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Optimize Images for Search

Jul 27th, 2009
by admin.
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There’s an area that is often overlooked in SEO and that’s images. Just like the words on a website, images generate traffic and links, too.

In terms of aesthetics, images are an integral part of website design. They break up a copy-heavy page and give site visitors instant visual stimulation. In terms of SEO, images can be optimized and bring additional visitors to a website. Actively using images as part of your overall optimization strategy can pay dividends.

Image Search Optimization Tips

Image naming: Give image filenames a title that reflects the content and is descriptive such as “Sony Ericsson C905″ instead of “SEC905.jpg”. Make the image names of your files match what is actually represented in the file. Don’t stuff your Alt Tags full of keywords though- especially ones that don’t relate to the rest of your page as they run the risk of being seen as spam.

Image linking: Boost internal linking and traffic by linking images to relevant articles and/or blog posts on your website. If you are sending out press releases or contributing articles to other websites, provide an image link.

Image quality: Good quality pictures with high contrast tend to work better. Make necessary resolution adjustments between your full size images and your thumbnails.

Image formatting: Photos saved as JPG files and other graphic image types as GIFs are the preferred image formatting.

Image freshness: Keep images fresh. If you’re targeting high popularity keywords it’s worth re-uploading images. Image freshness is a contextual clue for the search engines and could affect relevancy.

Image appearance: Further increase relevancy by optimizing the page the image appears on. Search engines look at text surrounding an image to determine relevancy.Text within the anchor tag and next to anchor text is especially going to influence image-search rankings.

Image duplication: Avoid duplicate image content on the website. If for example, you have a thumbnail, a medium size image, and a full size image, you don’t want these to all be indexed. The best way to handle this is to use robots.txt to prevent the crawler from looking at the versions you don’t want indexed.

Image filter: Enabled image search option at Google webmaster tool.

Posted in: SEO.
Tagged: ·

FAQs & Ecommerce – A Highly Recommended Match

Jul 21st, 2009
by admin.
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The frequently asked questions (FAQ) section is one of the most visited sections of each website. The users expect clearly written, well-organized, complete and actionable answers to their questions. Still only half of ecommerce retailers offer FAQs on their websites. Among those sites offering FAQ, almost one in five FAQ systems does not satisfy the client.

A FAQ section is especially helpful throughout critical stages of the buying cycle. Issues including the online ordering process focusing on payments and security can be solved through the FAQ section.

Tips about FAQs:

Effective FAQs
The FAQ section of your ecommerce site needs to be updated frequently. Keep it user-focused, and make sure that your FAQ page offers other easy, immediate ways (e-mail, phone, live chat) for the potential costumers to get answers.

Specific FAQs
Most FAQ sections are too long. Limit the general FAQ section to the handful of questions users are most likely to ask and create specialized FAQs for specific products, services, or types of users.

Dead-End FAQs
Some FAQs provide dead-end answers. The question is answered but the answer doesn’t include or link to relevant information that enables the user to take action. An excellent answer would link to an opt-out form or provide the e-mail address and phone number of a person to contact to opt out.

More FAQ facts to take into consideration:

Websites neglect FAQs and waste their potential
Ecommerce retailers are neglecting the answering of FAQs on their websites or the FAQs are lacking in quality. Yet FAQs can solve customers’ issues quickly and easily. Looked after carefully they provide customers with the information they seek faster than an e-mail.

FAQs rarely provide the right answers
FAQs frequently fail to do what they are supposed to, instead leaving behind more questions than answers. Almost one in five catalogues of questions leaves potential customers with their service queries entirely unanswered. And 70% of companies only occasionally provide the right responses.

FAQ saves time & money
An intelligent question-and-answer system which does not involve elaborate navigation can help customers to help themselves and it increases satisfaction levels because they can obtain a solution to their problems at any time of day or night. It also relieves other communication channels which involve much more staffing and cost. Furthermore, most customer queries relate to issues that can be dealt with more quickly by FAQs than by e-mail: delivery times, methods of payment and shipping costs. Powerful self-service solutions therefore offer enormous potential savings.

Posted in: E-commerce tools.

Ecommerce Blogging – A Business Tool

Jul 14th, 2009
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Blogging is very important to ecommerce businesses. It’s one of the easiest ways to update the websites content, and it also demonstrates expertise about the offered products. Blogging can complement online shops products and offer a reason for people to return to them. The return on the blogging investment is quite high in terms of content, SEO, trust and reputation.

Consider blogging because:

Blogging Builds Trust
Ecommerce sites often focus on attracting visitors for the immediate sale, but sometimes potential customers want to learn more about a business and products before they’re ready to make a purchase. With a traditional store, consumers know where to go if they have questions. It’s more difficult to find the same level of trust with an online store. Providing valuable information to potential customers builds trust based on long-term considerations.

Show Off Expertise
Consumers usually purchase from companies that have expertise with their products and in their industry. A blog is an opportunity to demonstrate this expertise, to share insider tips and to discuss issues of interest with your customers and provide them with valuable insights and information.

Easy SEO
Search engines like sites that constantly update their content. Blogging is an easy way to update website content, while providing something of value to potential customers at the same time. Also, including top industry keywords will help build valuable links to the Ecommerce site’s content.

Blog Comments & Feedback
Blogging gives online retailers the opportunity to have a conversation with and get feedback from customers and others in the industry. Not every blog will get comments & feedback right away but after blogging for a while, there should be an audience to tap into from time to time with short, one-question surveys. Additionally a focused, well-written blog can get readers hooked on the blog and promote repeat visits to the website or garner subscriptions via RSS feeds and email newsletters.

Ecommerce Site’s Personality
Many ecommerce sites have a personality that is associated with the company. Since people are more willing to purchase from another person it’s recommended to include some information about the personalities ‘behind the scenes’ of the ecommerce site.

Blog Themes
A blog’s theme should be consistent with a company’s focus, yet universal enough that the blog is not solely about things the company sells. A blog that only exists to link to its corporate site will not be trusted. A site selling cameras, for instance, should go beyond making the blog a secondary camera sales tool and get involved with photography as an art and business. It’s secondary to cameras, but it is directly related to the interests of potential customers.

Start Blogging
Most blogs are created using free or low-cost online sites such as Blogger from Google, WordPress, and Typepad . These services are simple to use and configure and it’s possible to have a blog up and running in less than an hour. With a bit of extra work, the blog can become part of the ecommerce site, adding value to the content and SEO.

Nevertheless, ecommerce retailers should be aware that setting it up and linking it to the website is the easy part. Keeping the blog updated, active and topical is the hard part. Ideally, the blog should be updated once a week. The more relevant content and posts are the more value the blog with have as a resource for new customers.

Posted in: E-commerce optimization, SEO.
Tagged: · · ·

Back to School Shopping Will Benefit E-tailers

Jul 6th, 2009
by admin.
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While students enjoy their summer, parents get ready for one of the biggest shopping seasons of the year, the Back to School shopping season beginning next month.  Every year between the months of July and September families spend hundreds of dollars on everything from apparel to electronics which accounts for the second largest amount of shopping dollars spent during the year, the first being the winter Holiday season.  The retail industry is now preparing for what could be a test of consumer demand and could also determine whether the economy has recovered since the recession.

Shopping Figures

1.    It is estimated that around 45% of families will spend close to $250 per child.
2.    The majority of this shopping season will be done in July & August.
3.    Over 38% of dollars spent will be during this time.
4.    Approximately 25% of consumers will spend more this year than the previous year.
5.    In 2008, The U.S. spent $54 billion on back to school shopping .

Google Insights for Search: Back to school shopping trends

backtoschool

The above graph represents that the month of August is the peak for back to school on an annual basis which is predicted for the upcoming shopping season in 2009.

When back to school shoppers start looking to their lists for supplies they’ll also be looking for great deals.  Like most consumers, the majority of them begin their search online.  There has been a definite rise in the percentage of people shopping online in the last two years.   An analysis of online shopping trends predicts that retail e-commerce sales will increase around 4% from last year.  Those looking for deals on apparel and electronics should find them on Bing shopping, Google Advertisements and Twitter search when looking for the latest products and deals.  This has been a great boost for online retailers.  Since the recession, price conscious consumers have also found price comparison websites to be very beneficial and due to this response they will likely see a rise in use.

For e-tailers to capitalize on the upcoming shopping season advertising will be the most important factor.  Search engine marketing and keywords will play a large role in reaching consumers. Using seasonal keywords in addition to product specific keywords will be beneficial.  Creating package deals for multiple related items associated with school shopping would also drive consumers.  Researching new and popular items of the season will be an advantage when attracting online shoppers.

Sources
1.    Kristina Knight (Big Report) “Study: Back to School Could Help Etailers”
a.    Study by Burst Media
2.    Jessica Wohl (Reuters) “Back to School Shopping to Test Retail Resilience”

Posted in: Research.
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Tech Savvy Moms Online

Jun 30th, 2009
by admin.
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As eMarketer reported earlier in the month mothers are one of larger user groups online and are among the most internet savvy.  In the US alone approximately 34 million moms are online per month, as reported by eMarketer, and they are influencing those purchase decisions.

So how can ecommerce sites understand how to gear their offerings towards mothers who not only by for themselves, but also their children.

Before making a purchasing decision moms will use general websites, referrals from friends and family, search engines and mobile web browsing as the top four resources for product information. Your product has to be where the consumer is searching.

moms-chart-one

Tips for targeting tech savvy mothers:

1.    Ecommerce sites should be offering all available information per product and where the consumer can find additional information, possibly third party information, on lines of products you carry.
2.    Utilize search engine marketing with an emphasis on the shopper. You can create specific campaigns just targeting women between the ages of 24 to 35 for example.
3.    Once a purchase is complete get the consumer to fill out a review of the product a few weeks later or their experience shopping on your site.

So what sites need to pay attention to the increasing role of tech savvy mothers online? The top three categories for which moms research are clothing, food/cooking and baby/parenting, however the next three categories are banking services, electronics and travel. Gearing websites and advertisements towards mothers within these categories will require companies to make sure the site is user friendly towards various potential shoppers.

moms-chart-21

Posted in: Research.

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