Online commerce is a competitive environment, and shoppers are often scanning product options quickly to make selections. You are probably employing a number of strategies to engage visitors to your online platform, and paying attention to your product descriptions is a simple and cost effective way to turn more visitors into customers. Images and video are what attract shoppers first, but your text descriptions give you an opportunity to stand out amongst your competitors. So how can you use product descriptions to their best advantage?
Tip #1: Be accessible and easy to understand.
You want to make sure you are using clear, easy to understand language, so that a wide range of consumers understand your product. Avoid long, run-on sentences and filler words or phrases. Focus on the key features of your product and how you can clearly convey them to a consumer. Also, pay attention to how text is laid out, and avoid long blocks of text – they are easy to skip over. Formatting your text is as important as the text itself.
Tip #2: Focus on the consumer’s point of view.
People want to know how your product is going to impact them. How can you word your product descriptions to emphasize the user’s experience? For example, a consumer wants to know that their razor blade will provide a close, clean shave – not necessarily how the blades themselves are constructed. Unless detailed technical specifications are a necessary selection feature for your shoppers, those specifications should be tucked away in a tab or placed below the descriptive text. Tell your shoppers how your product will impact and improve their life. Will it cut down on their food waste? Will it make their hair smoother and shinier? Will it secure their data from information breaches? What problem will your product solve?
Tip #3: Write to your target market.
Make sure you are emphasizing the features that your target consumers are shopping for in your product descriptions. For example, if you are selling repair parts for cars, you’ll want to make sure that part numbers and compatibility specifications are very clearly stated in your online product description. However, if you sell audiobooks, your product descriptions will look very different! Pay attention to consumer feedback to your product and website, via comments, reviews or emails, and adjust your descriptions accordingly. Another thing to remember is that your target market still contains a wide variety of people. Don’t focus so narrowly on one demographic that you fail to market to other possible customers. For example, if you sell computers, don’t focus so much on marketing to online gamers that a student on a tight budget feels like you won’t have an inexpensive device for them.
Online product descriptions are more than just a literal description of the product you are selling: they are an opportunity for you to engage with visitors to your online platform and tell them why your product is the product they need. By applying these three tips to your text, you will improve your connection to your visitors, and turn them into customers.
