How to Write Product Descriptions That Tell a Story

Many of us struggle to find the right words to describe our products or to talk about our creative work with others. It's an awkward balance: you want to show your enthusiasm, without coming off like a used car salesperson.

One of the best ways to sidestep the "sales pitch" approach is to use storytelling techniques when describing your product. Rather than listing product features as you would vital statistics and telling browsers how much they will love the product, you want them to fall in love with its personality and spirit.

Here are 4 tips on writing product descriptions that tell a story.

1. Your product gets its personality from you

If you're not convinced that attaching your story to your products is important, consider this point from Christine Gierer, in a list of tips for writing handmade jewelry descriptions:

"People often buy handmade jewelry so they can feel wise or insightful and you, believe it or not, YOU are often the biggest selling point, especially if your work is very distinctive and unique, or if you yourself are distinctive and unique."

Gierer goes on to list various ideas for telling stories about your work: What funny thing prompted you to make this handmade necklace? What is the story behind an interesting bead in that necklace?

2. Put your heart and soul into it

What's the difference between your hand-printed stationery and the printed stationery stacked up at any number of retail stores? Yours has a soul.

You are selling your creative product because you believe that people value the difference between something that comes from human hands vs. a machine.

So your product descriptions and marketing efforts should be imbued with the life, spirit and personality that go into your product.

If the public nature of written product descriptions feels intimidating, imagine yourself describing the product to a friend and apply the same tone to your description.

Your spirit can also be reflected in many contagious ways: a clever "about" page, a profile shot that makes others smile, lively blog posts or beautiful product shots.

3. Let other people do the talking

We're all skeptical when it comes to advertising and sales pitches. One way to throw more credibility and creativity into your marketing efforts is to include voices other than your own.

You can ask buyers for testimonials to include on your site or in your product descriptions. A quote from someone else saying that the product solved a problem, made a great gift, or simply makes them happy to look at every day can go a long way.

Mogul Mom Heather Allard found a great example of using feedback in this ad for Swaddle Designs - it lists 14 reasons why retailers love the company's products.

Even if you don't use testimonials on your site, it will help to simply get feedback from others about your product. They will see it, describe it and use it in ways you haven't thought of.

Perhaps a client tells you that she wore your handmade earrings to a job interview and got the job. That's a useful anecdote - all of a sudden you're selling "great first impression" earrings.

4. Make our dreams come true

Remember those "Calgon, take me away!" commercials from the 1980s? They promised that a relaxing escape was contained in a box of Calgon bath salts. Creating a mood or feeling for your customers can often help make the difference between a browser and a buyer.

I love the way Paco+Lupe, makers of handbags and other fabric items, have named their summer bags after cities known for their beautiful beaches. There's the Valencia bag, the Costa del sol, Mar Azul and the Baga Beach. When you pair the look of the bright fabrics with the feeling conjured by the name, you can practically taste the margaritas. Not into the beach? They also sell a bag called New York Weekend.

Some other ways to inject personality into product descriptions are to give voices or characters to your products or get creative with color descriptions. Thanks to Simply Said for pointing out a page that lists all kinds of creative color names.

Main image courtesy of tsuacctnt.

How do you feel about writing product descriptions? Do you have fun with them, or are they low on the priority list?