There’s no doubt that Black Friday and Cyber Monday are two of the most important retail days of the year for online brands.
If you’re starting to coordinate your digital marketing plan for the upcoming shopping season, then you’ll definitely want to read through this guide carefully.
Inside, we’ll talk about various methods for better search engine optimization (SEO) and how to get in front of potential shoppers who are ready to get the best deals possible.
Here are twelve of the most useful ways to improve your Black Friday SEO for better results this holiday season.
#1. Check Your Technical Details
The first step in improving your Black Friday SEO really comes down to checking your technical details.
After all, things like page load speed and broken links can greatly affect the way Google ranks your website.
A few tips?
Double-check to ensure your server can handle excess traffic and resolve any 404 error pages.
You should also place 301 redirects on any old landing pages or items that are no longer in stock.
From the technical side, you can also spruce up meta titles and descriptions with words like Black Friday and Cyber Monday (but remember to change them when the season is over!).
#2. Choose Specific Black Friday SEO Keywords
There’s no doubt that two of the biggest keywords for the holiday shopping weekend are Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
However, you don’t want to just target those words only in your content.
Instead, go a bit more specific with individual products or categories of items.
For example, long-tail keywords like Cyber Monday Deals on Televisions or Best Black Friday Skincare Sale.
Whatever makes sense for your niche or industry, choose the best search terms you would use throughout the year and add those extra Black Friday SEO keywords onto them.
#3. Showcase Reviews More Prominently
When it comes to Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping, reviews are a big deal.
Why? Most people want to see whether the item you’re offering is worth their time or if they’re actually getting a good deal.
With more people switching to online shopping versus visiting brick-and-mortar retailers, being able to see reviews from past customers is really important.
That said, you can optimize your Black Friday SEO by including actual reviews — good or bad — from customers.
If you’re on Shopify, WooCommerce, or BigCommerce, there are tons of plugins and apps that can do this for you.
Some will even splash the most recent product reviews across a small popup at the footer, which can be a great way to help site visitors discover new products.
#4. Create Specific Holiday Landing Pages
Another excellent Black Friday SEO tip is to create specific holiday landing pages.
Include plenty of good keywords that describe the products you’re promoting and the various discounts you’re offering on those items.
Depending on whether you have a high-ticket item or something else, you could even use video or other interactive content like quizzes on these pages.
The main goal here is to create another entry point for someone looking to shop for the holidays, which means publishing another page to your website is a great idea for improving rankings and boosting traffic.
#5. Bundle Products Together for More Content
If you have a small catalog or somewhat niche products, you can always consider bundling products together for more content that could rank in the SERPs.
This is a great way to boost your Cyber Monday and Black Friday SEO, as it conveys both a valuable offer and makes it easier for someone who doesn’t know a lot about your product to decide it is a great value as a giftable item.
Usually, these bundles don’t have to be huge or have a major discount on the individual price.
But you can usually create some sort of savings that makes the shopper feel as though they’re getting the best value possible.
#6. Curate Seasonal Content for Your Blog
If you haven’t noticed with this list, adding additional content to your website is a good method for improving your Black Friday SEO.
That means curating seasonal content for your blog that covers topics related to how your product is ideal for use as a gift item, how to use it in the winter months, or whatever else makes the most sense for your niche.
Be sure to include those top Black Friday keywords in conjunction with specific terms, update your meta descriptions to include the term Black Friday, link to pages within your website, and handle all those technical SEO aspects that the crawlers love.
#7. Review User Experience (UX) for Flaws
Another major Black Friday SEO tip is to review your overall user experience (UX) for flaws and make changes accordingly.
- Is it too difficult for shoppers to find specific products within your navigation?
- Or is your checkout process a few steps too long?
Find areas where you can improve the experience that customers have when they come to your page.
While this isn’t related to search ranking directly, it can ensure those that do arrive from Google or Bing make a purchase instead of abandoning a cart.
#8. Build Links with Media Sources and Other Websites
As you likely already know, building backlinks is a critical component of off-page SEO.
The more quality pages that link to your online store, the better your rankings and the easier it is to climb the SERPs.
That said, you can take a holiday approach to the process.
There are many publications and websites out there that are looking to highlight specific Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals.
By getting into contact with them ahead of the shopping season, you can offer a deal where their readers get a specific coupon code in exchange for the publication including your product and brand in their list.
This is a pretty common practice in eCommerce around the holiday season, but it does take a bit of early discussion to make it worthwhile.
Thus, you should start scoping out these firms in late summer or early fall to ensure you’re getting backlinks prior to Black Friday and the holiday shopping period.
#9. Give Website Visitors the Option to Share on Social
With Black Friday and Cyber Monday being such a big deal in the retail industry, it only makes sense that you want to be able to give those website visitors that arrive on your page the ability to share their favorite products on social media.
If you don’t already have this option on each product page, consider enabling it.
These links not only create buzz, but they give you a social backlink that can help improve your SEO.
Furthermore, you could opt to provide a special discount for those that share items from your brand with friends or family members.
There are tons of different plugins for Shopify and other platforms that make this process easy and give you that extra boost you’re looking for in terms of search optimization.
#10. Use an Omnichannel Strategy
If you’ve worked on your brand’s digital marketing strategy for a considerable amount of time, you already know that having an omnichannel approach is crucial to your success.
But how does this relate to improving organic traffic on Black Friday?
Well, most consumers need to see advertising from a new brand several times before they start to trust a special offer.
If a shopper has already seen your ads or posts on social media or through banner ads, they’re already going to connect you as an authority in your industry.
Thus, when they see your link in SERPs, they’ll be more apt to click on that link and go to your page.
Building this kind of trust takes time, but prior preparation can make it so that you’re not only ranking high on Google, but getting the clicks that ultimately lead to orders.
#11. Understand Who is Buying Gifts from Your Brand
When improving your Cyber Monday and Black Friday SEO, it is important to think about your ideal customer persona and who might buy your items as a gift for them.
This is one side of digital marketing for the holiday shopping season that a lot of eCommerce brands miss, which is why it is such an important aspect to think about.
For example, maybe you own a skincare company for women. In that case, your search optimization and paid ads should try to attract those shopping for their partner or the best gift ideas for mom.
From there, choose long-tail keywords that best resonate with that particular demographic.
#12. Start Throughout the Year
Optimizing your website for Black Friday certainly isn’t something to start last minute.
Instead, it should be a tactic that you’re continually working on throughout the year.
After all, when you’re already ranking high in the SERPs for evergreen keywords and topics, achieving the same for Black Friday or Cyber Monday content is a lot easier.
At that point, all you have to do is add content for seasonal deals and Cyber Monday and Black Friday SEO keywords.
Remember, search optimization is a marathon and not a sprint.
The more you do early on, the easier it is to gain organic traffic during the busiest shopping season of the year.
Other Black Friday and Cyber Monday Tips to Consider
While Black Friday SEO is certainly important, it is really only one piece of the bigger holiday shopping season you’ll want to keep in mind.
Here are a few additional tips you’ll want to consider:
Remember the Thanksgiving Holiday
Many eCommerce brands make the mistake of jumping straight to Black Friday and Cyber Monday with their content.
Remember, you can use the whole Thanksgiving holiday weekend as a way to draw in customers.
Consider running deals before and after Thursday or simply sending out messaging of gratitude to your existing shoppers on the holiday itself.
Start as Early as Possible
There’s a huge movement in retail to start Black Friday and Cyber Monday advertising as early as possible.
Some brands like Walmart and Amazon are releasing their deal preview lists in October to get in front of shoppers who want to complete their gift-buying lists early.
Use Urgency Keywords for Missed Deals
Another thing you can do to boost all of your Black Friday advertising — whether that’s paid ads or just social media posts — is to use urgency keywords for missed deals.
This can be something like “you just missed out, but here’s another chance” or anything else that makes it easier for a shopper to still see value even though they weren’t able to buy right away.
Wrap-Up: Best Tips for Improving Your Black Friday SEO
Improving your Black Friday SEO isn’t something that happens overnight.
But with a little planning and this list of tips, you can see an improvement in organic traffic this shopping season.
Are you looking for other ways to potentially improve your search ranking all year long?
Our SEO Maturity Assessment is an excellent place to start!
