As an e-commerce specialist, you will eventually have to add products to your store’s website. This means you’ll need to add product descriptions, page titles, alt text, and meta descriptions. In this reading, you will learn about the basic process for creating product detail pages in your online store.
Table of Contents
Writing a product description
A product description is the text on the product detail page of an e-commerce store that provides details and information to customers about the product. A good product description persuades customers to purchase your product. If your product description is incomplete or not descriptive enough, you are leaving questions unanswered, which means customers are less likely to buy the item.
When creating descriptions, make sure your copy stands out from the rest. To do this, consider your customers. Ask yourself:
- Who is my target customer?
- What kind of copy would they want to read? Humorous? Serious? Imaginative? Soothing? Fresh?
- What qualities are they looking for in a product? What makes my product special?
After you’ve answered these questions, you can start drafting your product description. Write a brief paragraph that includes features and any relevant information your target customers may want. After you’ve created your clear, concise description, feel free to add some personality and cleverness, if you think it makes sense. Remember, you’re trying to convince people that they want this product. Then, include a bulleted list of features the product has. The following is an e-commerce scenario and related product description:
Imagine you run an online electronics store, and you are writing a product description for a new pair of headphones that just arrived in your store. Your customers are tech enthusiasts who love the latest and most high-quality trends. They are clever, and they don’t mind spending a lot of money if the product is worth it, especially if the product looks cool, too. Your product description might read:
Immerse yourself in the smoothest sound and strongest noise cancellation on the market. Available in five colorways, these headphones will have everyone around you doing a double-take—but you won’t notice because you’ll be lost in the sound.
Writing a product title
A product title should be very straightforward and concise. Target customers should be able to read the product and know exactly what it is. To write an effective product title, include details like the brand’ name and the product’s name. Then, think about the color, flavor, material, and type of item, and include whichever aspects feel important. Finally, you may want to add information about size and quantity, depending on what you are selling.
Note: In a previous video, you learned that a stock keeping unit, or SKU, is a unique code that retailers use to identify a product. Certain products may have multiple SKUs based on identifiers like color, size, type, and more. If the product detail page allows the customer to select a size, color, or other variation, you wouldn’t include these identifiers in the product title because one product page will represent multiple SKUs for that product.
Revisit the online electronics store scenario. Here’s a good example title for the new headphones:
Audiophile Over-The-Ear Studio Quality Headphones, Black
In this example, it’s clear which style of headphones they are, that they’ll provide you with studio- quality sound, that the brand is Audiophile, and that the color of these specific headphones is black.
Writing alternative text
Alternative text, more commonly called alt text, is a brief, written description of an image with the primary purpose of assisting individuals who are visually impaired. Screen readers read alt text aloud, allowing customers to understand what the image is by describing it in words. Alt text is also important for search engine optimization, where it’s used to return search results. Alt text shouldn’t exceed 125 characters.
When you are writing alt text, keep these considerations in mind:
- Be concise but specific enough. The reader should have a general understanding of what the image is.
- Make sure the alt text makes sense when you read it aloud.
- Explain the type of image. Is it an illustration, graph, chart, stock photo, screenshot, or something else?
- Don’t start your alt text with “image of” or “photo of” as it can get repetitive if there are several images.
- Incorporate a keyword or two, but don’t over do it. Keywords will help your SEO, but if you use too many, this will be flagged by search engines and you may be ranked down.
Going back to your pretend store’s new headphone release, your alt text for the image below might read something like the following:
White headphones with a volume adjustment button, a bluetooth button, a USB-c port, and a 3.5mm port.
Writing a web page title element and meta description
For SEO purposes, every webpage has a page title and a meta description. The webpage title provides both the users and search engines with a page’s topic, while the meta description provides search engines with a summary of what the page is about. Every page on your website will need a webpage title element and meta description so that your business can be found by potential customers when they search for products like yours.
Webpage title elements should be brief so that search engines don’t show only a portion of your text to potential customers. That doesn’t mean webpage title elements shouldn’t be detailed, though. Make sure that as you write your page title, you thoroughly describe what users will find on the page.
As for the meta description, it should be about 150–160 characters, and it should include carefully selected keywords. Make sure to be thorough in your meta description, because you’re summarizing what potential customers can find on the page.
Your headphones have their own page and need a webpage title element and meta description. Here’s what that might look like:
A webpage title element and meta description that reads “New Noise Canceling Headphones by Audiophile. Top-of-the-line, noise-canceling, wireless headphones that provide amazingly smooth audio. Available in five colorways.” and features an image of the headphones to the right of the text.
Key takeaways
Creating product page details can take a lot of time and isn’t something that should be overlooked or rushed. If you want to create a website that entices people to buy products, you’ll need to be very thoughtful about the copy you add to your product descriptions, alternative text, webpage title elements, and meta descriptions. Doing so will ensure the most effective SEO possible.