Boosting your app download numbers can feel like a tricky business. You invest in crafting the best, well-optimized Shopify listing around, only to find out it’s worthless when nobody sees it.
The solution? Use internal link building to drive more traffic to your Shopify app listing in the Shopify App Store.
Internal link building is a powerful strategy that is often overlooked. BUT when done right, it can do wonders for your Shopify app’s visibility. Internal link building involves placing strategic hyperlinks between web pages on the same domain and creating a web of connected pages that are all driving traffic to your app listing.
As well as driving traffic to your app listing, educational content that is well-connected provides your visitors with a roadmap that leads them through the buyer’s journey towards a set destination.
That destination is your Shopify App Store listing.
There are two main reasons why internal link building works
The first being that link building is great for SEO & boosts your SERP ranking: Google’s algorithm gives a higher priority to websites that are easy to navigate. Webpages with well defined internal links let Google know exactly what the purpose of each page is, so they rank higher.
In fact, it’s the most important factor for gaining a high Google ranking.
Your web pages can act as signposts to each other, telling Google what is on each page.
Secondly, it improves your customer journey: a tactful placement of links between related content and to your Shopify app listing from your website helps to guide visitors towards your app’s listing on the Shopify App Store.
After potential customers have learned about who you are and what you can offer them via connected pages on your website (through blogs or a feature page, among others) — your Shopify listing provides a summary of what they have learned. It reinforces a picture in their mind which reminds them what your app can offer their business — trust has already been built.
As you can see, what’s helpful to visitors to your site, is also helpful to Google. But by linking many marketing strategies, there’s a right way to carry it out. So before you start placing hundreds of links over your site, let’s talk about pillar pages.
What exactly are pillar pages?
A pillar page is home to an important piece of content on your website, acting as a central portal to more pages that cover related topics. And when it comes to content marketing for your Shopify app, they’re your best friend.
Let’s look at an example. Imagine you’re tasked with promoting an app that automates shipping and delivery. Needless to say, automation is going to be the topic for a large portion of your website.
The best tactic to help readers learn about automation and its benefits to shipping and delivery, is to create a longer pillar page for the “automation” category of content. Then, you create lots of shorter pieces of content that go into more detail on narrower sub-topics related to automation.
These pages are known as “cluster content”, and they’ll link to and from the pillar page, and to each other.
For our shipping and delivery app, great cluster content might include a blog post on how automation is cost effective, another on time efficiency and a further on speeding up the supply chain. There are many, many possibilities.
How does this help your Shopify App Store listing?
When you use pillar pages and cluster content, you improve the experience of your customer journey for visitors to your site. It guides readers all the way from stumbling across one of your blog posts on a particular query, through all the related pieces of content that help shape their understanding of how your app can help them with it.
And at different touch points, readers will find your Shopify app listing. And as we mentioned earlier in this post, your listing reminds them of what they learned on your website.
Most importantly of all - it’s where they’ll download your app.
Summary
In this article we’ve shown you how links from within your website will help move merchants along the customer journey and download your app. The use of pillar pages and cluster content is the best way to achieve this optimally.
An optimized Shopify app store listing should be a key part of your marketing strategy, and building links to it will ensure it gets the attention you need to boost downloads, gain new customers and increase revenue.
👉🏽 Want to learn more about how to attract and retain Shopify merchants? We have built a program specifically for you! For more details on the program lessons and 1-1 support, click here.
Or, if you would you like a fantastic team of experts who understand Shopify to take care of this for you, schedule a call with us today!