It can be incredibly frustrating if you’ve spent ages finding a great product and putting together an excellent eBay listing, only to find your sales pages languishing at the very bottom of the search results.
Studies from Google have shown that if your product isn’t found on the first page of results then it won’t get clicked on much, and the statistics are similar when it comes to a website like eBay. Getting your listings to the top of the search results is vital when it comes to making sales.
There’s no secret formula that you can use to boot the competition out of the way unfortunately, but that doesn’t mean there is nothing that you can do to improve your chances of reaching the elusive top search spots. The following strategies will all combine to improving your search status, so put them into play right now and before you know it you’ll start to see your listings creep up through the results.
Use relevant keywords in your listing title. It is important to include information such as the make, model, size, style, colour and anything else that describes the item in question within your title. eBay’s search results perform a best match on items within the catalogue, so if your keywords match up with something someone is really searching for you’ll do well.
Choose the right category or categories for your items. Some shoppers on eBay will search for your item, while others might use the extensive category system to jump straight into a particular area of the website. If your item is listed in the wrong category then a buyer interested in the very thing you have on offer won’t be able to find you. If you aren’t sure where to list then I suggest having a look at other sellers offering similar goods to see exactly which categories they have chosen to use.
When you set up a listing on eBay you will need to choose one category, but you can list in multiple categories for an extra listing fee. If you aren’t sure where your item should fit then you may wish to consider opting for a couple of different categories.
Complete the item specific information. Filling in this information as fully as possible will stand you in good stead within the search results, as eBay will be able to match what you are offering with what a person is searching for. Different categories and items listed on the site come with different fields in this section, so just make sure you add in as much information as you have to hand.
Work on your customer service. One of the biggies when it comes to getting a good search result on eBay is the quality of your feedback. You might notice that Top Sellers on eBay seem to feature more prominently than those without much, or with poor feedback. You should work on getting a great Detailed Seller Rating (DSR) by making sure that customer service is your highest priority, and by politely asking existing customers to leave some nice comments after the sale has been completed.
Keep checking your DSR scores. You’ll start to see a pattern if one area in particular is suffering and can then work to correct the issue by reducing your P&P charges or answering emails that little bit more quickly.
Offer free postage. If you can afford to then I’d strongly suggest offering free postage on your items, particularly on those that are small and light. Products listed on eBay with expensive postage tend to appear lower in the results than those with free or very reasonable costs.
Chances are offering free or affordable postage won’t eat into your margins too badly, but if you are finding that it negatively impacts your profit then you can always consider this a short term strategy to help you to be noticed while you build up more positive feedback.
You don’t need to be the cheapest, but you do need to price competitively. Pricing yourself completely out of the water is a good way to relegate your listings to the bottom of the search results. I’m a firm believer that you really don’t need to be the cheapest seller within your niche market, but you should try to remain competitive, especially if you are a relatively new seller still building up a positive feedback score.
Create multiple quantity listings. Do you have lots of the same item to sell? Then add a multiple quantity to your listing rather than creating multiple listings for the same thing. The more of the same item that you sell, the more eBay will start to rank you more successfully in the search results as something of an expert within the field. It’s important to expand your selling business to be offering multiple products, but by selling a lot of one item you’ll certainly find yourself ranking highly within searches for it.
It might take a while to creep up through the results, but by prioritising customer service and remaining diligent you will start to see an improvement, and with each improvement you’ll start to see more sales!