How should I go about SEO for an eBay store?

[Nacho]

Does anyone have any experience on how to search engine optimize (SEO) for an eBay store?

I am in the process of opening an eBay store for about 100 or so items. Being the main objective to rank high on the search engines for relevant money keywords, but pointing to the eBay store (not a domain name) it makes it a new SEO experience for me. For example, this product is non related at all to me but will show what I mean:

Google on "TREMELO Harmonica (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&q=TREMELO+Harmonica)" or . . .

Yahoo! for "TREMELO Harmonica (http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=TREMELO+Harmonica&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-tab-web-t&cop=mss&tab=)"

Since the CODE is mainly controlled by eBay there is only so much and so little I can do.

Here are some example of eBay stores for the top two ranking sites in Google from the search above:

Pro Music and Photo outlet (http://stores.ebay.com/Pro-Music-and-Photo-outlet_Harmonicas-Wind-Instruments_W0QQcolZ4QQdirZ1QQsclZallQQsotimedispl ayZ2QQtZkm)

Cain Trader (http://stores.ebay.com/Cain-Trader_Harmonica_W0QQcolZ4QQdirZ1QQsclZallQQsotime displayZ2QQtZkm)

[seomike]

I'd say make a doorway site that has all your products you are selling in the ebay store. This will allow you to seo the site and build linkpop ect ect. Then when they want to buy you just send them off to buy through your ebay store.

Now how to get spiders from following the links to the ebay store.

Black hat - use ip delivery to cloak the link so that it doesn't show up for spiders. therefore they never leave the site.

gray hat - use a modrewrite to redirect them but since the link will still have your sites url in them it will cache the ebay store page as if it were part of your site :) similar to this way of juking out spider for amazon affiliates (http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/showpost.php?p=2208&postcount=7)

white hat - send every last known spider to ebay through a straight up hyperlink and shortly thereafter get tagged as an affiliate and lose all your rankings.

I think the black and gray hat approaches are the best because I've seen them both work. Sorry white haters but your way just won't cut it for this senario.

[Nacho]

Your ideas are valid.

However, I have a feeling that in the examples mentioned above (TREMELO Harmonica) it is proven to be a 100% pure clean technique where Googlebot spidered eBay, found these pages, liked them for whatever on-page plus off-page factors and ranked them #1 for the money keyword.

That's exactly what I would like to know how it can be done with very little website control. Which on-page factors are being inserted on the which are very limited on the content management system provided by eBay? What off-page factors are helping these eBay Stores (internal linking or external linking, or just simply eBay's link popularity being transfered down, or many other factors)? Does having a 50 item eBay store differ than having a 1000 item eBay store?

[Nacho]

I found a really good thread called ebay store in the SERPS (http://forums.seochat.com/archive/t-2801) over at SEO Chat. In summary, here are the best points made:


If you sell on ebay, submit your store but choose the store's name carefully - it goes in your title tag.
Having a few hundred items in your eBay store gives you a huge number of inbound links.
Your store department names should be keywords.
Build an "about me" page that has links to each major department of your website. Links from your "about me" page are allowed but you are not allowed to link out from your listings. If you have outbound Links in youre E-Bay Store you will lose youre PR! Its the same like Geocities.

Here is another great idea to get more traffic, check this thread about "Exporting your EBAY Store Items for FROOGLE and others (http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/showthread.php?t=538)".

Here is a news release (http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y04/m03/i16/s02) (March 16, 2004) about eBay enhancing their site for SEO.

Here is more information directly from the eBay Stores Subscription (http://pages.ebay.com/help/stores/store-subscription-levels.html) page where it says (among other things):

Automatic optimization of your Store pages to obtain the best possible rankings on search engines
I hope we get more tips in this thread. I’ll keep on looking around.

[jaanis]

Goog advice Nacho on the optimization of the actual eBay store. I would agree with Mike a slightly on creating another website that can offer more info on each product. Not so much a doorway site, but a real directory of information for each product that you offer and then offer sale links to the eBay store. Some other solid ranking sites for keywords that you are interested in are in this directory format:

http://www.musiccorner.co.uk/acatalog/Tremelo_Harmonicas.html and http://www.boothsmusic.co.uk/acatalog/Booths_Catalogue_Tremelo_Double_Reed_93.html

It has always been my belief if you affiliate stores limits you code wise then building out your own supporting site is a good idea. This allows you to offer the end user more useful product information before the sale page.

[billystiltner]

Lets say I have made a site that is kind of like my ebay store which is generated from the xml export. The products links are to a page on the site which is actually redirected to the products on ebay. The redirection pages which contain the links to ebay are dissallowed in robots.txt. Wouldnt this be a better way to link to somewhere that would drop your rankings instead of cloaking?

Thanks
Billy

[excell]

You could try something like this Keywords - ebay (http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&lr=&sa=G&q=%22keyword-index.ebay.%2Bcom/%22) :eek:

[jdude]

Here is a link to a page on eBay with Stores SEO info that will help (http://reviews.ebay.com/eBay-Store-Search-Engine-Optimization-SEO-Tricks-amp-Tips_W0QQugidZ10000000000099249) :)

[billystiltner]

Hey
I thought the keyword-ebay link was some ebay thing that you paid for.
Can someone explain the keyword-ebay thing to me?

Thanks

Billy

[jdude]

Keywords come up on eBay in a few contexts

There is an eBay paid keyword campain (mini-baner ads)- you can maybe get a few for free or a match credit depending on your store subscription, powerseller status etc. I don't think it is worth it if you pay for them.

On eBay you can also set you search engine keywords in your store - they become your meta tags.

You should also use good keywords all over the place for the spiders to index - use them in your categories, titles, listings, description, headers etc.


Hope that helped

[sully]

Does having a 50 item eBay store differ than having a 1000 item eBay store?

Yes, in that the 1000 item store would be more relevant for your search term. From your users' standpoint, it's also more effective to have a wider selection. You'll convert more visitors into buyers.

I would agree with Mike a slightly on creating another website that can offer more info on each product. Not so much a doorway site, but a real directory of information for each product that you offer and then offer sale links to the eBay store.

If you are testing the market, then eBay might be a good option for starting out. If the goal is to convert more visitors into buyers, then set up your own ecommerce site. You can add information to your heart's content, and in a more pleasing and effective manner for your users. It's more cost-effective, easier to optimize and better branding. You will want to promote your brand, not eBay's brand.

My 2 cents.