SEO tips you should know to enhance ranking and traffic to your Magento shopping cart website

Learn & Copied from Internet :) Sharing for others ...

1. Update the Latest Version Of Magento Platform

You need to make sure that you are using the latest version of Magento. New releases will have best SEO support because it has improved security, bug fixes. This is the first thing you should give attention if you want to get high rank in search engine.

2. Optimize URLs  

It is better if URLs of your website do not have any codes. Follow these steps to clean URLs: System => Configuration =>Web =>Search Engine Optimization => URL Options, and then set Add Store Code to “No”. After this configuration is saved, product/category codes will not be automatically added to your URLs, which make it more SEO- friendly.

To radically clean URLs, in Search Engine Optimization menu, turn Server URL Rewrites to “Yes” . The phrase “index.php” will be removed from your URLs as well.

3. Use proper keywords

Magento has default sample content for product title and description, but it is not standard for SEO. You need to edit them by go to Configuration => Design => HTML Head. Meta title and description should be keyword-rich and unique. With the title, one rule is putting important keywords near beginning of your title as much as possible in order for search engines to realize them more easily. One more thing is eliminating words like “the”, “and” from your title. Do a similar action for category title and description, you will have a more SEO-friendly site.

4. Optimize product images

Don’t forget to optimize product images on your site. Make sure that titles can tell about the meaning of images other than a seri of meaningless words and numbers. In addition, similar to other titles, image’s title also should contain relevant keywords. Alt tags are as important as title and URL. Add alt tags to images to get best visibility in search system.

5. Avoid Duplicate Content

When the same product is shown in different categories in your site, or even a piece of content appears in two pages, it is a mistake called duplicate content. Google will not appreciate sites with duplicate content. Let modify canonical link to figure out this problem. Go to System =>Configuration =>Catalog =>Search Engine Optimization and set Canonical Link Meta Tags for Products and Categories to Yes.

6. Speed up your site

Loading speed can influence the site ranking. As Google has stated, low loading sites are not preferable. Only one lower second can drop the the site ranking. There are various ways to speed up your site, below is some simple but easy ways for you:

> Enable all caching features (System => Cache Management)

> Enable Flat Catalog Categories and Flat Catalog Product  (System => Configuration, Catalog => Catalog,Frontend)

> Merge CSS and JS files System => Configuration, Advanced => Developer => JavaScript Settings/ CSS Settings

> Reduce the number of external files that can be downloaded from your server

7. Generate a Google Sitemap

With some simple steps, you can generate a Google sitemap on your site, which helps you provide information about site link for search engines to crawl.

1. Go to Catalog => Google Sitemap => Add new.

2. In Filename, type “sitemap.xml”

3. In Path field, fill out with the directory on server that the sitemap.xml file will be saved.

4. In Store View, select the store view you set up the sitemap for

5. Save and Generate

8. Modify Robots.txt File

Why should we take a look at robots.txt file? In case you create a site without real products, Magento adds a robots.txt file to your site so that search engines will not index it. Your site is real, right? So don’t let robots.txt file prevent search engine find out your site.

By default, Robot setting is “NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW”, which make your site cannot appear on search results. To solve this problem, go to System => Configuration => Design => Default Robots, and then change it to “INDEX, FOLLOW”.

8 tips above can bring better organic traffic for your site, increase site rankings and search engine visibility.

================================================================

https://www.milople.com/blogs/magento/add-featured-product-magento-store-homepage.html

How to add featured product on Magento Store homepage

You may not aware of SEO advantages of having featured product 0n Magento store homepage. Many store owners have found the solution to make updates in sites regularly by adding featured products and most of them have noticed improvement in indexing. Another feature to point out regarding SEO is having featured product on homepage will get higher priority in searches compared to other products. One can promote products and let them showcase in a better way to your customers and that can result in boost of sales of your store. Here I have described five steps to make featured product attribute and to display it on home page.

STEP: 1. To make featured product attribute.

• Login to Magento admin area.
• Now add attribute from tab

Catalog–>Attribute –> Manage Attribute–>Add New Attribute.

Attribute Properties to be set

• Attribute Identifier: featured
• Scope: Store View
• Catalog Input Type For Store Owner: Yes/No
• Unique Value (not shared with other product): No
• Values Required: No
• Input Validation for Store Owner: None
• Apply To: All Product Types

Front End Properties to be set

• Use In quick Search: No
• Use In Advance Search: Yes
• Comparable on Front-end: No
• Use In Layered navigation (Can be used only with catalog input type ‘Dropdown‘): No
• Visible on Catalog Pages On Front-end: Yes

Manage label/options to be set

• Default: Featured Product
• English: Featured Product

Now add featured product attribute in attribute set:
Go toCatalog –>Attributes–>Manage Attribute sets.

Our featured product attribute will be displayed in “Unassigned attribute” in right end side of the screen. Now drag and drop our “featured product” attribute in ‘General’ tab of “Groups” displayed in left end side of screen. Now click on “save attribute set” button. See the screen shot for reference.

STEP: 2. Create featured product block file.

• Go to Local directory app/code/local/ and create directory.
• Create directory level

“Featured Product/Catalog/Block/Product/Featured.php”

Copy and paste this code in Featured.php file.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23

<?php class FeaturedProduct_Catalog_Block_Product_Featured extends Mage_Catalog_Block_Product_Abstract { public function getFeaturedProduct() { //database connection object $storeId = Mage::app()->getStore()->getId(); $resource = Mage::getSingleton('core/resource'); $read = $resource->getConnection('catalog_read'); $categoryProductTable = $resource->getTableName('catalog/category_product'); $productEntityIntTable = (string)Mage::getConfig()->getTablePrefix() . 'catalog_product_entity_int'; $eavAttributeTable = $resource->getTableName('eav/attribute'); // Query for featured product $select = $read->select() ->from(array('cp'=>$categoryProductTable)) ->join(array('pei'=>$productEntityIntTable), 'pei.entity_id=cp.product_id', array()) ->joinNatural(array('ea'=>$eavAttributeTable)) ->where('pei.value=1') ->where('ea.attribute_code="featured"'); $row = $read->fetchRow($select); return Mage::getModel('catalog/product')->setStoreId($storeId)->load($row['product_id']); } }

STEP: 3. Create template file for featured product.
Go to directory “app/design/frontend/my_theme/template/catalog/product/” and make featured.phtml file.
Replace my_theme with your current theme name.
Copy and paste this code in featured.phtml file.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44

<?php $totalPerPage = ($this->show_total) ? $this->show_total : 6; $visibility = array( Mage_Catalog_Model_Product_Visibility::VISIBILITY_BOTH, Mage_Catalog_Model_Product_Visibility::VISIBILITY_IN_CATALOG ); $storeId = Mage::app()->getStore()->getId(); $_productCollection = Mage::getResourceModel('reports/product_collection') ->addAttributeToSelect('*') ->setStoreId($storeId) ->addStoreFilter($storeId) ->addAttributeToFilter('visibility', $visibility) ->addAttributeToFilter('featured', true) ->setOrder('created_at', 'desc') ->addAttributeToSelect('status') ->setPageSize($totalPerPage);   Mage::getSingleton('catalog/product_status') -> addVisibleFilterToCollection($_productCollection); Mage::getSingleton('cataloginventory/stock') -> addInStockFilterToCollection($_productCollection); Mage::getSingleton('catalog/product_visibility') -> addVisibleInSearchFilterToCollection($_productCollection); ?>   <h1 >Featured products</h1><br><br><div> <?php $_collectionSize = $_productCollection->count() ?> <table cellspacing="0" class="generic-product-grid" id="product-list-table" style="margin-top:-50px; width:960px;"> <?php $i=0; foreach ($_productCollection as $_product): ?><?php if ($i++%3==0): ?> <tr style="margin-top:20px;"><?php endif ?><td><p class="product-image" style="width:330px; margin-top:20px;"> <a href="<?php echo $_product->getProductUrl() ?>" title="<?php echo $this->htmlEscape($this->getImageLabel($_product, 'small_image')) ?>"> <img style="height:190px; width:300px;" src="<?php echo $this->helper('catalog/image')->init($_product, 'small_image')->resize(170, 170); ?>" alt="<?php echo $this->htmlEscape($this->getImageLabel($_product, 'small_image')) ?>" title="<?php echo $this->htmlEscape($this->getImageLabel($_product, 'small_image')) ?>" /></a></p> <?php /*?><h5><a href="<?php echo $_product->getProductUrl() ?>" title="<?php echo $this->htmlEscape($_product->getName()) ?>"><?php echo $this->htmlEscape($_product->getName()) ?></a></h5><?php */?><div> <?php echo $_product->getShortDescription() ?></div><div> <?php if ($_product->getSpecialPrice()>0):?> <span class="old"><?php echo $this->helper('checkout')->formatPrice($_product->getPrice()) ?></span>&nbsp; <span class="new"><?php echo $this->helper('checkout')->formatPrice($_product->getSpecialPrice()) ?></span><?php else: ?> <span class="new"><?php echo $this->helper('checkout')->formatPrice($_product->getPrice()) ?></span> <?php endif; ?><?php if($_product->isSaleable()): ?> <button type="button" title="<?php echo $this->__('Add to Cart') ?>" class="button btn-cart" onclick="setLocation('<?php echo $this->getAddToCartUrl($_product) ?>')"><span><span><?php echo $this->__('Add to Cart') ?></span></span></button><?php else: ?> <p><span><?php echo $this->__('Out of stock') ?></span></p> <?php endif; ?></div><div class="clear"></div></td> <?php if ($i%3==0 && $i!=$_collectionSize): ?></tr><?php endif ?><?php endforeach ?> <?php for($i;$i%3!=0;$i++): ?> <td class="empty-product">&nbsp;</td><?php endfor ?><?php if ($i%3==0): ?></tr><?php endif ?></table> <script type="text/javascript">decorateTable('product-list-table')</script></div>

STEP: 4. Add new block to the app/etc/local.xml
Add the following code after the global tag ends:

1	<product_featured>FeaturedProduct_Catalog_Block_Product_Featured

STEP: 5. Add featured product block in home page.
Copy and paste this featured product block on home page

1	{{block type="core/template" name="product_featured" as="product_featured" template="catalog/product/featured.phtml"}}

Now the featured product on your home page can be seen”¦..