An online store is not a brochure website with a checkout bolted on. It has hundreds or thousands of pages, a product catalogue that changes weekly, duplicate URL problems that brochure sites never see, and a direct connection between search visibility and revenue. SEO for ecommerce has to be built for that reality.
Why online stores need different SEO
The stakes are different too. For a service business, ranking means enquiries. For an online store, ranking means sales, and a page that ranks for a product keyword either produces revenue or produces nothing. That is why ecommerce SEO has to be judged on organic revenue, not traffic. A store can rank for plenty of searches and still lose money if the wrong pages rank, the product pages do not convert or the technical setup leaks the traffic it earns.
Most online stores I audit have the same core problem: they built a shop, then treated SEO as an afterthought. Product pages were imported from a feed with thin descriptions, categories were set up for navigation rather than search, and nobody checked whether Google could crawl and index the catalogue properly. The result is a store that is technically live and commercially invisible.
What ecommerce SEO includes
Technical SEO: crawl, canonicals and faceted navigation
The technical layer decides whether search engines can find and understand your catalogue. This covers crawlability and indexation, canonical tags so duplicate product URLs do not compete with each other, site speed, and the way faceted navigation, filters like size, colour and brand, generates duplicate or infinite URLs that waste crawl budget. Get the technical layer wrong and every other SEO effort is capped.
Product page optimisation
Each product page needs a title, description and content that matches what shoppers search, plus the information that turns a click into a purchase. Thin product descriptions imported from a supplier do not rank and do not convert. Product pages need genuine descriptions, specifications, use cases and, where possible, original photography and customer reviews.
Category architecture
Categories are where ecommerce SEO is won or lost. A well-structured category page targets the broad terms that carry most of your volume, links down to the products within it, and gives Google a clear picture of your catalogue. Most stores leave category pages as little more than a grid of products with a heading, which is a page that can rank but does not.
Content and blog support
Ecommerce content is not a blog for its own sake. It targets the research questions shoppers ask before they buy: comparisons, sizing guides, how-to content and buying guides. That content builds authority, earns links and captures shoppers earlier in their journey, then funnels them into the product and category pages that convert.
Link building
Online stores need authority to rank against national retailers and marketplaces. That means earning links from relevant sources: suppliers, industry publications, bloggers and partners. Link building for ecommerce focuses on assets that attract links naturally, like original guides, data or tools, rather than buying links that risk a penalty.
Shopify SEO vs WooCommerce SEO
The platform shapes the work, and I work on both of the major Australian store platforms.
Shopify SEO is about working within a controlled, hosted platform. Shopify handles a lot of the technical basics well, but it has specific constraints: URL structure, duplicate content from product variants, and limits on how much you can control the crawl. The work focuses on making the platform's strengths work for you, configuring the settings Shopify gives you, and building content and structure on top of it.
WooCommerce SEO runs on WordPress, which means near-total control over the technical setup and a wider range of plugins and optimisation options. That control is a double-edged sword: WooCommerce stores are often slower and messier out of the box, with more plugins, more duplicate content risks and more that can break. The work focuses on using the platform's flexibility to build a clean, fast, indexable store rather than a tangled one.
Whichever platform you use, the principles are the same: clean technical foundations, product and category pages built for real searches, and content that earns authority.
Common ecommerce SEO problems
Duplicate products are the most common issue. The same product reachable at several URLs, through search filters, multiple categories or tracking parameters, splits your ranking signals and makes Google choose between versions of the same page. Canonicals and a clean internal linking structure fix it.
Thin descriptions are the second. Stores importing supplier descriptions end up with hundreds of pages that are identical to every other store selling the same product. Google has no reason to rank you above the original source, and shoppers have no reason to trust you. Original descriptions, even short ones, change that.
Pagination and faceted navigation problems come third. Deeply nested catalogues and filter combinations create pages Google either cannot crawl efficiently or should not index at all. Managing pagination and keeping faceted pages out of the index protects your crawl budget for the pages that matter.
Case evidence
The work described on this page follows the same process as my published case studies: audit, diagnosis, fix, measure. Results vary by business and market, and the published case studies show real numbers from real engagements rather than promises. The retail case study in particular shows what structured, search-driven work can do for a business that sells products and services together.
Read the retail marketing case study for the detail.
What it costs
Ecommerce SEO is usually priced as a monthly engagement, because the work is ongoing: technical fixes, content production, link building and reporting compound over time. A one-off ecommerce SEO audit is available as a fixed-fee project if you want the diagnosis before committing to ongoing work.
Pricing is a custom quote based on your goals, the size of your catalogue and the competitive reality of your market. You get exact numbers after understanding your store, and there are no lock-in contracts. If the work is not delivering, you can leave at the end of the month.
Frequently Asked Questions
Getting Traffic but Not Organic Revenue?
If your online store is getting traffic but not organic revenue, or you are not sure where the SEO problems are, book a free 30-minute Strategy Session. We will look at your store, your market and the biggest opportunities. No pitch deck, no obligation.
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Tell me a bit about your business and we can dial in a strategy that fits.
