Product descriptions and SEO

[Neo10]

Hi

Im about to start listing a new line of product on my website, I am buying the products straight from the manufacture and they have told me I can use all there product photos and descriptions from there website, can anyone tell me would the search engines penalise my website for using the same descriptions as the manufacture which are already listed on the main search engines

Thanks

Kevin

[debra]

You will not get penalized but don't expect to out rank them without a lot of backlinking and onpage seo. Remember, they have age on their side and have already established their persence.

Personally, I would spin the descriptions to be more unique.

[usearchme2]

You wont get penalised no, but its not a good idea to use the same text as search engines would drop pages that it thinks are duplicated, still probs wont affect your site since your only using descriptions but why take the risk.

The obvious and simple answer is just write your own desciptions and then you dont have a problem and nothing to worry about !

Woc

[Kevin Koop]

Writing product descriptions is much more than SEO!

Sure, you want to get found for relevant keyword phrases but don't forget that the copy has to entice someone to add the product to cart! Too many marketers concentrate on the SEO-side of things and pay little attention to whether or not the copy motivates someone to buy.

What good is traffic that doesn't convert?

Just make sure that your site architecture is good from an SEO standpoint (product name/keywords in title tag, meta description, on page, etc) and then make sure you write a good (and hopefully unique) product description that makes someone want what you're selling.

Also, I'd recommend changing the name of the supplied images before uploading them to your site and adding intelligent "alt text" as well. I get a lot of traffic (for my clients) from Google Images and this is because of the image names and the alt text attached to it.

Google Images isn't talked about all that much but it is a good source of traffic and one you shouldn't overlook.

Best,
Kevin

[debra]

Originally Posted by Kevin Koop

Writing product descriptions is much more than SEO!

Sure, you want to get found for relevant keyword phrases but don't forget that the copy has to entice someone to add the product to cart! Too many marketers concentrate on the SEO-side of things and pay little attention to whether or not the copy motivates someone to buy.

What good is traffic that doesn't convert?

Just make sure that your site architecture is good from an SEO standpoint (product name/keywords in title tag, meta description, on page, etc) and then make sure you write a good (and hopefully unique) product description that makes someone want what you're selling.

Also, I'd recommend changing the name of the supplied images before uploading them to your site and adding intelligent "alt text" as well. I get a lot of traffic (for my clients) from Google Images and this is because of the image names and the alt text attached to it.

Google Images isn't talked about all that much but it is a good source of traffic and one you shouldn't overlook.

Best,
Kevin

I was going to hit the "thanks" button but, I see that it's MIA at the moment.

You are spot on!

[Kevin Koop]

@debra -- "Thanks" for the "Thanks!"

Hopefully, they'll put the "Thanks" button (and the search function) back on the forum soon but I guess we'll just have to wait and see.