posted on November 12, 2007 02:58:17 PM
I sometimes spend an inordinate amount of time trying to find the "best" category for an item. Does it really make a difference? I never look at a category when searching for items, I just do a search with keywords and see what pops up. Do buyers really browse through category pages? Opinions please.
Thanks!!
posted on November 12, 2007 03:18:32 PM
My answer is Yes and No. It does make a difference if the keywords are apt to be found in many categories. There are several of my searches that include the word "camera" or "photograph". Sometimes I think that 99% of eBay descriptions include "the spots on the item are from my camera flash" or "the item looks much better than the picture because I am not a good photographer." I am forced to search by category or I would have way too many false positives. I am sure I miss some things because of this.
I wish there was a way to exclude catagories. One of my searches is for a specific phrase that is also the name of a band. If I could exclude music it would really help.
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“The illiterate of the future will be the person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as of the pen.”
Maholy-Nagy, Vision in Motion, 1947
posted on November 12, 2007 04:10:39 PM
Hmmm, I never search by category, I just type in the name of the item and see what appears. If that is what most people do, I can't understand why people would pay twice as much to list an item in 2 categories.
I agree that I would like to have a way to exclude items from a search. But, when my search comes up with too many choices, I can pick categories then, like prints or antiques and not have items with the same names that came up in music or toys.
posted on November 12, 2007 04:48:14 PM
I search both ways. In a catagory like Breweriana - Prepro, there aren't many new listings on a daily basis.
In a larger catagory, I might not want to wade thru the fresh listings, so I'm specific in what I'm looking for, and I don't pick a catagory.
posted on November 12, 2007 05:15:41 PM
I, too, search first by keyword and then narrow the search by category. International eBay sites do not map to the US categories very well, so I usually have to include the major name of the category in my title when I list (smart search may take care of that). I collect postcards of postcard stores, searching for them drives me crazy.
posted on November 12, 2007 06:47:14 PM
I don't think many people search by category, but some categories you will have a great chance of making ebay Pulse pages, while with other categories you will have little chance. (look for Pulse pages that don't have all 10 items filled)
If you have items that get at least 5-10 watchers early on, this may be something to consider.
posted on November 12, 2007 07:17:49 PM
Some of the collectibles I sell are found by buyers browsing in a specific category.
Photosensitive: When you search for a word or phrase and get extraneous stuff, I'm sure you know you can click at the left of the page on the categories you're fairly sure will meet your needs, and just see what's in those categories. (Forgive me if this is elementary to you!)
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posted on November 12, 2007 07:23:29 PM
I have never searched by catagory & with all the changes eBay has made I am always suprised that it's still there.
posted on November 12, 2007 08:33:37 PM
Categories are important even if you don't think so.
For one thing, affiliate stores are built based on a category. If you put your custom-made orthopedic Nascar cat bed in the Sports Memorabilia category, it will never appear in my MyChildEatsBugs store. If you put it in the cat bed category, it will.
Affiliate stores are key because eBay itself is just too big to search reasonably.
