SEO Promotion for an Online Store Specializing in Construction Products

• Field of activity: Paints, varnishes and construction chemicals
• Target region: Ukraine
• Platform: originally MODX, now OpenCart
• Period of work: January 2019 – present (with a five-month break in 2022)
• Tools: Google Analytics 4, Google Search Console, Ahrefs, Serpstat

The Belife.ua online store is a direct supplier of paint and varnish products under several own brands. At the outset, the project had a limited range of own brands (Belife, Rino Paint, Bosny), minimal organic traffic and a reliance on paid advertising. The task was ambitious: to build a stable SEO sales channel and propel little-known brands to the top of the Ukrainian market.

Over the course of six years, despite the challenges posed by a full-scale war, we managed to increase organic traffic 39-fold and make SEO our primary sales channel (accounting for 61% of revenue).

About the client

Belife.ua — an online shop selling paint and varnish products and construction chemicals manufactured in-house.

The shop's product range:

• Spray paints (all-purpose, heat-resistant, fluorescent, with special effects)
• Primers (for plastic, metal, all-purpose)
• Construction foam (household, professional, liquid cement)
• Sealants and silicones
• Varnishes and construction chemicals
• Hand tools and consumables

Project highlights

The initial situation posed significant constraints on progress:

• Little-known brands without prior marketing
• Limited product range (selling only our own products and those of our partners)
• Competition with large construction chains
• The need to build trust in unfamiliar brands

Reason for the enquiry and main objective

The client approached us with a MODX website that had critical technical errors and was receiving virtually no organic traffic. All traffic came from contextual advertising, which created a high level of dependence on the advertising budget.

Key issues:

• Lack of SEO optimisation (duplicate content, incorrect URLs, slow loading times)
• Poor website structure (one product = one page with a colour selector)
• Minimum number of indexed pages
• Lack of backlinks
• Low brand awareness

The main objective is to establish a stable channel for organic sales, reduce reliance on advertising, and ensure that key search terms rank at the top of Google.

Marketing strategy

We have developed a comprehensive SEO strategy focused on technical excellence, in-depth semantic analysis and high-quality content.

Technical basis

• A comprehensive website audit with rectification of critical errors
• Configuring correct metadata and metadata tags
• Implementation of Schema.org microdata
• Optimising loading speed
• Mobile optimisation settings

Semantics and structure

• Collecting and clustering queries
• Restructuring for SEO filters
• Creating separate product cards instead of options and toggles
• Increasing the number of pages

Content

• Expert articles for categories (3,000–5,000 characters)
• Informative blog posts
• Wholesale and dropshipping prices
• Optimising product descriptions

Link building

• Analysis of the top competitors' donors
• Placement on websites with a Domain Rating (DR) of 30 or higher and traffic of 5,000 or more
• Crowd-sourced links in directories
• Guest articles on construction websites

What has been done

Phase 1: Technical optimisation (2019)

Initial situation:

• A MODX website with critical errors
• An unattractive layout with few pages
• Incorrect URLs (Cyrillic characters, special characters)

Work carried out:

• Technical audit and drafting of technical specifications for a programmer
• Corrections to URL and metadata generation
• Implementation of Product and BreadcrumbList micro-markup
• Speed optimisation (compression, caching)
• Splitting products into separate SKUs
• Defining the requirements for the development of an SEO filter, followed by the creation of landing pages based on it

Phase 2: Expansion of the structure and change of CMS (2020–2021)

Changes to the product range:

• The Rino Paint range and Bosny premium products have been added
• Hand tools (8 subcategories) have been introduced
• Consumables added (5 subcategories)

Work carried out:

• Compilation of over 1,200 new queries for new categories
• Conducting an audit for the creation of a new company website on OpenCart to facilitate the migration of the project to a new CMS
• Working with the new semantics
• Creating dedicated landing pages for brands
• Adding Ukrainian to the website

Link building:

• Analysis of suppliers to medium-sized DIY stores
• Placing links on thematic portals
• Articles on construction blogs
• Catalogues and profiles

Stage 3: The Challenges of War and Adaptation (2022)

Issues:

• Work suspended for 5 months (February–July 2022)
• Decline in traffic
• Part of the range is currently unavailable
• Logistical challenges

Adaptation of the strategy:

• Focus on an affordable range
• Taking advantage of opportunities presented by competitors who have ceased trading

Stage 4: Migration to the new design (2023–2024)

In 2023, the website underwent a major redesign.

Reasons:

• The need for new features (comparison tool, personal account)
• Outdated design
• Improvements to the mobile version
• Adding bulk purchases

SEO audit for the new version:

• Save all URLs
• Loading time: up to 2 seconds (desktop), up to 3 seconds (mobile)
• Responsive layout
• Detailed micro-marking

Transition:

• Checking the completed website to ensure there are as few changes as possible that could affect SEO
• Indexing monitoring
• Prompt correction of errors

Current phase (2024–2025)

Focus of the work:

1. Holding ground 
   • Handling enquiries for positions 4–10
   •  Optimising content for intent
   •  Adding product blocks to articles
2. Long tail 
   • Search results for specific queries
   •  Filter extensions
3. Technical optimisation 
   • Speed monitoring
   •  Core Web Vitals
   •  Content update

Key aspects of link building

Donor selection strategy:

Selected work with competitors' donors:

• Analysis of the top 10 competitors using Ahrefs
• Downloading backlink profiles
• Filter by criteria (traffic 5,000+, DR 30+, topic)
• Analysis of availability and cost
• Prioritising high-quality donors

Results of the work

Key metrics

Organic traffic:

• Organic traffic – currently: ~40,000+ visitors per month
• Growth in organic traffic: +3,900%
• Proportion of SEO traffic: 80% (there was virtually none at the start)
• Proportion of sales generated through SEO: 61%

Conclusion

Comprehensive SEO for an online paint and varnish shop, focusing on technical excellence, in-depth semantic analysis, high-quality content and strategic link building, has delivered impressive results:

• Organic traffic has increased 39-fold
• SEO has become the main sales channel (61% of revenue)
• The project has become one of the market leaders in Ukraine

It is particularly significant that these results were achieved despite serious challenges: a limited product range, little-known brands, fierce competition and a full-scale war. This confirms that the right SEO strategy and a systematic approach yield consistent results even in difficult circumstances.