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When building a Shopify or e-commerce store, it becomes important to understand metadata and custom fields. Metadata and custom fields can help you expand the function of your product pages and even help you start to code better in Shopify Liquid Web. Don’t let that scare you though, this is easy. So let’s talk about how to add metadata and custom fields to your Shopify store.
What is Meta Data in Shopify??
Metadata is the data that you can add to the bottom of your Shopify product page that helps to define the product better.
For example, if you sell shirts, the metadata might say the shirt is made of wool or uses cruelty-free manufacturing.
How is Shopify Product Meta Data different from Product Variants?
An important note, Shopify has product variants inside each product page. These are not the same as Meta Data. You can think of meta data fields as qualities to apply to your products and variants as the options people can select.
For example, in the Shopify product section above, small medium and large represent product variants and 50% cotton / 50% polyester represents the meta data of this particular product.
Adding Custom Fields with Shopify Scripts
Custom fields are sections you can add almost anywhere or to almost anything in Shopify. Custom fields allow you to add extra code or function to a dedicated page.
Adding custom fields used to be really difficult with all sorts of steps, apps, and code integrations. However, in Shopify OS 2.0, you can simply add a section to your product page called “Custom Liquid”. Then using HTML and CSS, you can add any field you wish.
10 SEO Tips for improving your Metadata on Shopify Product Pages
There are a lot of best practices you will find on the internet but I figured I would jot down the 10 best tips I found for improving your Shopify SEO.
1: Always optimize product titles for SEO keywords.
Have you ever seen a product on Google or Amazon that is just filled to the brim with a ton of random fluff? Ever wonder why?
The answer is simple, the owner is trying to rank for those words on Amazon or Google search so they can show up at the top of the organic SERP. If you are new to SEO keyword research, check out my favorite tools I use for SEO research to get started.
2: Write Unique Meta Descriptions
Meta descriptions are the short snippets that describe your product when it’s shared on social media. But not only are they important for social media, they are also very important for SEO because that description is used to rank your website.
By default, Shopify will use the description you already wrote for your product page, but it you want to go the extra mile, using the optimized keywords you found in your SEO research will help give you an extra boost in search.
3: Use Alt Text for Images:
Alt text is the text that describes your images to accessible readers. But one frequent tip I find not enough Shopify stores doing is actually writing alt-text descriptions for their images. It may seem like a small thing but I find it’s the small things you do in SEO marketing strategy that make all the difference.
4 : Implement Structured Data (Schema Markup):
No kidding, when I took the time to incorporate a plugin in my WordPress website that structured my website’s data in a way that made sense, I started seeing results almost overnight.
Now will you a lot of improvement by implementing schema on your Shopify website… only time will tell. Shopify does a lot to make sure you never have to worry about the data or code of your website but from my experience, it’s always worth giving a Schema Marckup app a try for a month and seeing if it improves your organic traffic.
5: Leverage Meta Keywords (sparingly):
Meta-keywords have become more commonly known as “keywords” in the SEO space. But essentially, make sure you are only using one to two keywords per page and avoiding common black hat tactics like keyword stuffing.
On my own websites, I have found good success by adding one keyword per page as a meta keyword and then spending all my time optimizing the content on that page for that one keyword.
These could be longtail keywords or short-tail keywords depending on your industry.
6: Customize URLs (Permalinks):
By default, Shopify will use your product name as its permalink. This will work perfectly for most businesses that use Shopify but if you start to have a lot of product categories that might interlap, it may make sense to customize each permalink a little bit to make sure it’s not cannibalizing your remaining content.
7: Utilize Product Tags and Categories:
Product tags and categories are very helpful to search engines because they help the bots that index your website find the right niche. One mistake I see in many stores is that they don’t include tags to describe their products. Things like Material, Size, and Color are easy tags that can help you rank for the low-hanging keywords quickly and efficiently.
8: Avoid Duplicate Content:
This is a big one. Duplicate content can ruin your reputation with Google if they think you are creating content that overlaps with existing content. Avoid duplicate content at all costs! If you need to restructure your product offerings, it may be worth it to make sure one of them can rank properly.
9: Regularly Update Product Information:
Pop quiz! Which is easier: Trying to rank a new product on Google search or improving/updating an already ranking product page? Obviously working with what is already working is going to be the better strategy.
However, I often see businesses make the mistake of deleting old products instead of maintaining them and redirecting links to other products. This can be a great way to bring people organically into your store without having to go through the headache of ranking another page.
10: Analyze and Monitor Performance:
This last one is arguably the most important: make sure you are constantly analyzing and monitoring the performance of your website pages. About 30 minutes a day is all it takes to be able to catch an issue with SEO in its tracks and correct it quickly.
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Disclaimer: None of the information presented on this site constitutes legal, business, tax, or medical advice. In each scenario, it’s recommended to first chat with a medical, legal, business, or tax professional before making any decisions.
