SEO Guide to Optimize Your Magento Ecommerce Website

If you want to improve your Magento eCommerce store's SEO, you've come to the right place. This guide will cover crawling and indexing, JavaScript rendering, URL paths, redirects, on-page content, blogging functionality, and structured data. By following the tips in this guide, you can ensure that your store is optimized for the search engines and improve your chances of ranking higher in the SERPs.

What is Magento SEO?

Magento SEO is the process of optimizing a Magento store for search engines. Magento is a popular eCommerce platform that offers many features that can help store owners improve their ranking in search results. However, Magento is also a complex platform, and it can be challenging to optimize for SEO. In this guide, we will cover some of the most important aspects of Magento SEO and how you can use them to improve your ranking.

Crawling & indexing

Crawling and indexing are two essential components of SEO for Magento eCommerce stores. Without these processes, your store would not be visible to search engines and potential customers.

Crawling is the process by which search engines discover new content on the web. Bots, also known as web crawlers or spiders, visit websites and follow links to other pages. The crawlers then index the pages they visit, making the content discoverable by search engine users.

To guarantee that your Magento store is appropriately crawled and indexed, you must ensure that it is well-structured and easy to navigate. Magento's default settings are not optimized for SEO, so you must ensure that you have made the necessary changes to your store. You can find more information on how to do this in our article on Magento SEO settings.

JavaScript rendering

JavaScript rendering is how a browser turns a JavaScript code into actual, visible content on a web page. This is important for Magento SEO because, if done incorrectly, the search engine crawlers may not be able to see all of the content on a page. There are two main ways to render JavaScript: server-side and client-side. Server-side rendering is when the web server renders the JavaScript before sending it to the browser. Client-side rendering is when the browser renders the JavaScript after receiving the server's code.

Magento recommends using server-side rendering for all content visible to the user, as it ensures that the search engine crawlers can see all of the content on the page. If client-side rendering is used, it is also essential to provide an HTML version of the content so that crawlers can see it.

There are a few different ways to render server-side, but the most common is using a headless browser. A headless browser is a web browser without a graphical user interface. It can render web pages and return the results as HTML, which can then be served to the user.

Magento has created a headless browser specifically for rendering JavaScript pages. It is called Visual MerchandiserJS and is available as a free, open-source project on GitHub.

If you are using client-side rendering, you can do a few things to make sure that search engine crawlers can see your content. The first is to use the history API. This allows you to change the URL without changing the page itself. This is useful because it means that you can have different URLs for different content versions, making it easier for crawlers to index your content.

The second is to use pre-rendering. This is where you render the page on the server and then send the HTML to the browser. The browser will then automatically display the page. This is a good solution if you use client-side rendering but do not want to use the history API.

The third is to use server-side rendering with a JavaScript library such as React or Angular. This is a good solution if you want to use server-side rendering but do not want to use a headless browser.

Magento has created a guide to rendering JavaScript pages that covers these methods in more detail.

URL paths

One of the most critical aspects of Magento-SEO is the URL structure. The URL is the first thing that Googlebot will crawl when it arrives on your website, so it's essential to ensure that your URLs are clean, descriptive, and keyword-rich. Here are a few tips for optimizing your Magento URL structure:

- Use keyword-rich URLs: The URL should be descriptive of the page content and should include keywords that are relevant to the page.- Use dashes to separate words: This makes the URL more readable and helps Googlebot crawl it more easily.- Keep it short and sweet: Long URLs are more likely to be truncated in the search results, so aim for around 50-60 characters.

- Include the category in the URL: This helps Google understand the hierarchy of your website and can be an excellent place to include keywords. If you're unsure whether your Magento URL structure is up to par, you can use a tool like Screaming Frog to check. Simply enter your website URL and let the tool crawl your site.

Redirects

Redirects are a necessary part of any eCommerce website. They help keep your site structure clean and help visitors find the content they're looking for. Magento provides several options for redirects, and it's essential to choose the right one for your needs.

The first option is to use Magento's built-in redirect functionality. This is a good option if you're looking to redirect a small number of pages or if you're not comfortable working with code. The downside to this option is that it can be slow and can't handle many redirects.

The second option is to use a third-party extension. This is a good option if you want to redirect many pages or need more control over the redirects. The downside to this option is that it can be more expensive and more difficult to set up.

The third option is to use a .htaccess file. This is a good option if you're comfortable working with code and if you need more control over the redirects. The downside to this option is that it can be more challenging to set up and slower than other options.

No matter your choice, testing your redirects before launching your site is essential. This will help visitors find the content they're looking for and that your redirects work as intended.

On-page content

On-page content is an integral part of any SEO strategy, and there are a few things to keep in mind when optimizing your Magento store. Your title tags and meta descriptions should be unique and relevant to each page. Additionally, your H1 tags should be used judiciously and not over-optimized, as this can result in penalization from Google. Finally, your content should be well-written and informative, addressing the needs of your target audience.

Blogging functionality

A blog can be a great way to improve your SEO and attract organic traffic to your Magento site. You can use your blog to share news and announcements, write helpful guides and tutorials, showcase your products, and more.

When setting up your blog, be sure to choose a platform that is compatible with Magento. WordPress is a popular option, as many plugins and themes are available that are designed specifically for Magento sites.

Once you have your blog set up, you can do a few things to optimize it for SEO. First, create unique and relevant titles and descriptions for each blog post. Use keywords throughout your content to help search engines index your site.

Additionally, promote your blog content on social media and other websites. This will help to increase your reach and attract more visitors to your site. Following these tips can improve your Magento site's SEO and attract more organic traffic.

Structured data

Structured data organize information on your website so search engines can understand it better. It's usually written in code (JSON-LD is the most popular format) and is placed at your website's HTML head. When search engines see structured data on a website, they can use it to provide more successful and informative search results.

Magento 2.3 introduced a kind of structured data that is specific to eCommerce websites. This is called Product Rich Snippets, and it allows you to specify additional information about your products, such as price, availability, and review ratings. This can be a great way to stand out in search results and attract more clicks.

To add structured data to your Magento 2 store, you first need to install the Google Tag Manager module. Once that's done, you can follow Google's instructions to add the code for product-rich snippets.

Conclusion

Ultimately, the good news is that Magento is an excellent open-source platform for eCommerce. You can control the site's SEO elements, such as robots.txt, sitemap.xml, redirects, metadata, and more. The Magento tools can quickly fix SEO issues, such as duplicate content through the faceted navigation and no blog functionality.