SEO for Fashion Ecommerce: Our Agency’s ULTIMATE 7-STEP Plan

Solid SEO for fashion ecommerce helps you get results like these:

‍

In fact, Deux par Deux Kids is one of our best success stories in SEO for fashion brands.

This guide will help you get even better SEO results. 

So, let’s dive right in.

TL:DR:

What Is SEO for Fashion Ecommerce and What Makes It Different?

SEO for fashion ecommerce improves your website to make sure your fashion brand appears higher in search engine results. 

Pro tip: You can notice specific particularities for fashion e-commerce brands compared to general search engine optimization. That’s why you can’t hire a generic SEO agency.

These unique elements shape the SEO efforts you need to engage the right audience in the fast-paced fashion ecommerce niche.

• Mobile dominance: Over 60% of product searches – including fashion product searches – are on mobile. That means you need a very mobile-friendly website.
• Product pages focus: Other websites aren’t centered around product pages. But you likely have hundreds of such pages, and some feature very similar products. Optimized product descriptions, images, and URLs ensure that these pages are prime for conversions.
• Search intent: People looking for fashion products usually look for very specific terms like “long black casual dress.” These are called long-tail keywords. Well, optimizing for such long-tail keywords helps you capture the specific interests and intentions of potential customers.
• Competitive edge: The fashion market is crowded, but you already know that. The point is you need standout SEO strategies for visibility among other fashion ecommerce businesses.

Just look at how comprehensive Old Navy’s website is, encompassing tens of product categories and multiple other product pages:

Benefits of SEO for Fashion E-commerce

SEO is vital in the fashion niche for several compelling reasons:

• Increased visibility: Effective SEO strategies boost your search engine rankings, making it easier for target customers to find your fashion e-commerce website amid a competitive digital landscape.
• Higher conversion rates: When you focus on relevant keywords and create SEO-optimized content, you attract visitors more likely to purchase. Ultimately, this improves your conversion rate.
• Customer engagement: High-quality content not only informs but also engages. We’ll see in a few seconds that one of our strategies is to build a solid fashion blog. Well, the content you’ll publish on that blog helps you build relationships with customers by providing fashion tips, trends, product reviews, and expert advice. And all that relevant content keeps them coming back.
• Cost efficiency: Organic search is a cost-effective channel compared to paid advertising. Investing in SEO can yield long-term dividends by consistently driving traffic without ongoing costs.
• Enhanced user experience: SEO involves, among others, improving your website’s mobile responsiveness and user-friendliness. And these are factors that Google considers when ranking sites, so they directly impact your SEO rankings.

Our Agency’s Top Fashion Ecommerce SEO Strategies

Now that you’ve seen what makes SEO for fashion ecommerce brands different and why it’s important let’s plan your strategy from A to Z.

1. Create a User-Friendly Website 

A user-friendly website is essential in fashion ecommerce because it significantly influences user experience, SEO rankings, and, ultimately, conversion rates. 

Here’s how to ensure your website meets these criteria:

Mobile Website

Over 60.67% of online shopping traffic comes from mobile devices, so a mobile-friendly website will help you reach a wider audience. Besides, a website that looks good on mobile enhances user experience and ultimately influences user behavior.

Deux par Deux Kids offers a great example:

So, implement a responsive design.

Ensure your website automatically adjusts to fit the screen size of any device.

Then, optimize navigation and button sizes for touch control.

Speed

A slow website can lead to a high bounce rate, with 53% of mobile users abandoning sites that take longer than three seconds to load.

To implement speed optimization for your online fashion website:

• Use Google PageSpeed Insights: Before doing anything, conduct a speed audit to see the exact issues – if any – your website is dealing with.
• Optimize images: Use compression tools to reduce image file sizes without losing quality.
• Minimize HTTP requests: Reduce the number of elements that need to be loaded.
• Leverage browser caching: Store frequently used data in temporary storage to speed up page loading on subsequent visits.

Let’s analyze Barker’s Shoes.

Apparently, they failed their Core Web Vitals check:

However, they have plenty of solutions to implement:

Navigation

Clear and intuitive navigation ensures that potential customers can find what they’re looking for quickly and easily.

That’s why ease of navigation directly impacts the bounce rate and user experience.

We typically advise our clients to focus on the following elements:

• Simplified menu: Use a clean, streamlined menu with clear categories.
• Search bar: Implement an easily accessible and functional search bar to help users find specific items.
• Breadcrumb navigation: Include this to help users track their path from the home page to the current page.

For example, our success story, Deux par Deux Kids, has an intuitive website with plenty of categories that are well organized for visibility:

CTAs (Calls to Action)

Captain Obvious Moment: Calls to action are not just important for fashion e-commerce SEO.

They’re an important part of your overall digital marketing strategies.

Here’s the problem: We’ve seen many generic SEO agencies simply ignoring CTAs because they’re not specialized in fashion SEO.

So, they don’t stop to think that optimizing CTAs can actually be part of a solid SEO strategy for fashion ecommerce.

You probably noticed that Deux Par Deux has a great CTA for its mobile app: 

This CTA remains fixed as you scroll through their mobile website.

So, obviously, effective CTAs guide users toward conversion, impacting the click-through rate and conversion rate.

It’s also easy to implement if you focus on:

• Visibility: Make CTAs stand out with contrasting colors.
• Actionable language: Use verbs that encourage action, like ‘Buy Now,’ ‘Learn More,’ or ‘Sign Up.’
• Placement: Position CTAs both above and below the fold and within easy reach during navigation.

Fonts

Again, many generic SEO agencies can choose to ignore fonts as part of the web design team’s responsibility.

Conversely, an SEO agency focused on revenue growth will not ignore these website elements.

Readable fonts contribute to a good user experience and make the website more accessible. That means they can direct users toward conversion.

So:

• Choose fonts that are easy to read and size them appropriately for desktop and mobile.
• Maintain consistent font styles across all pages to ensure a cohesive look.
• Ensure sufficient contrast between text and background colors to facilitate readability.

Shopping Cart and Checkout Process

A smooth checkout process reduces cart abandonment rates, which is an average of 69.57%.

In the fashion sector, 68.3% of people abandon their carts. And online clothing stores have a 40% cart abandonment rate.

 You can avoid that if you:

• Minimize the number of steps required to complete a purchase.
• Allow customers to checkout without creating an account.
• Include various payment methods to cater to different preferences.

Insider tip: We like to include user reviews on the checkout page.

This tactic helps SEO because user reviews include keywords naturally, without any keyword stuffing.

Plus, current UGC statistics show that these reviews are very compelling.

2. Competitor Research

Understanding what your competitors are doing can be a game-changer in the highly competitive fashion industry because you get:

• Market insights: Competitor research provides valuable insights into market trends and customer preferences within the fashion ecommerce industry. That means you can identify solid opportunities before they become mainstream. And we all know fashion trends change really fast.
• Benchmarking: You can compare your SEO efforts, product offerings, and marketing strategies against those of your competitors. That means you can sleuth out areas for improvement.
• Innovation opportunities: Analyzing the competition can help you spot gaps in their strategies or areas they haven’t fully capitalized on. So, you get a chance to innovate and capture their market share.

For example, a quick competitor research for Old Navy shows you these competitors outranking them:

What’s even more interesting is that Walmart ranks for branded “Old Navy” keywords better than Old Navy itself:

Here’s how to conduct competitor research step-by-step for your own website:

1. Identify competitors: Use tools like Google Keyword Planner and Moz Keyword Explorer to identify which companies rank for the same keywords as your business.
2. Analyze their SEO strategies: Evaluate their website structure, content quality, keyword usage, meta descriptions, and title tags. Tools like SEMrush or Ahrefs can provide a detailed analysis of their search rankings and the keywords driving traffic.
3. Review their content: Look beyond their keyword rankings at the type of content they publish. Assess the engagement levels, especially for the pieces you also want to rank. Particularly focus on how well they address customer needs and search intent.
4. Assess website user experience: Analyze their website design for user-friendliness, mobile responsiveness, navigation ease, and loading speed. Tools like Google’s PageSpeed Insights will offer quantitative data on their site performance.
5. Check their backlink profiles: Understanding who links to your competitors can offer insights into their reputation and authority in the industry. High-quality links from reputable websites are a strong indicator of trust.
   • Pro tip: Even better than that, you can contact their link partners to get brand mentions from them, too.
6. Evaluate their social proof and customer engagement: Look at customer reviews, testimonials, and overall engagement on social media to gauge their brand’s reputation and customer satisfaction levels.
7. Monitor their sales tactics and promotions: Keep an eye on their pricing strategies, discounts, and promotional campaigns. This can help you adjust your sales tactics to stay competitive or to offer better value.

3. Focus on Product Pages

Optimizing product pages will boost the visibility and appeal of your fashion e-commerce website.

Besides, you’ll enhance user experience on your product pages, so they’ll be likelier to convert visitors into buyers.

Here’s how to make the most of each element:

Relevant Keywords for Fashion Brands

Choosing the right keywords ensures that your product pages are discovered by users actively looking to buy.

Use keyword research tools like Google Keyword Planner or Moz Keyword Explorer to find high-search volume keywords specific to your products.

Next, incorporate them strategically – but avoid keyword stuffing.

Place relevant keywords naturally in titles, descriptions, and even ALT tags to improve organic search visibility.

Here’s a slew of keyword ideas that Old Navy can write content for:

Notice they all have a low difficulty and high search volume.

This is Neil Patel’s Ubersuggest we’ve used – just to show you it has the option to generate content with AI, too.

So, you’re living in a world where generating high-quality, relevant content for your audience is essentially easy.

Titles

Titles are the first thing searchers see in search results; compelling titles increase click-through rates by up to 500%.

So, be concise and clear. 

Ensure titles are descriptive yet succinct, typically under 60 characters, to avoid truncation in search results.

Pro tip: Include brand keywords and key features. Mention the brand, type of product, and one or two distinctive features.

For example, Barker Shoes offers a negative example here because they have various product pages with the same title: “McClean.”

Descriptions

Well-crafted descriptions serve as a selling point and help with search rankings.

Remember:

• Focus on benefits: Highlight what’s unique about the product and why it’s a must-have.
• Use natural language: Embed keywords naturally to enhance readability and SEO.

Canonicalize Your Web Pages

Canonical tags prevent issues related to duplicate content across similar or identical pages.

For example, if you retail the exact pair of shoes in red, green, and blue – you need separate pages for each.

So, assign a canonical tag to the preferred URL if product information appears on multiple pages.

Rich Snippets

Rich snippets enhance how your pages are displayed in SERPs with additional information like ratings or price.

Basically, they increase your fashion store’s visibility considerably.

They also increase CTR by 677%.

Here’s what this looks like on Google:

To implement this, we use structured data.

Use Schema.org markup to provide search engines with detailed product information, improving the chance of displaying rich snippets.

High-Quality Visuals

Visuals can impact buyer decisions, with studies showing that clear, high-quality images can increase conversion rates by up to 60%.

Pro tip: And websites with AR see a 94% higher conversion rate.

That’s why mages are extremely important for fashion websites. Arguably much more important than on other websites.

To win at this:

• Use professional photos: Invest in professional photography to showcase your products in the best light.
• Optimize your images: Ensure images are high-resolution yet optimized for fast loading.

And here, we’ll take the opportunity to praise Barker Shoes because their product images are indeed professional and unique:

4. Start a Fashion Blog 

Starting a fashion blog on your e-commerce website can significantly boost your SEO efforts and connect with your target audience.

Here's why it's important for SEO:

• Drive organic traffic: Regularly updated blogs with high-quality content improve organic search rankings by keeping your site content fresh and relevant.
• Establish authority: A blog allows you to showcase your expertise in the fashion industry, building trust and credibility with your audience.
• Enhance user engagement: Engaging and informative content keeps visitors on your site longer, reducing bounce rates and increasing the likelihood of conversions.
• Deepen your relationships with customers: You can create a loyal community around your brand. This community is likelier to purchase your products in the long-term and support you during PR crises.

Here’s how to start a fashion blog step-by-step:

1. Define your niche: Focus on specific aspects of fashion that align with your brand and appeal to your target audience, such as sustainable fashion, luxury accessories, or fashion trends.
2. Plan your content: Develop a content strategy that includes a variety of blog posts, from how-to guides and trend analyses to customer stories and expert tips. Use keyword research tools to identify topics that have a high search volume and relevance to your audience.
3. Create high-quality content: Produce well-researched, visually appealing, and engaging posts that provide real value to your readers. Ensure each blog post is optimized with relevant keywords without resorting to keyword stuffing.
4. Optimize for SEO: Use best practices for on-page SEO, including meta descriptions, title tags, internal links, and structured data to help search engines understand and rank your content.
5. Promote your blog: Share your blog posts across social media platforms, in newsletters, and through other marketing channels. Consider guest posting on reputable websites in your niche to build high-quality backlinks and drive traffic.

Remember to use a keyword research tool to find content ideas. Let’s say your website only retails shoes for kids.

You might think you don’t have a lot of keyword opportunities here – but you’d be wrong. Here’s what Ubersuggest suggests:

And that’s just a part of it.

You can also filter these ideas by the number of monthly searches and keyword difficulty to leverage the most profitable content opportunities.

Here’s another example from Deux par Deux Kids:

This article answers a very important question for parents all around the world.

It’s also a great content for top-of-the-funnel customers who can find out more about baby-friendly coats from Deux par Deux.

5. Local vs. International SEO

Understanding the differences between local and international SEO is crucial for fashion ecommerce businesses that operate across different markets.

Here's a breakdown of each and how to optimize for both according to your needs:

Local SEO

Local SEO helps fashion businesses attract customers who are searching for fashion products or stores in their vicinity.

You’ll need this, especially if you have physical stores or region-specific online services.

How to implement:

• Google My Business: Create and maintain a Google My Business listing, complete with your store’s location, hours, and local reviews.
• Local keywords: Use location-specific keywords in your content, meta titles, and descriptions to appear in local search queries.
• Local backlinks: Build links with local newspapers, blogs, and business associations to enhance your local search engine visibility.

International SEO

If your fashion e-commerce business aims at a global market, international SEO is essential to attract customers from different countries and regions.

Focus on:

• Hreflang tags: Use hreflang tags to tell search engines which language and region your pages are targeted at, ensuring that users see the content in their preferred language.
• Localized content: Create content that resonates with the target audience in specific countries, taking into account cultural nuances and local fashion trends.
• Global link building: Establish high-quality backlinks from international sites to improve your site’s authority and global reach.

Key Differences

• Audience targeting: Local SEO focuses on capturing the nearby audience, often leading to quick visits and purchases. On the other hand, international SEO targets broader demographics with a more culturally nuanced approach.
• Keyword strategy: Local SEO leverages geographic terms and regional expressions, whereas international SEO involves researching popular search terms across different languages and regions.
• Technical considerations: International SEO requires more complex website structures, such as subdomains or subdirectories for different regions. On the other hand, local SEO typically uses a single domain.

6. Don’t Neglect On-Page SEO

On-page SEO is fundamental to ensuring your fashion e-commerce website ranks well in search engine results.

But it’s more than that. 

Effective on-page SEO is appealing to potential customers. 

Optimizing these elements below allows you to boost important SEO ranking factors like click-through rate, dwell time, and session length. And you’ll also decrease factors like bounce rates.

Here’s how to optimize these crucial elements effectively:

Schema Markup

Schema markup helps search engines understand the content of your pages, which can enhance the display of your pages in search results (through rich snippets, for example).

Use Product schema to provide details like price, availability, and ratings.

You can also implement Review schema to highlight customer reviews and improve credibility and attraction.

URLs

It’s very common for ecommerce fashion stores to have long, intricate URLs for different product pages.

Here’s an example of a long, intricate URL from Old Navy’s website:

A simple /category/women-jeans would have been easier to understand both by search engines and regular people.

By comparison, clean, descriptive URLs are easier for search engines and users to understand. And that’s why using them improves your search engine rankings.

Remember: Keep URLs short, using relevant keywords that reflect the page content. Avoid complex strings and numbers; use hyphens to separate words.

Meta Titles

Meta titles are a critical factor in click-through rates from search results; they act as the headline for your webpage in SERPs.

To win at this, ensure each page has a unique title that includes the main keywords.

Insider tip: Consider adding your brand name, especially if it's well-known in the competitive fashion industry.

Meta Descriptions

Although they don’t directly impact SEO rankings, meta descriptions affect user click-through rates by providing a summary of the webpage content.

Write concise and compelling descriptions that encourage users to click, using relevant keywords and a call to action.

Additional On-Page Elements

• Headings (H1, H2, etc.): Organize content clearly with headings that include target keywords. This tactic improves both readability and SEO.
• Image optimization: Ensure all images on your site have descriptive file names and alt text, which will enhance user experience and SEO.
• Internal links: Use internal links to guide users to related content and keep them engaged longer on your site.

7. Off-Page SEO

Off-page SEO is as crucial as on-page optimization for enhancing the visibility and authority of your fashion ecommerce website. 

The point is to build your online presence beyond your website and attract more visitors to it.

Here’s how to employ various off-page tactics effectively:

Relationship Link-Building

Building relationships with relevant websites and influencers in the fashion industry can lead to high-quality backlinks.

Getting organic mentions from them will boost your site’s authority and search engine rankings.

So, consider:

• Networking: Engage with fashion bloggers, journalists, and industry leaders through events, social media, and direct outreach.
• Collaborations: Partner with industry peers on projects or content that provide mutual benefits. This approach encourages natural link creation.

Here’s Deux par Deux rocking it again:

Guest Posting

Guest posting on reputable websites provides backlinks and, more importantly, exposes your brand to a wider audience.

First, look for fashion blogs and websites with strong audience engagement and authority.

Then, offer valuable, unique content that fits the host site’s standards and audience interests.

Roundup Posts

Being featured in roundup posts can drive traffic and improve brand credibility.

So, contact bloggers who do weekly or monthly summaries of fashion news or tips and pitch your content or products.

Of course, you have to ensure your contributions or featured products are of high interest to their readership.

Affiliates for Fashion Blogs

Fashion affiliate programs can drive sales and boost SEO through additional external links pointing to your site.

Follow these steps:

• Select affiliates carefully: Choose affiliates that align with your brand values and have their own robust audiences.
• Offer discount codes: Create specific discount codes with UTM links for each affiliate. You should also incentivize their performance with solid commissions or sales bonuses.
• Monitor performance: Keep track of affiliate performance to ensure your brand is represented appropriately and effectively.

Social Media SEO

While social media doesn’t directly influence SEO rankings, it affects them indirectly by increasing brand exposure and traffic to your website.

So, remember to regularly post engaging content and interact with your followers to build a community.

Insider tip: Use shareable content.

Create content that is easy and appealing to share, such as exclusive offers, stunning visuals, and compelling narratives.

Here’s a sneak peek into the Deux par Deux ambassador program that increases their social media reach with social media influencers:

SEO for Enterprise-Level Fashion Brands vs Smaller Websites

If you read so far, you now have a complete SEO strategy for your fashion website. 

However, SEO strategies differ significantly between large enterprise-level fashion brands and smaller fashion websites.

Here are some differences:

• Resource allocation: Big brands have larger budgets and teams dedicated to SEO efforts, so they can create more extensive campaigns and invest in more competitive keywords. Smaller sites might focus more on cost-effective tactics like guest postings and low-competition keywords.
• Brand authority: Enterprise brands typically have established reputations and high-quality backlinks from reputable websites, which boost their search engine rankings. Smaller sites must work harder to build authority and may rely more on niche-specific content and community engagement.
• Content scale and scope: Large brands can produce a vast array of content in a short time frame. With the right budget, you can have anything from detailed product descriptions to rich blog posts about fashion trends in a matter of days. Smaller entities need to be strategic, focusing on highly targeted content that appeals directly to their target audience.
• Technical SEO: Larger brands can implement complex technical updates like structured data markup and content delivery networks quickly to enhance their site’s performance and SEO. Smaller sites might prioritize basic optimizations such as image file names and mobile optimization to improve user experience.

These differences outline how SEO tactics are tailored to suit the scale and capabilities of your fashion business. So, to make sure you have the best online success and visibility, it’s important to choose the right SEO agency.

Blue Things can help you with all the SEO tactics we discussed above.

And you’ll get the same awesome results as Deux Par Deux Kids – and all our other success case studies.

So, schedule a free strategy call. We’ll show you potential SEO issues you’re dealing with and practical solutions to overcome those roadblocks in real-time.

FAQ

How can I improve my fashion e-commerce store's SEO?

To enhance your store's SEO, focus on mobile optimization, improve page loading speeds, and ensure easy navigation. Use SEO-optimized content with relevant keywords in product descriptions and blogs. Build quality backlinks and regularly update content to engage users and boost rankings.

How much does SEO for fashion e-commerce cost?

SEO costs vary widely, typically ranging from $500 to over $5,000 per month, depending on the scope of services, the size of the business, and the industry's competitiveness. Smaller businesses might start with less extensive, more budget-friendly strategies.

What are the most important ranking factors for fashion e-commerce?

Key ranking factors include mobile responsiveness, user experience, page speed, high-quality content, and backlinks. On-page elements like title tags, meta descriptions, and product detail accuracy are also crucial because they help search engines understand and rank pages better.

What are some good keywords to target for fashion e-commerce?

Effective keywords could include specific product names, attributes (like "sustainable women's beach dresses"), and broader terms like "trendy summer fashion." Tools like Google Keyword Planner or Moz Keyword Explorer can help identify high-traffic keywords relevant to your target audience and niche.