Maybe you just saw a competitor ‘jump’ past you on Google.
Or maybe you just opened up a Shopify store or moved to Shopify from another platform (like Etsy, eBay, Kickstarter, WooCommerce, or something else).
No matter what the cause, if you’re experiencing Searching Engine Optimization or Traffic issues with your Shopify store (pages missing from Google, low rankings, competitors passing you in the search results, low traffic, or something else), the question might naturally cross your mind:
Is Shopify ‘Worse’ For Google For SEO?
As an SEO and Shopify Expert, let me answer this question cleanly and clearly:
No.
Shopify is as good — and, often, better! — than many other ecommerce platforms out there!
When it comes to ranking in Google and your traffic, there are three major factors at play.
- How the content on your site is optimized for Google
- The number of links you have from other relevant sites in Google
- If your products and pages are showing ‘Rich Snippets’ in Google’s search results
If you’re suffering from low traffic, there are three things that I recommend you do:
- Check to make sure your store doesn’t have any site-wide or page/product specific SEO issues. The best way to do that is to go through an SEO Opportunity Report for your store to identify if there are any SEO issues affecting your ability to rank in Google.
- Check to see how many links — unique sites — you have pointing to your site. Check to see the same for your competitors for your primary or most popular keywords. If they have more links than you, that means they’ll be outranking you. The solution is to earn more high quality links and the best way to figure out how to do that is with a strategy to earn links, one of the topics tackled in the SEO Opportunity Report.
- Install a plugin to take your product reviews and display them in the Google search results using a plugin like JSON-LD for SEO. Which would you be more likely to click: a normal link in Google or a link that showed ‘4.8/5 stars’ right below the link? I’d be clicking the one that told me the product review right in the search results. You need JSON-LD for SEO for that.
And if you want done-for-you help with your Shopify SEO, check out my SEO PowerUp — I’ll handle the optimization for you.
And fellow Shopify Store Owner, remember: you are no longer alone!
Want to learn how to do SEO on your Shopify store yourself? SEO Simplified walks you through the process step by step.
— Kai Davis, Senior Traffic Consultant, Double Your Ecommerce
