How to write Seo-friendly product descriptions in 2022

Posted 19 May 2022 in GUIDES, Uncategorized by wholawholesale

Product descriptions are more powerful than you may think. They can be the key difference between a customer purchasing your item or deciding not to add it to their basket. And they can do even more than that.

An SEO-friendly product description helps your website’s product pages rank higher in search engines. This makes your products more easily discoverable by shoppers and ultimately boosts your reach, which is a fast lane to increasing sales.

To help you take advantage of the power of SEO, in this article, we’ll explain how smartly-written product descriptions can help you attract a larger audience to your ONLINE FASHION STORE.

We’ll also share 6 tips and tricks that will help you create your own tailored product descriptions that increase traffic and boost conversion rates. Let’s dive in.

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WHAT IS A PRODUCT DESCRIPTION?

Simply put, a product description is written information about what you are selling.

The main roles of a product description are:

To provide the customer with essential information about your products. For example, the item’s brand, weight, material, size, return policy, etc.
To help shoppers find your products online. Accurate and unique product descriptions increase the chances of customers landing on your site. How? That’s what we’ll talk about next.

HOW SEO-FRIENDLY PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS CAN HELP YOUR BUSINESS

FIRST THINGS FIRST: WHAT IS SEO?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation.

Search engines are platforms like Google that allow users to search for information on the internet. Thanks to its complicated algorithms, Google creates a vast index of web pages, learns what they’re about and serves up the most relevant results to a user when they type in a search query. See THIS GUIDE for more information on how search engines work.
Optimisation refers to the practice of tailoring your website’s content and technical features to make it easily crawlable and indexable by Google. If you do this well, Google will consider your website relevant and useful for searchers. This helps your website rank higher in search results and be found by more potential customers.

There are three different types of SEO:

On-page SEO: Anything that’s on your website pages, including marketing copy, blog content and product descriptions.
Off-page SEO: Elements that search engines consider important that are not on your website pages (for example backlinks from other websites).
Technical SEO: The technical aspects of your website that make it easy to crawl and index by search engines.

In this article, we’re going to be focusing on on-page SEO, specifically product descriptions.

WHY DO YOU NEED TO WRITE SEO-FRIENDLY PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS?

SEO is complicated. So much so that large businesses hire marketing agencies who specialise in SEO to help them get their websites in front of a larger audience. However, as a small business owner, it’s likely that your approach to SEO will be very much DIY.

The good news is, most ecommerce platforms like Shopify or BigCommerce have SEO built into them, so you don’t have to worry about your website meeting technical SEO requirements. On the other hand, the quality of the content of your website pages is completely up to you.

As a result, the best thing that you can do for your ecommerce website’s SEO is to write product descriptions that take SEO into account. This will increase the chances of your website pages being found online by people in your target audience.

Writing unique, SEO-friendly product descriptions takes time. A popular shortcut you may see ecommerce retailers take is to copy and paste the wholesaler’s product description onto their own websites. While doing this may save you time, it creates the following problems:

Google will penalise you for not having unique product descriptions, so you’ll never rank high in search results.
Wholesaler descriptions won’t match your tone of voice, which can break the trust between your brand and your customers.

That’s why it’s important to take the time to write descriptions that are unique to your business.

So, how do you write your own product descriptions? Let’s take a look.

6 TIPS FOR WRITING SEO-FRIENDLY PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS THAT ATTRACT BUYERS

1. WRITE FOR HUMANS, NOT SEARCH ENGINES

It may sound counterintuitive since we’re talking about SEO, but it’s essential to write for humans instead of search engine algorithms.

First of all, you don’t just want to get people to your product page, you also want them to convert (=buy your product). So, your product descriptions need to be compelling and resonate with your customers.

Secondly, it’s hugely important to reinforce your brand personality at every touchpoint because this is what creates and maintains an emotional bond with your customers. After all, emotional connections have been PROVEN to be the best way of developing brand loyalty and, in turn, increasing sales.

And thirdly, user experience is an important factor for SEO. When a user finds your page interesting enough that they spend some time on it and maybe even click on a link to another page on your site, that tells Google that this search result is indeed relevant.

So be sure to create content that appeals to people, not just algorithms!

2. DO KEYWORD RESEARCH

Keywords are the terms and queries that people type into search engines to find what they’re looking for. They play an important part in telling Google what your page is about.

Pages that are optimised for certain keywords (for example, contain them multiple times throughout the text and in important places like titles and subheadings) are more likely to rank high in search results.

Consequently, keywords are like a doorway to your virtual store: researching relevant keywords and including them in your product descriptions is vital.

There are many keyword research tools that can help you with this process. Most of them are quite expensive, which is understandable since well-chosen and well-placed keywords directly lead to more business. However, one of the most popular SEO tools AHREFS has a one-week trial for $7 that you can use to research and export hundreds of keywords to use later.

Here are a few things to look out for when researching keywords:

Search volume: This metric shows how many people are searching for a particular query in a given location.
Keyword difficulty: This metric is an estimation of how difficult it is to rank on the first page of Google for a certain keyword, taking into account your competition.
Head keywords: Popular keywords with high search volume. These tend to be more competitive and harder to rank for. For example, “women’s shoes”.
Long-tail keywords: Keywords that are longer and more specific than head keywords. While long-tail keywords usually have lower search volume, they’re less competitive and customers are more likely to use them when they’re closer to making a purchasing decision. As a result, most of the keywords you use in your product descriptions should be long-tail keywords. For example, “women’s striped cotton shirts”.

Besides using relevant, long-tail keywords, it’s also important to include the name of the brand whose item you’re selling – this can be helpful in generating traffic to your website, too.

3. STAY TRUE TO YOUR BRAND PERSONALITY

It’s important to ensure brand consistency across all your marketing channels, including your website, so customers can recognise your brand easily. Using a unified brand voice helps you build a strong relationship and trust with your customers.

With this in mind, you should write your product descriptions in the same tone as your blogs posts, EMAIL MARKETING, home page and every other aspect of your online and offline presence.

Ask yourself what your brand personality is. Is it formal or friendly? Contemporary or old-school? Exciting or romantic?

Whatever it is, sticking to your brand’s style and tone when writing product descriptions makes a real difference to your RETAIL STRATEGY and reminds buyers that it’s you they are buying from, building trust and loyalty.

4. APPEAL TO EMOTIONS

A balance between function and emotion is fundamental when writing product descriptions. Yes, buyers may want to know the features of a product, but that’s rarely enough to persuade them to buy, especially in retail. Remember, you’re talking to people, not robots.

You need to tell customers how this product will make them feel. Cosy and warm? Confident and sexy? Strong and athletic?

By engaging with their senses and, in particular, how they see themselves in your product, you’re building trust and a solid emotional connection with your buyer.

5. ALWAYS HAVE YOUR CUSTOMER AVATAR IN MIND

Just like all your marketing efforts, your product descriptions should also consider your customer avatar.

A CUSTOMER AVATAR is a detailed description of your ideal customer, including where they live, their motivations, interests, aspirations, income and other characteristics. You should know everything about your avatar, including what they want from you as a retailer.

So, when you’re writing your product descriptions, remember what your customer avatar would like to know about each product and how it would make them feel. Also, consider if your customer avatar would have the patience to read wordy or robotic descriptions.

6. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE ALL ESSENTIAL SEO ELEMENTS IN PLACE

Finally, go through this on-page SEO checklist and make sure you’ve done everything to increase the chances of your product page ranking high in search results:

SEO title (includes the main keyword).
Meta description (includes the main keyword).
H2 and H3 subheadings (at least one should include the main keyword).
Short URLs with a logical structure.
Internal links to other pages on your website.
Image alt tags (a few words describing the image, include keyword when relevant).
Make sure there are no duplicate pages. For example, if you accidentally end up having two product pages for the same item by the same brand, you should delete one of them and redirect it to the other.

CONCLUSION: HOW DO I WRITE SEO-FRIENDLY PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS?

By now, you should see why product descriptions are an opportunity to build stronger relationships with your customers and increase sales over time.

While keyword research will help you with SEO by providing the correct words for your product descriptions, bear in mind that you’re writing for people.

Use your brand’s voice and remember to appeal to your buyers’ emotions as well as their rational side. Doing this will maintain the bond between you and your audience while bringing in new potential customers at the same time.

FAQS ABOUT WRITING PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS FOR SEO

WHAT IS AN SEO PRODUCT DESCRIPTION?

An SEO product description explains a product’s core features as well as the benefits for the buyer. A good SEO product description will employ keywords that are popular with your target market, helping people find you online. You can find the right keywords for your target market by researching them using a keyword tool.

HOW DO YOU WRITE PRODUCT TITLES FOR SEO?

First and foremost, put yourself in the shoes of your customer avatar (or target audience) and ask yourself what they would like to know about your product. Then come the more technical aspects, for example, relevant keywords, length and format. Don’t forget to stick to your brand’s tone of voice, as this is how people differentiate you from your competitors!

HOW LONG SHOULD AN SEO PRODUCT DESCRIPTION BE?

It depends on your audience, but a 300-word description is generally a safe option. This gives you enough space to get your personality across while also listing the key features and benefits of the product to the buyer. It also allows you to place SEO keywords tactically for maximum impact, rather than randomly thrown into sentences.