Running a successful retail website means getting a lot of things right. From great photography to well thought-out ecommerce product content; relevant SEO to a clean user journey, your site has to match customer expectations if you’re going to make the sales you need.
Building and maintaining an ecommerce site can be expensive, so it makes sense to ensure that you’re doing everything you can to make that site a success. With 78% of UK shoppers saying they research products online before buying and, across a range of countries, 50% of shoppers admitting they often buy more online than they intended to*, there is a significant opportunity for online retailers to bring lucrative customers to their site.
Do you have an ecommerce product management strategy?
This growing online shopping market means your website needs to be at its very best to persuade shoppers to buy from you, rather than the competition. And for that, you need a well researched, properly implemented product strategy for your site. What does that mean?
That shoppers can find your site
You can only sell to the people who land on your site. So it’s vital that your whole site, and your product pages in particular, are written and designed to be found by customers who are searching for what you sell. You need to:
- Put yourself in your customer’s shoes – who are they? What age range? How might they search for your product? What keywords will they use? Will they know the serial or product number? Will they be searching geographically? Armed with this knowledge, you can write your product URLs, tags and descriptions to make sure they are completely aligned with your customers. You can use ecommerce resources like these to find out more about your customers, or use a research virtual assistant to help you.
- Refine your ecommerce product descriptions – headline product descriptions need to contain the right information for potential buyers to find what they want easily, whether they are searching by brand name, size, product number or generic keyword.
- Use images and video – not all products require video, but where it’s useful, it’s a great SEO tool and good for getting shoppers to engage with your site. You also need great photography – remember that shoppers are parting with their money on the basis of a few words and a couple of pictures – so your product descriptions and visuals have to be accurate and convincing.
That shoppers can find and understand the product
This is where well-planned ecommerce product data entry really matters. If customers are landing on your home page, they must be able to find the product they are looking for quickly and easily. This means looking at the way your site is designed, ensuring that it is intuitive to click on the right category, or easily search for products.
Once customers have found the right product, they need to see that it’s right for them. You need to put key information ‘above the fold’ on your site. This means at the top of the page, where customers can see it without having to scroll down. This area should re-state the product type, brand name, size, model number and any other important information. It should also include the price, and have a ‘buy now’ button or equivalent so that shoppers can buy straight away if they know it’s what they want.
You might want to include further product information, and here, don’t just think about detail, think about selling. Research has shown that bland product descriptions do not sell, but those that tell readers how they might use or wear the product, relating it to their lifestyle, their hobbies or their work, are more likely to sell.
You should also think about including reviews. Customers now expect to see product reviews and place considerable weight on them – quite often a review can make or break a purchase decision. If you are selling branded products, consider importing reviews from general feedback sites – there are ways you can add this to your website. If your products are your own, give customers an incentive to review, so that you are building up social proof on your site.
That shoppers can buy more from you
When you are planning your ecommerce product entry strategy, remember the importance of cross-selling and up-selling. This means adding a section on each product page along the lines of “If you like this, you might like that” or “Customers who bought this also bought that”. You can encourage customers to buy complementary products, increasing the value of their basket. Customers are used to this behaviour from online retailers, and expect these suggestions to be relevant both in terms of product and in terms of price.
That your products are properly described on all platforms
Many retailers sell through their own websites and on marketplace sites like Amazon, eBay and Etsy. Each of these sites has their own way of doing things, so your ecommerce data entry management will need to take this into account. Make sure that the customer gets the experience they expect whichever site they are on. This will make them more comfortable with your products and more likely to buy.
What now?
Managing an ecommerce site can turn into a full-time job – one that you almost certainly don’t have time to do. And yet, getting it right will boost your sales and help your business to grow. So why not consider using product data entry services like ours that can help you keep things going at a fraction of the price of hiring someone into your business?
It may seem like an overwhelming task, but agreeing a strategy and bringing the right people on board can help. Using a virtual assistant for data entry, for example – is a practical and affordable way to get your site working hard for you.
Ready to outsource data entry?
Stay in control of your ecommerce product content without having to do the day-to-day work yourself. From page layout to SEO, data entry virtual assistants have the skills and time to help you with ecommerce product entry to build an online retail site that works. You’ll be confident that your words and pictures are in the right place, saying the right things to the right people, and you can concentrate your valuable time on running and expanding your business.
To find out how our ecommerce data entry services could make the most of your ecommerce website or if would like to know more about our UK virtual assistants feel free to call us on 0800 994 9016 or use our contact form in the menu above.
*Connecting with Customers; LivePerson. Via www.mycustomer.com