A website is pretty important for any online business (obviously!) and fortunately websites are a lot easier to create than they were before. You don’t have to know HTML or CSS or PHP when building sites these days. Many online store providers give you easy to use store building administration areas and you just click the color, the font, load your images in the right spots and enter in your information.

Just because the site is easy to create and you can get one going on one day, doesn’t mean that it’s instantly going to make sales or receive traffic. That takes time.

This blog post is going to talk about content when you build & grow your store.

Content is the MOST important part of your store. It’s not the product images, or discounts you offer, it’s the content. The more useful your content, the most visits your site will receive. It’s a no-brainer. Content is KING on a website. Not only does it help customers FIND your store, but it needs to be engaging enough to KEEP them in your store and incite them to BUY. So carefully crafted content, placed in the right areas will do just that. We are talking about headings, product descriptions & informational pages.

Compelling content can be done in many ways. But here are the top things to remember to include:

Call to Action:
Words like CLICK HERE or BUY NOW. These words tell the customer what to do. When you put call to action words like CLICK HERE on your site, explain what they will get when they click something you want them to click. Example: CLICK HERE to receive $10.00 off your first order and lead them to a page to sign up for your newsletters. This is a great way to get a pool of customers to contact from time to time that could lead to repeat customers.

About Us:
When I see an online store that doesn’t have an About Us page, and I don’t know that company, I won’t buy from them. It’s important to explain who you are, what your business is and what your mission is. Since the customer isn’t meeting you in person, you have to convey to them who you are and what you are about to make them comfortable buying from you.

Write your OWN Product Descriptions:
Everyone want to use datafeeds that load this information automatically on their websites. But this “time saving” method only hurts your business, not helps it. Carefully written product descriptions that cater to your chosen demographic not only will engage the customer, but it will also help in the search engines.

Search engines don’t like duplicate content. So if you and hundreds of other retailers have the exact same written information about a  product on pages of your website, this confuses the search engines. You must write your own content to separate from the pack.

A great way to come up with ideas for your content is to take a look at your competitors. Just don’t copy them! Be unique and stand out. It will help you in the long run.