Everyone already knows that in order to bring traffic to your site, you have to work hard. Having put so much effort into a site, who would want it to turn into a ghost town? We’re betting no one… If you agree, your options go in two ways (more or less), you can pay for your traffic or work on optimization a bit harder. Both PPC and SEO bring their value. That means you need the best of both worlds.
Our knowledge of Magento has grown over the years. Likewise, we know a thing or two about getting results for your business. So today, we’ll talk about everything you need to know to get the best of the SEO world.
Speaking of which, we grabbed Andreja today from her usual responsibilities and asked her a few questions to paint you a picture of our SEO process and talk about benefits for you and your business.
Ok. You got us. There’s one more thing as well. Andreja recently became a team leader of our Digital Marketing team, so, in a way, this is the right moment for us to congratulate her publicly and for you to catch some helpful info. Let’s get right into it!
Hi Andreja, thank you for taking the time to speak with me. First of all, you recently became a team leader of our Digital Marketing team. Congratulations on your promotion! Since then, what has changed in your daily work routine?
Andreja: Thank you, Lucija! To be honest – not much has changed.
I’m still working in production (less than before, though) and on our internal SEO modules, but now, in addition to taking care of the team and business development. That means in addition to my usual tasks, I’m thinking about the tasks and goals of others. As we cover both SEO and PPC, a clear set of goals is necessary to ensure that both the team’s professional skills and productivity grow.
Other than that, most things remained the same, involving the great working atmosphere. But that’s where the team comes in and helps. A little teamwork goes a long way!
Among the many things you encountered during your career, what makes SEO unique? Also, how did you decide to become an expert in this field?
Andreja: SEO is constantly changing, and if you’re continuously willing to upgrade your knowledge, you can never get to the point where you feel like you’ve hit the wall with nothing left to learn, and that’s why I fell for it. It’s intriguing; it has so many variables (such as different platforms where each platform has unique challenges) and includes collaboration with other teams (development, UX, content, etc.), which is always fun!
Tell me about our perfect client match. What advice would you give clients to help them decide when looking for a trusting partner to take care of their sites’ SEO?
Andreja: When choosing a perfect partner for search engine optimization, choose wisely. There are a lot of brilliant SEO managers out there, but choosing the one, you can trust and feel comfortable working with takes work.
Since SEO is an ever-changing field, look for a partner with good general knowledge of industry trends and a proven track record of success on your platform. Your partner might be the most experienced person you’ve ever encountered, but if they’re not willing to adjust their strategy and adapt to your business needs – they might not be the perfect fit.
Your partner needs to communicate clearly their strategies and make realistic expectations. If it sounds too good to be true – it probably is. So make sure you research and ask all the questions before making the final decision.
One more factor you want to consider when choosing a new partner for SEO is the price. Be aware that choosing the cheapest option can be very expensive in the long run, so emphasize the expertise and track record of success over price when making this important decision.
What can you tell about our SEO services? How does the journey with our clients usually start?
Andreja: We always start with an SEO audit to get better insights into their current organic performance and technical SEO setup.
During this phase, we look at different things (such as site structure, layered navigation, rel canonicals, meta robots, robots.txt, schema markup, etc.) to see if some low-hanging fruits can be easily implemented to boost their performance. We also prepare a list of everything that should be done on the tech SEO side to improve their organic traffic and comply with the industry’s best practices.
One thing that makes us different from some other agencies is that we’re not generic SEO specialists; we have a lot of hands-on experience with Magento, so we know how to address and resolve all potential issues that can occur on this platform. We also have great developers, devops and UX experts on board, which makes it easier to provide highly performant solutions that won’t add unnecessary bloat to our client’s stores.
As you previously mentioned , we consider SEO Audit the first step for helping our clients better their ranking positions. How often should merchants request it? What are some indicators that they need an SEO Audit? What would you say?
Andreja: Even though there’s no rule, I’d advise merchants to request a technical SEO audit at least once a year to ensure their store is still following industry best practices.
Of course, they should react immediately if they’ve made any structural changes to their online store or already noticed a decline in their key performance indicators. Hire a professional to review their technical SEO setup to identify if there are any underlying issues and provide tailored recommendations for their business specifically.
Did you come across situations where SEO Audit showed some hidden problems that the client wasn’t aware of before? How serious were they, and how did they affect clients’ business?
Andreja: As a matter of fact – many times! From indexed search result pages, entire catalog sections were disallowed in robots.txt, to all 404 pages being redirected to a non-indexable page (which caused a massive traffic loss).
Welcome to another Andreja Talks SEM !
— CommanderA. (@AndrejaCicak) May 25, 2021
This time we’re focusing on one of the most important functionalities of an eCommerce website – Site search, so keep reading if you want to find out more. (1/9)
We’re looking at every detail to find out how we can help you gain more organic visibility and grow your business. I mean, as an SEO manager, your job is to find and achieve good results without compromising the integrity or goals of the website, no matter how big the potential issue is.
How would you say Magento SEO is different from other eCommerce platforms SEO?
Andreja: eCommerce SEO is generally quite complex since it has several page types (CMS pages, product pages, category pages) and dimensions (faceted navigation, sorting, viewing, etc.). The main difference between Magento and other platforms is that Magento is a robust and flexible platform, which allows many customizations requiring extra attention regarding SEO.
Additionally, even though it comes with some default SEO features, I wouldn’t recommend relying solely on those since it probably won’t give you the results you’re aiming for. Instead, you’ll definitely need some 3rd party extensions (which are not always the best solution) or custom coding. In fact, as a part of our ongoing SEO service and through Inchoo Flavored Magento, we’ve developed internal SEO modules that cover all the most common issues with Magento SEO. This way, we provide our clients with a good starting point (in terms of technical SEO) and continue building their organic visibility with on-page optimization.
What misconceptions did you recently encounter with clients about eCommerce SEO? Are there many in general, and how do you deal with them?
Andreja: To be honest, there aren’t many misconceptions. Even when they do occur, I elaborate on the reasons behind certain decisions, and the rest goes smoothly. That’s why I always emphasize the importance of finding a trustworthy partner. After all, you are putting your “digital baby” into someone else hands.
What would you say to sum up this interview in a sweet note by sharing your favorite part of SEO? And what keeps you motivated to do your job efficiently?
Andreja: What drives me is a desire to help my clients grow and the constantly evolving nature of this business. Each day is a new challenge and an opportunity to learn something new. That being said, my favorite part of SEO is finding solutions for unsolvable problems. That feeling you get when you resolve something after spending a couple of hours or even days figuring out how to do it is incomparable with anything else, and it’s easy to get hooked on it.
Andreja, it was a pleasure talking with you about our SEO services and sharing a bit of your experience and knowledge with us.
So there you have it, folks. Hopefully, we covered every question you have in mind when choosing the perfect SEO partner and what to count on when choosing us. If you have any other questions, feel free to reach out to us!
And also, if you think your Magento site needs to be properly optimized, especially now that you understand our business model, drop us a line. We want to know more about your business. After all these years, we can safely say we know Magento.
