Jan
4
One of the most important aspects about your auction listing is the title. On eBay, the title is limited to 55 spaces. The words you employ in that limited space must be carefully crafted to appear in bidders’ search results and get the click once found.
An effective auction title:
- Uses keywords that potential bidders use to search listings.
- Solves a problem.
- Make a reader curious to know more
- Is simple and easy to read and understand.
- Exhibits professionalism.
On eBay, the default search method only scans auction titles. These queries return results based on matches to the search term found only in the titles. Don’t waste precious space with useless descriptions like “Awesome”, “L@@K”, or “Wow!”. Nobody searches for an “awesome” iPod. Put yourself in the shoes of the bidder for moment and brainstorm the search terms she might use to find a product like yours. Include these words or phrases in your auction title. Include your item’s brand name, artist, or designer. State exactly what your item is, even if your title repeats the category name. Additionally, if you have the space, consider including alternate spellings of your product. For example, if your selling a lawn mower, write it as one word (”Lawnmower”) and two words (”Lawn Mower”).
After ensuring your listing is found in the search results, go to eBay and do some searches using these terms and see what listings are returned. Look at the auction titles and note the ones that draw your attention and start your mouse finger twitching. Search closed listing and see which titles drew high prices in the past.
Likely, the titles that are the most appealing and effective also communicate the merits of the product. Let your title sell the potential bidder on the honest benefits of your particular listing loudly and clearly. If your auction has an incredibly low opening bid with no reserve price or free shipping, ensure you annotate the fact in your title. Some commonly used auction title acronyms are listed below.
Here are some compelling words to tout the merits of your particular product:
powerful, admirable, impressive, success, breakthrough, announcing, secrets, dazzling, prosper, in-depth, ingenious, succeed, incredible, overwhelming, imagine, acclaim
Here are some commonly used auction title acronyms and abbreviations:
FS - “Factory Sealed”
GU - “Gently Used.”
GW - “Gently Worn.”
MWT - “Mint With Tags.”
NIB - “New In Box.”
NR - “No Reserve” price.
S/H - “Shipping and Handling”
Remember, your auction title is the key to getting found by bidders and enticing them to click on your listing. Finding and clicking are key events that must occur BEFORE you get any bids. So spend some time to consider what you include in those 55 spaces before you list your next auction.
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3 Responses to “Powerful Auction Titles: Your First Step to eBay Success…”
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I must admit.. one night I was surfing ebay and I had an idea. I wanted to just scan different items to see how their seller set up the auctions and which format I enjoyed the best. I couldnt think of how to get a diverse item selection until the thought to search “l@@k” or “awesome” came into my mind. It worked perfectly! So I must say, those words in a heading have a “use” but *I* didnt bid on any of the items!
so ture. a lady and I were selling the exactly same wedding gowns for dolls. I used “wedding gowns bridal dresses for barbie dolls”, she used “bridal dress for 11.5″ dolls”, her listing got 10 hits (I hit at least 6 times from different computers, as I was curious if she got bids), but mine got more than 50 hits in 2 days and 2 bids. The keyword people use to search is “wedding gown”, “bridal dress” is less used. and Barbie dolls have huge groups of collectors at ebay.
Words such as ‘L@@K’, ‘awesome’, “WOW” and all that might sound cute, but they do absolutely nothing to attract sales. It doesn’t take a degree in rocket science to figure out that when someone is looking for, say, ‘widgets’, they’re not going to do a search for “WOW” or “L@@K”, and those ‘words’ in your description are a waste of space and keywords. Add as much as you can with words that are RELEVANT to the item you’re trying to sell. I’ve seen some sellers who abbreviate what should be useful keywords, just so they have enough room to add the ‘awesome’ or some other such nonsense. From my own experience, I can tell you that such words have never enticed me to look at one particular sellers items over another. It actually seems to show a lack of imagination - the opposite of the intended effect. When I look at items I might have some interest in, one thought I have (which I’m sure others do as well) is “what can you tell me about it in the title?” Saying “wow” or “awesome” doesn’t tell me a whole lot. That may work if you’re trying to target kids in elementary school, but isn’t of much use otherwise.
But yet another failing of many sellers is words that are incorrectly spelled. Come on, folks - every lister - including the one on eBay - has a spell checker. For one thing, poor spelling and grammar doesn’t do much to increase people’s interest in your items. An ad with a lot of poor spelling and wording will only make people think things such as perhaps you’re some junky in a sleazy trailer park. Not to mention that I’ve got some REAL good bargains from people who have spelled things wrong in their title or description - I have LOOKED for items with spelling errors (as have others I know) just for that reason - because I KNOW they won’t have many hits, and you can usually grab-up such items with a single bid.