Should you outsource your product content creation? Yes! Here are 4 great reasons why.

Great content should feel natural. It is clear, concise, and compelling. Expertly presented, it helps convert browsers into buyers. But producing polished, informative content for your e-commerce store on a regular basis takes an enormous amount of time and know-how.

Fortunately, help is at hand! Here are four reasons why you might want to consider outsourcing this vital piece of your e-commerce marketing strategy:

 1.    Increase content effectiveness

Professional, well-written content will drive clicks and conversions. But it's not just about writing. In today's competitive environment, e-commerce sites need graphics, videos, and podcasts as well as great photos to go with product descriptions. Outsourcing content creation to an agency means you have access to a large pool of talent – writers, editors, photographers, videographers and so on. It's difficult to hire the staff able to take on all these tasks, but outsourcing will give you the expertize you need, just when you need it.

2.      Put effort where it's most needed

Your team is busy. They have other duties to complete by deadline. Tasks that they do well. Creating and managing content is way down on their "To Do" list. Outsourcing content creation means you get a team of professionals immersed in the marketing and content field. Do your employees have the time and knowledge to keep on top of the latest content trends and strategies? Outsourcing may be a good option to tap into the experience of a team of specialists.

3.      Guide the buying experience

Consumers like to make informed buying decisions. More information on products equals higher customer satisfaction and lower product returns. Product descriptions are just the start. A team of professionals can put together user and how-to guides in a wide variety of formats, from simple text to fully immersive interactive styles that can support the buying experience. This type of skill tends to be needed at infrequent intervals, so hiring extra employees with the expertise could be a waste of precious marketing dollars.

4.      Gain a fresh perspective

Outsourcing content creation can be a great way to get the perspective that only a fresh pair of eyes can give. A different angle might just be what's needed to boost sales of slow-moving items. A diverse team of skilled content creators could revitalize your product content and descriptions, tailoring them to your customers' needs.

Outsourcing isn't for every e-commerce store, but if you find you lack the time or expertise to create eye-catching content in-house, partnering with a team of experts who take the time to get to know you and your products might just be the answer. It's something to consider at your next marketing strategy meeting.

How can SEO drive your e-commerce business?

Search Engine Optimization: Why are these three words so important to your e-commerce business?

Not optimizing your site content and product descriptions for search engines such as Google, is a bit like not bothering with a sign or a window display for a physical store. There’s no point in selling your products online if no one can find them. Let’s look at three components of SEO that can help drive potential buyers to your e-commerce store:

Keywords are essential in matching your product with a buyer. The more specific the keyword, the higher the chance your product will appear early in search results. Consider using long-tail keywords.

Long-tail keywords are more specific and less common than their one or two word counterparts. They focus on the uniqueness of your product. For example, if you sell dog food, simply using dog food as your keywords is not enough to make you stand out in a crowd. You’ll be one of about 213,000,000 sites using the words dog food. Think about what makes your dog food different.

You may come up with natural, organic, grain free dog food. Using this longer string of text in more places means that if someone is searching for natural, organic, grain free dog food, your store is more likely to be included in the results.

Another benefit of long-tail keywords is that, even if those specific words are used less in a normal search, people searching for natural, organic, grain free dog food and finding your site, are more likely to buy. The longer and more specific the search terms are, the higher the chances of conversion from browser to buyer.

Content is crucial. The content on your e-commerce site needs to be fresh and, above all, unique. Search engines are wary of duplicate content. For example, you could simply copy and paste the manufacturers’ description for your product. But, apart from the fact those descriptions tend to be overly technical or boring, it’s duplicate content and won’t help your search rankings.

Rewrite the product description to make it more appealing to the potential buyer. This is where defining your buyer persona can help. If you know who’s likely to buy from your e-commerce store, you can write a product description almost tailor made to appeal to them.

Finally, make sure your site is mobile-friendly. While research has shown that not everyone is comfortable making a purchase on their smart phone or tablet, a large percentage of shoppers will at least search for goods and services while on the move. And, beginning in April 2015, Google started to penalize sites that are not mobile friendly, allowing all those mobile window shoppers to possibly land on a competitor’s site.

There are other important components to SEO, but getting started with these three will see your e-commerce business off and running at a good speed.

5 Things to Consider for Seriously Seductive Product Descriptions

When a customer has to rely on a picture and a few words to make a buying decision, product descriptions become crucial. It's no longer enough to just describe the product's features. That short description needs to engage, connect, and sell. Consider these five strategies when developing your ecommerce product descriptions:

Know Your Buyer Persona

1. Know your buyer persona.

Developing a buyer persona, or profile of your target customer, results in more cost effective and stronger marketing. Rather than targeting everyone in general but no one in particular, gather as much information as possible about the customer who buys your product. Knowing the buyer persona allows you to use language they're used to, place marketing efforts where they're likely to see them, and provide solutions that seem tailor-made to fill their needs.

2. Combine benefits with the features.

A feature is a factual statement about your product. A benefit answers your customer's question: "What's in it for me?" Be careful that the benefit isn't just an elaboration on a feature. For example, maintaining a consistent speed may well be a benefit of cruise control in a car, but what your customer really wants to know is, "How does this help me?" The answer could be: by maintaining a consistent speed, you'll save on fuel costs. Think about your customer's needs. How does your product help fill them?

3. Seduce with sensory words.

This is particularly important for ecommerce sites. Research has shown that touching a product increases the desire to own it. Seduce the customer to buy from you by using sensory words. An aromatic candle, a dreamy plush blanket, soft stretch-denim jeans all convey sensory aspects of the product to let the customer imagine smelling, feeling, wearing the product.

4. Create a readable format.

People rarely read every single word on a Web page. They scan the text, picking out individual words and phrases. Make sure your description is easy to read by highlighting keywords, use bullet points, increase the font (particularly if your buyer persona is in an older demographic!), use video or photography, and give the reader lots of white space. 

Use Effective Keywords for SEO

5. Use effective keywords for Search engine Optimization (SEO).

Finding the right balance between using effective keywords and keeping the product description readable for your customer is never easy. People have a tendency to be pretty specific in their keyword searches, so try to avoid overly general keywords. Search engines dislike duplicate content. Use unique content rather than duplicating the manufacturer's description, which might even have the result of sending people over to another website!

Your product descriptions may be short, but they need to pack a punch. Know your buyer and try to anticipate the ways your product can help them. Above all, make it easy for customers to find you and buy.

5 Principles of In-Store Retail Merchandising that Apply to Online Stores

The line between online and offline shopping is becoming increasingly blurred as shoppers use both in tandem to fulfill their needs. Smart retailers know that, despite the two being separate entities, shared merchandising principles exist between them. Here they are;

Principle 1. Think about product placement as the first item of importance. 

Bricks-and-mortar stores are familiar with the importance of strategic product placement, with supermarkets being especially savvy at this. Consider the last time you went grocery shopping: Produce is placed at the front of the store so shoppers will fill their carts with fruits and vegetables; this makes them think that once they’ve checked off the healthy items on their lists, it’s okay to throw some junk food—which is marked up considerably—in their carts as well.

Smart online retailers have learned this lesson well from offline stores, placing products that showcase their brand on the front page and drawing a lot of attention to it. They also tailor landing pages to their customers, offering a search bar and brand descriptions for newer shoppers so they can familiarize themselves easily and providing suggestions for returning customers.

Principle 2. Showcase product use by placing similar items together.

Walk into any bricks-and-mortar store and you’ll immediately notice that the retailer demonstrates how the product is to be used. In clothing stores, mannequins wear layered outfits; bookstores surround novels with blankets and candles; and music retailers arrange CDs with earbuds and headphones.

While mannequins don’t have the same efficacy online as they do offline, online retailers can still use the same concept by placing like-minded items together, showcasing testimonials and reviews and creating an “ideas” section where shoppers can compare items side by side.

Principle 3. Recognize holiday-targeted marketing as an opportunity.

At least one month before major holidays—or more than two for Christmas—offline stores start ramping up specialized marketing campaigns aimed at the holiday using a variety of colour schemes, buzzwords and themed sections. A furniture store will group chaise lounges, umbrellas and patio tables together with summer accessories for the May long weekend, while movie theatres will bombard shoppers with posters of hit movies around awards season.

This is a fairly common concept for online stores because it’s easy to code different images and layouts for holidays—for example, all that is required during the Christmas season is rearranging the coding to showcase Christmas wish and gift lists, shopping options and holiday-related themes. Another trick that online merchandisers use is sorting their products by price and category, with the former offering shoppers options for gifts under X number of dollars.

Principle 4. Recognize the habits of impulse buyers. 

Just about every bricks-and-mortar store features a selection of low-price items beside the till, with convenience stores being the best example. Colloquially known as stocking stuffers, impulse buys and till-side advertising, these value items have been shown to increase purchasing when placed in front of the customer when they’re paying.

Although it’s physically impossible to place actual objects beside a till in online stores, the essential concept remains the same: The final purchase is split horizontally in half, with the basket and checkout on one side and featured items on the other. Another incentive for using this strategy in online stores is motivating shoppers to add a few more items to their basket so they can meet the minimum requirements for free shipping, if offered.

Principle 5. Cross-sell low-margin items with high-value items.

Department-store retailers understand shopping psychology and know that buyers aren’t nearly as likely to act on impulse when it comes to higher-priced items. Therefore, they place lower-priced items in high-traffic areas in anticipation of drawing the customer deeper into the store and closer to higher-value items. Retailers also make a smooth transition between the two by sporadically placing a high-value item amid low-margin ones at the front and gradually increasing its appearance.

 
To transfer this strategy to online stores, retailers can research high-traffic areas on their site—landing pages are the most obvious example—and strategically place items they need to sell in these areas. Another way to use this concept is to place a “suggestion row” underneath a shopper’s current selection, with the idea of showing how two items work together so the customer will be more likely to pick up both.

 Although online and offline stores vary in their marketing and merchandising strategies, they actually have a lot more in common than what appears at first glance. By implementing the five key principles that in-store retailers use, their online counterparts can appeal to shoppers more efficiently and strategically. Take time to visit bricks-and-mortar stores regularly to see how they implement these principles, and adopt them in your online store accordingly. Some will work and some won’t, but never be afraid to try something new. After all, the most successful online stores are those that learned from the hits and misses of offline stores.