This document discusses strategies for small ecommerce stores to generate organic traffic through content marketing even if they don't have many products. It provides examples of 3 small stores that successfully used blogging to generate over 100,000 monthly organic visits. The strategies discussed are producing educational how-to content, blogging about competitors to target keyword searches for alternatives, and creating audience-focused content that answers questions or discusses passions related to the product category. The key is investing heavily in content to build a large, engaged audience over time.

1. How to crush SEO even if your store
doesn’t have many products
Complete with 3 examples

2. Profiles of 3 “small” stores with big organic
traffic
To really get a good picture of the success,
we’re looking at both total traffic and
unbranded traffic.
And, while branded traffic is an important part of
SEO, not every store has a strong brand, and
it’s important to see how successful stores are
generating traffic outside of their brand as well.

3. A quick note on definitions:
● Total organic traffic = total estimated traffic from Google (as estimated by Ahrefs, our enterprise
SEO tool)
● Total unbranded organic traffic = traffic that does not come from people searching a brand or
product specifically

4. Example #1: ChefSteps
● Products: 3
● Total organic traffic: 144,000
● Non-branded organic traffic:
~150,000/mo

5. Chef Steps traffic at a glance
Their total organic traffic is an estimated
161,000 visitors per month.
Their traffic has been up and down (which is
normal), reaching a high of 500,000 visits at the
beginning of 2018. Still, it’s been a consistently
strong and source of traffic for them.
Of that estimated 161,000 monthly organic
visitors, only about 17,000 is branded traffic
(coming from the homepage and the Joule
page).

6. Chef Steps where does the traffic come from?
Spoiler: It comes from the same place as most
great non-branded traffic: content, content,
content.
A huge chunk of ChefSteps’ traffic comes from
their blog that showcases recipes and cooking
techniques.
Like this article: “How to Truss a Chicken the
Traditional Way.” This is an educational,
how-to-type article. It’s not about their products,
and it’s not built to sell — at least not directly.
Instead, it’s built for traffic; or, perhaps more
accurately, it’s built to build an audience.

7. Example #2: Hello Tushy
● Products: 10
● Total organic traffic: 144,000
● Non-branded organic traffic:
~150,000/mo

8. Hello Tushy traffic at a glance
In total, Hello Tushy generates an estimated
272,000 organic visits per month.
Like most brands that have been around for a
while, their traffic has seen its share of ebbs and
flows, but for the most part, their organic web
presence has been strong from the beginning,
peaking, in places, close to half a million visitors
per month.
Of that traffic, about 20,000-30,000 monthly
visits come from pages for which the primary
keyword is unbranded.

9. Hello Tushy where does the traffic come from?
This blog post (“How to Do a Natural Colon
Cleanse at Home”) generates about 1,000
eyeballs per month — 1,000 people who want
to be better poopers, which is exactly Hello
Tushy’s audience.
Content about pooping, for poopers and they've
built a catalogue of poop - related content.
They are getting after it, and they are really
leaning into the power of blogging to build a
strong, active audience over time.

10. Example #3: Our own client (a keto store)
● Products: 6
● Non-branded organic traffic:
~30,000/mo

11. Our own client’s traffic at a glance
We developed a strategy that leaned on the
thing most successful “small” stores leverage if
they want to win in Google: content, content,
content.
The strategy was pretty simple: if we don’t have
many products, we have to build our audience
by answering their questions.
In total, over the course of a 6-month campaign,
we wrote ~60,000 words on the keto diet. We
were also able to build an audience of of
20,000-30,000 monthly organic visitors and
create traffic curves we were really proud of.

12. Our client where does the traffic come from?
Sometimes they were simple, like a guide on
how to eat keto at Buffalo Wild Wings.
This was one of the most successful articles we
produced, in fact, and it still generates almost
1,000 visits/mo.
And sometimes, the content was much more
complex. For example, was a complete guide to
eating keto — everything from the basics to the
science to tactical, day-to-day logistics.

13. How to do it
Stores with small catalogues absolutely can —
and do — build large, defensible audiences on
Google.
But how? How exactly?
In my view, if you’ve got fewer than 10 products
and you want to crush it in Google, the thing you
should be prepared to do is: invest in content.
In other words, you’ve got to blog.

14. Branded blogging (…and not just your own
brand)
Branded blogging = blogging about topics that include a brand.

15. Real quick, though ….
● Being able to blog about your own brand is a luxury.
● Building a brand takes a lot of time. And it especially takes a lot of time to build a brand big enough
that people are typing it into Google.
● However, I am not saying that in order for a “small” store to be successful in Google, it’s got to first
build a brand.
● That’s not true.

16. So what do we need to target?
Conversational keywords — keywords that
indicate the searcher is both looking for your
brand and wondering about something.
In other words, we want to look for keywords
that meet the following criteria:
● Include your brand name
● Include some indicator of conversation
● Have a decent number of people
searching for them each month

17. ● The keyword “simplisafe reviews,” for example, indicates someone who is looking specifically for
SimpliSafe products but who wants to read reviews.
● If I were SimpliSafe, I would absolutely want to be the one leading that conversation.
● The other keyword, “ring vs simplisafe,” is a keyword that indicates users are searching for
information about how SimpliSafe compares to one of its primary competitors.
● Again, if I were SimpliSafe, I would absolutely want to be the one leading that conversation.
Keywords like these indicate an opportunity

18. Blogging about competitors brands
If you’re an eCommerce store with a small brand
and a small product catalogue, can you still
leverage the power of branded blogging?
Absolutely.
How? By writing about other brands.

19. Here’s the basic strategy
Produce content that targets branded,
conversational keywords about your
competitors.
Monster VOIP, a company that offers phone
and team communication services for small
businesses.
One of their strategies is to write articles that
target keywords about their competitive brands,
especially those that indicate their competitor’s
customers may be looking for something
different.

20. Here’s the basic strategy: Monster VOIP
This targets the keyword “google voice
alternative.”
The keyword difficulty is a bit high, but
2,100 people search for it every month,
and because they are actively looking
for an alternative to a solution they’ve
already spent money on, these people
are likely very motivated to buy.
So Monster VOIP wrote an article on it.

21. It now ranks #4 in the organic results
This article generates an estimated 844 visits
per month.
And this is one keyword about one competitor.
This strategy can be leveraged for any keyword
that indicates people are asking questions (or,
ideally, aren’t happy) with your competitors.

22. Audience-oriented blogging
Audience-based blogging = producing content around highly
specific topics your audience is already searching for to build a
large, strong, defensible audience over time.

23. 1. Answer questions about your product
verticals.
People will have questions. Someone
somewhere has to answer them.
And if you can be the one who answers, it
helps establish authority, expertise, and
trust — and those things can lead to a
sale.
And just look at all these questions
people have about bidets:
Here’s keyword data for “how to use a
bidet.”

24. 2. Talk to your target audience about their
problems.
One of the ways you can attract
potential customers is to demonstrate
your expertise by helping them solve their
problems — and then/also by offering
your product as part of that solution.
Suppose you were an electric bike
company. Your potential customers may
have problems like the following:
● Bikes can be unsafe
● People steal bikes
● Bike laws change from state to state
● Commuting to work is annoying in big
cities
● Being sweaty after cycling to work
“
This is true even if a keyword
doesn’t necessarily indicate
interest in your specific
product.
”

25. 3. Talk to your target audience about their
passions.
It’s also true that whoever your audience
is, they’re interested in stuff.
So, one way to bring our target audience
in is to create content about their
passions.
And the idea is the same: we’re not
necessarily looking to target the most
specific customer. We’re not only writing
about our products.
“
We’re trying to build a large,
sustainable audience by
talking to our customers about
their passions.
”

26. The “small store advantage”
Sometimes, this stuff can work even better if you don’t have many products.
Why?
Because all the rest of your marketing can be so focused.
All the message goes to your one product. Every single page can nudge people to
the same product. If you get people on an email list, you can promote your special
thing.
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