Why Your Online Store Isn’t Ranking (And How to Fix It)

Why Your Online Store Isn’t Ranking (And How to Fix It)

It doesn’t matter how good your products are or how competitive your prices are or how good your online store looks if no one can find you. If you’re in eCommerce, you know this unfortunate reality. But often, it’s the way eCommerce sites are built that prevent search visibility and owners don’t realize until months down the line, they’ve sacrificed revenues to competitors.

The Foundation No One Mentions.

All too often, people create online stores, upload products, maybe add some descriptions and then wonder why they’re stuck on page five of Google for all the retailers selling inferior options or pricing. Inevitably, the problem starts at a technical level.

For example, site speed sounds like the most basic website management aspect of all. But most online stores fail to adhere to the idea of quick loading pages. If your product pages take longer than three seconds to load, that’s a problem for search engines. In fact, what’s more problematic, ultimately, is when users experience slower speeds, they don’t wait around; they leave. But speed isn’t just an isolated factor. Every eCommerce app people use loads tons of scripts, image sizes and tracking codes that bog everything down. Each app you add to your store – review widgets, pop up tools – all add weight that slow loading times down as well.

Mobile responsiveness is another huge hurdle where it’s not enough for a site to "work" on a mobile version anymore. If a checkout process involves too much scrolling, if a button is too small to click or if product images don’t shift and scale properly, you can kiss search rankings goodbye. These are factors out of the owner’s control.

Pages Search Engines Cannot Read

It’s an unfortunate oversight but far too many online retailers fail to recognize that product pages are informational sites in themselves instead of simply containers for a photo and buy button. Search engines need context to understand not only what you’re selling but also who to promote it to in an effective result.

When businesses work with an eCommerce SEO agency and take stock of their online product pages, there are basic tenets of optimization that are either non-existent or poorly implemented.

For example, product descriptions on product pages consist of overly-used copy from manufacturers (meaning countless others have the same), or consist of thin descriptions that boast three sentences or bullet points. A product page with three sentences and a bulleted list gives search algorithms nothing to work with. And to make matters worse, when an online retailer boasts hundreds or thousands of products, each more detailed than the next seems impossible.

Then there is categorization and organization. The way people want to structure their categories may make sense for them but not for search engines or users. If your architecture is far too deep (ie., it takes five or six clicks to get to a product from the homepage), search engines fail to crawl and index effectively. The URL structure also matters; "yourstore.com/product?id=28472" gives search engines no sense of what’s on the page.

The Consumer Demand That’s Way Too Expensive

Without realizing it, this is where things become far too costly. When someone types in "waterproof hiking boots size 10," they’re looking for a purchase, but they’re also looking for information to help them arrive at a decision. If all your product page does is boast a price and image but your competitor pages have sizing guides, materials explanations and use case discussions, guess who ranks higher?

Those who treat content as secondary suffer the wrath of losing long-tail search traffic that ultimately converts. People don’t search in broad strokes; they search for exact terms. "Best running shoes for flat feet," "dishwasher under $500 with stainless steel interior," or "laptop backpack that fits a 17 inch screen." If your product pages (and ultimately, supporting content) fail to mention these searches, you might as well be invisible.

Most assume that only product names need attention and basic category pages need work. But that’s not true. Comparison content, buying guides, problems solved with expertise writing can drive traffic that ultimately converts – but most never create content like this because they think it’s "blog stuff" that doesn’t mean anything.

Schema Markup That Gets Forgotten

There’s something that most shop owners never even hear about and it’s called schema markup. This is how search engines decide what information is on your pages (product price, availability, reviews, ratings). Without it, search engines have to guess what your content means. And guess what? They aren’t good guessers.

When schema markup – and structured data – are used properly, you get rich snippets which encourage search results like ratings stars, minimum price, comments on stock status (i.e., "in stock"). Those get more clicks as they stand out visually and provide information prior to someone even accessing your page for themselves. You’re operating with one hand tied behind your back if you skip this step altogether.

Duplicate Content Annoyance

It’s unfortunate that this is almost inevitable for anyone who has an online store – duplicate content issues. When your products come in multiple colors/sizes/shapes/dimensions, many platforms allow these different iterations to get their own URL generated. Search engines see this as duplicate content because the description is basically the same (albeit pictures are different). The same goes for inventory appearing in multiple categories; each category might create a different URL.

Faceted navigation makes this even worse. When consumers filter by price/brand/options/features, some retailers will create new URLs when using the filter option; hundreds or thousands of filtered pages will show similar images with minimal content differences. Search engines don’t know which version should rank and ultimately, none do.

Internal Linking Done Right

If an online retailer boasts decent internal linking abilities, odds are they’re as bad as they get. Main categories link from homepages and that’s usually it. Product pages sit on their own without access to related products or useful content suggestions based on what people might also want.

The fix involves carefully constructed links between products/categories/content pages that make sense. When they do, internal linking helps spread ranking power across a site and keeps users engaged longer when they see products they might actually want because the algorithms connected them.

What Happens Now?

There is no magic bullet that rectifies problems created unintentionally from a retailer’s end. Online visibility needs to occur at a technical level – which includes improved content quality – structured data application and a functioning world where effective sellers rank higher than ones who struggle.

The difference between retailers who get their name out there versus those who don’t is simple: understanding what needs to get done for search engines to work best and then doing that work, it’s more than just putting together a proper eCommerce site from the start and thinking that’s all that needs to be done.