Best out of the Box e-commerce for SEO?

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R

RayB

  • #1
    Hi all,

    Our main e-commerce website is totally bespoke but I have a few other domain names I want to experiment with using an off the shelf solution.

    What is the best "out of the box" e-commerce package from an SEO point of view, especially:

    • Custom meta tags
    • Friendly url's
    • SEO friendly nav (preferably page content before nav CSS)
    • clean code
    • W3C compliance (or thereabouts)
    • Easy online payment integration (we use HSBC credit card payment currently)
    Any advice or tips greatly appreciated - this is not something I have looked into before!

    I'm reasonably html literate but wanted the best turnkey package to play with!
     
    awebapart.com

    awebapart.com

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    Dec 21, 2006
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  • #2
    I would definitely say that osCommerce, out of the box, is not very good SEO-wise, but then again I've also said many a time on this forum that osCommerce shouldn't be treated as an out of the box solution.

    There are lots of code changes you have to make to osCommerce to add SEO improvements. We have made a lot of these changes with our custom version of osCommerce, which is part of our off the shelf sitebuilder solution we provide to our clients, but even so there are still other improvements for us to make in the near future. The base osCommerce code should also improve in the future as it moves over to XHTML with v3 (v3 is currently in alpha).

    Although osCommerce 'out of the box' is not very good for SEO, we chose osCommerce for the ecommerce part of our sitebuilder solution, because we knew we could make the code changes (since it is open source), in order to create an improved 'out of the box' solution for our clients.
     
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    awebapart.com

    awebapart.com

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  • #3
    If you want to see what open source ecommerce systems look like 'out of the box' in their default state with no coding customisation or improvements, it is worth checking out:

    www.opensourcecms.com

    which has a number of systems installed and running (just click on system, e.g. osCommerce, then click on 'front page' to see the live demo), so you can evaluate their 'out of the box' SEO features.
     
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    I, Brian

    I, Brian

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    May 18, 2005
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  • #7
    I've been having a b!tch of a job working with OSCommerce. Despise it with a passion after rebuilding the same site about 6 times now. What no one tells you about OSCommerce is that it's not simply not SEO friendly out of the box - it's also non f'ing functional a lot of the time as well because it's so infrequently updated.

    Once Paul has a couple of updates applied to his package, it's on my shopping list. I don't want to have all this hassle again. And from what I've seen, most ecommerce software platforms need a lot of coding work to make them useful.
     
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    R

    RayB

  • #8
    I said:
    I've been having a b!tch of a job working with OSCommerce. Despise it with a passion after rebuilding the same site about 6 times now. What no one tells you about OSCommerce is that it's not simply not SEO friendly out of the box - it's also non f'ing functional a lot of the time as well because it's so infrequently updated.

    Once Paul has a couple of updates applied to his package, it's on my shopping list. I don't want to have all this hassle again. And from what I've seen, most ecommerce software platforms need a lot of coding work to make them useful.
    Click to expand...

    Hi Brian,

    What are the updates needed from an SEO point of view, and Paul - will these enhancements be rolled out soon (cos i'd like to use your solution)
     
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    awebapart.com

    awebapart.com

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  • #9
    Optimisation is an ongoing process, we have done a fair bit already, but there is always some other area where you can squeeze out some extra optimisation. The next few improvements we have planned are more SEO friendly URLs (e.g. shop/[category_name] rather than shop/index.php/cPath/39), more use of Header tags on category and product pages, and allowing category textual descriptions on category pages. The timescales for adding these improvements is a matter of weeks rather than months. No doubt there will be other SEO improvements for us to consider after this!

    Ray, if you are interested please feel free to get in touch, my contact details are in the PM I sent to you.
     
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    R

    RayB

  • #10
    awebapart.com said:
    Optimisation is an ongoing process, we have done a fair bit already, but there is always some other area where you can squeeze out some extra optimisation. The next few improvements we have planned are more SEO friendly URLs (e.g. shop/[category_name] rather than shop/index.php/cPath/39), more use of Header tags on category and product pages, and allowing category textual descriptions on category pages. The timescales for adding these improvements is a matter of weeks rather than months. No doubt there will be other SEO improvements for us to consider after this!

    Ray, if you are interested please feel free to get in touch, my contact details are in the PM I sent to you.
    Click to expand...

    Hi Paul,

    I'll give it a wiz when these next updates are ready - header tag control and friendly urls are crucial in my experience.

    Let me know when rolled out and I'll give it a whirl.

    Anything to add Brian?
     
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    M

    Miranda

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    Jan 6, 2007
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  • #11
    I've always been very pleased with Actinic - when I first got it late 1999, there wasn't much in the way of shopping carts in the box about, but of its peers it was the one most higly rated especially in terms of seo.

    I've not been disappointed (google 'nappies' or any of the brands we stock and you'll see what I mean)
     
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    I, Brian

    I, Brian

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  • #13
    Nothing to add, Ray - Paul's covered the bases. :)

    I know there are a couple of other shopping cart options I've looked at that offer SE friendliness, but I'd have to look them up.

    Frankly, the bother I've had with OSCommerce means I seriously don't want to have to recode another shopping cart again - I want something that's ready out of the box.

    Paul, quikie - you do have the Paypal IPN installed, do you? Simply that - having thought myself finally finished with OSCommerce, I find it doesn't even process Paypal orders properly unless the IPN module is installed.

    OSCommerce downloaded as is simply isn't functional, hence the long frustrations. So I'm happy to pay for someone to ensure it's all set and able to function as intended.
     
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    awebapart.com

    awebapart.com

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    Dec 21, 2006
    2,534
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    Wellingborough, Northants
  • #14
    I said:
    Paul, quikie - you do have the Paypal IPN installed, do you? Simply that - having thought myself finally finished with OSCommerce, I find it doesn't even process Paypal orders properly unless the IPN module is installed.
    Click to expand...
    Yes, PayPal IPN was one of the first things we got working with our custom version of osCommerce. It is a 'must have' feature IMO.

    The standard PayPal payment functionality you get with osCommerce's default installation isn't very good. From what I can remember of it, you could end up with people paying for orders and not know what people had ordered!
     
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    R

    RayB

  • #16
    Good point about paypal Brian, good to hear you have it covered Paul!

    One question - the products I will be selling are zero rated for VAT - but I need to add carriage cost which is VATable e.g.


    Goods Cost VAT Sub-Total

    Item £100 £0 £100

    Carriage £10 £1.75 £11.75

    Total £111.75

    Can you do this?
     
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    awebapart.com

    awebapart.com

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    Dec 21, 2006
    2,534
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    Wellingborough, Northants
  • #17
    RayB said:
    One question - the products I will be selling are zero rated for VAT - but I need to add carriage cost which is VATable e.g.


    Goods Cost VAT Sub-Total

    Item £100 £0 £100

    Carriage £10 £1.75 £11.75

    Total £111.75

    Can you do this?
    Click to expand...
    Yes. Charging VAT on the shipping but not the products is possible, in fact this is something that can be configured with standard osCommerce. The invoice/checkout confirmation bill, is presented like this:

    Products
    -----
    1 x Product A = £30
    1 x Product B = £70
    -----
    Sub-Total: £100.00
    Carriage: £10.00
    VAT 17.5%: £1.75
    Total: £111.75

    and even this format is configurable to a certain extent.
     
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