SEO ( search engine optimization ) Who Understands It? Maybe We Need A Workshop For It?

[kmmcrafts]

How many online sellers are here on the village? How many of you understand SEO or think you do? 

This seems to be a big struggle point for most online sellers.. and it's the single most important thing for getting sales.. You can have the best photos, lowest prices and best overall items but if they aren't being picked up in searches then they won't get seen, thus no sales...

I'm far from an expert in this field but been online selling products since 2003 ish.. and have learned a bit along the way.. If you are struggling with views and sales I'd be willing to give my constructive criticism. As I said though, I don't consider myself as a pro at this but I'd look over a listing or a whole site and give you an honest opinion.. Sometimes as sellers you get tunnel vision with keywords and placement of them in titles and descriptions and list items as a seller rather than thinking about how the buyer would search for a particular item.. Descriptive keywords are important but also placement of those keywords is also important. 

Reply with a link and I'll look and reply with my suggestion.. IF I have any suggestions,  as I said.. not a pro ( I don't think ) . Only doing this for a week or so as I'm working to build my Christmas listings and inventory.. when doing some new listings this morning it got me to thinking about how others are doing with their SEO.    

[rjweb]

Kevin, I don't sell on line or even sell at all, but wanted to tell you that is very nice of you to help others, RJ

[Dak0ta52]

Thanks Kevin. I'm thinking seriously about setting up a webpage. If I go through with it, I'll definitely send you a link to get your "Expert" opinion.  

[BadBob]

I know enough to be dangerous.

Every search engine has its own set of rules. Etsy search is different than Google search, for example. A lot goes into it besides the keywords; in Google search, people pay to rank high. I think that the people that get it right are either selling something that is unusual and ranks high when someone searches for that or they get lucky.

[kmmcrafts]

16 hours ago, BadBob said:

I know enough to be dangerous.

Every search engine has its own set of rules. Etsy search is different than Google search, for example. A lot goes into it besides the keywords; in Google search, people pay to rank high. I think that the people that get it right are either selling something that is unusual and ranks high when someone searches for that or they get lucky.

You are absolutely correct, however having the right search words in the right place on a title does make a difference across most all searches. Also the first 1-2 sentences in your description helps google and most sites decipher were it'll be placed.  For instance back in the early days of etsy.. almost everyone's title started out with "handmade" or the type of product material for instance "wood or wooden" This is fine for "on etsy searches" however google is different.. google is overloaded with everything so you need to get right to the point of what it is you're selling.. Plus.. why put "handmade or wooden" at the beginning of your title when you're on a handmade selling venue and your photo clearly shows it's made of wood... If you want handmade in there then put it at the tail end and get to the point of what it is in the beginning. My experience for online selling is.. many folks don't seem to care a lot if it's handmade.. They see the image and say.. Oooh I like that.. That's the importance of good photos.. and a whole different subject.

Handmade Wooden Nurse Christmas Ornament 

Nurse Christmas Ornament Handmade From Cherry Wood 

In the two titles above I did add a couple words to further describe wood.. At one time on etsy most every listing started with Handmade so the search was flooded and couldn't make sense of it all.. To help make more sense of it all etsy recommended filling the tail end with keywords so there were tons of people doing this example.

Handmade Wooden Nurse Christmas Ornament, Holiday Deco, Xmas Ornament, Nurse Gift, Holiday Decoration, 

Google doesn't like long titles.. or all the tag words so while they might have ranked higher on etsy they was also getting kicked out of google. 

Etsy got so many items kicked out of google search that they had to implement the Google search ads.. anyone ( me ) making over $10,000 has to pay for search ads to be placed on google.. The system works like our welfare system does.. The workers are supporting the ads while everyone gets to just run with crappy SEO off the backs of those that actually strive to get into google searches.  

Back in the day when I sold on the Artfire platform I had many items that ranked on the first pages of google searches.. Higher than some of the big companies.. Instead of putting the work in on SEO the big companies went to google with lots of money and that's when it became a pay to rank.. You probably remember this.. especially if you were a seller back then. 

Years ago I made a lot of snowflake and angel ornaments.. I probably had 10 - 15 different styles of each.. How hard it is to describe a snowflake 10 - 15 different times of my own items.. then also compete with everyone else selling snowflakes. I've learned to think ahead about what to make that "would" be easy to describe and so now I make more specific things ( ie Nurse ornament and even break it down from there to ICU Nurse, Flight Nurse etc etc ).. So thinking about the title and how to describe it before making it helps me a ton..  

 

Edited August 18, 2023 by kmmcrafts

[BadBob]

I have repeatedly changed my Etsy titles, trying to find the right combination for Etsy.

I have been messing with SEO and search engines since before Google existed. Remember Web Crawler? I have been online since the mid-80s before there was a web. I built the first web server for the State Of  Florida with one other person. I had my servers beaten down when we were on NBC Nightline. I built and maintained many servers since then and spent untold hours explaining it all to managers who could barely get their heads around email. SEO has been a moving target the whole time. It was easy at first, but not anymore. If you want to rank on Google, you need something that is out of the ordinary or so it will rank on the first page. You seem to have found that.

I started selling toys because I liked them and was already making them. After I retired, I got serious, and my sales and views steadily increased. January 20, 2021, everything turned the other way sales and views steadily declined. My Visits and views are increasing but the only things that are selling are the low-priced items. My views started coming back when I went to using word salad for my tags.

[kmmcrafts]

1 hour ago, BadBob said:

I have repeatedly changed my Etsy titles, trying to find the right combination for Etsy.

I have been messing with SEO and search engines since before Google existed. Remember Web Crawler? I have been online since the mid-80s before there was a web. I built the first web server for the State Of  Florida with one other person. I had my servers beaten down when we were on NBC Nightline. I built and maintained many servers since then and spent untold hours explaining it all to managers who could barely get their heads around email. SEO has been a moving target the whole time. It was easy at first, but not anymore. If you want to rank on Google, you need something that is out of the ordinary or so it will rank on the first page. You seem to have found that.

I started selling toys because I liked them and was already making them. After I retired, I got serious, and my sales and views steadily increased. January 20, 2021, everything turned the other way sales and views steadily declined. My Visits and views are increasing but the only things that are selling are the low-priced items. My views started coming back when I went to using word salad for my tags.

It is a changing target all the time.. what worked 10 years ago no longer works today.. However if you were good back in the day and got sales they'll keep showing what is selling and keep on crawling it to somewhat maintain ranking in google search. Etsy pays for google ads for everyone on behave of those that make more sales / money as you already know... However if you have bad keywords and keyword placement nobody's going to search the terms anyway.. Kinda like searching for a cutting board by the search term ornament, LOL I see so many folks using "Made To Order" as the first three words of their title.. may work well on etsy or whatever platform but google sure won't pick up on that..  If you have made to order stuff it's best to describe the item and then put made to order as the first sentence of the description instead of in the title..

A nice way to test SEO is to duplicate the same listing several times with different keywords and placement of them.. then delete the ones that don't work the best, LOL.. That cost money to do on etsy because of the listing fee. That is why I worked with Artfire way more than etsy back in the day.. Plus Artfire was a platform that had classes and workshops to help with selling.. most of what I learned was from back then but for the most part it still applies today other than some minor changes. Goimagine kind of reminds me of how Artfire was in the early stages.. unfortunately the man running artfire got a different job and the new person ran it into the ground and they closed down in 2021.. However I left in 2014 because it was so poorly run and were not addressing issues etc. site only worked when it wanted to LOL 

[BadBob]

11 hours ago, kmmcrafts said:

If you have made to order stuff it's best to describe the item and then put made to order as the first sentence of the description instead of in the title..

I have been struggling with this very thing. Do I tell them or just let them figure it out ...

 

[kmmcrafts]

52 minutes ago, BadBob said:

I have been struggling with this very thing. Do I tell them or just let them figure it out ...

 

Unfortunately it's a double edged sword, If you tell them they may take it the wrong way.. On newer sites like Goimagine it hurts the site as a whole because if someone just happens to shop there to find something and the results aren't showing something that's actually there then the site as a whole loses out.. and the shopper may not ever come back because the site has hardly anything on it.. or if the search function brings up irrelevant searches because someone uses tags that are not really relevant. 

The other day I did a search for a specific item on goimagine and it brought up 3 items that was relevant and 2 pages of stuff in no way anything close. Etsy has enough sellers and products there is almost always something