E-commerce SEO
An online shop has hundreds of pages that look almost alike to Google. E-commerce SEO is deciding which of them deserve to be found, making those excellent, and keeping the rest out of the way.
→The short answer
E-commerce SEO is the work that gets an online shop's category and product pages found on Google: category pages written for the searches people make, complete product data so products can appear in Google's shopping results for free, filters that don't create thousands of duplicate pages, and sensible handling of out-of-stock and discontinued products.
(01)Category pages
Where most of a shop's search traffic should land.
Category pages do the heavy lifting
People search broadly before they search specifically: "women's waterproof jackets" before a particular jacket. Category pages are what rank for the broad searches, so they need more than a grid of products.
One category for each real search
Organise categories around how customers search, not how your stockroom is arranged. If people search "linen bedding", it deserves a page.
A short introduction, written for the search
A few helpful sentences above the products: what's in the range and how to choose. Longer buying advice can sit below the grid.
Links between levels
Clothing links to jackets, jackets to waterproof jackets, and back up again, so Google and customers can find every product in a few clicks.
No empty categories in search
A category with no products should be kept out of Google's index until it has some1.
(02)Products and free listings
Your products can appear in Google's shopping results without paying.
Product data and Google's free listings
Structured data on every product page
Price, availability, delivery and returns in the code Google reads, so products can show with their details in search results2.
Google Merchant Center
A product feed in Merchant Center makes your products eligible for free listings across Google, including the Shopping tab, Images and YouTube3. It costs nothing; accurate prices, stock and delivery costs are what it needs.
Product titles that match searches
Brand, product type and the details people search for, such as colour, material and size, in a sensible order. Not clever names on their own.
Your own descriptions
The supplier's description appears on every other shop selling the same product. Written your way, with the answers customers ask for, it gives Google a reason to choose your page.
Photos that work in search
Clear product photos on a plain background, with descriptive file names and alt text.
(03)Filters and duplicates
The problem most shops don't know they have.
Filters, sorting and duplicate pages
Every filter a customer can click, colour, size, price, brand, can create a new address, and combinations multiply into thousands of near-identical pages. Google has to crawl them all, and the pages you want found get less attention. Google's own guidance is to keep filter pages out of crawling when they don't need to be found, and only create them when products exist4.
How we handle them
- Sorting options (price, newest) are never indexed.
- Most filter combinations are kept out of Google's crawl.
- A filter people genuinely search for, such as "black leather ankle boots", becomes a proper category page with its own introduction.
- Product variants (sizes, colours) share one product page rather than a page each.
- Filters that would show no products aren't clickable.
(04)Out of stock
Out-of-stock and discontinued products
| Situation | What to do with the page |
|---|---|
| Temporarily out of stock | Keep it live, marked out of stock in the product data2, with a back-in-stock alert and similar products. |
| Seasonal, coming back next year | Keep it live and say when it returns. Its search history is worth keeping. |
| Discontinued, with a direct replacement | Redirect it to the replacement. |
| Discontinued, nothing equivalent | If it still gets visits or links, keep the page with clear alternatives. If not, let it return a 'not found' page with helpful links. Never redirect everything to the homepage. |
| A category with nothing in it | Keep it out of the index until it has products1. |
(05)Shopify SEO
Shopify does a lot for you; a few things it leaves to you.
Shopify SEO specifics
Two addresses for one product
A product opened from a collection gets a second address inside that collection. Shopify points Google to the main product address, but your theme should link to the main address directly.
Tag pages
Collection tags create extra pages that are usually thin copies of the collection. We keep them out of the index unless one deserves to be a real category.
Titles and descriptions
Every product, collection and page has its own search title and description in Shopify. The defaults are rarely good enough; we write them.
Fixed address patterns
Shopify decides much of the URL structure, such as /products/ and /collections/. We work with it rather than against it, and set redirects whenever a handle changes.
Apps and speed
Each app can add code to every page. A fast shop on a phone is part of SEO, so we keep apps to the ones that earn their place.
More on building on Shopify, including moving from another platform without losing traffic: Shopify website design.
(06)How we charge
E-commerce SEO in our partnership
Search optimisation is part of our e-commerce partnership: £499 for your branding, no build fee, then 5% of the sales your shop processes. If you'd like SEO for a shop you already run yourself, tell us about it and we'll say honestly whether we can help.
Questions
(07)Questions
Fixes to product data and duplicates can show within weeks once Google recrawls the shop. Category pages that compete for broad searches usually take months. Nobody can honestly promise a position or a date.
For the products that matter most, yes. The supplier's text appears on every shop that sells the item, so yours gives Google no reason to choose you. Start with your best sellers and your most-searched products.
Yes, it handles the basics well: sitemaps, editable titles, clean product pages. Most Shopify SEO problems come from themes, apps, tag pages and thin collections, which are all fixable.
No. You need a Google Merchant Center account with accurate product data. Paid Shopping ads are separate, and optional.
Sources
(08)Sources
Every figure on this page comes from one of these. Checked on the date shown.
- 1Ecommerce URL structure best practices, Google Search Central. Checked 26 October 2026.
- 2Merchant listing (Product, Offer) structured data, Google Search Central. Checked 26 October 2026.
- 3Free listings for products, Google Merchant Center Help. Checked 26 October 2026.
- 4Crawling December: faceted navigation, Google Search Central Blog. Checked 26 October 2026.
(09)Start a project
Let's build your
free preview.
Tell us about your business. We'll come back with a plan and start on your preview. You pay nothing until you give it the nod.