What's the best method to handle out of stock items without damaging SEO?

[amir-a]

Hello,

So i have been struggling to find the best way to deal with out of stock products and need help.

I sell seasonal products which i probably sell about 20 of every year, however, I have a huge amount of SKU's, around 2000 of them.

I want a way to hide those products but not fully because many have very good SEO rankings. I'm wondering if there is a way to hide items from the store if people search for them, but if somebody had the link or finds it on google can still access it without affecting my SEO.

Here is what i tried and but í'm not happy with:

1. used collection rules to only show inventory over 0 stock. That's not good because if people search for the items they will still see a lot of out of stock items.

2. used an app to push out-of-stock items to the end of the collection. this also doesn't work for the same reason as above.

3. made products unavailable on Shopify store. that's also not good because I believe it will affect my SEO

is there any other way I can possibly use?

Please help!

[zimousdigi]

Hi @amir-a 

would you mind checking our app Nada - https://apps.shopify.com/nada-sort-hide-out-of-stock

The app is doing both, pushing sold-out products to the bottom of collections or hiding them completely. Or you can combine both approaches and hide them after being sold out for few days.

Try it for free for 7 days and check if it helps to solve your problem.

Martin

[amir-a]

Hi @zimousdigi 

If I choose to hide an item, what happens to the item SEO wise? I can see that you can redirect to a different page, but if an item is hidden for a long time, doesn't that link vanish from google eventually?

Also, would your app work if we put some products on pre-order or coming soon?

thanks

[zimousdigi]

Hi @amir-a ,

from the SEO perspective is better not to hide the products but rather sort them at the end of collection. 

[demib]

There ar two issues at stake here - that is partly connected

1. What you display in your shop - on collection pages and directly accessing a product page
2. Which products you get indexed in Google and how they rank

Lets start with number 2 ...

In order to get your pages indexed in Google they do (off course) need to be accessible and indexable. So if you redirect them, use CANONICAL tag, NOINDEX, password protects them or in any other way make them inaccessible to Google, or tell them not to index them then they will (most often - there are exceptions but that's a more geeky detail) not be indexed. 

But indexing alone has no real value unless the pages also rank for (at least) some of the relevant keywords. 

If there is no internal links to a page a page it is much less likely Google will rank it for anything. Even if you have external links to it. The logic is easy - if there is not even a single link to a page how important is it? Google understand this. 

So, lets look at number 1 ...

With the above in mind, removing all links to your out of season products WILL hurt your SEO. Google still need to find internal links to them.

A solution could be to keep all your seasonal products in seasonal collections only - or at least when out of season. These collections could be listet on a "seasonal collections" page linked to in your footer. This way Google can still find links to them but they do not appear in your primary navigation. 

Users will off course also be able to find them but if someone specifically look for Christmas socks in July why not let them? 🙂

[amir-a]

Thanks @demib love your reply!

that's a great idea you gave me there, and I will implement it. 

only problem is like you said people will still be able to search for them, but the problem with my products is (I sell calendars) so every year I might have the same calendar but the next year's version, so 2021, 2022 etc.. and once they sell out they are gone forever, I will never stock them again. In 3 years times this could become an issue that if someone searches for bulldog calendar for example, they are going to see 3 different one from 2021, 2022, 2023. But sounds like i can't do much other than that

[demib]

Thanks - if you like my solution you can mark it as solution 🙂

Calendars is a special (SEO) issue. For that I would (301) redirect the previous years calendars to the newest current edition. 

For most other types of expired (no longer or never again available products) I would instead show updated content letting prospects know about good alternatives (or whatever they need)  - rather than redirecting. The reason for this is that prospects often search for products without knowing a newer or alternative version is available. If you just redirect you won't rank for those searches and prospects often get confused if they land on a different page than what they searched for. Explain it to them instead. That works better - for conversions and SEO alike. 

A good example is computers. Many people search for models no longer available. But why? Some may just not know a newer model is available (often better and cheaper). Some may need to get the old model repaired or are looking for a manual for it. 

By changing the normal product page to an informational page you can supply all that to the prospects. Let them know there is a new model, helt them get it fixed or link to manual (if thats their need). 

For your product types you do off course need to identify these needs and then supply them.