EBay for Dummies (40 page)
Authors: Marsha Collier
Tags: #Electronic Commerce, #Computers, #General, #E-Commerce, #Internet auctions, #Auctions - Computer network resources, #Internet, #Business & Economics, #EBay (Firm)
Shipping and handling charges:
eBay requires you to show your shipping charge in the listing. Buyers are more likely to bid or buy right then and there if they feel your shipping costs are reasonable. If they have to e-mail you with questions, they may find another listing for the same item — with clear shipping — and bid or buy that one. Also, when you list a flat shipping charge on your listing, eBay will take that into account when deciding how your item shows up in Search. For larger items, see information on eBay’s handy shipping calculator, later in this chapter.
Payment instructions:
Here’s the place you put any after-sale information. You are required to accept PayPal or at least one electronic payment or Internet merchant credit card option for your items. (These are the safest options anyway.) If you want to offer the option to pay with a different electronic payment service, mention that as well. This information appears at the top of your sale when the sale is completed, under the Shipping and Payments tab of the listing while it’s active, and in the End of Listing e-mail (optional).
PayPal and immediate payment:
Fill in this area if you want to require the high bidder to pay through PayPal immediately when using Buy It Now. Add the Immediate Payment option if you know the shipping amount and would like the winner to pay with a click of the mouse (optional).
Return policy:
If you are willing to accept returns, indicate it. You can give the customer as few as three days to return the item (that cuts down on spurious returns).
Filling in the Required Blanks
Yes, the Sell an Item form looks daunting, but filling out its many sections doesn’t take as long as you may think. Some of the questions you’re asked aren’t things you even have to think about; just click an answer and off you go. Other questions ask you to type information. Don’t sweat a thing; all the answers you need are right here. In this section I describe all the required info; later in this chapter, I talk about optional stuff. After you click your category, you land on the official Sell an Item page.
Selecting a category
Many eBay sellers will tell you that selecting the exact category isn’t crucial to achieving the highest price for your item — and they’re right. The bulk of buyers (who know what they’re looking for) just input search keywords into eBay’s search box and look for their items. Others, though, may select a category and, just like when you go to the mall, peruse the items for sale and see if a particular one strikes their fancy.
On the first page of the Sell an Item form, you need to select the main category for your item. Type at least three keywords that best describe your item in the box provided and click Search. Figure 10-1 shows you how the results come up after typing your words, making it easy to select a main category.
Figure 10-1:
Let eBay do some of the work in finding the proper category for your item.
Here’s where your creativity can come into play. Who says that a box of Blue Dog (the famous doggie icon painted by Cajun artist George Rodrigue) note cards belongs in
Everything Else: Gifts & Occasions: Greeting Cards: Other Cards.
If you look around, you may find a better category. The Find Categories tool appears the second you open the Sell an Item page. Just click the associated link to browse for categories. Check to see if anyone else is selling the item (and in which category) or just let this tool help you pick a good category.
You can also browse the categories by clicking (surprise!) the Browse Categories tab. This will help you select your main category, and the thousands of subcategories. eBay offers you this wealth of choices in a handy point-and-click way. If you’re unfamiliar with the types of items you can actually
find
in those categories, you may want to pore over Chapter 3 before you choose a category to describe
your
item. Figure 10-2 shows you how to manually narrow the subcategory listings on the Sell an Item page.
To select a category, here’s the drill:
1. Click one of the main categories.
In the next box, you see a list of subcategories.
2. Select the most appropriate subcategory.
3. Continue selecting subcategories until you have narrowed your item listing as much as possible.
You know you’ve come to the last subcategory when you don’t see any more right-pointing arrows in the Categories.
Figure 10-2:
Narrowing your sub-categories.
Most bidders scan for specific items in subcategories. For example, if you’re selling a Bakelite fruit pin, don’t just list it under Jewelry; keep narrowing your choices. In this case, you can put it in a costume jewelry category that is especially for Bakelite. I guarantee that the real Bakelite jewelry collectors out there know where to look to find the jewelry they love. To narrow the category of your item, just keep clicking until you hit the end of the line.
Some subcategories aren’t for everyone
If you’ve chosen to list an item, bid on an item, or even just browse in the Everything Else: Mature Audiences category, you need to follow separate, specific guidelines because that category contains graphic nudity or sexual content that may offend some community members. You must
Be at least 18 years of age (but you already know that all eBay customers must be 18 or older).
Have a valid credit card.
Complete a waiver stating that you’re voluntarily choosing to access adults-only materials. For more on how to do this (and a handy primer on privacy issues), see Chapter 15.
If you have Adult/Erotica items that you’d like to sell in a private auction, study the section later in this chapter that details the Private Auction option.
Creating the perfect item title
After you figure out what category you want to list in, eBay wants to get down to the nitty-gritty — what the heck to call that thing you’re trying to sell.
Think of your item title as a great newspaper headline. The most valuable real estate on eBay is the 55-character title of your item.
The majority of buyers do title searches, and that’s where your item must come up to be sold!
Give the most essential information right away to grab the eye of the reader who’s just browsing. Be clear and informative enough to get noticed by eBay’s search engine. Figure 10-3 shows examples of good titles. Note how a few of these titles contain subtitles (more info on subtitles further in this chapter).
Figure 10-3:
These item titles are effective because they’re clear and concise.
Here are some ideas to help you write your item title:
Use the most common name for the item.
If the item is rare, vintage, or hard to find, mention that.
State the item’s condition and whether it’s new or old.
Include the item’s special qualities, such as its style, model, or edition.
Avoid fancy punctuation or unusual characters, such as $, hyphens, and L@@K, because they just clutter up the title — and buyers don’t search for them.
When you get into advanced selling mode, you should take a look at one of my other books, coauthored by Patti Louise Ruby,
eBay Listings That Sell For Dummies.
It covers eBay photography and HTML in depth.