Trying to create the best product description page for your ecommerce store? If your first inkling is to say, “The product sells itself,” then it’s time for a mindset switch. No matter how good your product is, a bad product description page design can be your biggest roadblock.

To put it lightly, Nicolas Cage would still go through all of that trouble to steal the Declaration of Independence rather than buy it from a poorly optimized PDP. 

So how do you go about optimizing your PDPs on Shopify or elsewhere? We have a few quick ideas.

Competing in Ecommerce

Despite buying online being easier than ever and a plethora of willing customers ready to make online purchases, you still need to put in the work to make sure your PDPs are working for you, not against you. 

As common as online shopping is today, many customers are still wary of buying from online stores they aren’t familiar with. Instead, they turn to mega-retailers like Amazon that have already gained their trust (and their credit card information). 

So how can you use your product description pages to build trust with your customers and (hopefully) score a conversion? How do you win against the convenience of one-click checkout? We’ve got three must-have product description page elements that help to build trust with consumers.

3 Product Description Page Must-Haves

1. High-Quality Images

As the need for quick information continues to increase, high-quality product imagery is more important than ever. People aren’t willing to give your product a chance if the image itself doesn’t immediately pull them in. 

Professional product photography should be part of your budget when creating your PDPs. After all, what’s the point of setting up your ecommerce site for SEO if all of that free traffic is just going to bounce when met with low-quality, outdated imagery?

When adding product photographs to your ecommerce website, consider utilizing these three types of photographs: 

• Detailed close-ups. This is where you can show the quality of your product. Your customers may not be able to interact with your products before they buy, so give them enough information through imagery to accurately depict the color, texture, and quality of your product. 

• Lifestyle shots. Lifestyle shots are a great way to show your product in action or “out in the wild.” Teach your customers how they might use your product by showing it in a real-life setting.

• Pictures with packaging. Believe it or not, product packaging can make a big difference for your ecommerce business. Your packaging helps to tell your brand story, so including it in your product imagery can help to sway potential customers. 

When optimizing for ecommerce SEO, product images can also be used to help target your intended keywords by adding descriptive alt image text. 

2. Short And Effective Product Page Descriptions

Finding the balance between too little and too much information can be difficult. Give too much information and your customers will start to get confused. Give too little information and your customers won’t know what they’re about to buy. 

High-quality imagery is the first step to grab a user’s attention. From there, use your product page descriptions to sell them on your product. What can your product do for them? How will it make their life easier or better? 

When looking at the best product description pages, it’s common to see a short description at the top of the page with more information and specs below the fold. This is a perfect set up, as it allows customers who are ready to buy to easily find that “Add to Cart” button, while those still on the fence can scroll down for more detailed product information. 

As an SEO services agency, we frequently use the space below the fold to not only provide SEO-optimized copy, but also utilize FAQs with schema markup to give the client an opportunity to take up more real estate on a SERP. 

3. Product-Specific Reviews

Remember when we discussed the trust that Amazon has built with customers? That trust doesn’t come from Amazon having a squeaky-clean reputation or from being a wholesome mom-and-pop shop. It comes from user-generated content in the form of product reviews.

It only takes a handful of reviews to drastically increase the likelihood of conversion, and collecting Shopify reviews isn’t as hard as it may seem. We always advise our Shopify SEO clients to utilize reviews as a way to try and improve conversion rate. 

The best practice is to ensure your PDPs feature reviews for that particular product. If you have products that aren’t getting reviews, it may be time to incentivize your customers. 

When sourcing reviews for your products, let users post reviews directly on the product pages but make sure to eliminate as many steps as possible between your customer and the “submit review” button. Buying a product is a simple exchange of “I’ll give you this if you give me that.” You’re now asking that customer to do one more thing, so make it as simple as possible for them and offer them an incentive if needed.

The Best Product Description Pages Work For You

Your PDP is your 24-hour-a-day salesperson, and you don’t even have to pay them. Optimizing your products for SEO or running shopping ads can only get you so far. As an SEO consulting agency, we understand that the bottom line is more important than page views and impressions. Utilizing stunning imagery, punchy descriptions, and product-specific reviews can all build credibility for your online store, and hopefully get those conversions rolling in.