Seo

How to Make the Most out of Magento 2 On-Page SEO

What Is On-Page SEO?

On-page SEO optimizes web pages with specific keywords to improve search engine visibility and organic traffic. In practice, this means that when users search for specific things online, your eCommerce store will rank on search engine result pages (SERPs) because the keywords they use to correspond with those on your eCommerce web pages.

Achieving successful on-page SEO entails publishing relevant, high-quality content, and optimizing headlines and HTML to drive traffic to your site. Ultimately, more traffic provides increased leads and sales.

General On-Page SEO Tips

Choose a High-Quality Hosting

A poor-quality website hosting company can compromise on-page SEO, especially if it has a slow loading time. Websites that take a long to load are penalized by search engines and rank lower on SERPs.According to Google, websites should take 2.5 seconds to load, and more than 4 seconds is considered poor. Therefore, aA reliable website host should provide excellent infrastructure with fast loading times.

File Robots.txt

Robots.txt tell search engine crawlers which URLs they can and should access in your Magneto 2 eCommerce site. Your website performance can be adverse affected without proper configuration as bots may scan and index incorrect pages. Be sure to carefully read the Magento User Guide to ensure your pages are correctly configured.

Create a Sitemap

An XML sitemap is a list of pages of a website within a domain. It allows search engines to crawl and index a website,  boosting its ranking in search results and SEO. Not having an HTML sitemap in your Magento store means missing out on a second chance to be indexed by Google. Unlike Magneto 1, the Magneto 2 does not support auto-generated HTML maps. However, a third-party plugin can easily combat this problem.

Use Canonical Tags

Avoid having too many URLs with the same content gains, as Google may assume these are duplicate pages, which negatively affects page rank. In Magento 2, it’s possible to edit URLs to help Google assign the correct search value to different pages with similar content.

To avoid duplicate pages, you can either remove the category from the URL, so each product only has one address no matter how many categories it is part of, or you can leave only one category path in a product URL.

Don’t Forget About The Hreflang Tag

Some Magento 2 eCommerce stores have multi-store views, i.e., they contain the same content in English but are targeted at different markets. Often Google can’t identify subtle changes in currency, for example, and assumes these pages are duplicate content.

To troubleshoot this common issue, Magento 2 has developed a Hreflang tag (code) to distinguish between pages that have different URLs with more or less the same content so that on-site SEO isn’t affected.

Magento 2 On-Page SEO

While white hat SEO practices apply to all eCommerce stores, a few tips apply specifically to Magento 2 that can drastically improve SERP ranks.

Install Defer JavaScript Extension

This extension places all JavaScript files at the bottom of a website page so that browsers load HTML and CSS before JavaScript files. Basically, it improves the loading speed of your eCommerce website, solving issues of slow loading times and providing a more positive shopping experience for your customers.

Support Google AMP

Support Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) is an extension for Magento 2 that helps all eCommerce store content load faster on mobiles and tablets. This plugin improves search engine visibility, increases traffic and conversion rates. On average, stores that make use of these efficient plugins experience page load times of less than half a second.

Use AJAX for SEO-friendly Navigation

Ajax is an extension that provides an optimized sitemap to help customers select their favorite products as quickly as possible. With Ajax, matching results will reflect on your store’s pages directly after customers have filtered specific product attributes without reloading an entirely new page. This greatly improves customer experience and often leads to increased purchases.

HTTP or HTTPS?

Most customers assume that eCommerce stores offer secure online shopping environments, meaning that their data entries aren’t susceptible to dubious third parties. Not only is this good business practice, it’s also the easiest way to build customer trust. Using the HTTPS (SSL) certificate for your Magento 2 eCommerce store ensures you are following standard authentication and security protocols.

Set Up Google Search Console and Google Analytics for Your Page

Google Search Console is the most efficient way to measure your site’s traffic and performance. It’s part of Google’s ecosystem and integrates seamlessly with Google Analytics, offering a comprehensive toolkit to constantly monitor and improve on-page SEO performance. It’s also possible to optimize website pages and meta tags using Google Search Console.

    Conclusion

    Optimizing on-page SEO for Magento 2 is a technical process that’s rewarding when properly executed but risks going wrong if you are unfamiliar with SEO best practices. That’s where Catapult Revenue can help.

    We’re an eCommerce agency specializing in Magento 2 development and SEO. With over a decade of eCommerce, our experts can transform your eCommerce platform into a revenue-growing business. Find out more about our on-page SEO services for Magento 2 here.

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