Created on April 16, 2025 | Updated on April 16, 2025

Magento SEO: The Only Guide You'll Ever Need to Optimize Your Website

SEO Articles
Magento SEO: The Only Guide You'll Ever Need to Optimize Your Website

If you’re reading this, you most likely know how insanely important SEO is these days. So, in this guide, you won’t see any section like “SEO benefits” or, better yet, “What is Magento?”

We hope you understand all those basics, if not, please go and ask ChatGPT. Instead, in this article, we’ll get into details of how you can improve your optimization with the tried-and-true Magento SEO tips.

Note: To make things easy and convenient, we’ve split all those tips into groups. We’ve rated them as easy, moderate, and complex.

Of course, we think it’s best you start with the easiest fixes and then move up to more complicated strategies. But if you want to do it the other way around, go ahead and have fun.

Contents

Magento vs. Magento 2 SEO: Is it still okay to do optimization for Magento 1?

Note: If you’re already using Magento 2, just skip this section and scroll down to the next one on Magento SEO best practices.

But if you’re still using Magento 1, let’s address the elephant in the room. Our guide focuses on Magento 2, as the older version of Magento was officially deprecated. And Adobe stopped supporting it in 2020.

That’s why the short answer to whether you can still do optimization for Magento 1 is “yes,” but you probably shouldn’t.

You see, the issue is that you’re way too limited with the older version of Magento. But the biggest problem is that you face many more security risks, as there are no updates or patches anymore. And weak security is a giant “no” when it comes to SEO.

Even if we forget about all those problems, you get a huge advantage when using Magento 2 because it:

  • Is much faster compared to Magento. It’s all thanks to full-page caching and better indexing.
  • Comes with responsive themes by default, so you don’t have to worry too much about mobile-friendliness.
  • Automatically adds canonical tags to avoid duplicate content issues. Still, you have to keep an eye on this to make sure you’re doing fine.
  • Has built-in structured data (JSON-LD) for better Google Rich Snippets.
  • Automatically creates XML sitemaps, which saves you time.

On top of that, Magento 2 requires fewer extensions and manual setups. And, of course, it is supported by Adobe and is much better in many senses.

We know that transitioning might not be that easy, but it’s still highly recommended.

Now that we have got this out of the way, let’s jump to the main course — Magento ecommerce SEO tips.

Easy SEO Magento tactics

True to our promise, we are starting with the easy, low-effort tips. But make no mistakes — even though they are simple, that doesn’t mean they are not high-impact. In fact, even if you just fix these, you’ll be much better off than most sites out there.

1. Work on your meta tags

Meta tags perform an essential role in SEO. They serve up information about your site to search engines. This helps them display your page content (including title and description) correctly in the search results.

Your users and target audience also need this information to know if your webpage has the product they need. So, when you nail your meta tags, you’re definitely on a good track to crushing Magento SEO. To make your meta tags click-worthy, make sure you:

  • Optimize your title tags and meta descriptions;
  • Use proper headings;
  • Don’t duplicate meta tags across all your product pages.

Now, let’s see how each of these works in detail:

Optimize your title tags and meta descriptions

You probably already know to keep meta titles and descriptions unique for each page. But you also need relevant keywords for each as well.

When it comes to meta titles, keep them short and simple — anything over 60 characters is just too much. At the same time, meta descriptions should be up to 160 characters.

To do this, head to the Admin page and then, depending on what you need to edit, do the following:

  • For products: Go to Catalog → Manage Products. Then choose the product you need → click Search Engine Optimization.
  • For categories: Go to Catalog → Manage Categories. Next, choose the category you need → click Search Engine Optimization.
  • For blogs: Go to CMS → Pages → choose the page you need → click Search Engine Optimization.

Once you’re there, add your meta title, meta keywords, and meta description in the textbox that appears.

Note: In case you’re still using Magento 1, the process is identical. But instead of Search Engine Optimization, you have to look for Meta Information (for products), General Information (for categories) and Meta Data (for blogs). Yes, it’s different for different things.

Use proper headings

This part is straightforward — use H1 for your page title. There should only be one of these on each page. Then, use H2, H3, and H4 tags to structure your content and add keywords for better relevance.

At the same time, you want to avoid keyword stuffing — a terrible yet common SEO mistake that hurts rankings.

Don’t duplicate meta tags across all your product pages

Copy-pasting meta tags across different pages is a bad SEO Magento move that will confuse the search engines. And by now, you already know that this can (and most likely will) affect your search rankings negatively.

2. Ensure your URLs make sense

You can’t talk about Magento SEO best practices without saying anything about URLs. That’s because they are key. Key to what? Well, they help both your customers and search engines navigate through your site without hassle.

permalink structure

What are the best practices when it comes to your links?

  • Only use SEO-friendly URLs. To ensure that your URL is SEO-friendly, you have to keep it short and avoid any unnecessary parameters. When it comes to your slug SEO, throw in a keyword in there. This gives Google a heads-up on what the page is about.
  • Make it descriptive. This is not just because you want to be “colorful,” but it is literally what Google wants you to do.

Source: Google Search Central

Why? A permalink that says https://examplesite/best-laptops is easier to understand than one that reads ../productid=1234.

  • Avoid weird punctuations and symbols in your URLs. You know, those URLs that come with underscores, spaces, or tons of random %*^%^€*? That’s actually bad for Magento SEO performance (and not only Magento, for that matter).

Does this mean you should write your URLs with the words all jumbled together? Nope. You can use hyphens to separate words. This is easy for such engines to read, and your URLs will be free from junk as well. Also, it’s best to stick to lowercase.

  • Set up breadcrumbs to help make navigation and indexing better. Breadcrumbs help users know which path they took to get to the current page they are looking at. Plus, it makes it easy for crawlers to go through your site, too.

Source: Nordstrom

3. Pay attention to your images

Images are not just there to make your page look pretty. Sure, if they are good enough, they can get people to buy your products, but they also affect your SEO.

If you follow Magento 2 search engine optimization tricks for images, you should see improvements in rankings. Some of those hacks include:

  • SEO-friendly filenames. Use proper descriptive filenames for your images. For example, a name like red-Western-Cowboy-boots.jpg is far better than image9343.jpg.
  • Don’t forget the alt text. Each product image should have a descriptive alt tag. A keyword here wouldn’t hurt, either (if it makes sense). This is important for accessibility and SEO.

You want search engines to be able to understand your visuals. This will improve the odds of your shoes showing up in search results for Western Cowboy boots, for example (based on the example above).

  • Pay attention to media file size. For Magento SEO optimization, size does matter. Heavy files can slow down page load speed, which means lower rankings. So, ensure you compress your images.

You can do this using Magento 2 built-in lazy loading or several extensions. There are many options that will do nicely.

Source: YouTube

4. Make your content SEO-friendly

Magento SEO marketing content is a lot different from regular blogging on, say, WordPress. Of course, you can still have a blog. But here, it’s mostly about the product descriptions than anything else. You know, that copy that gets people pumped up about buying your products.

Since it can directly impact your revenue, you want to be sure to put your right foot forward on all counts. This means it’s got to align with people’s needs and search engines’ algorithms as well. That means you should try to:

  • Make a great first impression with the product title. The product title does not only have to be unique, but it also needs to be short and easy to read. That’s why you have to keep it between 30-60 characters long. On top of that, it needs relevant keywords.
  • Optimize the body copy. This means you are going to need to integrate relevant keywords into the content body. Whatever you do, avoid the urge to copy and paste from the manufacturer’s site or your competitors (or anyone else, really).

Another important SEO Magento 2 hack is to keep the paragraph short and concise. You can use bullet points to highlight the main features of your product. Besides, don’t forget to include quality images.

Still, always prioritize people (not search engines) when writing your description or anything else.

Here is a good example from a site using Magento.

Source: VitaMix

And that’s the wrap-up on our list of easy SEO for Magento 2 tips. Now comes the next section, which requires medium effort but gives a high yield.

Moderate Magento SEO techniques

Here are some SEO in Magento hacks that you can use to step things up a bit.

5. Submit your XML sitemaps to Google Search Console

Your XML sitemaps act like a real map for search engines that helps them find your site and content. It also provides a complete structured list of all your product pages. It makes it so that search engines know which pages are important and which are not.

A big part of Magento search engine optimization is ensuring that you submit your XML sitemaps to Google Search Console. You don’t want Google to miss your recent pages or be unaware of the existence of whole sections of your website.

To do this, you have to go to your Admin panel → Stores → Configuration. Then click Catalog → XML Sitemap.

  • Next, set up your preferences in Categories Options, Product Options, and CMS Pages Options.
  • After this, what you have to do is click on the Generation Settings and make the required changes.
  • Then go over to the Sitemap File Limits, where you will leave all the default values the same except if your store has more pages.
  • Then, finally, move on to Search Engine Submission Settings. Make sure the robots.txt file is set to “Yes.” Click on the Save Config button.

Now, go to Marketing → SEO & Search → Site Map, and then choose Add Sitemap. This will generate a new sitemap. Now you are done.

Don’t want to go through all that trouble? There are tons of Magento SEO extensions that can simplify the process, especially if you have some extra requirements. You can Google around a bit to find the perfect one.

6. Don’t ignore mobile-first indexing

It’s no secret that Google is partial to mobile-friendly sites. It uses the mobile version of your site to decide how to rank you. Don’t believe us? It says so right on their site.

Source: Google Search Central

This does not, of course, mean that if you don’t have a mobile responsive site, you won’t get ranked at all. Yet, stats show that mobile devices currently make up about 63.38% of all internet traffic.

Source: Statcounter Global Stats

Put simply — if you are not making your site attractive for the people using mobile devices, you are definitely losing money. It's not a good move for a business of any size.

Since mobile-first can affect how you rank in search results, you need a way to gain a competitive edge. To that end, you want to try these Magento 2 SEO optimization hacks for mobile-friendly sites:

  • Use mobile-responsive themes.
  • Improve Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), First Input Delay (FID), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS).
  • Use Magento 2’s PWA (Progressive Web App) Studio for better mobile performance.

What do all these mean? Let’s find out:

Use mobile-responsive themes

Like WordPress, Magento has a ton of SEO-friendly themes that you can use to build your site. Even a quick Google search will show tons of good options. For example, Envato, Claue, and Porto are just some of the most popular names.

Of course, you will have to check the features of each theme and read some reviews to see which is best for you. Some themes are free. But for a medium to large e-commerce site, you will need something a little more secure and powerful. This will probably cost you money.

Improve Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), First Input Delay (FID), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)

First of all, what are all these acronyms?

  • The LCP measures how well and fast the largest element on your page loads, whether it’s text, images, or anything else.
  • The FID takes note of how long it takes the page to respond to user interactions.
  • The CLS, on the other hand, focuses on how visually stable your page is.

Together, the three form what is known as Core Web Vitals.

If anything is off with any of these, it means the user is having a bad experience. Plus, minding your Core Web Vitals is simply a must if you want to outrank your competitors.

Since Google uses these metrics to judge UX, it affects your rankings. So, take the time to measure how your site performs. If the performance is poor, you might need to upgrade to a better server, minify your backend code, or choose a better CDN (more on these below).

You might also need to reduce Javascript load time, compress images, and decrease the number of Magento SEO plugins you use.

Use Magento 2’s PWA (Progressive Web App) Studio for better mobile performance

Sometimes, it’s easier to just install the right theme or extension. You know, to get your storefront to become more responsive.

The PWA Studio is an official Magento toolkit that gives you pre-built components and front-end architecture. You can customize it and add even more extensions for additional functionalities (if needed).

7. Improve page speed (as much as you can)

Want to increase engagement on your website almost overnight? Fix the page load speed. Studies after studies have shown that pages that load within 0-4 seconds get optimum conversion rates.

Clearly, there is a direct link between page speed and better rankings. So, you can’t work on Magento search engine optimization without working on page speed.

If you want to make sure everything on your end is performing well, then start by auditing your site. There are so many things that can seriously mess with a page load speed. We have already mentioned some of them, like heavy files, server performance, etc.

Source: HubSpot

But here are a few other tips you can use to significantly improve your page load speed:

Enable full-page caching (Magento 2’s built-in Varnish Cache)

You can use Varnish to add an extra layer between a user and the server. This is one Magento SEO feature that you should take full advantage of.

Basically, what it does is it stores a cached version of your pages. This removes the need to try and retrieve information from the database each time. It just pulls it directly from the cache.

This helps make your site respond faster since it cuts down on the server load.

Minimize JavaScript & CSS files

JavaScript can help you add some pretty cool effects and functionalities to your site. But sometimes, it just clogs things down, especially when there’s just too much going on.

That’s because the more you get going on a page, the longer it takes to load it. So, stick to what’s essential. Then, minify your JavaScript and CSS files. This means removing unnecessary code that is just causing bloat (including spaces).

You can also merge several JS codes together (the process called bundling) and move your JavaScript execution to the bottom of the page. This allows the page to load other stuff first before trying to load the effects.

Use CDN (Content Delivery Network) to load pages faster globally

This is one of the best SEO for Magento tips to slash down your page load time. CDNs are servers scattered around the world with cached versions of your website.

Using a CDN means that the user gets the information from your website faster. How? The nearest server from the network simply pulls out any requested information from their cache for every user.

8. Consider adding rich snippets

Ever searched for how to make your new favorite dish and got back results that looked like this?

Source: Google

That structured extra information like categories, ratings, and prep time is what rich snippets are about. Rich snippets provide additional data on top of the regular title, meta description, and URL.

Wondering what’s special about them? Most Magento SEO help blogs will tell you those are click magnets, and that’s true. Because they look different and give more details, they tend to result in higher click-through rates.

Equally important is the fact that they help search engines and users understand what a page is about. So, using these is definitely a good move when it comes to SEO for Magento's e-commerce.

So, how to do this?

  • If you’re on Magento 2, it automatically adds JSON-LD structured data to your product pages. This is one sweet perk that saves you time.
  • On Magento 1, you’ll need to install an SEO extension that you can use for schema markup. Examples of this are FMEAddons, OpenMage Rich Snippets and Cards, etc.

You have to carefully consider the different types of rich snippets you’ll need since there are so many.

9. Use internal links

On every Magento SEO checklist, you’ll find a section on internal links. That’s because these links do the important job of helping search engines discover your other pages. They also help pass link equity.

Source: Site Centre

But be careful, though. You don’t want to start linking pages all randomly. Did you know that while 40-45 internal links per URL meant more traffic, 45-50+ usually resulted in even less traffic?

To avoid any negative consequences, here’s what you could do:

  • Link smart. You should only connect related products and categories together. So, say, a page on dresses can link to accessories like earrings or even shoes and bags. This makes more sense than a link to a construction helmet or vest.
  • Use the tools at your disposal. You have access to Magento’s "Related Products" and "Upsells" features. Use them. They can help encourage customers to check other offers and improve your site's crawlability.
  • Stick to a shallow structure. You don’t want to use links to layer category pages on top of each other.

You know, so that when one clicks on a link, they need to click on six other links to find the right page. This is called deep nesting and can cause several Magento SEO issues. Instead, you want to keep your categories 2-3 clicks away from the homepage.

Here’s the thing — even though people keep arguing about it, backlinks are insanely important. It’s going to be hard to find a Magento 2 SEO guide that says otherwise. Till now, pages that top Google search results and get 27.6% of all clicks have more backlinks than all the others.

The more backlinks you have, the more credible your site appears to Google and people.

It’s not always easy for e-commerce sites to build backlinks. But that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. You can still:

This takes off the burden of you trying to find the right blog or partner since dedicated SEO pros can help connect you with the right webmasters across niches.

  • Take advantage of Magento blog extensions to create your own blog. You can publish engaging content that attracts quality links.
  • Support social causes and local events. This will help improve brand mentions, create awareness & create good PR that boosts domain authority.

Now that you have both the basic and intermediate techniques for SEO in Magento 2, hands down, let’s move to the next and last level.

Advanced SEO Magento strategies

These are some of the SEO for Magento website tips that require some level of technical know-how. They are not really the easiest, but they allow you to face issues head-on and resolve them quickly. To start, you can:

11. Fix duplicate content

Duplicate content is pages that are too similar or the exact copy of other pages on your site. This can be a serious problem for e-commerce sites. Why?

Because it is all too easy to create tons of pages for variations of the same product. Spoiler: don’t do it. This can mess with your Magento on-page SEO and your sales goals.

If you already have duplicate content or want to avoid the issue in the first place, let’s see what you can do.

The first and most obvious solution is to use 301 redirects to send people and crawlers to the “main” product page.

To set up your redirects, go to the Admin sidebar → Marketing → SEO & Search → URL Rewrites. Then, find duplicate links and add redirects.

Source: Adobe

Canonical tags can also help in this case. The good news is that Magento 2 already has built-in canonical tags. You just have to make sure they are turned on for the duplicate pages.

Besides, keep the following in mind:

  • There’s no need to have a special page for every color of a product. You can simply have one page with canonical tags for product variations (color, size, etc.). Or have one page with different dropdown options and other features.
  • You can also fiddle with the Magento 2 SEO settings to stop duplicate content from being indexed. While redirects send people to the right page, the noindex tag prevents crawlers from accessing certain pages.

12. Fix indexing errors

Indexing errors can prevent Google from crawling and indexing your important pages. This can be a major Magento and SEO bummer. So, you should avoid this at all costs. Still, if you are already in this boat, here’s what you can do.

First, sign up on Google Search Console, or just sign in if you already have an account.

To make sure that you don’t have any critical indexing errors, you have to check the Not indexed pages.

How do you find these?

Go to the menu → click Index→ Pages. There, you’ll see both indexed and unindexed pages.

If you scroll down, you’ll see the reasons why all those pages weren’t indexed.

Should you fix all of them? Of course, no. Only fix those that you want to be indexed. If those are some admin pages or duplicates, then leave them as they are.

Yet, remember to review this tab in Google Search Console from time to time to make sure that there are no critical indexing issues.

Conclusion

Trying to dominate SEO with Magento can feel tricky and confusing at first. But this will soon pass. You can start with any of the techniques we shared that seem easy to you. It’s better to start small than attempt everything at once.

Even better, you should read more Magento SEO guides like this one. The more you learn about the platform and the best practices, the easier it will be to make the right call.

At the heart of every SEO tactic is user-friendliness. Focus on figuring out what your customers really want and then adapt your strategy to deliver that. This way, you’ll stay a step ahead of the competition.

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