E-commerce Website, 1 year on, what are the next steps?
-
Hi all,
I'm sure i'm at the stage most people find themselves:
• Site designed and built
• Products added to online store
• Basic SEO carried out, titles, tags, H1, etc
• Site has been running for almost a year and gain a little momentumhttp://www.internationalcheese.co.uk
Now it's time to turn my attention to pro-active link-building and marketing of the site in order to build traffic and sales.
My question to you guys is: What's the best way to go about implementing this next step?
I have a list of links from competitor sites via OSE, what do I do with them?
I try to post regularly on twitter and Facebook, but they rarely make an impact - i guess i need to look at the content i'm posting - how do i generate more engaging content?
Your help is appreciated, any comments suggestions or feedback on the site design, structure, usability, links etc would be appreciated.
**Can anyone share any real-world examples specifically relating to e-commerce businesses? **
The site is built and hosted on the Shopify platform which i find a pleasure to use. They allow certain on-page seo control, i think i've done as much as I can but i'm open to any suggestions
The site link again is: http://www.internationalcheese.co.uk
Thanks in advance!
Chris
-
Thanks John,
I will read through these posts. I appreciate you taking the time to bring them to my attention.
Chris
-
Hi,
Thanks for your advice. The question i have is, how would i decide which product lines are worth putting the time into? How can i get a realistic idea of which products have demand online and which ones don't? Once i have this information then i can begin to look at similar products within competitor sites and build a picture of how links are built.
Thanks again for you time.
Chris
-
Hi Tina,
Thank you for taking the time to reply, and for your positive comments about the website. You make a great suggestion and i'll look to implement a paragraph at the bottom of the site during my next round of site amends. Shopify certainly does allow for those types of changes.
I have glanced through the competitor links - What criteria should i be using to decide on where I should be focusing my efforts? For example, should i be looking at links with high page and domain authority?
Great ideas about social media, you're right - i think it needs to be more fun and should also involve the audience in some way rather than using it as another broadcast platform. Thanks for you tips and advice
Chris
-
Hi Dana,
Thank you for the compliments about the site. A lot of work has gone into it from a design and more importantly, a usability point of view. I think we're streets ahead of the competition but it counts for nothing unless we get traffic and sales!
Great advice about the bloggers. My query about this is should i be contacting them or should i be generating content for the site that will get their interest? Is it still 'ethical' to offer them freebies in return for articles / links or will this work against me in possibly creating bad publicity?
Product reviews are certainly in the pipeline, as is video in some form and more blog posts. Thanks for sharing your story of success with reviews, it has further convinced me that this should be high on my to-do list.
Thanks again Dana, your blog for cheese request has been noted
Chris
-
Take a look at the following recent posts and Q&A thread about content creation in "boring" niches (not to say cheese is boring). They seem relevant to your question with regards to generating content:
- http://www.seomoz.org/blog/companies-in-boring-niches-creating-great-content
- http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-guide-to-developing-a-content-strategy-for-boring-industries
- http://www.seomoz.org/ugc/whiteboard-takeover-5-awesome-content-ideas-for-boring-niches
- http://www.seomoz.org/blog/define-and-align-a-manageable-content-and-social-media-marketing-process
- http://www.seomoz.org/q/example-of-a-local-boring-niche-site-in-a-relatively-high-competition-area-using-strictly-white-hat-tactics
-
Chris,
Great job on the site. I love it! OnTwitter and FB do you follow every celebrity chef who loves cheese? I bet there are some bloggers out there that would blog for cheese {I am one of them]. My guess is an inbound link from a celebrity chef or food and wine authority site would be pretty valuable. Ask them if they'd consider linking to you if you sent them some free cheese!
Have you considered adding product reviews? I am pretty sure your E-cart integrates with PowerReviews. We have been using them on a little niche site we launched back in January and I have been very impressed with them. It's only 30 USD/month. If you upgrade to the next level you can actually submit your star ratings to Google so they appear alongside your product listing. Might be something to consider?
Great job on the site,
Dana
-
Hi you have a very nice website I would recommend adding a paragraph or two of text at the bottom of the site about your company, and your products as well if Shopify allows you to. That is one of the biggest drawbacks with Shopify not having full control of the site.
"I have a list of links from competitor sites via OSE, what do I do with them? "
Look at the best links your competitors have created, and see if you can get those links, or some that are comparable. For example if your competitors are listed in certain directories it would be a good idea for you to do the same.
"Can anyone share any real-world examples specifically relating to e-commerce businesses? "
**When it comes to Facebook and Twitter you can use it to hold contests, promotions, sales ect. **
For example you could give away a block of cheese to the follower that posted the cheesiest picture. You will be surprised at what people will do for free stuff. Get your fans involved, and you will go a long way.
-
I would suggest to start from competitive link analysis.
Try to understand how your competitors are building links for each particular product line. This will help you to develop a link building strategy including article posting, developing company blog, social optimization, promotional campaigns, etc.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Linkedin "company website" link - any value?
Hi So, on Linkedin, I can put my company website. I've been trying to figure out if this is a nofollow, or do follow - or, not even really a link. Here's how it appears in my profile's source code Websites <a target="_blank" <strong="">href="/redir/redirect?url=http%3A%2F%2Fmaxvape%2Ecom&urlhash=MtlQ&trk=ppro_website">Company Website</a> Is this even a "link"? I'm guessing the way it is built, no it's not even a nofollow link. Secondly, does anyone know any good link-juice you can get form Linkedin. Thanks!
Social Media | | Ted_Cullen0 -
Setting up Google+ Profiles for seperate websites
Hi all, for a website that has muiltiple domains for the same company (e.g. different location based salon websites) is it advisable to create multiple google+ pages for each individual website or just have the one google+ account? Thanks simon
Social Media | | simonsw0 -
Creative ideas to invite G +1 button clicks
Hello, What's some creative white hat ways to get people to click our G +1 button? A competitor is offering a coupon in return but isn't that black hat? What are some 100% white hat ways?
Social Media | | BobGW0 -
Is it possible to add more than 1 author for a post?
for example if me and 2 co-workers of mine worked on a post, is it possible to add 3 rel=author of our google plus's?
Social Media | | Ouzan0 -
How Can I do SEO for a Escorts Website?
So here comes the hard part of working with SEO.... I've been doing SEO for a quite long time now and as far as I concern, it has been working and that's why I can tell people I'm a SEO Manager! It was all good until 3/4 months ago when I got this client that wanted me to do SEO for his Escort Agency. I've analysed his website and came across some structure error, poor linking and so on... I've started by reformulating his website, re-structuring his urls, keeping good pages and throwing alway the poor content ones, requested some website owners to remove links to that website and so on.... All good and sorted, but when it came to do the off-page optimisation it became a nightmare! It's pretty easy to get links for a clothing website or any other (not "obscure") kind of websites, but no serious and authority websites would link to an escort agency; It's also very easy to create something funny and nice and post it on a page of your website to get people sharing and liking on facebook, but again very hard to get people to share and like things posted by an escort agency... You can't really advertise on escorts directories and use keywords on the ad because godfather google would penalize you.... I really don't know what to do anymore, so I will list some questions and if guys SEO experts could help me out, I would be so grateful!!! How can I get people linking to the website without paying for it? How can I get good authority links to this kind of website? How can I advertise on paid directories without being penalised by google? How can i get shares and likes on social network websites? The website has about 3000 pages, been online since 2010, have at least 3 lengthy articles posted a day! Please guys help me out with this case that is making me loose my nights of sleep... If you guys need the website address and the targeted keyword I can PM you (I dont know if the forum allows me to post it here) Thank You so much for the help in advance....
Social Media | | douglasapuc6 -
Twitter lists - Transferring from 1 account to another
Hi Does anybody know how to transfer Twitter lists from 1 account to another ? Twitter says this isnt possible but is anyone aware of any software that can do this (or technique) ? Both accounts have the same owner Many Thanks Dan
Social Media | | Dan-Lawrence0 -
How do website owners gain from facebook scams like this?
I've noticed two things that are going wild on Facebook this week: http://timhortonsgiveaway.me/ and http://promoforipads.net/ In the first scenario, you supposedly just click share and they'll send you a $25 Tim Horton's gift card. (For those who don't know Tim's it is a very popular coffee shop in Canada). There's no way this is happening...they claim to have something like 5000 cards to give away. In the second one they're apparently giving away 1000 ipods. Yeah...OK. So, they're obviously scams that are just trying to get a few zillion facebook shares. But why?
Social Media | | MarieHaynes0 -
How do you leverage UGC for a corporate website?
We've heard a lot about how user-generated content is doing good for SEO, and how it can add more value to users. While this would work in certain niches, how would one go about implementing UGC like Q&A and comments on a corporate website? I've thought about having a Q&A about our services, but that would limit the appeal of the content.
Social Media | | IslandLogic700