How Seductive Are Your Product Descriptions? Part 2

Depending on the range and breadth of your product inventory, it’s very possible that you won’t have the time to try out every product, or the spare cash to give up one of every product for trial. It’s also possible that you won’t even get to see or hold some of the products you’re writing about.

Know Your Products

That’s why it’s vital to get all the data you can about every product. Talk to your supplier to get all the information you can. That said, where possible, physical interaction with your products will enable you to write better descriptions. Try to answer the following questions while writing your product descriptions to make sure your customers aren’t left uncertain whether or not to purchase your products (these should help you during your brainstorming as well):

• Who would use this product?
• What are the features and details?
• ­Where can you use this product?
• When will you use this product?
• Why is this product better than the competition?
• ­How is it used?

Create a Comprehensive List of Features and Benefits

Potential clients don’t want to know what your product is or does. They want to know what’s in it for them. How does it make their lives better? Which problems does it take away?

Before you start writing the description, make sure you’ve listed all of your features and specifics, and then translate them into benefits. A feature is a fact about your product, while a benefit is an explanation of what that feature does for your reader. A benefit can be phrased as a positive (e.g., improves productivity) or as a problem that’s avoided or reduced (e.g., decreases stress).

Wanna see examples? This is how Method Home describes one of their hand wash gels:

Sometimes the scent of seasonal hand wash is all we need to rouse our holiday spirits. Available in an array of festive fragrances, our naturally derived gel hand wash will leave your hands soft, clean and ready to be tucked into a pair of fair isle mittens. It really is the most wonderful time of the year.

Method Home suggests that the benefit of their soap is not just that your hands become soft and clean, but that the soap actually rouses your holiday spirit making the holidays more festive and therefore more enjoyable.

Consider the benefit of each of your features. How does your product make your customers feel happier, healthier, or more productive? Which problems, glitches, and hassle does your product help solve? Don’t sell just a product, sell an experience.

Come back next week for the third part of Seductive Product Description Tips!