My product descriptions should be how long?

Like many, we’re homeschooling our 7-year-old for the time being. Last week was her first full week of remote learning and it was, to say the least, interesting.

I was a bit surprised to see she was struggling with writing since her teacher told us at the last parent-teacher conference that, behind reading, writing was a favorite subject of hers.

So last week, as she’s trying to write about what she’s been up to since school has been out, she had a bit of a mental breakdown. (I hear ya kid! We all hear ya!)

The assignment wasn’t meant to be hard. All she had to write a few sentences about what she had done for the last 3 weeks. But as she was brainstorming topics, she drew blanks and the topics I recommended, didn’t excite her.

So we sat there while she stewed on various topics before I realized she had writer’s block.

Sure there are plenty of topics to write about, and she can talk for hours about all the things we’ve done recently. Picking one that she felt was good enough and one that she could be proud of proved to be much harder.

Product descriptions are similar. I bet if I got you on the phone and asked you a few questions, you could talk about your products for days.

But for some reason, writing quality product descriptions, escape most merchants. Yet the beauty of product descriptions is that you can bust any objections customers have right there on the product page.

I usually recommend between 200 – 500 words. If I recorded our phone conversation, I bet it would be over a thousand words.

Of course, if you can write a thousand words for your product description, that would be awesome. Lengthly product descriptions are great if it actually provides value to the product or customer. Meaning don’t keyword stuff your description and don’t babble on without a purpose. They will see right through this and feel as though they are being “sold” on something.

Product descriptions should be long enough to convey the features and benefits of the product and provide valuable contributions to help customers make a purchasing decision.

There’s a simple product description formula to help you with creating valuable content for your product pages.

Before I forget, if you include standard language such as your shipping & return policies, this wouldn’t be unique enough to help you with SEO. So keep it in your product description, but don’t count it towards your overall word count.

Stores suffering from the lack of objection busters may benefit from a Website Review. Essentially, I record myself going through your website, talking about what I notice, any frustrations I experience and provide recommendations on areas you could improve.