SEO eCommerce hReview

Most people think of design when they think of conversion rates.  But in 2010 one easy way to increase conversion rates are to code your eCommerce website with standard microformats so Google can display their new Rich Snippets. This article is to help eCommerce website owners (1) understand the basics about microformats & hReview (2) help them integrate it into their site to help them increase conversion rates.

A Microformat re-uses existing HTML/XHTML and Meta Data and other attributes in web pages.  So your programmer doesn’t need to use a new language.  Microformats are really just built upon these simple standard coding “building blocks.’  Elemental microformat (a single attribute with a value) make up the basic microformat and then compound microformat (has properties and subproperties) make up the more highly known.

Every website owner that knows the basics about SEO or link development knows of a ‘elemental microformat.’  Back a  few years ago Google dropped in the spam killer rel=”nofollow” and amature SEO Experts became amateurs again.  But, recently website owners have started using compound microformats when coding a website; hcard and hcalendar are some popular ones. That is what leads me into the main point of the article for website owners:

4 Resources To Give To Your Programmer When Programming an eCommerce Website

1. hReview – How To Embed Product Reviews
2. hReview – The Importance of hReviews Explained By Google
3. hReview Testing – Type in a Web Page To Test Your Programmers
4. Get On Google’s Email List To Learn More About Rich Snippets
   

The above 4 links discuss a microformat called hReview.  With hReview you can indicate whether or not your customers support a product, and people can express their “vote” with much higher fidelity than a simple up/down/neutral statement. Plus, with hReview they can express *why* they support or don’t support something.

Numerous web sites publish reviews using a broad variety of schema for all sorts of things from products (movies, music, books), to businesses (restaurants, hotels, stores), to events (concerts, theatre), to people (artists, leaders, celebrities), to places (landmarks, parks), to online resources (web pages, files), to reviews of reviews themselves.

HReview enables and encourage the sharing, distribution, syndication, and aggregation of these reviews.  What does this mean to you as an ecommerce owner?  It means if your website’s product review software application is coded with hReview your search engine result in Google can look like this:

Eye Catching, isn’t It?  What are you, as a user, more likely to click on:  A search engine ranking for a product that has a five star rating out of 15 reviews or one that does not have any for the same product?  No doubt you would first explore the result with the trusted reviews.  That is the power of using hReview and other micro-formats.  The first 4 links will provide your programmer with all the needed information to integrate SEO friendly product reviews into your eCommerce Website.

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