A couple of months ago, I published an E-commerce marketing strategy guide which received an incredible amount of likes, shares, and comments. First of all, I want to thank everyone for your responses and your feedback. I feel incredibly humbled by your show of support and your comments. That said, I wanted to follow up on some of the specific questions you had about crafting a winning E-commerce strategy and hone in your E-commerce store’s most important part; your product pages. A highly convertible product page is so important to success for any E-commerce store. But how do you design the perfect E-commerce product page? Let’s go over 12 tips about how you can really optimize your store’s product pages so that they can have the highest conversion rate possible.
Use Professional Product Photography
Having professionally taken product photographs is super critical to success. Because your product page doesn’t exist simply on your website. You will display your products on social media such as Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter as well as on Google shopping, Bing shopping or even Amazon. So, if you don’t have good product photography you are not going to stand out from the rest of the ads and images vying for people’s attention. Typically when someone is shopping online, what they are really noticing initially is the product photography. You won’t get noticed unless you have high-quality product photography. Of course, on the product page itself when visitors are landing on your website it is vital that you use big images. Without professional quality product photography, visitors might hit the back button which is the last thing you want. Not only will this get you to lose the sale, but it will also hurt your search engine page rankings as search engines will count this as a bounce against you.
Use Product Videos To Tell A Story
Have a nice professional video of your product to tell a story. By professional, I don’t necessarily mean a high production or expensive video; you can potentially film this with your smartphone. What is important about any product videos you do post on your product pages is that they are professional about the way you are introducing your product, how you highlight the quality of the product, how you talk about the features of the product, or maybe how the product works. This is important because this is your opportunity to make your sales pitch or value proposition for that product, that can be given to thousands of people at the same time that may be watching that video. Put it this way; if someone were to walk into your store and ask you to tell them about this product, that should be what your product video is about. Don’t limit yourself to good pictures, spend some time to make product videos for your flagship, or if possible, all of your products because product videos are going to be huge for your conversion rate.
Include An FAQ
Think of this in terms of what are the typical questions or doubts a typical buyer might have about your product. Perhaps when they are talking to one of your salespeople, customer support staff or to you directly, they would be asking things like shipping options (Express, free etc), when can they expect to receive the product, maybe they have some questions about payments and secure checkout. These are questions that should be visible and answered right away on your product page as this will save you and your buyers important time while also increasing your conversion rate as buyers will see those boxes checked for them mentally before they move forward with a purchase. Keep your design real simple; use a few bullet points or check-marks, but make sure they are visible. If buyers have to scroll a mile down your product page to see this information, it might negatively impact your conversions.
Bonus Tip – You can include a chat-bot on your product pages and also incorporate AI if possible to answer any questions people have in real-time. One thing to keep in mind here though is to make sure you are available. There is nothing more frustrating to have a chat-bot direct a buyer to a phone number and not have anyone available to answer that person’s call.
Use Modifiers and Magnet Words On Your Product Page Title
Make sure you have an SEO optimized title tag and description. This is important as buyers are searching on Google and Bing Shopping all day long to find things that they want to potentially buy and you want to be visible when they are doing this. You want to optimize all your product pages. Don’t use a product page title with a flashy name that you have created for yourself, think about how you can have an SEO optimized title. By that, I am referring to what are people actually searching for when they are looking for that product you are selling. That should really be your title. Any flashy phrases can be added after the title; in the product description or in the title after a succinct but clear description of the product. Using modifier or magnet words in your product page title can help you with your SEO and also bring in additional buyers. Using words like “Buy” or “Cheap”, or “Free Shipping” in your product title would do the trick (if applicable). Just make sure that you have placed that SEO optimized title at the beginning of the title is massively important to rank high on search engine page results and lead more clicks.
Write Original Product Descriptions
Boring, or uninspiring or simply not original content can hurt your business. The same is true for your product descriptions. Writing a detailed product description is often overlooked by many E-commerce stores but if written well, a strong, original and inspiring product description can help increase your sales, and get you a better search engine page ranking. With that said, what makes a great product description? For starters, it needs to be original. Sure, what it is you are selling may have come along with a product description, which you may choose to include or not, but using that alone on your product page is a guarantee for a lower search engine page ranking or worse, elimination from search results. When writing your product description, think about your target audience. Who are you selling to? Is your target audience younger, hip, and exciting? Your product description language should reflect that. The same is true the other way around, if you are selling a business product, or you are targeting a more mature audience. Whatever the case may be, make sure your product descriptions are informative and engaging to your target audience. Since we speaking about selling products online, I need to put emphasis on ensuring your product descriptions keep search engines in mind. Include your keywords and phrases naturally throughout the product description, in order to be found by your target audience when they are looking for exactly what you are offering online.
Keep Your Product URLs Short and SEO Friendly
This one might frustrate your webmaster, but it is important that your product page URLs are short and include the product name in it. Proper product page URL structure plays an important role in your search engine page rankings as it literally “speaks” to search engines, telling them what exactly you are selling. I will give you an example. Below are two URLs for the same product (In this example, a vinyl record by Techno artist Judas, titled “Unsaid Part 2”) online:
- https://www.juno.co.uk/products/judas-unsaid-part-2/
- http://www.toolboxrecords.com/en/product/31526/techno-hardtechno/691737-23-2/
Do you want to take a guess which one ranks higher on search engines? If you guessed the first one, you are correct. That is because we can see the product name in the URL itself. If we can see the name, so do search engines. Therefore, it is important to consider your product pages URL structure to include your product names and be as short as possible. It should also be pointed out that one site is using an SSL certificate, and the other is not. Which blends perfectly with our next tip.
Use SSL Certificate and Include Trust Badges
To say that using Secure Sockets Layer (or SSL) certificates on your E-commerce site is crucial to success would be an understatement. Not only does it safeguard your buyer’s data by so-called man-in-middle attacks, but using SSL could also boost your search engine page rankings. Moreover, internet security is a great way to build trust with your buyers. There is no shortage of SSL certificates out there, but if you have a respectable or high turnover of products, you should consider purchasing and using SSL certificates from a reputable business. Since we are on the topic of trust, you can also include things like trust badges or seals for your product page. This simply reinforces your brand’s status as an identifiable, verified online business.
Have Fast Loading Times and Mobile Friendly Pages
This is critical because 80% of people are shopping online with their phones these days. Therefore, you need to make sure that your product page looks really good on small screens as more than likely, your product page visitors are looking at your product page while they are sitting on their couch late at night. It also needs to load quickly because if it doesn’t, or there is too much clutter on the page, you run the risk of losing that business.
Keep Product Prices and Order Buttons Above The Fold
Clearly illustrate the price and order buttons at the top of your product page. Make it easy for the buyer to identify the product price, any discounts you are offering as well as quantities. The call to action button should be easy to see as well which should read something like “order online”, “purchase now” or “add to cart”. The button should be big, it should use a colour that stands out and it should be above the fold on the product page. If you include these things, it will really help buyers find their way to the checkout with ease and put some tailwind in your sales.
Include Product Reviews
This one gets missed a lot but includes reviews of your products. I cannot name how many E-commerce stores miss this step! A product page without any reviews is not going to be very effective. You want to instill a sense of confidence and trust to buyers when they visit your product page. In order to have that, they really want to hear from third-party reviews. If those are strong, let’s say mostly 4 or 5-star reviews with some positive comments about their experiences with the product you are selling, that will really boost your chances of making future sales. It will also help you rank higher in search engine page results which is key, as your product page will have more quality content on the page.
Make Your Product Page Shareable
Always include social share icons on your product pages. Many times a buyer will come across your product page and they want to share it with a friend (or friends) who would love to own that product. Perhaps this is a great gift idea they plan to purchase for an upcoming birthday or other special occasions so they want to send your product page to a friend by email and ask for their advice, or to their partner if they would love to have this product for Christmas. Whatever the case may be, if all they have to do is click a share button, then they can easily share your product page with their friends online. These social share buttons are huge as its going to increase your referral business to shoppers you may not be currently reaching. Adding these social sharing buttons to your product pages makes reaching these potential buyers easy.
Include a Related Products Carousel
Offering buyers recommendations on related products to what it is they are viewing on your product pages is one of the best ways to increase your sales in addition to offering your buyers great value. What is a great camera without a stand? If you are selling eye-glasses or sunglasses, why not recommend a nice case to keep them from getting scuffed? What is the point of shelling out for a great record player without a pristine needle to enjoy your beats with? Whether you are using a feature which displays products people “also bought”, or are using an application which pairs relevant products your buyers will find handy is a great way to boost your sales and improve customer experience.
Final Thoughts
As you can probably tell, E-commerce product pages are a highly complicated part of your E-commerce strategy with many moving parts. With everything you need to consider, I hope these 12 tips offer a starting point for optimizing your product pages and leads to more sales. Do you need help designing the perfect E-commerce product page? I am a Google Shopping Certified professional and would love to hear how I can help. Put your thoughts and opinions in the comments below if you can think of any strategies that can help E-commerce marketing initiatives.