Driving organic traffic is critical for ecommerce success, but outranking competitors can be challenging. The right SEO tools provide the data and insights you need to improve site visibility.
This guide explores 10 essential tools for executing an effective ecommerce SEO strategy:
1. Google Search Console
Google Search Console is a free platform that gives you insights into how Google views and indexes your site.
Connecting your ecommerce site to Search Console allows you to:
- Identify indexing issues like crawl errors and fix them
- View clicks, impressions and rankings for target keywords
- See which pages attract the most organic traffic
- Discover HTML improvements to better optimize pages
This visibility from Google itself enables you to optimize pages based on how Google bots interpret them.
2. Google Analytics
Google Analytics is the leading website analytics platform, tracking key metrics like traffic sources, on-site behavior, conversions and more.
Ecommerce sites can integrate Analytics for detailed sales and conversion tracking. It provides visibility into:
- Traffic sources driving transactions
- Which products or pages convert best
- How visitors navigate your site
These insights reveal optimization opportunities to improve conversions.
3. Ahrefs
Ahrefs is a robust SEO tool offering unparalleled competitive analysis and keyword research.
The platform lets you analyze the top pages and domains ranking for your target keywords to understand their optimization strategies. See which pages link to competitors to identify link building opportunities.
These competitive insights help you reverse engineer what’s working and expand upon successful tactics.
4. SEMrush
SEMrush is a leading SEO and digital marketing platform providing keyword rankings, paid and organic competitor analysis, and site audits.
Ecommerce brands can leverage SEMrush to:
- Uncover new keyword opportunities around products, categories and industry terminology
- See what paid and organic terms competitors rank for
- Estimate search traffic for keywords you’re targeting
Ongoing tracking in SEMrush helps guide content creation and link building.
5. KeywordTool.io
KeywordTool is a free alternative keyword research tool that generates semantic keyword ideas and variations using Google Autocomplete data.
It’s helpful for ecommerce brands to brainstorm long tail keyword opportunities related to specific products. You can filter keywords by difficulty to focus on less competitive terms.
6. Surfer SEO
Surfer SEO is a Chrome browser extension that analyzes key on-page SEO elements like title tags, headers, page speed and more.
It makes auditing competitor product and category pages fast and easy directly in the browser. You can quickly see where their optimizations are successful or lacking.
Surfer SEO offers a lightweight option for on-page analysis beyond Google Search Console.
7. Yoast SEO
Yoast SEO is the most popular WordPress SEO plugin, used on over 8 million sites.
It analyzes pages for proper keyword utilization, readability, title lengths and more. The tool also optimizes for search by default as you create new content.
For ecommerce sites using WordPress, having Yoast SEO integrated makes optimizing product copy and pages simpler.
8. Screaming Frog SEO Spider
Screaming Frog is a desktop web crawler that identifies technical SEO issues impacting site indexing and crawling.
Running the crawler regularly generates audits of critical problems like broken links, thin pages, accessibility errors and duplicate content.
Fixing these site-wide technical errors improves overall search visibility for ecommerce brands.
9. HubSpot SEO
HubSpot offers a set of free SEO tools including site crawlers, audits and rank trackers.
The SEO tool generates audits evaluating site speed, security, indexability and performance against competitors. It suggests improvements for higher clickthrough rates.
HubSpot also tracks core page rankings and organic traffic metrics tied to a HubSpot account, making reporting easy.
10. Google PageSpeed Insights
PageSpeed Insights is a free Google tool that assesses site performance metrics on mobile and desktop. It pinpoints optimization opportunities specifically around site speed, which became a ranking factor in 2018.
Ecommerce sites can leverage PageSpeed Insights to identify fixes that enhance real-world user experience, like image compression, caching, and code minification.
Faster sites directly earn higher rankings while also boosting conversions and engagement.
The right tools provide the critical data to monitor positions, research competitors, diagnose issues, and continuously optimize pages over time. Improving ecommerce SEO visibility is an ongoing effort as Google’s algorithms rapidly evolve. Use these essential tools to gain an edge.
Have you discovered any other invaluable resources for boosting organic traffic and outranking ecommerce competitors? Let me know in the comments!