301 redirects, sitemap, meta descriptions and llms.txt in CloudCart

In short: a 301 redirect in CloudCart is created in Marketing → SEO → 301 redirects with Add redirect, or thousands at once from a CSV file. The meta description goes in the SEO Configuration section of each product and, for the home page, in Marketing → SEO → Meta information. Sitemap.xml and the canonical tag work on their own, and robots.txt and llms.txt are edited in Marketing → SEO on every plan.

This guide covers the tools themselves: where each field sits, what the platform does for you and which mistakes cost rankings. Keyword and product copy planning is in the SEO checklist for an online store, and submitting the sitemap is in the guide to Google Search Console for an online store. Screen names are as the CloudCart admin shows them, from the platform documentation and the SEO and blog page.

What a meta description is and whether it affects rankings

A meta description is the tag <meta name="description"> with a short summary of the page, which Google may show under the blue title in results. Google has said it does not use it for ranking (Google Search Central). It affects the click: of two neighbouring results, people pick the one whose description answers their search.

Google does not always show your text. It builds the snippet from the page content when that fits the query better (Google Search Central: snippets). So the meta description carries the main benefit, and the page text answers the detailed questions. Google gives no hard limit and truncates by screen width, so 140 to 155 characters is the practical range that shows in full on phone and desktop. CloudCart themes are responsive, with one address and one HTML for both, so you write the text once.

A good store meta description names the product type, one difference and one fact about delivery or payment. Three examples for a natural cosmetics store shipping with Econt and Speedy, the two largest Bulgarian couriers:

Page	Meta description	Characters	Where you write it
Product	Rose oil face cream for dry skin, 50 ml. No parabens, made in Bulgaria. Delivered in 24 hours with Econt or Speedy. Order yours today.	134	Products → the product → SEO Configuration
Category	Face creams for dry, oily and sensitive skin: 48 products from 12 brands. Filter by skin type and price, 24-hour delivery, 14-day returns.	138	Products → Categories → the category
Home page	Natural cosmetics from Bulgaria: creams, serums and oils for dry and sensitive skin. Delivered in 24 hours, pay by card or cash on delivery.	140	Marketing → SEO → Meta information → Home

To see what Google shows, search site:your-domain.com face creams. In Search Console's Performance report, compare a page's click-through rate before and after the change, after at least 4 weeks.

Which SEO tools CloudCart has

CloudCart has eight SEO tools. Six are cards on the Marketing → SEO screen (Main SEO settings), each saved on its own; meta information and 301 redirects have their own screens in the same menu.

Tool	What CloudCart does	What you do
Canonical tag	On by default, every page points to itself	Leave it on
Deindex Filtered and Sorted pages	Filtered and sorted pages get noindex	Choose how many filters stay in Google (0 to 5)
Pagination word	Adds "Page 2 -" to titles from page two on	Change the word if the storefront is not in English
Sitemap.xml	Builds and updates the sitemap	Submit it in Search Console
Robots.txt	Always closes cart and checkout to crawlers	Add the Sitemap line
Llms.txt	Publishes a short summary if empty	Describe what you sell
Meta title and description	The theme usually falls back to the page name	Write the text for Google results
301 redirects	Redirects an old address for 30 days after a rename	Add permanent rules, by hand or from CSV

Access comes with the SEO permission (marketing.seo) in staff permissions.

Who needs the SEO settings and when

• New store. Go once through the Marketing → SEO cards, write the home page meta description and submit the sitemap.
• Migration from WooCommerce, Shopify, OpenCart or Magento. Old addresses must lead to new ones with a 301, or Google sees 404 errors and rankings drop. What moves over is in the guide to importing from WooCommerce, Shopify and Magento.
• Renaming and deleting. When a category address changes or a product is deleted, check the old address has a permanent redirect.
• Visibility in ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity. Llms.txt tells AI assistants what you sell.

One detail answers most "why is my store not on Google" questions: a store on a trial or expired plan, or in maintenance mode, answers crawlers with Disallow: /, whatever your robots.txt says, and the admin shows no warning. The block lifts by itself once the store is on a paid plan.

How to change the meta description in CloudCart

1. Open the product. Products → click the product name.
2. Expand SEO Configuration. It shows a Google preview with the meta title, description and URL handle (by default /product/<handle>).
3. Write the meta title. Up to 60 characters, product type first: "Women's running shoes Model X, sizes 36 to 42".
4. Write the meta description. 140 to 155 characters. The field has no counter, so measure it yourself.
5. Save the product. Meta texts save with the rest of the product.

If the ShopperPen skill of the CloudIO app is enabled, an AI bar under the field writes a description from the product data with Generate text, using the tokens in your plan; Keep puts it in the field. Weak and strong examples are in the SEO checklist.

Page	Where the meta description lives
Product, category, brand, blog article	The record's editor (meta title, description, sharing image)
Page (CMS)	Page editor, plus Canonical URL and noindex
Home, Contacts, Products, Vendors, Blog	Marketing → SEO → Meta information, one shared save button

Meta information is per language and per active theme: in a Bulgarian and English store you fill it once for each language, and recheck after a theme change. An empty field falls back to the page editor text, then Meta information, then the language default. A category does not pass its meta text to its products.

For a whole catalog, the SEO Spinner app (Apps → SEO Spinner) writes meta titles and descriptions from a template, without AI: {Buy|Order} {$name} by {$vendor} for {$price}. You review every line before Finalize, after which the old texts cannot be restored. It warns about titles over 65 and descriptions over 155 characters.

Where your store's sitemap is

Every CloudCart store's sitemap is at https://your-domain/sitemap.xml. You copy it with one click in Marketing → SEO → Sitemap.xml file. It is built automatically and cannot be edited: visible products (with the main image for Google Images), categories, brands, visible pages, blogs with active articles and the articles, contacts and listing pages. Noindex addresses (filters above the threshold, cart, checkout, account) are left out. Large catalogs are split into files of 1,000 addresses under the sitemap.xml index, and a new product appears within an hour.

1. Add it to robots.txt. In the Robots.txt file card, write Sitemap: https://your-domain.com/sitemap.xml. CloudCart does not add it for you.
2. Submit it in Search Console. Indexing → Sitemaps → paste → "Submit". Steps with screens: submitting the sitemap.
3. Check the status. "Success" with discovered pages. Discovered is not indexed.

The address follows the main domain. Change the main domain and you submit the sitemap again.

How to set up a 301 redirect in CloudCart

A 301 (permanent) redirect tells browsers and Google that a page has moved for good. Google treats it as a strong signal that the new address is the main one and over time shows it instead of the old one (Google Search Central: redirects).

1. Open Marketing → SEO → 301 redirects. Rules are listed newest first.
2. Click Add redirect. An empty row appears at the top.
3. Fill in Old url address. Just the path, for example /face-creams. Anything after # is dropped; parameters after ? stay part of the rule.
4. Choose the Redirect type. The record type if the target is in the store, otherwise Manual redirect.
5. Set New url address. Search the record by name, or type the path for Manual redirect.
6. Click Create and open the old address to check it.

Which redirect type to choose

Type	When	Follows the record after a rename
Product, Product category, Vendor / Brand, Blog, Blog article, Page (CMS)	The target is that record	Yes
Section	A built-in page: home, contacts, cart, login	Yes
Manual redirect	A store path that is not a record, such as a filtered page	No
External	Another site; write https:// or http:// is added	No

Wildcards and CSV import

An asterisk stands for any text: /old-shop/* catches /old-shop/category/x and /old-shop/product/123. Regular expressions are not supported, and a rule works with and without a trailing slash.

For a migration, Import redirects takes a CSV in three steps: upload, map the old and new columns, confirm. It runs in the background. Each row becomes Manual redirect, or External if the target starts with http. A row with an old address you already have replaces that rule, so a corrected file creates no duplicates. Automatic import is limited by plan: 100 on Baby Pack, 2,000 on Starter Pack, unlimited on CC Pro and CC Master (pricing). How to build the old-to-new table is in the WooCommerce migration guide.

What CloudCart does on its own

• 30 days after a rename of a product, category, brand, page, blog or article, the old address redirects to the new one, then stops. For a permanent redirect, add a rule.
• Deleting a product or category deletes the rules pointing to it. Manual, External and Section rules stay.
• Ad parameters such as gclid, fbclid and utm_source are carried over; utm_term and utm_content are not, so point ads straight at the new address. See Google Ads and Meta ads for tracking.

Every redirect here is a 301; there is no 302. Files such as .pdf and .jpg are not redirected. The Domain Redirect app is something else: it sends visitors to your stores by country with a temporary redirect.

Canonical and noindex for filters: how CloudCart prevents duplicates

The canonical tag tells Google which address is the original when the same content opens from several addresses (Google Search Central: duplicate URLs). In CloudCart it is on by default and saves instantly. Ad parameters are stripped (/category/shoes?utm_source=x&page=3 has the canonical /category/shoes?page=3), each listing page points to itself, and CMS pages have a Canonical URL field. Turn it off only if a custom theme already adds the tag.

The Deindex Filtered and Sorted pages card sets from how many filters a category page gets noindex, with a Parameter value of 0 to 5. Only listing parameters count: price, brand, discount, new, sorting, search and properties.

Setting	What stays in Google	When
Off, or on with 0	The category without filters	Most stores
On, 1	One filter, for example ?sale=1	People search "brand + category"
On, 2 to 5	Up to that many filters	Only with proven demand

Pages above the threshold stay open to shoppers and crawlers still follow their product links; they just stay out of results and the sitemap.

How to edit robots.txt

Robots.txt tells crawlers which addresses not to open (Google Search Central: robots.txt). Edit it in the Robots.txt file card; saving asks "Are you sure?". The store always appends a block for checkout, cart and wishlist plus Crawl-Delay: 3, and changes show at /robots.txt within 5 minutes. The one line almost every store should add is Sitemap:.

Important: never write Disallow: /. It hides the whole store from Google, and the save confirmation is the only safeguard.

Which AI crawlers to let in is covered in GEO for an online store.

How to write llms.txt in CloudCart

Llms.txt is a Markdown file at https://your-domain/llms.txt that tells AI assistants what the store sells and which pages to read, following the llmstxt.org convention. You write it in the Llms.txt file card of Marketing → SEO: a # title, one > sentence about the store, a ## Pages list of 5 to 15 key links and a ## Contact section.

# Example store
> Natural cosmetics for dry and sensitive skin, made in Bulgaria. Delivery across Bulgaria in 24 hours.

## Pages
- /category/face-creams: face creams by skin type
- /page/delivery: delivery to an office, an address or a parcel locker

## Contact
- hello@example.com

Left empty, the store publishes only its name, the home page meta description, links and contacts: proof it exists, not what it sells. The file is public, so no internal notes. A trial or expired store returns 404 for it, and reading it is voluntary for AI assistants.

How to check your SEO settings with an AI agent

An AI agent such as Claude Code, ChatGPT Codex, Gemini CLI or Cursor, connected with a PAT token, audits the meta texts of the whole catalog and fixes them after your approval. It reads /robots.txt, /sitemap.xml and /llms.txt straight from their addresses. Try: "List products without a meta description, sorted by sales", "Find descriptions over 155 characters and suggest shorter ones" or "Check robots.txt for a Sitemap line and for Disallow: /". At 2 minutes per product, 500 products by hand is over 16 hours.

What these settings get you: an example

A cosmetics store renames /category/creams to /category/face-creams, because that is how people search. Without a rule, the old address redirects for 30 days, then returns 404 and the rankings it built fade. With a Product category rule, it leads to the category for good and follows any later rename. The new address enters the sitemap within an hour, and a meta description with "face creams" matches the search.

Best practices for SEO settings in CloudCart

1. Keep canonical on. It handles duplicates you do not see.
2. Write meta descriptions where the money is. Home page, top 10 categories and top 20 products first.
3. Check the pagination word. It defaults to "Page" and is one word for the whole store; if your main storefront is in Bulgarian, write the Bulgarian word.
4. Add a permanent redirect for every rename, using the record type.
5. Redirect a deleted product to the closest category with Manual redirect, since Product rules vanish with the product.
6. Write llms.txt yourself. Ten lines are enough.

Mistakes that cost rankings

Mistake	What happens	Fix
Disallow: / in robots.txt	The store disappears from Google	Block only specific paths
Expecting Google on a trial plan	Crawlers are blocked	Move to a paid plan
Relying on the automatic redirect	404 after 30 days	Add a permanent rule
CSV import over manual rules	Rules with the same old address are replaced	Check the file first
Meta description over 155 characters	Cut with an ellipsis	Measure it yourself
Meta text in one language only	Others show the default	Fill each language

All these tools come with every CloudCart plan, from Baby Pack (€14 a month billed annually, excluding VAT, see pricing) to CC Master, with a 0% transaction fee on sales. Open a store for €1 a month for the first 3 months and submit your sitemap this week. Questions: support@cloudcart.com.

Frequently asked questions