posted on August 15, 2007 09:46:26 PM
Fluffy wrote on another thread:
"Also, I don't want to name names, but I've looked through some Vendians' auctions and a return to basics is definitely in order.
I imagine this is probably true as well for some of you who are terrified that someone might find out your eBay ID.
By "basics" I mean:
-Using a high concentration of keywords in your title and omitting useless terms that no one searches on, like "the". Use a thesaurus if you need to.
-Spelling keywords correctly. eBay won't cover you on this, even with the new "finding experience".
-Inadequate descriptions.
I just think it's funny that people blame special listing events for poor results when they should be looking a lot closer to home.
fLufF
There is enough meat here for a new thread. When I first started selling on eBay, I left out key words that were in the category description - assuming most people searched by category. WRONG! Especially for the international market - their categories do not map to the U.S. categories. A savvy customer chided me to leave off superfluous words like "lovely" (I still use it occasionally) and to include assumed keywords like "postcard" in the title. Great advice!
OTH, I'm tempted to emulate (but haven't) lazy sellers who put minimal info in the title, requiring buyers to click through to see what they are really selling. Many buyers, although peeved, will click on "Portland Oregon Postcard" for the scarce chance that it is one of a few they have been searching for years for.
VERO opens a whole new list of key words one should avoid when listing- I've learned to use "stagecoach" instead of "coach", "Mercury" instead of "Hermes", etc.
posted on August 17, 2007 01:23:36 PM
In another thread, I spoke of things I first heard of on http://www.eauctionair.com. Here's one that can be very useful for mining keywords:
To show you how it works, I entered "sterling silver jewelry". The Selection Tool returned a list of searches that included my phrase, with a count of how many times each appeared.
This list tells me several things. For one, if I list a piece suitable for a man (like a chunky bracelet) I should use the word "man" instead of the word "men's". It also tells me there is plenty of interest in wholesale jewelry, so I should use that word more, especially if I have 10 letters left in the auction title.
Try it with some of your products and see what happens.
posted on August 17, 2007 01:36:46 PM
sure,Ebay just yanked my auction which mentioned SWASTIKA?
IT gets a lot of attention and some bids before it was pulled.
Sometimes silence is golden!
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Lets all stop whining !
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posted on August 17, 2007 03:12:57 PM
You are correct, Wayne. It does sometimes take a long time to perform a search. Thank heavens for tabbed browsers.
I figure keyword selection isn't really date-sensitive unless we're talking about current events.
