10 Tips to Increase Sales Using SEO

The world as we knew it changed in 2019, causing us all to re-evaluate how we live and how we purchase goods and services. While there were many pitfalls and hurdles, interestingly, the US’s e-commerce industry grew by 14.9% in 2019. Plus, an estimated 2.05 billion people, which is 25% of the world population, shop online – which means, if you’re not using SEO as a marketing tool to help grab traffic and boost your sales, you’re missing out on this incredible opportunity.

Whether you’ve started a new eCommerce business, have an incredible product that you want to sell, or simply want to use SEO to increase your sales – You’ve come to the right place. Today we’re going to give you ten tried and tested tactics that use the power of SEO to increase your sales.

1. Create Brand Awareness Through Keyword Research

Keywords are still a massive slice of the SEO pie, and they make up a crucial component of your SEO strategy. Using branded keywords will definitely attract customers who are looking for your product/company. However, the way to expand your customer base is to focus on a mix of both branded and non-branded keywords. That’s where keyword research can help with SEO and sales.

Say, for example, you sell homemade soy candles, then your main keyword phrase would obviously be – homemade soy candles. However, thinking of other keywords that match your brand and products, such as – vegan gifts or natural candles, or best organic gifts – would also help customers find your product through their searches. A diverse keyword strategy is beneficial for search engine optimization, finding potential customers, visibility, and boosting sales.

2. Write Engaging Content

The bedrock of a successful SEO strategy is authentic and engaging content. Your website’s content shouldn’t just be a tool to deliver keywords. The content you create must be relevant, authoritative, valuable, and engaging so that prospective users can find your brand based on the content you put up on your website. Giving customers the information to make their purchasing decision will build relationships and convert leads into clients. Grab the attention of old and new users through blogs, podcasts, infographics, campaigns, e-books, white papers etc. Not only will this help rank your website, but it’ll give you a chance to organically use keywords that will drive traffic to your website and potentially increase your sales.

3. Focus Efforts on Social Media

Social Media is one of the fastest-growing platforms and an essential element in today’s modern approach to SEO. Consumers discover new brands, companies, and products through posts, reels, and videos on their ‘For You’ page. Keywords, hashtags, alt tags, and other technical SEO tricks can increase your chances of going viral, reaching a wider audience, and converting leads into customers.

Integrating your website with your social media is a must, as many search results on Google come from social media sources. So, grow your reach and audience by having a strong social media presence and using it as a direct marketing tool through Instagram/ Facebook ads. Plus, interacting with your clients one-on-one can lend a personal human touch to your brand, which helps with sales targets.

4. Fine Tune On-Page SEO

In order for users to find you, your website must be accessible and visible to crawlers that index your site. Structure content on each page so that search engines can easily understand and index your website to rank it when a user searches for your targeted keywords. Pay attention to headlines, titles, meta descriptions, image optimization, etc. All these aspects will help with the SEO of your website, the higher your site ranks, the more traffic it gets, and the higher the chances are to convert leads into clients or consumers.

5. Optimize Product Pages

Make your product page grab attention by optimizing it to the max. Write concise and keyword-rich descriptions that are engaging and entice customers to buy your product. Research various terms and phrases people use when looking for your specific product – these must be used in your headlines, tags, alt tags, product descriptions, image file names etc. Additionally, Google now shows thumbnails of products that fit a user’s search on the first page; this is a great way to get customers to click on your product directly, so ensure that your images and thumbnails meet image SEO best practices.

6. Meet Your Users Where They Are

Solely being on Google’s first page results isn’t enough when you want to increase sales. The premise of SEO is to be the solution to your audience’s problem wherever they conduct their search. In other words, if a user is searching for something specific, your company/brand/product needs to be where they are making that search. That means creating content based on user intent on platforms such as Quora, Youtube, Tik Tok, industry websites, review sites, podcasts, etc. – this makes your brand shine wherever your customers are.

Additionally, having your brand/product on multiple platforms will help with brand recognition. Plus, the links from various reputed sources are great backlinks for your website. Authentic backlinks give you a boost in rank because Google sees your website as an authoritative voice in your niche. These small details help attract potential clients who are searching specifically for your company or product, so take advantage of it.

7. SEO friendly URLs

Whether it’s an informative blog or a product page, the URL is vital when conveying what the page contains. By default, most platforms use the main header or page title to construct the URL.

Let’s say you’ve written an article about ‘the best practices for content curation for SEO’ – however, your URL is based on your clickbait title, which says ‘No one reads, so why write content?’ While the title is engaging, the URL needs to be simplified and reflect the keyword, which in this instance is content curation for SEO.

URLs impact your website’s ranking and are an essential element in SEO strategy. Therefore, streamline URLs, so that users know exactly what they’re getting when they click your link.

8. Don’t Forget to Optimize Images

Images are the first thing that our eyes gravitate towards. Therefore the images on your site must be high resolution and captivating. Unique product images or personal company pictures that are shot by a professional have a higher chance of converting leads into sales and clients. When it comes to online shopping, users must clearly visualize the product’s attributes since they can’t physically explore it, making product images a vital resource. If images are grainy or don’t have different angles, customers can click off the site and decide not to buy it.

Apart from great-looking visuals, it’s also essential to perform image SEO – this means utilizing keyword-friendly alt tags, implementing keywords into file names, selecting a suitable format (PNG, JPEG), creating an image file path, etc. All these aspects will help rank your products on image searches, which improves your chances of being discovered by new customers who want to buy your product.

9. Reduce Load Speed

When was the last time you personally waited longer than a few seconds for a page or picture to load? Fact is, the faster your website loads, the better it gets ranked on Google, and the more users will stay and explore your page. It is suggested that your page speed come in at 3 seconds or less. Therefore, conducting a proper audit of your site and its content, including videos, images, heavy plugins, etc. – anything that could weigh down your site and cause a lag to speed must be optimized.

10. Focus on Local SEO

Take advantage of location-based queries such as ‘designers near me’ or ‘dentist in Atlanta’ by focusing on local SEO. When looking for a service or product, user behavior suggests that people first look at businesses in their area – making it vital to establish your business in your target location.

Creating a Google My Business (GMB) listing will significantly increase visibility to users in your area and develop more organic online/foot traffic of potential clients. Additionally, Google ranks and prioritizes their GMB listings on the first page and often highlights them as snack pack results that appear above regular search links. These floating boxes with your listing can entice users and make them click on your business. Therefore, while all SEO efforts are important, make it a priority to also work on your local SEO.

One way to maximize the effectiveness of your Google My Business listing is by utilizing a GMB post scheduler. By doing so, you can automate your GMB posts, ensuring consistent updates and engagements with your audience. This not only enhances your online presence but also saves you precious time.

FAQs About Sales and SEO

Have you still got some questions about how sales and SEO correlate? Listed below are some FAQs we found on popular community platforms that we’ll attempt to answer concisely and in layman’s terms. Think of it as a rapid-fire round of questions based on sales and SEO.

Q1: Is SEO an effective marketing tool to increase sales?

SEO is a tool to rank your website on search engines and therefore get more traffic to visit your website. Keeping that in mind, the more visibility your brand gets, the higher the chances of converting leads into customers and increasing sales. If you’re an e-commerce business, SEO is the most effective way to increase sales, as it can be used to grow your client base, gain brand recognition, rank your website and get potential clients – all these aspects have the potential to increase sales.

Q2: Can SEO services help increase my annual sales?

If you’re a local business and haven’t focused on SEO, then SEO services will surely help get your business more online traffic, visibility, engagement, and conversions. However, suppose you’ve already dabbled in SEO services, and your website has started to rank on search engines. In that case, it’s important to remember that SEO is a long-term marketing strategy, and therefore, over time, if done right, there will be an increase in annual sales. Creating an SEO strategy takes expert planning and foresight. So, it’s advisable to hire an SEO specialist or a digital marketing agency who can help you with your SEO and sales goals.

Q3: How do I do SEO for my eCommerce site?

On-page and technical SEO is crucial for eCommerce sites, as it streamlines content and backend functionalities so that search engines can index and rank your website. Mentioned below are some SEO practices you can begin with to help your eCommerce site:

• Keyword research and implementation.
• Website loading speed.
• Image optimization
• Creating genuine, valuable, and relatable content.
• Getting an SSL certificate (turning your HTTP website into a more secure HTTPS site).
• Getting a Google My Business listing.
• Writing concise, engaging and keyword-rich product descriptions.
• Having a strong social media presence

Q4: Can I increase sales quickly with SEO?

SEO is a long-term marketing strategy. Therefore, it takes time to see the immediate sales increase. It’s true that a well-optimized website will get more traffic; whether that traffic avails of your service or buys your product depends mainly on your service/product. So, there is no quick way to increase sales with SEO, but SEO will help get your website more visibility and more organic traffic over time.

Having said that, doing an audit of your website will highlight areas that you can improve on that may be causing your website to drop in rankings or miss out on crucial users due to wrong keywords utilization or technical issues. However, according to Oberlo.com an estimated 2.05 billion people, which is 25% of the world population, shop online, so any SEO practices you undertake will yield results due to this large percentage.

Q5: Do businesses need SEO for sales? 

SEO isn’t a sales tool; however, it is a highly effective digital marketing tool that can significantly impact your sales goals. Nowadays, the majority of people search for products and services online before they make their buying/service decisions. Therefore, it’s vital for any business to do some form of SEO for their website. Additionally, SEO is excellent at targeting and pandering to an audience that needs and wants your product/service, thus, giving you more quality leads. If you want a strong online presence, then SEO is a must for your business.

Those were some of our tips about how SEO affects sales and how you can use it to generate more leads. SEO is a difficult child to control, so we highly suggest hiring an SEO specialist or marketing agency if you really want to make the most of this effective digital marketing tool. To sum up, SEO does not directly increase sales, but it can definitely give you the best chance to turn quality leads into customers with the right SEO plan. We hope this article was helpful; keep checking back for more SEO-related content!