Writing product descriptions and website copy with AI: method and limits
Updated: 2 days ago
You have thirty product descriptions to write, an About page that has been sitting unfinished for six months, and not a spare hour in sight. ChatGPT or the AI assistant built into Wix promise to sort it out in an evening.
That is partly true, provided you know how to brief the tool, proofread its output and refuse the one-size-fits-all copy that reads exactly like your competitors'.
Over the past year we have seen plenty of AI-generated text land on our clients' sites: home decor shops, craftspeople, law firms, restaurants. Some of it is very good. A lot of it is hollow. Here is the method we use at les défricheurs agency, and the limits we learned the hard way.
What AI does well, and what it will never do for you
A tool like ChatGPT, or the AI writer built into the Wix editor (the "Create text with AI" button in text boxes and in Wix Stores product pages), does three things very well: it produces a first draft in ten seconds, it rewrites a clunky paragraph, and it spins one piece of content into five variants.
For a small business with nobody to write, that is a real gain: where a first draft used to take twenty minutes per product, it now takes two.
What AI does not know is your product, your customer, or the reason people buy from you rather than elsewhere. Give it nothing and it makes things up: vague materials, "exceptional quality" with no evidence, delivery promises you cannot keep. It checks nothing. It produces plausible text, not true text.
The real risk is not the glaring error, which you will spot. It is the correct, fluent, interchangeable text. Type the same instruction as your competitor and you will get more or less the same product page. A customer who reads "a unique piece combining elegance and modernity" for the third time closes the tab.
Brief the AI the way you would brief an intern
Around 80% of the output quality comes from what you put in the instruction. A good brief for a product description has six parts, and we ask every client for them before generating anything:
Who buys: age, situation, the problem the product solves ("young couple furnishing a first flat", "tradesperson looking for a tool that lasts").
The facts: dimensions, material, origin, production time, care, price. Everything the AI cannot guess.
The difference: what you do that others do not. Made in your own workshop, repaired for life, hand-picked from three suppliers.
The tone: paste two or three sentences you wrote yourself and ask the tool to keep that voice. Formal or casual, short sentences, no superlatives.
The format: length (80 to 150 words for a product page), structure (a hook, the specifications, one sentence about use), and the banned words.
The keyword: the phrase your customers type into Google, used once in the title and once in the body, no more.
With this brief you no longer get generic copy but a first draft that actually talks about your product. In Wix, paste the brief into the assistant's instruction field; in ChatGPT, keep it in a note and reuse it for every product, changing only the facts.
Before and after: a home decor shop's product page
A home decor shop we work with sells a ceramic lamp made in a workshop in the south of France. First version, generated with no brief:
"Discover our beautiful ceramic lamp, a unique piece combining elegance and modernity. Perfect for enhancing your interior, it will bring a touch of warmth to any room. A must-have in contemporary decor."
Fifty words, zero information. No dimensions, no precise material, no workshop name, no price, nothing about the bulb. The text could sell any lamp from any shop. Second version, generated with the six-point brief and proofread by the owner:
"Table lamp in glazed stoneware, hand-thrown in Pauline's workshop near Uzès. 32 cm tall, washed linen shade, 1.80 m fabric cord. Each piece shows slight variations in the glaze: that is normal, it is handmade. E27 bulb not included, we recommend 2700 K for a soft light. Ships within 3 working days in reinforced packaging."
Same tool, same generation time. The difference is the brief and ten minutes of proofreading. On that shop we rewrote all 40 product pages in two afternoons, where a copywriter's quote alone came in at around 1,500 euros. The AI did not do the work: the owner did, with the AI as labour.
What to proofread, every single time
Generated text never goes live without a read-through. We check five things, in this order. Facts first: every figure, material, lead time or standard must be accurate, and AI happily writes "stainless steel" where you sell aluminium. Promises next: "lifetime guarantee", "24-hour delivery", "the best value for money" are legal and commercial commitments, not turns of phrase.
Third, repetition: AI loves "discover", "elevate", "ideal for", "whether you are... or...". If a word shows up on every product page, delete it everywhere. Fourth, the voice: read the page out loud.
If you would never say that sentence to a customer across the counter, rewrite it. Last, search: one keyword placed naturally, and a product title that describes the item ("Handmade glazed stoneware lamp") rather than a slogan.
Allow five to ten minutes of proofreading per product. That is the price of credibility. A proofread page converts; a raw one merely fills the space.
Where to start
Write your own six-point brief (customer, facts, difference, tone, format, keyword) and keep it in a reusable note.
Test on three products, not the whole catalogue: generate, proofread, correct, and compare with your old descriptions.
In Wix Stores, open a product, click "Create text with AI" and paste your brief into the instruction, or go through ChatGPT and copy the result over.
Proofread every text against the five-point list (facts, promises, repetition, voice, search) before publishing.
After a month, check in Wix Analytics which rewritten pages gained visits and add-to-carts, then roll the method out to the rest.
What we take away
AI is an excellent first draft and a very poor final writer. It saves you the blank-page time, provided you give it what it does not know: your facts, your customer and your tone. Without a brief, you publish the same text as everyone else, and that is the worst thing you can do to a website.
What sells a product page is the true detail: the workshop's name, the height in centimetres, the real lead time. No machine knows those for you. Clear that ground yourself, and let the AI carry the rest.
Got a Wix catalogue to rewrite or site pages that do not sound like you? We will set it up for you: a tailored brief, the Wix AI assistant configured, product pages rewritten and proofread with you. Book a slot or take a look at our Wix services.
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