Do you have an online store or are you just about to create one, and think about how you can write and combine well content that will please your visitors but also search engines? In this article, I will show you some possibilities for how to prepare and optimize the content in your online store and promote an online store to its visitors.
The content (texts, images, videos, graphics, podcasts, etc.) has an essential influence on the conversion rate (e.g., the ratio of visitors to buyers) of your store as well as on the ranking in search engines. When crawling, the latter try to “emulate” the behavior of website visitors and to capture and evaluate a website in the same way as the user would do in front of the screen.
You can see how Google currently “sees” parts of your website in Webmaster Tools under Retrieve as by Google.
As early as 1997, Jacob Nielson found out in a study that numerous Internet users do not read texts word for word, but mainly scan them. Therefore, it is essential to create interesting and unique content that focuses on the added value for the visitor.
If your visitors find the content exciting and useful and stay longer on your website, look at several pages and bounce less often on the first page. This is also a positive signal for search engines and has an indirect influence on the ranking of your entire website. In the following, I would like to give you some content ideas and tips for your online store.
Create informative and high-quality topic pages
In practice, creating well-prepared theme pages as a kind of “info counter” with useful information on the topics covered in the online store has proven to be very useful for visitors and search engines alike. Let’s say you run an online store for digital products and pattern templates. Depending on the product range, you could, for example, write or have written content on the following topics:
- Business and Finance,
- buying & selling real estate,
- contract law,
- tenancy law,
- tax law,
- family law,
- media law,
- labor law,
- labor law,
- business plans,
- job applications.
The integration of infographics and statistics in the topic pages is also highly recommended, as they enhance the content for the visitor and are usually linked to more often than pure text content. This in turn creates backlinks from other websites, which can have a positive impact on search engine rankings.
Since the creation of extensive topic-related content involves a great deal of effort, you can use our content creation service if necessary. It is particularly important to have a carefully prepared briefing with precise requirements and to carefully check the purchased content.
You should also not skimp on the quality level and prefer to spend a little more instead of having inferior content in the online store. You can read more about this later in this article.
Video marketing: present your best products with videos
With videos, information can be conveyed more quickly and the target group can be addressed much more directly on an emotional level. In addition, videos remain longer in memory. They can have a decisive influence on the way users perceive a brand or product.
Short explanatory videos for frequently searched and high-quality products are a nice measure for your content marketing in the web store as well as on YouTube. Videos improve the user experience and have a positive impact on both the ranking and the conversion rates of your online store.
Ein schaftes Bild einfügen (am Besten ein Tier oder Vogel Bild, bei dem der Hintergrund unscharf ist)
Use only high-quality and crisp product images
Images positively influence the user experience and are also important for search engine optimization (SEO). Although search engines cannot (yet) understand the content of images, they also offer the possibility of integrating suitable keywords in the appropriate places.
For this purpose, the file name, image title, alt attribute (alternative text if the image cannot be displayed), image description and image caption should be optimized. This also increases the likelihood that your images will appear higher up in the image search and lead the potential customer to your online store.
Create a lexicon / glossary
A glossary or a lexicon with significant technical terms matching the topic of a website is equally useful for your visitors but also for your SEO. On the one hand, interested users can inform themselves about different topics, and on the other hand, search engines have more relevant content to index.
By choosing appropriate terms with unique content, the entire online store can be enhanced. Attempt to divide your glossary in such a way that you create as many subpages as possible and link them well among each other.
However, also make sure that each individual page offers enough content and has an appropriate content/source code ratio of at least 35%, better >50%. Many “low quality” pages with “thin content” can do more harm than good, as search engines want to avoid presenting content-less pages with 2-3 sentences to their users.
Offer FAQs with frequently asked questions
FAQ pages with frequently asked questions and answers about the products or the ordering process should not be missing in any online store. By answering common questions from visitors, a lot of communication effort can be saved.
Thanks to the FAQ, website visitors can get information in advance without having to contact the hotline or inquire by e-mail. Furthermore, important keywords can be highlighted in the FAQ and integrated into a meaningful context.
General example questions:
- Questions about the ordering process
- Questions about the newsletter
- General questions about documents
- Questions and problems with payment
- Questions and problems with logging in
- Questions about downloading products
When creating FAQ pages with a broader range of topics, the questions should be divided into individual topic blocks so that interested parties can get to the desired answer more quickly.
Publish press releases and news
Especially current and fresh content is interesting for your store visitors and for search engines and indicates a well-maintained online store that is worth being visited and indexed more often. To ensure this, for example, the integration of a directory with current and topic-relevant press releases and news is suitable.
Here, on the one hand, news from the development, e.g., new functions and features in the online store, and on the other hand, news and changes in the law relevant to the topics in the store can be published. News from the press should in no case be copied 1:1, but summarized and reproduced in your words and include a link to the original source.
Create unique texts for each category page
In each product category and subcategory, descriptive texts that briefly outline the content of a category should be integrated before or after the product listing. This is important because the page structure and category-level content can change frequently, for example, when products are discontinued or new ones are added.
However, texts that are located further forward on a page are of greater importance for the visitor and for search engines and can positively influence the ranking of your online store. From the point of view of conversion optimization, long texts in front of a product list are not useful, as they can distract from the products.
A possible solution to this problem is to make category texts expandable or, even better, to provide them with a “read more” link and, when you click on it, scroll the screen to the other content below the product list. Another option is to integrate your texts in a sidebar, as big stores do.
Be careful not to integrate pure “SEO texts” just for keywords, but offer your visitors readable and informative content, for example about the history, the manufacturing process, or the benefits of a product.
Optimize your home page
The start page of your online store is one of the most important pages and has an essential meaning for your visitors, but also for search engines. Therefore, it should be designed appealingly, contain extensive content, and link from the content area to the most essential product categories in the store to let the link power flow properly through the pages.
There is no guideline here regarding the word count, but if you have something interesting to tell about you, your store and your products, you should already offer a few hundred words. This can also have a positive effect on your rankings.
Add a few PDF documents
The integration of crawlable and downloadable PDF documents is also highly recommended for OnPage optimization. While these don’t have the same weighting as content on an HTML page, they are helpful for your online store’s SEO, as ultimately the mix of different media enhances the overall website.
High-quality content such as scientific texts or white papers is often made available in PDF format on websites and is therefore usually highly trusted by search engines.
This is how you optimize your PDF documents:
- Populate PDF file names with keywords,
- Structure content well to make it easier to read,
- fill in PDF metadata (title, topic, keywords) and
- pay attention to small file sizes.
However, when it comes to internal linking, make sure that PDF documents do not inherit link power to outbound links and take appropriate steps to optimize your internal linking if needed. In the following article, you will find some possible solutions to squeeze link juice out of PDF documents.
Now you got some ideas on how to enhance your online store with content. Now I would like to give you a few tips for content creation so that it is better perceived by your visitors and also easier to find in Google & Co. The structure and formatting of content are particularly important.
Tips for content creation
✅ Your most critical keyword or keyword combination should appear in the main heading (H1).
✅ Divide your product texts into several sections and integrate the keyword combinations at least 1 time in each section.
✅ Pay attention to the proximity of the keyword combination to the search term!
✅ The keyword combination should appear as far upfront as possible in the first section.
✅ Include subheadings (H2, H3, H4) that also contain the keyword.
✅ Be sure to include bulleted lists and lists (numbered and unnumbered).
✅ Format your main keywords 2-3 times per product description in bold and italics.
✅ In the last section of the page, the keyword should appear again at the very end to ensure keyword focus.
✅ Distribute other keywords cleverly throughout the article so that your product text reads as well as possible and doesn’t seem like keyword spamming.
✅ Vary keywords with synonyms, other spellings, singular and plural to ensure high readability.
Each topic page or product page should ideally be optimized for only one keyword or keyword combination so that search engines can clearly assign the topic and output the page for corresponding search queries.
Important formatting elements
Headings <hx>
Headings are identified in HTML using the <h1> to <h6> tags. The most significant heading is the <h1> tag. In it the keyword combination should be integrated in any case. So far there are no guidelines how the different <h> tags gradations are used in their natural order as SEO ranking factors.
In various studies and analyses, it is repeatedly found that many visitors primarily read the headings and only skim the rest of a web page text. Therefore, keywords in headlines are given higher importance, as they clearly stand out from the text.
Rumors circulate in the SEO scene that the H1 heading “may” be used only once per subpage; otherwise the page will be “disadvantaged” in the ranking by search engines. That this is not the case is explained in the following video by Matt Cutts (Head of Web Spam at Google), who is well known in the SEO scene.
For example, it makes sense to structure web pages with extensive information as follows:
<h1>Our offer on the topic XYZ</h1>.
… Contents and subheadings (H2-H4)…
<h1>General info on the topic XYZ</h1>.
… Contents and subheadings (H2-H4)….
By integrating two H1 headings in pages with over 600 words, I have been able to achieve excellent results in my projects so far.
Lists
✅ Bullet points stand out and often imply a “summary”
✅ Important and useful things are usually written here
✅ Therefore, lists are read by most Internet users when scanning
Lists as structuring elements quickly catch the eye when viewing a web page and should therefore be used wherever it makes sense. It is also important that lists contain the main keywords and highlight them by using bold and italics.
In addition, the use of lists of different types should be weighed (structured, numbered, unstructured). Bullet points help users in their attempt to grasp the essentials on a web page as quickly as possible. Therefore, they usually generate enough attention to be read.
Putting your content in list form has two benefits:
1️⃣. It helps you structure your thoughts and content.
2️⃣. It helps you create content faster and easier.
Instead of staring at a blank sheet of paper and pondering how you’re going to get it filled, it allows you to build a framework, a pattern of sorts.
Let’s say your post should have 3 main parts and in each of those 3 main parts you show step by step how your readers need to proceed, then you have a structure that you can follow through in your entire post.
Tip: Add a table of contents to your content for even more clarity. Learn more about content patterns here.
Formatting
(Bold, italic, underlined)
Word formatting in bold, italic and underlined stand out from the rest of the text within a continuous text and quickly catch the eye. Therefore, it can be assumed that these words have more importance for search engines than non-formatted words.
According to various studies, the formatting in bold by <b> or <strong> tags have a demonstrable impact on the ranking of a web page. Most likely, the same is true for italics (in <i> & <em> tags) and underlined text (<u> tag). Also, from a usability perspective, it makes sense to highlight the most important passages in the text, so that the core message can be taken just by skimming if necessary.
Keyword density and term weighting
The frequency with which keywords occur in the content of an entire web page is considered when search engines rank web pages. The keyword density is a very controversial term in the SEO scene, which is supposed to indicate the ratio between the number of occurring keywords to the number of all words in the text. For Google, there is of course no confirmed value for an optimal keyword density.
In the SEO scene, values between 3-7% are usually recommended. However, the calculation of the keyword density is not quite trivial, since it is not known whether the complete text (including source code, navigation, sidebars, etc.) on a web page is used and how link words are treated.
In addition, since the Google Panda algorithm update, the entire website with all its content and terms is evaluated for the ranking of a subpage and no longer just individual subpages.
In addition, however, there are at least 200 factors that influence the ranking of a website!
Tips for creating tasty and engaging product descriptions
✅ Write a descriptive headline that makes you want to read it.
✅ Use as many verbs as possible to bring “life” and dynamism to your texts. According to the motto: Verbs advertise!
✅ Use figurative language to trigger associations in your visitor.
✅ Your texts should appeal to the reader’s feelings and set off emotional triggers that encourage a purchase decision.
✅ Use more active rather than passive phrases.
✅ Write short and concise sentences that an average customer can quickly grasp.
✅ Avoid superlatives and general phrases (top prices, the best quality, better: fair price, excellent quality, good price/performance ratio).
✅ Use technical language and foreign words sparingly, unless they are important keywords.
✅ Address your reader/customer as personally as possible and create a call to action: e.g., Download your application template here and now / Get a professional and non-binding consultation, etc.
✅ Wording should be polite, friendly, casual, yet professionally written.
✅ Address your readers more often with YOU, YOUR, YOU and less often with WE, OURS.
✅ At the end of a topic page or product description, you should include a short summary and a call to action that encourages the purchase of the product.
Clearly highlight advantages and benefits for the visitor
In most cases, your potential customer wants to use your product to solve a specific problem and/or generate a benefit for his or her life. Therefore, be sure to highlight the added value of your product range in a visual and imaginable way.
For a template store these could look like this:
✅ Documents created by expert authors
✅ Time and resources saved by working with templates
✅ More time for the “important things” in life
✅ Instant download
✅ Individually customizable documents
✅ Comprehensive offer
✅ Easy and fast ordering process
✅ No risk and no follow-up costs
✅ Secure payment & privacy
It is crucial that your texts deal with problems, wishes, possible questions, and objections of the prospective customers in advance and inspire confidence in the reader. The first sentence of the text has a special meaning, it should encourage the reader to read the second sentence, which in turn should make him eager to read the third sentence, etc.
This way the visitor stays longer in your store and is encouraged to buy, which in turn has a positive impact on the average visit time of the entire website, which indirectly affects the ranking in search engines.
So, before you start copywriting, you should take a closer look at your target audience, their wants, and needs because only then you can create appealing and targeted content that sells.
Here you can learn 5 more rules for good product texts. WICHTGIST HIE EINEN INTERNEN LINK ZUM RELEVANTEN ARTIKEL (5 .. Product Texts)
What should happen after a reader has read your content?
You need to tell them, with a clear call to action. Posts that leave the reader hanging in the air at the end are wasted effort. Therefore, actively tell the reader what to do next, what their next steps are.
Here are a few examples of typical call-to-actions.
✅ Click here to subscribe to our newsletter.
✅ Click here to learn more about our products.
✅ Click here to read a related article.
✅ Click here to leave a comment.
Pro Tips
What can you do to make your content more valuable and worth reading? Use one or more of the following elements.
✅ Examples: Make what you talk about in your content easier to understand with concrete examples. Especially if you’re working with technical terms or setting out to explain complex relationships.
✅ Pictures and drawings: Some things are really hard to describe as text. Instead of or in addition, try to make a drawing of it and be it “only” a hand drawing, which you then scan and provide to your readers.
✅ Stories: We humans love stories. Tell your personal story of how you went from problem to solution. Or share one of your customer’s case studies of how they got to a better outcome with your help.
✅ Evidence: Back up your claims and advice by, for example, referencing a trusted source or using charts and statistics.
✅ Quotes: Also let your readers know what proven experts have to say about your content and advice. Link to relevant statements or include quotes including the source directly in your post.
Outsource content creation
I recommend that you write one or two articles yourself to implement what you have learned and to gain confidence.
But if you don’t have the time or the inclination, you can hire GudComp to do it for you. We are professional copywriters and can do it for you. Our customers have had excellent experiences with us. The price-quality ratio is right. We have mostly received 5-star ratings from our clients. It is recommended to have articles created with a word count of at least 1000 words.
Search engines love long, detailed articles. Orient yourself here also to the length of the contributions, which hold the top rankings to the targeted keyword. Of course, tell us your target keyword and your supporting keywords.
Essential! The key to success here is the quality of the chosen copywriter and the copywriter briefing. The higher the quality of the copywriters you hire, the better the quality of the texts you get. The quality also depends on how you brief your GudComp copywriters in advance.
Don’t hold back any information here and describe exactly what you expect for a result and where it goes online. Also, give us access to your researched keywords and link to competitor sites that you want us to follow.
Verdict: “Content is King!”👑
Conclusion
Content is an essential factor in conversion optimization as well as for SEO and especially crucial for online stores that want to increase their sales. Also, for search engine advertising with Google Ads and Google Shopping, the content of a page is an important quality criterion and can determine the success or failure of a SEA campaign.
Google, for example, uses a combination of automated systems and human evaluation to determine the so-called “landing page experience” for the visitor. The latter also affects the quality factors as well as the advertising costs and the display position of Google Ads ads and should therefore be checked and optimized for each ad and each landing page.
However, in the first place, you should think about your visitors when creating your content because in the end you only have to convince them to buy your products. The work and time you invest in content creation now will benefit you for years to come. Content that ranks well and is built with the proper values and principles will survive any search engine update and be an ongoing traffic builder.
It all starts with the proper content marketing strategy. A well content marketing strategy shows exactly the way: Which measure should be implemented first? What is the goal? How are budget and human resources allocated? There is no one-size-fits-all solution that works for every online company. We would be happy to advise you on this without obligation and, if necessary, create a content strategy for your online store. Now read on here how to sell products successfully online.
PS: If you liked this article or have any questions about content optimization, just leave me a comment.