Retail is Detail: Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Let's face it - running your own business is hard work!  There are no easy answers that work the same for everyone.  Those of us who have shops on Etsy have to learn how to apply marketing savvy we may have used in traditional retail to online selling.  Along with the specifics of your business plan, results will be influenced by your product mix, your target market, your competition, and the current market trends.  Do you have a business plan?

If you do not blog, have a Facebook page, use Twitter or other Social Media, what can you do to attract customers?  Let's look at Search Engine Optimization (SEO), which means where your items rank in search results.  Do they show up on the first page or even the first ten?

  

The term SEO was originally used for search engines like Google, Yahoo, or Bing.  But Etsy has its own search engine -- how soon your listings show up in an Etsy search effects your ability to make sales. The good news is you can impact your items' ranking with the proper use of keywords in the listing title and tags. Using the same phrasing and key words that customers actually use in their search is a must. You need to develop the ability to determine the best keywords for each of your listings.  This is a perfect example of why running an online business is not easy. Yet using the right tools can make a real difference.

To begin you need to know what the Etsy search engine does when someone enters words into the search bar. The system looks at listing titles and tags for the best match.

Best Practices for Titles 

Etsy titles can have up to 140 characters.
         
Best Practice: Titles that are short and descriptive.
Keep important keywords at the beginning of the title.

Repetition or "keyword stuffing" can hurt rankings on Etsy and Google.  An example would be using the word "dress" over and over again in the title and tags of a listing.  This can be seen as spam by the search engines and also potential customers.
         
Best Practice:  Keep repetitions to a minimum. Repeating keywords once or twice will not look like spam. More than that can affect the listing's rank.
         
You can be competing with yourself for search relevance if you use the same words over and over for items that are similar.
                     
Best Practice: Use a slightly different keywords for each listing of similar items. Different buyers might be searching with different keywords. Variation of keywords is the best way to ensure all similar listings will be seen.  

Best Practices for Tags

Etsy allows 13 tags per item. Three tags from the product categories are also automatically included.
       
Best Practice: Always use all 13 tags.
The order of tags is not important but order of words within the tags IS.

Best Practice:  Choose the word order you think a customer is most likely to enter. The word order that appears as suggested keywords when you type into the Etsy search bar reveals the most used word order for that search.  Spend some time entering different words and word orders into the search bar to see which combinations are used the most.  Also check your shop's stats to see what keywords were used to find your listings. The only punctuation or symbols allowed in tags are © and ™.

Repeating keywords in tags does not hurt your Etsy ranking, so you can move keywords around a bit in the tags.  Please note that repetition of key words in tags may hurt your Google ranking.

Tags are a good place to use niche keywords (i.e. long tail) that you wouldn't use in your title.

SEO Resources on Etsy

There are a number of great blog posts on Etsy about the art of writing titles, descriptions and tags for your listings. Two are discussed below.

https://blog.etsy.com/en/2011/shop-makeover-titles-descriptions-and-tags/

This post offers some great before and after examples of how to improve your listings titles, descriptions, and tags. Below is a short summary of the best advice in the article.

Titles:  don't be too vague, use the details in your description that would compel the customer to look further at the item. But -- be careful not to get too specific -- to over specify is to risk not relating to a wide enough pool of potential customers. The trick is to find a good balance that allows your listing to be general enough to be seen by a wide a lot of people while still being specific enough to entice a customer.  Not too hot, not too cold.

Descriptions:  This is where the customer should hear your voice and your passion. Specify why this item is special, use verbiage like, "we love the unique colors in this piece".  Specify dimensions, condition, labels, and item details. 

Tags:  Use keyword tags that a customer would use in a search, review a new listing tag by tag before you publish it and make sure you have used as many different keywords as possible. Use specific descriptive terms, (i.e. ruby red vs. red), use style specific terms, (i.e. Asian, Modernist, Brutalist).  Don't clutter your tags with different spellings of the same word (jewelry, jewellry).

Another great article on Etsy is about putting your shop on top.

https://blog.etsy.com/en/2011/putting-your-shop-on-top-etsy’s-most-relevant-search/

The key takeaways from this article are:

Although Etsy is moving towards weighting relevancy more than recency, the newness of a listing is very important with broad searches. Newer listings will be weighted more heavily and shown first.  This is why it's imperative to add new listings as often as you can, or re-list existing ones, and also to renew older listings.

If a search includes two or more words, then tags with the exact two words next to each other will be weighted more heavily, so when you are writing tags, repeat the exact phrasing you used in the title ("art deco necklace" in the title is also "art deco necklace" in the tags).

Again, review your Shop Stats regularly to see what keywords are working for you. Also try to figure which ones aren't.

Other Important SEO Factors

Buyer behavior in aggregate is the cumulative action buyers take when they see your product in search results including how many views, favorites, and treasuries the listing has been in.

Not all views and favorites are weighted the same by the Etsy search engine; those that come from team activities aren't rated as highly as "organic" favorites.

The quality of your photographs has a direct bearing on how many people will click to view your listing.  Great photos that show your listing in a clear uncomplicated manner will help it get more views.

Strategy to Improve SEO Relevancy

Run some search tests with a few of your items.  Don't make too many changes at once -- play with different key word orders and pairings and see if certain ones help move your item towards the front of a search.  Only work with listings you think are not being seen. Remember, "if it ain't broke don't fix it".

Make changes in titles and tags of items you are relisting.  Also think about taking new pictures if you feel the ones in the current listing aren't attention grabbers.

Keep a copy of the original listing in case the title and tags in it had better results.  Give your changes some time before you judge how effective they are.

Remember converting a view to a sale depends on many things -  photographs, descriptions, reviews, item specifics, shop policies, and price are some of the most important that may influence a customer to buy.

 

Sources: 

Etsy blog articles: 

"Shop Makeover Series: Titles, Descriptions and Tags"

"Putting Your Shop on Top"

Lastly, you may have heard about an online article that sited Etsy's new direction for SEO's. We certainly have heard talk of it; and  we have participated in team and individual "Blitz" activity generated in response to this article.  Here's a link to that article (it does get quite
technical), that being said it's quite interesting . . . .

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/2143857/papers/topics.pdf