No matter your industry, market, or goals, you probably already know that getting more qualified traffic to your site is vital to growing your online business. Directing traffic to your eCommerce site can be difficult, but you will be in good shape if you set up a solid system to engage and convert your customers when they get to your site.

There are different channels that you can use to drive traffic to your site like PPC management, social media (paid and organic), and SEO marketing. Each channel has their own benefits and drawbacks, and you should choose the tactic that best meets the needs of your customers and aligns with your business goals.

From my experience, SEO marketing is one of the hardest channels to get right since many eCommerce marketers have limited knowledge about how their content can influence search engines.

While there are many “how-to” guides available that talk about SEO from a holistic perspective, it is important to know the best steps to optimize on-page SEO to drive more qualified leads to your site and convert more conversions.

1. Have A Better Understanding Of Your Target Audience

Each product appeals to a particular group of people, and that’s what you call your target audience. As an Internet marketer, it’s essential that you know your market. That means you have to consider the kind of people who would likely be interested in what you have to offer.

Having a solid understanding of your audience and their needs means that you can get found by customers through search engines based on their needs. User Intent is a big part of eCommerce marketing because you not only have to battle against large sites like Amazon and Walmart, but you also have to compete against informational sites like PetMD.

Instead of trying to beat the larger sites, you should spend a lot of time thinking about what your customers need based on specific search queries. While this sounds complicated, in reality, this process is really just basic economics. Think about it like this, what is the supply and what is the demand for a given search query.

There are a number of keyword research tools that help you accomplish this, and I like to use Ahrefs for this type of project.

The truth is that you likely won’t be able to beat out Amazon or Walmart in SERPs when you first launch your eCommerce site, so you will need to rely on your knowledge of your customers. As a smaller online store, you have the advantage of being able to conduct surveys and build a personal relationship with your customers.

You should use this competitive advantage to your benefit and always create content that meets the needs of your customers and addresses your business goals.

By being familiar with the audience you have to serve, this would allow you to come up with a unique copy for your product. Through this, you’ll be able to make a client persona which you could easily refer every time you have to reference point for each page on your site so you can drive more traffic and sales on your eCommerce site!

2. Write Informational Based On Search Queries

One of the best ways to rank in search engines for a competitive keyword is to build out long-form content around a subject. If you look through many large eCommerce sites you will notice that many pages only have general information provided by the manufacturer.

Instead of making thin content, you can make long-form content that provides a lot of information based on what your customers are searching for. Each time someone looks for something on Google they are asking a question, and if you build guides and other content around those questions and your product you should be able to rank quickly.

Not only does long-form content help you get found and indexed quickly, but it also keeps your readers on your page for a longer period of time. Both of these factors go into the algorithms that search engines use, and you can use this fact to your advantage.

You can see an example of long-form content on this example page that has a lot of great information that dog owners are looking for when it comes to orthopedic dog beds. Not only is the page laid out well to help readers find the information they are looking for, but this page also does a few other on-page SEO tactics that you can use for your eCommerce store like:

• Lots of bullet points to help readers consume information easily.
• Bold keywords to break up blocks of text and move the customer’s eye to important terms.
• Great internal linking between pages to help build the power of the site.
• Exact-match questions used as H2 and H3 tags. This helps Google and readers find information easily.
• Local resources included at the end of the page. This information will help consumers find more information and Google finds these links as a sign of authority in this niche.

3. Use Keywords In Content Strategically

The use of keywords in your content is one of the main pillars for on-page SEO marketing. As you write engaging content that informs your customers about your products based on their needs, you should optimize your pages with keywords throughout your content.

The best way to rank your eCommerce site quickly is to use thematic keywords for each page on your site. This means that you should organize keywords for each page, and you can use LSI keywords and other strategies to rank pages for different information.

Along the same lines, you should also think about the length and how specific keywords are on the page. There are three types of keywords that you should think about including Generic Keywords, Broad Keywords, and Long Tail Keywords.

The above diagram shows the general principles of each keyword. In general, you should focus on Long Tail Keywords if you launch a new site. While you will receive less traffic, your audience will be highly focused and more likely to convert on your eCommerce store.

Grow Your eCommerce Store With On-Page SEO

Growing your eCommerce store is tough, but you can use on-page SEO marketing strategies to drive more qualified traffic and close more sales. Look at the needs of your customers and build amazing content to grow your online business today!

About the Author: Chris is a Digital Media Strategist in Orlando, FL. He loves helping business owners and nonprofits improve their online presence as a freelance copywriting and PPC management.