Should products descriptions be made in to blog posts?

[Algenic]

Howdy,

Here's a situation I got myself into. For the past few months, I've been planning to start up an e-commerce business. I've got my homework done - created product design, wrote value-adding product descriptions and a few regular blog posts in order to start providing content right away. Recently, I've got some news that the product I was about to sell won't be arriving for at least a month longer. Here's what I am considering:

In order to make the start of the business smoother and gain attention quicker, it would make sense to start building a presence in advance. What I am considering now is instead of using the product descriptions I have for their original purpose, I could make them into a handful of blog posts with WordPress. I am relatively sure that with proper promotion, people would find them interesting, as they answer common industry questions in a unique, entertaining way. However, I am not sure what implications would such move have for my business in the longer term, especially when it actually starts selling products. I would switch to the Shopify platform, which would probably mean I would have to transfer my blog posts onto another platform? Maybe I should just wait till I have all my products ready and stick with the plan, instead of using the content I have for the blog right now? If I should indeed go through with the blog first, what content would I later put in the product descriptions and what are the possible SEO consequences?

I hope it is at least somewhat clear what my situation is. Thank you in advance for the help.

[Joe.Robison]

I think it's a great idea to stoke demand by creating blog posts before the product pages are up.

If you think about it you're suggesting two options: do nothing or do something. If your product pages won't be up for awhile, might as well put that content to use, which will help you uncover a few things:

• How difficult is it to rank for product related keyword?
• How much natural demand is out there for my products already?
• Are people willing to sign up for a waiting/mailing list for my products?
• What types of content do readers find most compelling on my site or in my niche?

I wouldn't wait because you never know what delays there will be in the future, so might as well start now.

Switching platforms, such as to Shopify, is always a pain, but if you're going to be migrating pages anyways, a few blog posts won't be a huge technical challenge.

Possible SEO consequences/recommendations between blog posts and product descriptions:

• They are two different things. When reading blog posts, people are looking for information, stories, ideas, etc. When people read product pages they want to know details and FAQs about that product specifically. There will be some overlap, but keep the goal of the user in mind.
• That said, you can use some of the product descriptions within blog posts, but I wouldn't just copy/paste. There's no such thing as a duplicate content penalty, but it's usually not a good idea to replicate pages across your site word for word.
• When you write blog posts about your products, link to the product pages from within the post. You always want to prioritize product pages for your money keywords, and blog posts for more informational/long-tail/high volume, but low difficulty keywords - two different strategies.

Hope that helps! Let me know if you have follow-up questions!