for a lot more than just keywords and useful content. Now elements such as page speed, how quickly buttons can be interacted with, content layout shifts, and the overall quality of a website.
This is especially important for eCommerce websites, as the user experience can play a role in things like conversion rate and how long your customers stay on a particular page. A website that lacks a good core user experience is not going to perform well, which means that you need a smart, proactive SEO team that will be willing to call out certain aspects of your website that are underperforming and advise the right path forward.
In this way, SEO has evolved to encompass the worth of an entire website from the user’s perspective. A clearly branded website that has a professional look and feel and that functions correctly may at times outperform an over-optimized website that is slow and clunky.
A great user experience is not only one of the keys to keeping users on your site and helping them to convert, it’s important for SEO as well.
Content Creation
The content you are creating on your website is important for several reasons. For instance, a well-written blog will not only help you inform your customers and build your brand, but it can also provide much-needed SEO value as well.
The problem is, most store owners don’t have time to operate a blog, much less a polished one. Given the importance of building a content strategy and showing Google that you are an actively updated website with plenty of valuable content, you need a full-scale SEO campaign for your BigCommerce store that includes SEO blog writing as a part of the strategy. This is one of the key elements that will begin to help your website climb the SERPs, and build brand authority at the same time.
Developing a Backlinking Strategy
There is also the matter of backlinking to think about, which is something that isn’t even on the radar of many store owners. Natural-looking and authoritative backlinks are another crucial aspect of your SEO that you can’t afford to ignore. Links, after all, are what drive the Internet and are what signal to Google that your website is relevant. Without an abundance of links pointing back to your eCommerce store, Google won’t see fit to rank you very high for competitive keywords.
A skilled marketing agency that specializes in eCommerce SEO will know how to generate high-quality backlinks for your website, along with well-written and SEO-optimized off-site content that will drive traffic and authority to your target pages. This translates into relevance in Google’s eyes, yet can’t be easily performed without the assistance of a professional SEO company.
You also don’t want to get desperate and “buy” backlinks from various services you find online. Not only are such links spammy and could get your website penalized, they aren’t attached to any strategy and simply won’t have the desired effect you are looking for.
The Need For BigCommerce SEO Experts
After reading through all of the different reasons why a BigCommerce SEO company is a must, you now have to think about which agency is right for you.
The main things you want to focus on when it comes to selecting the right agency, is whether or not the company in question has experience with BigCommerce, and if they specialize in customized SEO plans rather than cookie-cutter packages.
If these are the kinds of SEO services you are looking for, you are already in the right place. Genius eCommerce® is a leader when it comes to conducting effective SEO campaigns for online businesses. From in-depth keyword research to comprehensive backlinking and content strategies, our approach to SEO gets powerful results.
Not only do we specialize in eCommerce digital marketing such as SEO and PPC, we are also BigCommerce partners, who work closely with merchants on the BigCommerce platform to deliver superior results. For years, we have been the biggest name in eCommerce SEO for a reason. We know how to deliver consistent results based on a tried and tested strategy and a wealth of collective experience.
We understand how difficult it is to get a handle on your SEO and actually start ranking above the competition. You may have been working at your own SEO for years and only have modest gains to show for it. Even if your faith in SEO has been damaged over the years, the truth is it is the most effective form of digital marketing, and if done correctly, it can have a dramatic impact on the success and health of your business.
If you are ready to talk to a BigCommerce SEO company that fully understands the platform and that will be able to help you drive organic traffic and sales to your online store, give our team a call at 888.982.8269, and we would be happy to help you get started.
