eCommerce is all about sales. There's no other way to say it other than "Show me the money". With that being said when you are doing eCommerce in Northwest Alabama, Chicago, or a small and growing town like Chesterton you need to focus on the conversion of your visitors to buy from you. In this article, we will look at several techniques used when creating descriptions for your products to draw people into purchasing your products.
When you start writing stop pushing your product! That is where we always start. We want to be informative, human, and educational. Stop trying to manipulate the human psyche by thinking you can trick someone into buying your product. Treat your descriptions like you want to be treated. All too often we hear about people doing "good things" when their actions speak the exact opposite. Eat, breath, and act honestly and with integrity. Don't try to manipulate someone into buying your stuff. Yes, you want sales, we all do, but you should want it ethically and honestly.
Honesty and Integrity
It is important when you are creating your description that you not only sound like you know your product but know it. Think of what you would want to know and tell your potential customers why they will want it. Make certain that when you do that it is a compelling and honest product description.
When selling products online you will often get them from manufacturers and copy their "sales copy". This is a great place to start but not a great place to end. You want to get your products online to start generating sales. Often we will take the generic descriptions, learn about the product, and go back to tell the "real story" of the product. This also has an added search engine benefit that the search engines will see (if you are marketing on the search engines – I hope you are) and then when they come back to see you not only revised it but hopefully read (computers are smart after all) that you have made it more human, honest, and informational to inform your potential customer.
Details, Details, and more Details!
Part of educating and informing is having as much relevant information as possible. Consumers are smart (don't think they are not). Just because they might not want to know something this round doesn't mean the next time they purchase, research, or better buy that they don't want the details. Ensure that your descriptions, specifications, attributes, and details you provide are able to answer as many of the questions the buyer might want to know. This also helps make you knowledgeable on your site as well as helping to educate your customer on how awesome not only the product is but your eCommerce website is.
Know your customer
All too often with eCommerce we hear about people thinking they know who their customer is as they have a physical location and never realize the online audience is completely different. Yes, your physical store customers may go online but your virtual (online) customers are a much wider audience and also an audience that is harder to initially reach. As an example, our online sales were one every four months. Now we get a sale from our website almost weekly (some weeks are zero while others are multiple). Overall though we are now averaging more than 52 sales per year that at one time only gave three or four per year. Patience was key as well as modifying our site constantly to meet the needs of our clients that came through the website.
Keywords
We don't like it when people ask to be found under a keyword. They think the very old school of put this keyword in my meta information and be done. Worst thing ever! (then and now). The search engines really don't use this. They are looking at the context of what you have on your site. If you want to be known for social media marketing in Northwest Alabama then write articles about your social media marketing in Northwest Alabama, let people know you are there, etc. If your goal is to promote the vintage furniture you sell then write about vintage furniture and show your expertise in it. Don't do the keywords. Do actual words that help people see you as an expert and that you are the person to buy from.
Grammar Nazi it!
We don't believe in being a grammar Nazi but be sure to proofread and look for obvious errors in your writing. Be authenticate and true. If you are missing a comma and your audience will see it as more natural to have bad grammar live with it. Don't listen to the grammar Nazi. The key is being genuine and real with your audience. Just don't be unorganized, careless, or misleading in what you write. Think and work to your audience the way that will not only draw them into your world but think of you after the fact.
Mobility wins
In today's landscape if you are not thinking mobile you are not thinking. If you are thinking solely about social media you again are not thinking. Be where your customers are, be aware of their changing needs, and make certain you test, test, and test again on mobile.
Social media is important
You need social media as much as you need a website. You need a website as much as you need social media. These are no longer two distinct items. They both work collaboratively together to build your brand and online reputation. Use both together. Push people from social media to your website. Provide social sharing tools for every single product you offer. Allow people to get your products out to the masses.
Core items to think of
When it comes to eCommerce, and regular brochure style websites they are truly simple to achieve great results. Don't overthink it and don't just follow what others are doing. Be a leader and be in tune with your audience. With that said here are the core items to look at when it comes to creating your product descriptions:
Have a compelling headline
- Spellcheck
- Grammar Nazi your description according to your audience needs
- Short or Broken Sentences (bullets are awesome!)
- A clear font that is large enough to be readable
- Works extremely well on mobile
- Scannable Bullet Points
- Well distinguished Font Colours
- Connective or Linking words
- Easy to follow writing style
- Plenty of white space
- Simple words instead of Jargons
- 52 to 100 characters per line
- Left-alignment
- Preferably, double spacing
- Phonetics for compulsive technical word
Conclusion
eCommerce is a great way for businesses to grow. It takes time, you have to be patient, be consistent, don't stop and restart, focus on the needs of your customers and not what you feel you need. You are not your customer! Create compelling, unique, and honest product descriptions that work on desktop, tablet, and mobile devices.