Internal links on product pages: how related products help shoppers and search
Links from a product page to related products and collections help shoppers keep browsing and help search engines find your catalogue.
2 min read
Area
Store discovery
Severity
Low
Fix effort
Small
Stores failing
Not enough data
Internal links on a product page, such as related products and links back to the collection, give shoppers a next step and give search engines a path through your catalogue. This check looks for those links.
Why it matters
A shopper who does not like one product is a customer you can still keep, if the page shows alternatives. Pages with no outgoing links to other products are dead ends for visitors and for crawlers alike.
What the audit looks at
The audit counts internal links on the product page to other products and collections.
What usually causes it
- A theme with the related products block switched off
- A recommendations app that loads after the page and is invisible to crawlers
- Breadcrumbs removed in a redesign
- Product pages built as isolated landing pages
How to fix it
Link the product page to related products and the collection it belongs to. The effort is small, usually a setting or a paste and under 30 minutes.
- Add a related-products block and a visible link back to the collection or category.
On Shopify
- Online Store > Themes > Customize > Product page: add the "Product recommendations" or "Related products" section.
On WooCommerce
- Enable related products in your theme and link the category name above the product title.
How to check it yourself
- Scroll a product page and note every link to another product or collection.
- View the page source and check the related links are present in the HTML, not only injected later.
- Test that the links are on every product type.
Frequently asked questions
How many related products should I show?
Four to eight is common. Enough to browse, not so many that the page becomes a catalogue.
Do recommendation apps count?
They help shoppers. Search engines may not see links added late by scripts, so server-rendered links are safer.
Related checks
Check your own store
See whether your store passes this check
Paste your store URL. The audit loads your pages in a real browser and shows the result for this check with the evidence behind it.