As you might know, Magento 2 websites are designed to be SEO-friendly by default. However, it doesn’t mean that you have to do nothing to have a SEO-friendly Magento e-commerce store. Through this today post, you will be equipped with fundamental knowledge of SEO in Magento 2, from how to set it up, how to avoid common mistakes to how to get most of the default Magento 2 SEO function. Let’s get started!

SEO CONFIGURATION IN MAGENTO 2 WEBSITES

1. Enable SEO-friendly URLs

First, you have to access the Admin panel, navigate to STORES, and choose Configuration (under Settings).

Then, on the left menu, select Web under the General tab.

Next, expand the Search Engine Optimization field, set Use Web Server Rewrites to Yes.

2. Set up SEO for Product Page

In order to set up SEO for a product/ a product page, you have to go to the admin panel, navigate to CATALOG, select Products, and then choose a specific product that you want to configure.

After selecting the product, scroll down to the Search Engine Optimization section and complete the empty fields.

• URL Key: This is the crucial component of the static URL, telling about what the product is. Once the product is created, the system will automatically generate an URL Key based on that product name. Moreover, there will be automatic redirect in case that the admin changes the URL Key.

• Meta Title: This can be considered as one of the most essential on-page ranking factors. This title will be displayed in the Search engine result pages (SERPs) as the title for that product page.
• Meta Keywords: This is the list of one to several keywords related to the product, telling the search engines about the page topic.
• Meta Description: This is a summarise of the product page appearing in SERPs, right under the Meta Title. It’s highly recommended to write the Meta Description with 150-160 characters in length and up to 255 characters.

3. Set up SEO for Category Page

In order to set up SEO for a category/ a category page, you have to go to the admin panel, navigate to CATALOG, select Categories, and then choose a specific category that you want to configure.

After selecting the category on the left category tree, wait a few seconds for the page to reload.

Then, expand the Search Engine Optimization section, and fill in the empty fields (similar to the Product page)

4. Set up SEO for other CMS Pages

For other pages in your Magento 2 websites (e.g.: Privacy Policy, Contact, About us,…), to change URL, Meta title/ keywords/ description, please navigate to CONTENT and choose Pages (under Elements).

Then, select a specific page that you want to configure.

Now, expand the Search Engine Optimization section and complete the empty fields.

5 COMMON MISTAKES IN MAGENTO 2 SEO

1. Recognize the layered URLs back to the category as Rel Canonical

On the one hand, Google released the Rel Canonical with the aim of handling the duplicate content issues.

On the other hand, by applying layered filters in Magento 2 websites, the content of that URL has been changed with different groups of products. Therefore, we can’t consider these as duplicates.

As a result, instead of using Rel Canonical to solve the issue of thin-content layered URLs, you should try placing the Meta Noindex, which will follow your layered URLs and tell Google to not index these. Besides, it still allows the link juice to flow through them (via your product listings and navigation) to other pages in your Magento 2 websites.

2. Utilize Robot.txt or Meta No Index to block layered navigation parameters

In many cases, in order to get the layered navigation parameters on the category pages out of Google index, the Magento store owners have a tendency to apply the Robot.txt disallow. Nevertheless, this is not an effective and thorough way to deal with it. Although the Google bots can’t crawl these parameters, your pages are still indexed.

Another idea is to use the Meta No Index instead of Robot.txt but the result is the same. In short, both of these methods should not be applied.

3. Index both HTTP and HTTPs of Magento 2 websites

There are many Magento 2 stores made the same mistake of indexing both HTTP and HTTPs versions of their sites. Why? That would be considered as absolutely duplicate content. Here, there is no better solution than using the Rel Canonical to unify the duplicated one into your preferred version.

To be more specific, if you prefer your HTTPs, the HTTP version must have a Rel Canonical pointing towards the HTTPs, and vice versa.

4.  Allow site search results through Robot.txt

As mentioned before, it’s a bad idea to disallow the layered parameters by Robot.txt, but in order to disallow the site search results, it does work. However, many Magento 2 website forget to disallow their site search results through Robot.txt and even link to the site search results from their home page. Consequently, there is a high possibility that those sites will be penalized by Google Panda.

5. Set the Homepage’s title as “Home”

It goes without a doubt that Homepage is the most pivotal page of Magento 2 websites. Therefore, if you just name it as “Home”, you have missed a great opportunity to enhance SEO for your store. Instead, we highly suggest you to add the targeted keyword(s) related to your products and services into your title.

5 SEO TIPS TO GET HIGH RANKINGS FOR YOUR MAGENTO 2 WEBSITES

1. Add A Long Tail Keyword In The Product Page URL & The Product Name

First, it’s a must to include your keyword in the URL of your product page(s) so that the search engines can understand the page content, index and rank it.

Second, it’s hard for your page to have high ranks on SERPs if you target common short keywords. Owing to that, most of Magento stores now are moving to use long-tail keywords (including 3-5 words) to easily reach their audience. For example, instead of using the popular “Skirt” keyword, you should name your product as “Zara Floral Printed Skirt”.

2. Delete All Duplicate Products

Having duplicate items is a big but common mistake of many Magento 2 websites, especially for configurable products with various options (e.g.: size, color, materials,…)

As a consequence, there are multiple pages on the site having the same title and content, all of which can be punished by Google and other search engines.

In this case, the solution is to configure different attributes for the product to discard duplication. By this way, you even can enhance SEO owing to have a unique page(s) with dense content.

3. Develop Internal Linking By Adding Related Products

Besides URL, meta title and meta description, the number of internal links on your site is also a critical on-page SEO factor. Fortunately, Magento 2 allows you to build a great number of internal links just by using its “related products” feature.

Specifically, you can easily add related items for each product configuration: Admin Panel => CATALOG => Products => Related Products, Up-Sells, and Cross-Sells => Related Products => Add Related Products.

As a result, it will not only stimulate your customers to buy more items but also help the search engines to discover and index other pages on your site.

4. Remember To Insert Alt Text For All Images

The search engines will evaluate your whole page content – both text and images. And for the images, they need to analyze the Alt Text of your image to know what it is about. Without the alt text, the search engines can’t “read” your page thoroughly and might give it lower rank.

To add the Alt Text for your product images, in product configuration you must scroll down to the Images and Videos section, click on the image and fill in the Alt Text field.

5. Prepare A Unique Product Description With A Minimum Of 300 Words

Last but not least, not only your customers but the search engines prefer unique and well-written content that provides detailed information about your products. Hence, spending your time to write quality product description with 300 words or more, and more importantly containing your targeted keyword(s).

CONCLUSION

SEO is always important for all Magento 2 websites. Good SEO would bring about great sales.

Hope that this comprehensive SEO guide for Magento 2 would help you to consolidate SEO of your site and improve your search engine rankings. If you have any questions or further useful tips to share, just leave your comments below.
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