Without product information, no transaction, online or offline can take place. Therefore, product information is a fundamental, mission critical component for supporting and building trust in your business. The quality of your product information directly affects purchasing behaviour. Inadequate, inconsistent, confusing, incorrect or misleading information will reduce user confidence and lower trust ratios. In a sales channel where consumers can find the same product with a click of the mouse, higher quality, deeper information is essential to keep the user on your site. So ‘stickiness’, the website’s ability to keep visitors on the site, becomes the first mandate. Quality information combined with usability standards is the new mantra because of its high ROI.
Build visitor confidence one word at a time
Retailers who value quality product information differentiate themselves and create significant consumer confidence in the process. Trust increases, sales rise.
Quality product information is also a fundamental component to meeting customer expectations. Customers expect to find sufficient information to evaluate a purchase decision or to make product comparisons. If your website lacks concise, relevant, well-written and persuasive content, they will seek out other websites to meet their requirements.
Online retailers must also deal with the variance in customer types in the quest to personalize the web experience. For example, a “directed shopper” places a lower value on the amount of information needed to influence a purchase decision. This type of shopper knows what they want to buy and simply needs to find it, quickly, and check out. Contrast this to a “browser” or an “impulse shopper” who greatly depends on the information to influence a purchase decision.
Here are seven fundamental characteristics of product content that build trust in a retailer’s brand. These are fundamental characteristics that all websites must endeavor to accomplish:
Content Characteristics That Build Trust
1 - BE ACCURATE
Accuracy of product information can support or destroy the trust customers have in your business. When a purchase is made based upon incorrect information, what happens to that customer’s willingness to trust you in the future? What happens when the inaccuracy becomes apparent to the customer? At best, the product is returned and exchanged, and that customer becomes distrustful of your information. At worst, the product is returned and you’ve lost a customer forever.
2. BE COMPLETE
When an important fact is missing from your online product information, a customer is unlikely to make a purchase decision. And if that fact is very important to the customer, they are more likely to click to your competitor to find it.
It is critical then that retailers understand the information needs of all customer segments, in each product category. Too little information will hinder sales, as will too much information poorly organized. Do you know what kind of information, specifically; your customers seek on each product?
To find this out, ask your customer service department how many calls are taken on requests for additional product information that should exist on your website. Ask your sales force about the kind of information that closes sales.
3. BE TIMELY
More than any other medium, your customers expect Internet content to be fresh and up-to-the-minute. They also expect to have access to the most current products. If you aren’t meeting these expectations, you’re missing opportunities to turn casual visitors into repeat customers. You also run the threat of turning away loyal customers to your competition. But considering how ultra-competitive web-based businesses are, retailers have no choice but to stay ahead, or get left behind and perhaps out-of-business.
4. BE UNDERSTOOD
Online retailers must go beyond the mere listing of benefits and specifications and include the reasons, factually and emotionally, why those specs are important and should be considered in the purchase decision. Every retailer must build a customer base that can count on the information presented, time and time again. That kind of dependability generates loyalty to your website and to your brand.
5. BE CONSISTENT
How many websites can you think of that offer widely varied amounts of information for products? In order to create a shopping experience that your customers can depend on, the amount of product information offered with each item must be balanced, consistent, accurate, well organized and at a sufficient word count.
6. TERMINOGY CONTINUITY
In order to compare products from different manufacturers and complete product searches, customers expect all same-category products to use the same terminology. To address this problem, retailers must standardize product specifications and terminology. This is not an easy task, but well worth the effort to both maintain customer trust and further the sales process
7. BRANDING
On the Web, just like with a retail bricks and mortar store, your customers develop expectations toward their shopping experience. Customers who know your physical store will come to your Web site with established expectations for what the online store experience will be.
An important component needed to meet those expectations is product information. Does your website information, and its manner of presentation, support the positioning statements that define your retail brand? Does it match the quality found in other media? It is expressly written for the web?
Conclusion
Product content without these seven brand-building components will lead to intellectual and emotional disconnects with your customers; a poorer shopping experience and ultimately to an erosion of trust. If your product content strategy is implemented with the goal of creating trust in your brand, customers will do just that … trust your brand to deliver on its promise. And purchase more from your store.
Part Two of this article can be found at the VKI Studios website. | 
