Product titles identify your product to consumers and also to search engines which helps drive organic traffic to your store. Due to this, it might be tempting to overload your title with keywords. Don’t do it. Google’s algorithm has grown sophisticated enough to notice keyword stuffing and will punish you severely for that. Besides, such titles make little sense to the people reading them and this might turn them away from your store. 

Keywords should be reserved for the product description where they can be employed in a more organic manner as part of the text rather than being crammed together.

 

What makes a good title?

A good title is both short and descriptive. Naturally, that is easier said than done so here are a few pointers:

  1. Use title case (Capitalize The First Letter Of Every Word): This makes it obvious that customers are looking at a title. Avoid ALL CAPS text because it’s “shouty” and is actually read at a slower rate.
  2. Avoid acronyms whenever possible: This is especially so for acronyms you’ve made up yourself as they’re just confusing. Well known acronyms such as RAM are acceptable.
  3. Avoid generic titles: A title like ‘32” TV’ barely communicates anything. Titles should be more descriptive. ‘Samsung 32” LED Smart TV’ is a better title. Brand + Model + Relevant attributes + Common product name is a good formula for titling.
  4. Include the brand in the title if you’re a reseller: People will often search for a specific brand’s products on Google when they’re looking to buy them. For example, “Nikon DSLR Camera.” The more bland “Camera” search term isn’t often used by people looking to buy. Including the brand name isn’t necessary if your store sells products under your own brand since you’ll get the organic traffic from Google whenever anyone searches for your brand.
  5. Use common product names in the title: Avoid obscure terms like spray head, spray cap, atomizing head, or shower attachment. Shower head is the common term and that’s what users are going to search for. You should also include the product name in the title. A title like ‘Brand X Chrome 6-Setting High-Pressure Handheld For The Ultimate Shower Experience’ doesn’t communicate that the product listed is a shower head.
  6. Avoid temporary names: Terms like new or bestseller should be avoided in the title. If you add them to the title of every new or best selling product, your titles are going to get very confusing. There’s also the small issue of newness being a rather fleeting physical state. 
  7. Include gender depending on circumstances: Apparel stores often include gender in the product titles. However, this should be avoided when the items of clothing in question are obviously gender-specific. So, while terms like “Women’s Sneakers” or “Women’s Shirt” are fine, you don’t need to specify the gender for items like skirts or bras since it’s obvious those are worn by women.
  8. Include some detail about the current variant: (see best practice #62 for more details on variant titles)
  9. Visually separate the title from the brand: (see best practice #167)

 

Google search results

As a side note, Google now shows 70-71 characters on desktop and 78 characters on mobile for the titles in their search results. Aim for SEO title tags with about 70 characters.