When we talk about naming things for the web, we’re not just talking about labeling: we’re talking about finding, navigating, attracting, and selling. An ideal product name is creative, descriptive, search engine friendly, relevant, and a long list of other attributes.
It’s impossible to find something that achieves all of these goals. However, with a little work, you can develop unique names that help shoppers find your products more often and both intrigue them and encourage them to learn more.
To ensure your product titles have the most effective impact in all your marketing and sales efforts, check out the top strategies we’ve compiled below for effectively naming the items listed in your online store.
1. Know your target audience
Always keep your intended user in mind. Is your product intended for adults, children or even animals? When thinking about who uses your product, it’s easy to add a modifier to a more generic product title. If you are a localized business, adding a city modifier or city-specific language can help increase product visibility. If you are selling products outside of the United States, it may be more appropriate to include metric dimensions rather than using inches. Knowing who you’re targeting and where they are can help you choose the right term for your product title.
2. Consider placement and space
Typically, your category pages listing a set of similar products will use more generic terms. However, the specific product page should use terms that distinguish it from other products found in that category. Try to include what makes the product unique, but also keep it simple, clear, and expandable. Remember, Google accepts 255 characters of text in its Title Tag field, but will only display the first 70 characters in search results.
3. Use brand names when possible
If you sell a lot of branded products, make sure to include them in page names and titles. People searching for that brand will be much more likely to find your product or click on your link if it includes the brand in the title. Even if it’s a new or lesser-known brand, it’s a good idea to include it. If you’re one of the few stores selling a specific brand, you’ll be one of the only ones showing up when people search for it.
4. Include SEO keywords
As with almost any content created for the web, you need to think about how it will affect your SEO. Since product names often act as title tags, link text, and various content on your site, they are one of the best places to include SEO keywords. Consider the words or phrases your customers would most likely use to find this product and try to include them in the name. Depending on your SEO strategy, you can also include some of your store’s main keywords or phrases, but always start with the product itself.
5. Avoid jargon and internal terminology
There is a fine line between brand terminology and jargon. When you talk about products and services internally, you often create names or terms that help you understand them better. But these terms generally have no meaning to outsiders, such as customers. If you have proprietary names for your products or services, consider how important they are to your potential customers. You can still include them for branding reasons, but be sure to include generic names or terms that also apply.
6. Include unique features
Depending on your products, specific details like color, size, or material can be very important to a customer’s purchasing decision. With a virtually endless selection of products online, these details also help differentiate your products. Differentiating features may be even more important for products such as electronics, software or automotive parts, where customers will purchase based on compatibility and usage.
7. Important upstream terms
Placing the most important terms at the beginning of product titles can be very beneficial, especially with Shopping feeds, where the number of characters that will display on a results page is limited. If you exceed this limit, your product title may be truncated. It’s also important to note that there are no set standards for how much text will be displayed on different platforms, websites, or devices. Therefore, including the most important information first ensures that regardless of location, buyers see what they need.
8. Test the chosen titles
Finally, test the titles you have chosen to see how effective or ineffective they are. Keep an eye on Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools to make sure the words and phrases you’ve selected for product titles are driving traffic and that the incoming traffic is relevant. If something doesn’t seem to be working, don’t be afraid to change it. Sometimes you have to change words several times before discovering the most optimal wording.
In conclusion
You do not have to use all of these strategies when you name each of your products, but it’s important to think about each one and determine what will work best for your products and your customers. You can be funny, creative or serious. You can be very detailed, or you can be simple and specific. But the most important thing you can do is strive to create names that help your customers find your products, understand what they are about, and get excited about buying them.