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Name product benefits rather than specifications

Written by Jelmer van der Linden
 
A good product description is an important tool to achieve a higher conversion in your web store. Still, there is often too little attention paid to the product text. Webshop owners often get no further than a summary of the specifications of their products. Too bad, because with really good product descriptions you can easily score with your customers.

What makes a product description a good product description?

To come up with a good product description, you first need to know your target audience. What are the needs, challenges and preferences of your target audience? When you know what is important to your target group, you can approach them in the right way. A good example of this isIKEA, an organization that can be characterized as a real family business. The advertising agencyÅkestam Holststudied the dynamics that can take place in families - such as the longevity of the relationship, the separation of partners and, for example, the relationship between father and daughter - and used the patterns found for a campaign called 'Where Life Happens'. In the campaign, the products IKEA sold were renamed popular searches within Google's search engine."[caption id="attachment_62984" align="aligncenter" width="652"]A couch that the partner can sleep comfortably on (instead of it keeping you awake in bed)[/caption] It's a cheeky way to get good results from SEO, but it goes much further than that. Each product refers to a solution to a problem that can occur in a relationship. In doing so, the company highlights five conditions a good product description should meet, namely;
  1. Know your target market and what is going on with your target audience
  2. Highlight the benefits of the product. As in this case, a solution to a problem that can occur in a relationship. Other examples of products within the campaign included "the attraction is gone" which leads to magnets and "my son plays too many computer games" which leads to scissors (probably meant to cut the computer's cable).
  3. List the specifications of the product separately
  4. Remove doubts. In a fun way, IKEA plays on your feelings.
  5. Incorporate relevant search terms. By using popular search terms, you improve the position of the products within the organic search results of Google and others.
The videoIKEA had developed for the campaign concludes with the quote,
"Whether it's a snoring husband, a never-ending gaming son or any other relationship problem you have, Ikea can come to the rescue ... or at least put a smile on your face while you keep Googling for an answer."
The principle behind good product descriptions is relatively simple; put yourself in your target audience's shoes and think about what benefits you can appeal to them with. No boring product information full of jargon and specifications, but texts that respond to the emotions of your consumer and translate specifications into product benefits. Another well-known organization that responds well to this isCoolBlue. If we look at the product description of asimple vacuum cleanerwe see the following: [caption id="attachment_62989" align="aligncenter" width="1048"]The product description of the vacuum cleaner Miele Complete C3 at CoolBlue[/caption] CoolBlue clearly plays on the feelings and questions that may arise in consumers. The question, Is this a vacuum cleaner with reach? Can of course be answered with a simple answer like "The range is 11 meters." However, CoolBlue chooses to explicitly mention the range and the associated benefits: "Thanks to the range of 11 meters, the Miele...".

Try it out for your online store

Every online store is different and requires a different approach in terms of product texts. Therefore, don't be afraid to test and dive into your data via Google Analytics to investigate the effects of textual changes. With an A/B text you can easily test which product page setup works for your web shop. Among other things, look at CTR (click through rate) and the bounce rate of the product page. But if you describe the product texts from the point of view of your target group, you will soon see that you score better than if you have boring product information on your pages. Have you written your product descriptions in a fun way yourself? Let us know by commenting on this blog.