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How I Became the Product Page Guy
We tested homepages, category pages, and checkout flows (mobile and desktop). If it had visitors, we tested it.
But, as time went by, a pattern started to emerge.
Sure, a few of the locations mentioned above (homepage, checkout, etc.) occasionally produced good results but there was only one page that was predictably good at driving results: the product page.
Didn’t Want to Be Exclusive
When the realization first hit I didn’t want to accept it. I didn’t want to niche down. I didn’t want to paint myself into a corner. So we kept this product page focus to ourselves.
The Wonder of Product Pages
Why Product Pages Matter
The product page is the last stop in the window shopping experience. Our hero knows what happens beyond the Add to Basket button:
It’s Not the Whole Product Page
Not every element on the product page matters– one element matters the most.
5 Product Page Optimization Levers
Your product page has 5 basic building blocks:
1. Price
Reducing prices does lift conversions but is a race to the bottom. Best to leave the price untouched.
2. Product Reviews
Product reviews really matter but …
You could have 5,000 five ⭐️ reviews and if the latest four are negative your conversion rate will dip. Little you can do about that.
3. Product Photos/Videos
Expensive to do a reshoot.
4. Page Design
Page redesigns are expensive as hell and require input by a committee, which is a nightmare.
5. And (the Easiest to Screw Up)…Product Description
The last woman standing is your product description. Updating the description is 5x easier to do 🆚 a redesign. It’s also way more impactful.
N.B. – Marketers make two big mistakes with product descriptions:
1: They use the Product Description page (PDP) to simply state features and benefits:
And 2: They keep the description short and to the point.
In the course of testing various product page elements (layout, design, and description) we realized that the product description was the biggest needle-mover.
Tweaks to the product description were causing massive differences in test outcomes (18 case studies).
And with that realization, we went from conversion optimizers to conversion optimizers who exclusively focused on product pages.
How to Write a Product Description
Now that we’ve established the importance of the description the next challenge is “Who am I writing my description for? Who am I trying to persuade?”
This is the million-dollar question, and those who nail it will have an unfair advantage over their peers.
The strategy is to ignore 84% of site visitors and triple down on a very special group, Healthy Skeptics.
