According to SEMrush, product content is one of the top three most important factors for winning online sales. It’s second only to price and delivery time. Product content is the information on your site that explains what you sell and how it benefits consumers — when your product is a service, this content comes in the form of service descriptions.
What Are Service Descriptions?
Service descriptions are like product descriptions. But instead of describing tangible goods, you’re describing the services that you provide, including what you do, some basics about how you do it and why people should care about the service.
How many service pages you have on your site depends on what you offer and how you want to market it. It also might depend on your content marketing budget. You definitely want to highlight your main services with their own description pages. Check out the table below for examples of the types of service pages you might see on various business websites.
| Type of Business | Potential Service Pages |
| Dentist | Routine dental care, teeth cleanings, crowns or fillings, dental bridges |
| Plumber | Toilet repair, sink repair, pipe replacement, new construction plumbing |
| HVAC Company | HVAC repair, HVAC service and maintenance, new HVAC installations |
| Tutor | elementary tutoring, math, language arts, chemistry, biology |
| Divorce Lawyer | No-contest divorce, contested divorce, child custody, mediation |
How to Write a Service Description: 7 Tips
Once you decide how many service pages you need and what services you should highlight, it’s time to create the service description content. Check out some tips below for creating service description pages that are likely to perform in SERPs and convert consumers who arrive to your pages.
1. Scope Out the Competition in SERPs
Start by checking out the competition. Search your keywords and look at the pages in the top three spots. What are they doing and how can you do it better?
(Okay, technically you start with keyword research so you know what your keywords are. TBH, we’re assuming if you know you need service descriptions, you know you need keywords and keyword research.)
Matthew Rogers, a search analyst and senior editor at Mango Matter, says he analyzes service descriptions that are ranking in SERPs before creating his own. “I work on the premise that every page Google promotes on page one is there for a reason,” says Rogers, “and success can often be reverse engineered.”
2. Focus on Your Customer
But you can’t let analytics reign over your content at the expense of the consumer. Rogers notes,”The most difficult part of writing service descriptions is balancing the need to please the user while pleasing Googlebot.”
It’s not enough to shove the ranking keywords into your service description and show up high in the page rankings. Your content must also:
- Align with searcher intent
- Provide relevant, helpful information to the user
- Persuade the user to take the next action in the sales funnel
In addition to doing your keyword research, make sure you have a target consumer and that you understand their needs and preferences. That way, you can create content for your service description that speaks specifically to the target audience.
3. Use Feature/Benefit Writing
One of the best ways to speak to the consumer’s needs and desires is via feature/benefit writing. This is common in product descriptions, and you should employ it in writing about services too.
Feature/benefit doesn’t just tell the consumer what you do. It tells them what you do for them (the feature) and why they should care (the benefit). Check out some example feature benefit pairs below to better understand this type of content.
| Potential service page on: | Might include this feature: | Which pairs with this benefit: |
| Toilet repairs | 24-hour service options | No need to wait or deal with emergency water or inconvenience |
| Child custody legal services | Free consultation | Ability to understand options to make an educated choice before hiring an attorney |
| Math tutor | SAT prep | Creates confidence going in to important standardized testing |
| Teeth cleanings | Friendly staff experienced with nervous patients | Makes cleanings less anxiety-inducing and helps ensure pain-free experience |
4. Make Service Descriptions Scannable
No matter how great your feature/benefit copy is, most people will skip the entire page if you present your service description as a big block of text. It’s daunting and annoying—especially on mobile.
Instead, break your content up into scannable chunks by using subheadings, small paragraphs, bulleted and numbered lists, block quotes, call outs and images. Check out our service page on article writing for an example of friendly scannable content with plenty of white space.
5. Include Various Content and Media Formats
Remember that not everyone prefers text-based messaging, and some people engage much better with images or video. That means they’re more likely to remember your message later when it’s time to make a purchase. Incorporate various media formats by:
- Explaining services using videos and infographics
- Showing services in action in photos
- Integrating consumer reviews and testimonials to back up your claims
6. Don’t Try to Do Too Much With One Service Page
To perform in SERPs and with users, your service pages have to answer pretty specific intents and questions.
For example, someone looking for toilet repair might be interested in some basic information about new toilet installation—especially if it’s information to help them decide between a new item or repairing the existing one. But they probably aren’t going to want to read an entire page devoted to sinks.
Ensure your service page comprehensively answers the intent of the search regarding a service, but leave tangential information to its own page. You can certainly mention that you also install sinks, but instead of going into detail, link to your sink installation service page.
Plan out your service description pages ahead of time so you can ensure you cover all the most important services and that they each go on their own page.
7. Include a Relevant, Clear Call to Action
Finally, don’t leave the consumer hanging. Be specific about the action you want them to take to engage your services.
Include buy now, get a quote or contact us buttons—and do so where the consumer can see them. If they’re buried somewhere seven scrolls below the fold, they won’t do you any good.
You should also give a concise explanation of what the consumer can expect when they act. For example: They’ll call to schedule a free consultation or drop their email in a form and someone will contact them within 24 hours.
Get Professional Help Writing Service Descriptions
Service descriptions can be hard to write well as they rely on a balance of SEO and strong marketing copy. Contact Crowd Content to find out how our experienced copywriters can help you create service descriptions that perform in the search engines and convert consumers into customers.
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