As industrial ecommerce sites see more customers coming their way from the search engines, the need to have high quality, interactive images will increase. B2C sites are already using product zooms, multiple product views, interactive personalization, and other image techniques to increase time spent on site and online conversions.

Industrial customers are already using these features on B2C sites in their personal lives, and are starting to expect the same richness of experience when they are making purchasing decisions for their companies too. Even if you sell through a distributor base, more and more customers are starting their research online, and then contacting distributors once they have done some initial research.

Here are a few ways B2C sites are merchandising their products with images. What would your industrial customers find valuable for your products?

Alternate Product Views:
Shoes.com has multiple product views so shoppers can see the top, back, side, and front views. They even show the tread on the bottom of the shoe.

Image Zoom:
Nordstrom has an interactive zoom feature on their products, allowing customers to zoom in on the details they want to see.

Color Options:
Instead of merely showing a little color swatch and making customers guess what their pants looks like in another color, JC Penney shows full images of products in each color choice offered.

Personalization Views:
Custom Ink gives their customers the ability to create their own custom t-shirts and shows them what the shirts would look like.

Don’t forget to name images and use keyword rich alt attributes so the search engines know what your images are about. And, having great images does not replace having great copy on your site. You still need to explain product features and answer questions to convert those buyers.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, November 19th, 2009 at 10:20 am and is filed under General, Industrial B2B Marketing, Usability & Conversions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.