Are You Making The Most of Your Ecommerce Blogs SEO Power?

Blogging for your e-store has a number of benefits, but are you taking full advantages of blogs in regards to search engine optimization?

Using keyword text appearing naturally in your posts and interlinking your product pages and even related blog posts gives those pages additional keyword relevance and page strength in the eyes of search engines. You're essentially telling the search engine that the page you're pointing to is all about "keyword phrase." This also helps direct visitors that stumble upon your blog content to your e-store. And since most ecommerce product pages do not have any external links pointing at them (not counting affiliate links), this can give you a real leg up on your competition!

Take this fictitious blog for a company that runs two ecommerce websites: a florist / flower delivery shop and a garden supply company.

The blog post doesn't necessarily have to presell your products, in this case it is providing some useful tips for caring for gardenias. This content is not only helpful for this company's customers, but could be found by anyone searching for such information through a search engine.

Within the post are several opportunities to link to deeper product pages of the gardening e-store. The links here could potentially link to:

• "care for your house plants" - another post on the blog or an in-depth guide offered on the main site, even an affiliate link to a relevant book on Amazon.com
• "African Violets" and "Poinsettas" - category pages for these particular plants, even though they are not the subject of the post
• "Gardenia arrangement" - a more targeted term that someone who was further along in the buying cycle would use, more likely a higher converting keyword than "gardenia" itself, pointing to a gardenia arrangement product page on the florist site
• "bouquet of tulips" - the tulip arrangement product page on the florist site, again, another complementary keyword, using a longer tail variation
• "acid fertilizer" - to the garden supply site's acid fertilizer category

So if you have a corporate or company blog, make sure you're taking advantage of interlinking opportunities using keyword-rich link text. And if you've built up a content-rich blog already, it's not too late to go back in and add links. And keep this in mind when you write your next pos