WooCommerce SEO
Search work for a WooCommerce store, sold as work. We check what each product page tells Google, the extra addresses a store makes, and the Merchant Center feed, fix what is wrong on the store, and test each fix again. No ranking is promised.
In short
- For a store on WooCommerce whose products are missing from Google, or reported with problems in Search Console or Merchant Center.
- We read what your store actually sends a search engine, on your version of WooCommerce, and do not go by what stores are said to send.
- What Google requires of a product is put right first. What it only recommends is your choice, and we say which is which.
- Merchant Center feed problems, such as a price that does not match the page, are part of the work.
- No ranking, and no place in Google's shopping results, is promised. Nobody can promise either.
A store has more ways to go wrong in search than a site of pages. Every product is a page that has to say, in a form a machine reads, what it is, what it costs and whether it is in stock. Filters, sorting and variations make extra addresses for the same products. And Google checks the price in your product feed against the price on the page.
This is search work for a WooCommerce store, sold as work. We look at what your store actually sends a search engine, put right what is wrong on the store's side, and test each fix again. It is the same audit and the same monthly hours as for any WordPress site, with the parts a store adds.
What we look at on a store
- Whether the store is launched at all. A new WooCommerce store starts in coming soon mode. A visitor who is not signed in, and a search engine, are given a holding page with a status of 200 and none of the product's data, while the owner, signed in, sees the real store. See what Google gets from a store in coming soon mode.
- What each product page tells Google. Google's documentation requires a name, an image and an offer with a price and a currency for a merchant listing. We read what your product pages print and fix what is missing.
- What is only recommended. A return policy, shipping details, a brand and a GTIN are things Google lists as recommended. Search Console reports them on most stores, and they are not errors. We tell you which are worth adding for your store and add the ones that are true of it: the return policy and shipping notices, and brand and GTIN.
- Products with variations. A product whose variations cost different amounts has its price given as a range. Google's documentation says product snippets accept that and merchant listings require a single offer. See variations.
- The extra addresses. Sorting, filters and pagination each make more addresses for one list of products, and with no SEO plugin WooCommerce's shop and category pages name no canonical address. We find which of these Google has picked up and deal with them the way Google's own guidance on filtered navigation sets out: filter and sort addresses.
- robots.txt. WooCommerce adds rules of its own to WordPress's answer, and a file placed in the site's folder silently drops them. We check which you have.
- Products that are out of stock or gone. What each should answer with, and where a redirect is right: out-of-stock and discontinued products.
- The Merchant Center feed. Products disapproved because the price or the stock in the feed does not match the page, and the usual causes on the store's side: a sale that ended, tax shown one way and sent another, a variation's price. See mismatched prices.
You can check one product page yourself, free: the product data check reads what a page tells Google and sets it beside what Google requires.
What you get
- An audit of the store, with each finding tied to the page of Google's documentation it rests on, and to what your store printed when we asked it. The fixes on the store's side are done within the hours the price includes, and each is tested again. The prices are on this page.
- Or hours each month, against a written list, for a store with more to work through than one job covers: a large catalog, a feed with many disapprovals, or addresses that have built up over years.
- A report of what was changed and what was tested. A figure in it is Google's own, from Search Console or Merchant Center, with the day it was read.
How it works
Step 1: Ask for a free diagnosis
Send your store's address through the free diagnosis form and say what Search Console or Merchant Center is reporting. We reply with what we can see from outside and confirm the price.
Step 2: Give us access to read
Read access to Search Console and, if you use it, Merchant Center. To make changes we need an administrator login for the store, or a staging copy of it.
Step 3: We check and fix
We work on a staging copy where the change could affect orders, and never change a price, a tax setting or a shipping rule without asking you first.
Step 4: You get the report
What was found, what was changed and tested, and what is left, in order.
What we do not sell, and why
- A ranking, or a place in Google's shopping results. Google's own advice to buyers is: "No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google." Product data makes a page eligible to be shown with a price or a rating. It does not decide that it will be.
- Markup for things that are not true of your store. A return policy you do not offer, a rating nobody gave, a GTIN that was made up. Google's guidelines require structured data to match what is on the page.
- Product descriptions by the hundred. Google's spam policies name pages made in bulk with nothing of their own.
- Links and reviews. See WordPress SEO for the reasons.
What it does not cover
- Running your ads. We work on the feed and the free listings that come from it, not on campaigns or budgets.
- Being sold inside an AI assistant. The programs that put a store's products into AI shopping answers are open to few merchants today. A complete Merchant Center feed is the route Google documents for any store, and that is what we work on.
- Looking after the store. Updates, backups and checkout tests are the Store plan.
- Stores that are not on WooCommerce.
What it costs
SEO audit
$249
A written audit of how a WordPress or WooCommerce site is found, with the fixes on the WordPress side done and tested again.
- Every finding with the page of documentation it rests on
- Up to 2 hours of fixes on the WordPress side
- Each fix tested again, and reported
- A list, in order, of what is left
SEO plan, 8 hours
$379 a month, per site
Eight hours of search work on one site each month, for a store or a site with more to work through.
- 8 hours of search work a month
- A written list of what the hours go to, agreed first
- A monthly report of what was done and tested
- What Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools show, read each month
SEO plan, 4 hours
$199 a month, per site
Four hours of search work on one site each month, against a written list, with a report of what was done.
- 4 hours of search work a month
- A written list of what the hours go to, agreed first
- A monthly report of what was done and tested
- What Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools show, read each month
Common questions
My products are not showing on Google. Where do I start?
With whether the store is launched. Open a product's address in a private window, where you are not signed in. If you see a coming soon page, so does Google. If you see the product, run the product data check on it, and then work through a site that is not on Google.
Search Console lists "missing field" on every product. Is my store broken?
Usually not. Most of those notices are for properties Google lists as recommended: a return policy, shipping details, a brand, a GTIN. A product stays eligible without them. A missing price, currency, name or image is different, and is put right first.
Do you work on Merchant Center?
Yes. Disapproved products, prices and stock that do not match the page, and the feed's settings are part of the work, as hours on a plan or as a quoted job. We do not run ad campaigns.
Do I need an SEO plugin for a store?
WooCommerce prints product data by itself, including a brand and a GTIN once they are filled in on the product. What it does not print with no plugin is a canonical address on shop and category pages, a return policy or shipping details. Whether a plugin, a few lines of code or nothing is the right answer depends on the store, and the audit says which.
Will changes to product data affect my live store?
The data is read by search engines, not shown to shoppers, so adding to it does not change what a customer sees. Anything that could touch prices, tax or checkout is tried on a staging copy first.