Google's search results are changing - and fast. In recent months, the rise of organic shopping results has reshaped the SERP landscape, prioritizing product listings with rich visuals and structured data. While this may be a win for retail brands, it poses a growing challenge for B2B ecommerce businesses. Traditional B2B sites, built around spec sheets and gated pricing, now compete head-to-head with sleek B2C listings offering instant visual appeal and accessibility.
This shift is more than cosmetic - it's affecting how B2B buyers discover, evaluate, and engage with your products. But with the right SEO strategy, B2B brands can not only compete but thrive.
The Blurring Line Between B2B and B2C Search
B2B and B2C search behavior used to be easy to distinguish - B2C users wanted quick purchases, while B2B users required detailed information, bulk pricing, and complex approval processes. Today, the lines are increasingly blurred.
Modern B2B buyers often behave like B2C consumers:
- They conduct independent research before reaching out to sales.
- They expect responsive websites with transparent product information.
- They compare vendors visually in the SERPs before clicking.
This means that even if your product is meant for large-scale procurement, you're still competing with sleek, consumer-focused listings in Google.
What B2B Brands Need to Know:
- Google no longer “protects” B2B intent just because a search includes words like “bulk” or “commercial.”
- SERPs prioritize listing style and completeness over business model.
- If your listing isn’t visually appealing or data-rich, it will likely be ignored.
Understanding the SERP Shift - Organic Shopping & Visual Listings
Google has introduced and expanded visual shopping experiences across both mobile and desktop. These include:
- Organic Shopping Modules that pull data from product schema and Merchant Center feeds.
- Visual Grids and Product Carousels that showcase images, pricing, and reviews inline with standard results.
- Product Knowledge Panels featuring specific brands or SKUs for high-volume terms.
This is part of a broader trend toward AI-powered, user-friendly results that encourage product discovery without needing to click.
Why This Matters for B2B:
- These modules dominate the top of the page - pushing organic text results further down.
- B2B listings without optimized visuals and schema are excluded from these elements.
- Retailers, resellers, and marketplaces that leverage these tools are capturing the space B2B brands once held.
Keyword Intent is Evolving
Today, Google classifies keyword intent based on observed behavior and machine learning - not just logical assumptions. This means that even clear B2B terms might generate mixed or B2C-heavy results.
This overlap causes confusion:
- Procurement specialists may see irrelevant listings.
- B2B brands may lose ground to retailers that optimize better.
- Search data becomes harder to interpret.
What You Can Do:
- Use intent mapping in your SEO strategy.
- Build pages that include multiple layers: commercial, transactional, and informational.
- Include modifiers (e.g., “for facilities,” “for hospitals,” “bulk orders”) to reinforce your B2B audience.
Structured Product Data is No Longer Optional
Schema markup is a critical component of modern ecommerce SEO, especially in Google’s increasingly visual SERP. Without it, your products are invisible in many of Google’s featured elements.
Key Product Schema Types to Implement:
- Product
- Offer (includes price & availability)
- Review / AggregateRating
- ImageObject (for rich thumbnails)
Why It Matters:
- Schema is required to appear in Google’s organic shopping modules.
- Listings with rich results consistently outperform plain listings in click-through rate.
- It supports AI-driven features in Search Generative Experience (SGE) as well.
Implementation Notes:
- Schema must match on-page content.
- Avoid incomplete or error-ridden markup - use validation tools like Google’s Rich Results Test.
- Consider product variants and structured attributes (e.g., sizes, part numbers).
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Actionable SEO Strategies for B2B Ecommerce Brands
Visual Optimization for Product Pages
- Use professional, high-res product images.
- Include zoomable galleries, dimension overlays, and packaging shots.
- Use schema to connect images to the product.
Content Optimization for All Buyers
- Add layered content: brief intros, spec sheets, use cases, FAQs.
- Create personas to target (engineers, procurement officers, managers).
- Include downloadable PDFs and CAD drawings.
Technical SEO Fundamentals
- Ensure clean site architecture with crawlable product pages.
- Optimize site speed and mobile responsiveness.
- Use canonical tags properly across product variants.
- Monitor crawl stats and indexing via Google Search Console.
Product Feed Optimization & Merchant Center
- Submit a product feed to Google Merchant Center, even if you don’t sell direct-to-consumer.
- Include full product details: pricing, availability, GTIN/MPN, and high-quality images.
- Use supplemental feeds to enrich data without site overhauls.
- Validate and monitor feed health regularly to avoid disapprovals.
- Submit a product feed to Google Merchant Center, even without DTC.
- Add product schema to every SKU page.
- Use canonical tags properly across variants.
Category-Level & Long-Tail Content Strategy
- Build SEO-driven landing pages for top categories.
- Add internal filters like “industry use” or “regulatory compliance.”
- Create supporting blog content that targets informational queries.
Industry Examples
Medical Training Equipment
A B2B brand offering simulation manikins struggles to rank for “CPR training kits” because retail listings and Amazon dominate the page. Their solution? Introduce image-rich product listings and spec-focused content hubs.
Commercial Lighting
A lighting manufacturer’s “commercial light pole” page was outranked by big-box resellers. They gained ground by improving schema, submitting a Merchant Center feed, and adding comparison charts across their pole styles.
Healthcare Labels & Supplies
A B2B brand selling clinical and veterinary labels (e.g., medication, IV, and procedure labels) struggled to rank for terms like “veterinary labels” and “medical stock labels” due to large office supply retailers and general marketplaces.
Their product pages lacked imagery, structured data, and clear categorization - making them nearly invisible in Google’s increasingly visual SERPs. By restructuring product categories around buyer needs (e.g., "IV Line Labels" or "Veterinary Prescription Labels"), adding high-quality images and product schema, and publishing supporting content like usage guides and safety compliance info, they were able to reestablish visibility and better align with evolving search intent.
SEO as a Competitive Advantage in the New SERP Landscape
The evolution of ecommerce SERPs doesn’t spell doom for B2B - it simply raises the bar. Brands that adapt to Google’s visual and data-rich format can gain visibility, build trust, and drive conversions even in competitive spaces.
Think of SEO not as a checkbox, but as a product development layer. Your product pages are sales tools - and in a visual-first world, they need to perform like one.
Ready to adapt your B2B ecommerce strategy? Contact Marcel Digital to evaluate your SEO opportunities.
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About the author
Joe Stoffel
Joe knows what it takes to drive SEO results. He is an experienced SEO specialist who currently leads the SEO department and strategy at Marcel Digital.