32% more organic category clicks, 44% fewer orphaned URLs, and crawl depth reduced for 126 priority ecommerce pages.
- Client type
- Large E-commerce
- Channel
- Technical SEO
Internal Linking Cleanup for a Large E-commerce Site
A technical SEO case study for a large ecommerce site that needed internal linking cleanup, crawl path improvements, and category restructuring.
What changed from the first constraint to the measured outcome.
Challenge
Important product and category pages were buried because internal links had grown messy over time.
Strategy
Crawl paths, link depth, anchors, category relationships, and priority pages were reviewed before restructuring recommendations were made.
Impact
32% more organic category clicks, 44% fewer orphaned URLs, and crawl depth reduced for 126 priority ecommerce pages.
What HGM actually did to create movement.
A practical view of the workstreams behind the result, before the long-form story expands on the details.
01
Find the real constraint
We reviewed where large e-commerce growth was stalling across visibility, content depth, technical health, conversion paths, and measurement.
02
Rank the work by impact
The Technical SEO work was ordered around the changes most likely to influence qualified demand, not around a generic checklist.
03
Execute the growth work
Crawl paths, link depth, anchors, category relationships, and priority pages were reviewed before restructuring recommendations were made.
04
Track the movement
32% more organic category clicks, 44% fewer orphaned URLs, and crawl depth reduced for 126 priority ecommerce pages.
The decisions, fixes, and execution behind the result.
Who Was the Client?
A large ecommerce website with many products, categories, subcategories, and supporting content pages.
What Was the Challenge?
As the catalog expanded, internal links became inconsistent. Some high-value categories were too deep, product groups were poorly connected, and supporting content was not passing relevance to commercial pages.
What Was the Strategy?
We audited crawl depth, internal anchors, orphaned pages, category paths, navigation links, and blog-to-category connections. Recommendations were organized by commercial impact.
What Were the Results?
- Priority categories surfaced more clearly
- Internal links mapped around revenue pages
- Crawl paths simplified for important templates
- Scalable linking rules created for future products
Impact Metrics
- 32% increase in organic clicks to category pages
- 44% reduction in orphaned URLs
- 126 priority pages moved closer to the homepage
- 18% lift in product-page revenue from organic traffic
Why Did This Work?
Large ecommerce SEO depends on architecture. Internal linking cleanup helped search engines understand which categories mattered and how products related to search demand.
For similar architecture work, see Technical SEO for crawl paths and indexation, or Ecommerce SEO when category, product, and content pages need to support revenue together.
We thought the issue was just traffic. HGM showed us that our product pages were not explaining the offer clearly enough. The changes were practical, the reporting was easy to follow, and the enquiries we got afterwards were a better fit.
Ecommerce business owner · Online retail brand
Questions this case study can help answer.
What was the main constraint in this Technical SEO case study?
Important product and category pages were buried because internal links had grown messy over time.
What work did HGM focus on first?
Crawl paths, link depth, anchors, category relationships, and priority pages were reviewed before restructuring recommendations were made.
Can this result be guaranteed for another business?
No. This case study shows what changed in one context. Results depend on the starting website, market, competition, tracking, offer quality, implementation speed, and the buyer journey.
Is this case relevant for other e-commerce businesses?
It can be useful as a pattern, but the right plan still depends on the specific market, service mix, proof assets, conversion path, and growth constraint for each business.
What clients say once the work is live.
Anonymised client feedback from businesses that needed clearer priorities, sharper pages, and work tied to actual enquiries.
We thought the issue was just traffic. HGM showed us that our product pages were not explaining the offer clearly enough. The changes were practical, the reporting was easy to follow, and the enquiries we got afterwards were a better fit.
Ecommerce business ownerOnline retail brand
We had a long list of SEO tasks and no idea what mattered first. HGM helped us sort the technical issues from the things that were actually stopping people from contacting us. It felt much more useful than another generic audit.
B2B business ownerUK professional services company
Our services made sense to us internally, but they were confusing on the website. HGM helped us split the pages properly, rewrite the vague sections, and make the next step clearer for visitors. The site finally felt easier to explain.
Managing partnerGrowth consultancy
They did not try to rewrite everything for the sake of it. They pointed out where buyers were likely getting stuck, tightened the calls to action, and made the page feel more trustworthy without making it sound like a sales script.
Company directorDubai service business
We had separate people looking at content, tracking, and the website, but no one was joining it up. HGM looked at the whole path and gave us a clear order of fixes. The conversations from the site became easier to qualify.
Practice ownerLegal services firm
The most useful part was the directness. We did not need a long presentation full of charts; we needed to know why the pages were not converting and what to fix first. That is what we got.
SaaS founderSpecialist software platform
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