Enabling customers to find your products is half the battle driving ecommerce sales. Competition on the internet is high, SEO rules are changing, and new channels pop up constantly. For industrial brands (many of which are still playing catchup in digital commerce), reaching online customers feels impossible.
So, to cut out all the noise and focus on the bleeding priorities, it’s important to remember what’s at the heart of online visibility – your product catalog.
The quality of your product catalog makes or breaks sales. When maintained well, it builds trust and drives conversions. However, mistakes damage your credibility among customers and sabotage your marketing efforts.
Let’s examine the most common yet critical mishaps that industrial brands make in their product catalogs and how they can be resolved effectively.
How does a strong product catalog boost your sales and traffic?
A perfectly optimized product catalog – meaning the product information is complete, accurate, up-to-date, and tailored to the specific market and demographic – influences purchasing decisions. Let’s take a closer look at some key statistics that highlight its impact.
/ 80% of customers, including physical shoppers, conduct online research before proceeding with their buying decision.
/ 85% of online customers choose to purchase from a brand based on the accuracy of product information in the product catalog.
/ 64% of online shoppers are influenced to buy from brands that include how-to-use or demo videos in their product catalog.
/ 83% of online shoppers are influenced by product images displayed in catalogs when choosing which brand to purchase from.
Similarly to influencing purchases, product catalogs can also have adverse effects if mismanaged. Let’s look at industrial brands' most common catalog mistakes and how they can be rectified.
The 6 most common product catalog mistakes
Today, an aesthetic product catalog isn’t enough to impress your target audience. Online buyers start their shopping journey with very specific requirements in mind. Hence, your product catalog needs to be functional, informative, and credible.
Here’s where industrial brands tend to go wrong when it comes to product catalog management:
1. Creating a generic brand experience for your customers
While visibility is the goal of every ecommerce business, it is important to target your reach. It’s more effective (and cost-efficient) for the right shoppers to find you than all of them. Hence, creating a generic product catalog does not necessarily lead to any valuable business conversions. You must understand who your customers are and who you want to cater to. This way you can create a product catalog that is specific and targeted to your actual customers, providing them with a personalized ecommerce experience.
More than 77% of online shoppers choose, recommend, and are willing to pay more to a brand that offers them a personalized experience. Further, 40% of online customers expect you to remember their preferences and provide only relevant information and suggestions. Once you’ve identified your target audience, you can then create product catalogs specifically tailored to their preferences. This saves time, effort, and costs while driving more traffic.
2. Providing inaccurate product information
Inaccurate product information is a significant misstep that can have far-reaching consequences for industrial brands. When details like inventory levels, pricing, or product specifications are incorrect, it undermines customer trust and frustrates potential buyers.
For instance, if a buyer discovers that an item listed as "in stock" is actually unavailable, or if the price suddenly changes at checkout, it not only creates a poor shopping experience but also erodes confidence in the brand. This frustration often drives shoppers to competitors who offer more reliable and transparent information. An industrial brand that consistently misrepresents its product data risks losing customers to competitors who provide accurate, up-to-date details, making precision in catalog management essential for retaining customer loyalty.
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3. Ignoring the importance of an SEO-optimized product catalog
Search engines like Google process more than 8.5 billion searches daily. Out of these, 74% of them are searching about online shopping. With millions of businesses offering similar services and selling similar products, it can become difficult for your customers to find you if you do not appear on their search engine results page within a few scrolls. You need to optimize your product catalog for search engines with the most commonly used keywords that customers use when looking up businesses similar to yours. This way, your business becomes relevant to what the customer is searching for, and you rank at the top of the search engine results page, making yourself easily noticeable.
4. Using irrelevant and fake product images
Online shopping prevents your customers from being able to physically see or feel your products, putting all the pressure on your product images to demonstrate them properly. Irrelevant or fake product images confuse customers. 67% of online shoppers prefer to shop with brands that provide high-definition product images, rather than plain product descriptions. Not only do you need to add high-resolution images that are compliant in clarity, dimensions, and other guidelines set by the ecommerce websites and marketplaces, but you also need to ensure your images match the product details.
Authentic photos of your product in use by customers also hold a lot of influence and help build trust. 77% of ecommerce customers tend to buy a product when you include images of the product from previous customers. It’s much more convincing to show a product in real life compared to one shot in a studio.
Elevate your product listings with Productsup's Image Designer tool, designed for creating and optimizing stunning product images. We help you customize images to meet marketplace requirements and enhance visual appeal, driving higher conversion rates. Explore how you can streamline your image management process and boost your brand's presence. [Watch Video]
Going beyond still images, digital catalogs allow you to add product videos to your product feed, helping you enhance the customer experience. Including video testimonials and product demo videos in your catalog has been proven to increase conversion rates by 80%.
5. Making a mobile-unfriendly product catalog
Imagine a customer browsing for a new pair of shoes while on their lunch break, only to find that the product catalog is difficult to navigate on their smartphone. This frustrating experience can lead to lost sales and missed opportunities. To avoid this, ensure that your product catalog is mobile commerce-friendly and responsive on all handheld devices and screen sizes. This accessibility allows customers to browse and shop easily from anywhere, at any time.
Additionally, optimizing your catalog for quick loading times is crucial, as delays can drive impatient customers away just when they’re ready to make a purchase.
Source: Onsightapp
6. Failing to provide consistency across ecommerce channels and platforms
Your online customers may reach you through various platforms and mediums, and they expect you to be available in each of these touchpoints. It’s essential that you list your business across all top-performing channels among customers, spanning from social media platforms to ecommerce marketplaces. But being listed everywhere is not enough; you need to be omnichannel, meaning you need to provide your customers with a unified and consistent brand experience across these channels.
Now that you know what not to do with your product catalog, it’s time to create the most functional product catalog for your ecommerce business. Explore product data management solutions like Productsup’s Retail PX and Marketplaces PX to help you with consistent and efficient product feed management.