Shopify has made it a breeze for merchants of all sizes to build beautiful online stores. But what good is a great Shopify store without visitors? This is where search engine optimization (SEO) comes in. This is a strategy focused on bringing organic traffic to online stores.
With 48% of shoppers starting their product hunt via a search engine, having an SEO strategy in place is crucial to driving consumers to your store. SEO, however, can be quite technical and time-consuming. Fortunately, Shopify has got your back, offering a number of SEO apps that will up your SEO game in an instant.
Before we give you a rundown of the best ones, let’s take a quick look at what SEO comprises.
A Brief Look At SEO
SEO is the practice of implementing a range of techniques so that search terms relevant to your business are synced with your website. Doing so will improve the ranking of your website against the most pertinent searches to the products you sell. This is a massive win as more suitable customers will be driven to your store, which increases the likelihood of securing sales.
Additionally, SEO plays a part in improving the user experience. Search engines take into account engagement metrics such as page speed and bounce rate when considering the rank of a website on SERPs. So, when you fully optimize your Shopify store for search engines, you’ll also guarantee a better shopping experience for your visitors.
When developing an SEO strategy, there are a number of elements to consider. This includes keyword density, page speed, backlinks, meta tags, and sitemap. These will work together to help your Shopify store climb the ranks.
Considerations for SEO strategy. (Source: Six Ads)
The variety of SEO elements can make forming a strategy a technical and complex task. So if you are a newbie or pressed for time, your best bet is to make use of an SEO app. Take a look at our selection of the best ones in the Shopify store.
Read more about SEO:
- Best SEO Practices for Shopify Collection Page
- 4 Search Engine Optimization Considerations Besides Keywords For Dummies
- Google’s New Core Web Vitals for Ranking Factors & How it affects e-merchants
Top 5 Shopify SEO Apps
SEO Suite by AVADA: Best app with speed focus
Rating: 4.9 stars
Price: Free plan available or $29 per month
SEO Suite is a pretty comprehensive app that can help you rank better on Google swiftly. The app was made with Google in mind with features to meet the search engine’s best practices. What's more, many of these features can be automated - great news for SEO newbies!
With SEO Suite, you can automatically optimize the meta titles and descriptions for Product, Collection, Blog listing, and Single Blog pages. Also, it will automatically optimize the ALT tags so search engines can find your pictures with ease.
SEO Suite analyzes everything on your page to provide tips for improvement.
If you’re unsure of where to shift your SEO focus, SEO Suite can provide an analysis of product pages and suggest the best solutions on a paid plan. Alternatively, you can consult the free SEO checklist to guide you.
As mentioned, the app has strong connections with Google. Google structured data can be auto-added to these pages. This will help the search engine better understand the content so that your pages appear in relevant searches, and will display your site in a more interesting way on SERPs. Plus, merchants can stay on top of their performance on Google thanks to the app’s integration with Google Search Console.
What sets SEO Suite apart, however, is its focus on page speed. This is one of Google’s new core web vitals, so it is an important consideration if you want to boost your ranking. The app promises to make your website fast on all devices and improve your Page Speed Performance score. It can also optimize your images automatically so that your pages load faster.
Learn more:
SEO Booster - SEO Marketing: Thorough features for both SEO newbies and experts
Rating: 4.8 stars
Price: Free plan available. Paid plans start at $34 per month with a 7-day free trial
SEO Booster is a super popular app that provides an all-in-one SEO solution for Shopify merchants. It has a simple interface with tons of features that can be automated if you choose one of their paid plans.
A great starting point for merchants who are unfamiliar with SEO is the SEO report which is available on all plans. Here, you’ll find detailed insight into your site’s SEO health with suggestions to fix.
Color-coded statistics give you instant, easy-to-recognize insight into your SEO performance. (SEO Booster)
Your site can appear with pertinent information like product rating, stock amount, and price in search results thanks to full JSON-LD. This is a method of structuring the data on your store’s pages so that search engines can easily read its content to match it to relevant searches. If you want to improve page speed, SEO Booster can perform a speed analysis, and optimize speed with pre-loaded pages.
Want to have a more comprehensive look at your site’s performance? Integration with Google Analytics and Google Search Console will give you this deep insight to further your SEO decision-making. The app also supports automated alt-tags for your images and automated meta tags on the paid plans.
The pro plan has some impressive features such as identifying potential keywords based on real-time data. It will also aid you in getting ahead of your competition with the competitor analysis. Moreover, the use of accelerated mobile pages can enhance the mobile experience while advanced Google snippets will show extra information on SERPs.
Users of this app will get around the clock support through live chat, and their expert team of developers can customize SEO for your site.
Plug in SEO: Best choice for enterprises that sell internationally
Rating: 4.6 stars
Price: Free plan available. Paid plans start at $20 per month with a 14-day free trial
Plug in SEO is an all-in-one app that would particularly suit large Shopify stores.
Create templates for your meta tags and save tons of time. (Plug in SEO)
Store owners with a huge inventory can optimize their meta titles and descriptions in minutes with the app’s bulk editor. It uses templating technology to apply these tags with minimal effort. Operate internationally? Your SEO can be optimized in all your foreign markets as it comes with multilingual SEO support. Plus, JSON-LD data will give your pages more pizazz on SERPs with the inclusion of reviews, product availability, social media links, and more.
Plug in SEO can optimize SEO across your product pages, collections, homepage, and blog pages. On all plans, the app can run unlimited SEO and speed checks. The issues found can be resolved automatically on paid plans. Additional data to inform your tactics is also available as the app is integrated with Google Search Console.
Plug in SEO provides a lot of support for Shopify merchants on paid plans, particularly those who are a little unfamiliar with SEO. An impressive unique feature of this app is the training videos and guides available. The cloud of confusion around SEO can be completely removed as they provide a wealth of information to help merchants improve their knowledge. Additionally, the keyword research feature can assist you in the creation and optimization of search terms for product descriptions and blog posts - a great first step in pushing your pages up SERPs.
Smart SEO: Basic features for starters
Rating: 5 stars
Price: Free plan available or $9.99 per month with a 7-day free trial
If your budget is tight and your SEO needs are simple, Smart SEO is the app for you. Across all plans, Shopify merchants can optimize their images, meta tags, and alt-tags, and fix broken links automatically. The number of image optimizations and broken link fixes will differ depending on which of the plans you choose. What’s also great about this app is regardless of what plan you’re on, you’ll have the ability to manage your sitemap with ease.
Edit alt-tags so your products appear in Google image searches. (Source: Smart SEO)
Choosing a paid plan not only increases the number of optimizations but also enables JSON-LD data. This can be generated to include Website, Store, Organization, Breadcrumb, ItemList, Product, Offer, AggregateRating, Blog, and Article. Shopify merchants with stores in foreign markets will find this app extremely handy as meta tags and JSON-LD can be created for different languages.
SEO Doctor: Great solution for SME
Rating: 4.5 stars
Price: Free plan available. Paid plans start at $14.99 per month
SEO Doctor tackles all the basic SEO needs so your store can rank higher in SERPs. Users of this app can have their store scanned for SEO issues and view recommendations. SEO Doctor also optimizes images with alt-tags and compression, including structured data, meta tags managing, and page speed boosting.
Understand the state of your store’s SEO at a glance and address issues instantly. (Source: SEO Doctor)
If you want these features automated, you’ll need to select one of the paid plans - which is what we would recommend for SEO newbies. Paid plans also have more extensive auditing capabilities and provide sitemap management - something that midsize to large stores may find more useful.
The app has integrations with lots of Google tools so merchants can really stay on top of their SEO performance. This includes Google Search Console, Google Page Speed, Google Mobile-Friendly Test, and Google Knowledge Graph Support.
Final Thoughts
SEO can be a tricky thing to wrap your head around, but it is vital in boosting organic web traffic. This is why Shopify SEO apps are such a big help. They can automate processes if you’re pressed for time or have limited knowledge. They can provide you with valuable data insights so you can continuously improve your ranking.
Regardless of your SEO needs or budget, you can boost your search engine ranking in an instant by trying one of these top apps.
