We all know by now that running an online business isn’t easy – it takes careful planning, industry research, Internet marketing know-how and tons of skills which you’ll only learn through hands-on experience. With all the time you spend managing your store, who has time to write unique product descriptions? After all, you can just rip them from the manufacturer’s site, and who’s going to notice that tiny paragraph of text you took from their site?
Search engines will notice!
Search engines have been known to reward sites with original, quality content – and penalize those who copy it. Think of it this way:
You’ve got a cold and you walk into a supermarket ready to buy chicken soup. You stare at the shelves only to find there are 50 cans of that same boring condensed chicken soup – and one unique can which has creative packaging and highlights how great chicken soup is for your sniffles. Which are you going to grab?
If you’re a shopper, chances are you’ll notice the distinctive packaging. Likewise, if you’re a search engine spider, you’re going to pick the unique chicken soup can. After all, not only does it set itself apart from all the other cans, but it gives you great information right on the can about how effective chicken soup is in making you feel better.
E-commerce store owners like you know the value of a successful Search Engine Optimization (SEO) campaign. If you’re not listed for keywords related to your store on the search engines results pages (SERPs), how will potential customers find your store and purchase your products? They won’t. But there is another component to successful SEO management. Search engine spiders frown on duplicate content, or content on your site that is taken from another site. Take the time to generate original copy. Don’t run the risk of letting duplicate content adversely affect your keyword rankings.
Writing original, creative product descriptions can attract the eye of search engines and even propel them to rank your site higher for the keywords you’d like to target. Here are some tips for writing effective product descriptions:
• Keep it short. A paragraph of text is sufficient. However, make it original. Remember why you added this product to your offering in the first place. Use the enthusiasm that you felt for this product when you feature it on your site.
• Highlight the product’s features. Think about the product. If you’re writing about chicken soup, talk about how soothing it is and why the noodles in your chicken soup are so tasty.
• Provide the customer with “free information”. Effective product descriptions not only describe the product, they also have take-away value. Tell me how long I should cook the chicken soup for and any great recipes I could use it in.
• Include your keywords. Use keyword research tools like KeywordDiscovery and Wordtracker to find keywords that people actually search for that reflect the nature of your business. For the chicken soup product description, I might target a keyword like “chicken noodle soup”, and use that phrase in the title of the page and about twice in the paragraph describing the soup.
If you have hundreds of products on your site and limited employees, we know it can be extremely time-consuming to write your own product descriptions. Have a good writer in the family, or know an English major who lives down the block? Have him or her read this article, give them a little extra cash, and give them something to do by hiring them to write your product descriptions for you. It’s a good secondary solution. But in fact, if you have the time, no one else knows their products quite like you.
Show the search engines you’re different than all the other sites out there and set yourself apart with unique product descriptions.
By Alicia Magda
aliciam@ebizinsider.com
