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January 27, 2016

Product Descriptions and Why They Matter

Day Four: Roads are perfectly fine, but to be safe we've been given yet another snow day. There is only so much lesson planning and TpT production a girl can handle! Needless to say, my sixth grade nutrition unit is going to be BANGIN! I can't wait to see how it goes with my students and hopefully upload it for TpT.

Speaking of TpT, I just spent the majority of the day updating my product descriptions. Why? They are the second most important piece of making a sale and mine needed a lot of work. Prior to the sitewide fix, none of my descriptions where the same, they were a tad bit messy, and I think they were losing me business. I took the liberty of looking at a number of top sellers to see what their descriptions looked like and wowsers, could I tell the difference. I tried to take inspiration from each of them to create a formula that worked for me. I wanted to take the time to share that with you!

The examples for this post will be taken from my Circulatory System Review Game.

1. The initial "grab" for my products was often a paragraph long, jumbled, and a total turn off to buyers. I took the time to shorten these introductions to keep potential buyers reading:

This Circulatory System Review Game is based on my circulatory system unit formed, with help, from Teen Health: Course 3 by Glencoe and is the prefect review game for students! 

2. After the shortened hook, I jump right into what my product is offering. I prefer to see a list format so I can go through and see exactly what I'm purchasing as buyer, so I incorporated that into my own descriptions. I also put the category in bold style so buyers can easily distinguish what they're looking at. I also include my initial pitch on commercial and personal use here, as well as a tip for buyers to view the previews before purchasing so they know exactly what they are getting:

INCLUDED ITEMS (1):
PowerPoint Presentation 
• Four Question Categories {16 Questions Total| Four per Category}
• Editable Final Jeopardy Question
• Easy Hyperlink Navigation


This set is available in a single PDF file for personal use and cannot be redistributed. Please view the thumbnail and downloadable previews to see some of the included images prior to purchasing.

3. It is said everywhere in the TpT forums to link additional products in your descriptions so potential buyers are exposed to more of your products. It is so true! I did, however, realize I was doing it all wrong. I used to link single items that were similar to the product within the description, but I've now seen that many top sellers link to an entire category of similar products! For example, in this product, I've decided to link to my health category and my integrated activities category:

RELATED PRODUCTS:
CLICK HERE to see my other health activities.
CLICK HERE to see all of my integrated physical education products.

4. Remember how I eluded to personal versus commercial use within the included items section? Well here comes the follow up, next is my terms of use section. I give a brief description about the terms and provide a link to my TOS page in my store. I uploaded it as a free download so potential buyers are able to easily see what my terms are. I also include a brief return policy:

TERMS OF USE:
Please review my TOU prior to purchasing. You may use these images for commercial or personal use, so long as you abide by those terms. You can view my TOS by clicking here. Since this is a digital file, and therefore provided as an instant download, no returns or refunds are available.

5. This next section is something I added. When it comes to providing credit, most sellers do so within their products, but I don't like this method. I feel like buyers won't scroll down to read them and the sellers who helped me create this product deserve more attention than that. So I include a credits section that links directly back to the product I used from that store:

CREDITS:
COVER BANNER
COVER FONT
6. We're almost done {promise}. Next up is file details and this is pretty standard, but a lot of the top sellers include this. I'm assuming it is because they have a higher volume of buyers and they've had multiple people contact them for tech support opening files. I hope to become a high volume buyer some day, so why not get into the habit of including this now, so I won't have to come back and do it later:

FILE DETAILS:
This product is contained in a .ZIP file. Please ensure you know how to extract/unzip the file to use it prior to purchasing.

7. A salutation is always important to ensure your buyers know you appreciate their business and the time it took them to read your descriptions. It's all about showing customers that you appreciate them!

HOPE TO SEE YOU SOON!
I hope you enjoy using this product in your own classroom as much as I have in mine! Be sure to check in to my store frequently for more freebies, design, and PE inspired products!
The Sassy PE Teacher

8. Finally, a lot of buyers may not realize that they can obtain credits from TpT for all purchased products. It's always a good idea to remind them of how to do this... It's also great for you and your store because it requires them to leave feedback on your items! Since we know your items are well made, well thought out, and amazing in general, we know your buyers will leave positive feedback! Although, even if they don't leave the best feedback, what they do leave can help you make your products that much better in the future:

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Customer Tips: 

How to get TPT credit to use on future purchases: 
•Please go to your My Purchases page (you may need to login). Beside each purchase you'll see a Provide Feedback button. Simply click it and you will be taken to a page where you can give a quick rating and leave a short comment for the product. Each time you give feedback, TPT gives you feedback credits that you use to lower the cost of your future purchases. I value your feedback greatly as it helps me determine which products are most valuable for your classroom so I can create more for you.

Be the first to know about my new discounts, freebies and product launches: 
• Look for the green star next to my store logo and click it to become a follower.

Voila! You will now receive email updates about this store.

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9. Keywords. I am new to this realm of TpT, but most of the top sellers have this stuck down on the bottom of the product. It doesn't benefit the buyer, it only benefits your store. TpT uses keywords within your product for search results, among many, many other factors. Adding keywords is not going to automatically put your product on page one of the results in a search, but it will help TpT searches identify your product as a factor for which order it posts something in.

keywords: health, health education, circulatory system, test prep, review, powerpoint, game, Sassy PE Teacher

Well, there you have it! These are the nine steps I have found to be useful when creating my own product descriptions and I hope they can help as you create your own store or go back and recreate your product descriptions.

Until next time,
xoxo The Sassy PE Teacher
 

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