Everything you want to know about eBay..

Here's what I know about eBay, their are some other very knowledgeable sellers that have posted some very valid tips.

1) Always use 12 photos - No matter what - It's going to give you the biggest bump. Make up photos, whatever it takes, show the item next to a ruler, the box it ships, anything you can think of.

2) If you have say 50 shirts to sell, always do GOOD TO CANCEL, this will maintain all your watchers and sold counts and this will also boost you in the search relevancy.

3) Being a Top-Rated Seller helps boost search rankings.. Their are pro's and con's some cons are you have to include tracking numbers, so no sending out baseball cards using postage stamps. It's going to count against you, you have to maintain 90% of what you sell with tracking. So some items will cost a little more to sell but the benefit is great.

   a) Using fake tracking numbers to keep you in compliance will ultimately get you busted.

4) Always use Fast and Free shipping (They get a bump also in rankings). So when you're selling multiple "Fast and Free is the way to go" along with Good To Cancel, with 12 photos.

5) Ending times on auction, It's different based on gender and merchandise categories.  Call eBay and ask for advice on when to end an auction for particular categories.

6) Theirs a new feature, not all accounts have it enable, its still in beta called, Relist your items up to 3 times automatically if it don't sell. Using this feature will re-list the items at no charge and no use of a free insertion.

7) If you need additional keywords to trigger that don't fit in a title, create Item Specifics for those keywords.

Always use the Ebay Global Shipping program, all you have to do is mail the item to ebays shipping center which is a commercial address, I sell a lot of items through it.

9) 1 day handling and 14 day+ return policy, gets you better search results.

10) Get yourself a label printer, if your doing first class postage on small packages, I use the QL-710W brother - Prints out a small label that can easily fit on small envelopes and packages.

11) Get yourself two scales, I have 3, one for measuring lbs, one for ounces and one for grams (I use for selling precious metals online)

12) Get yourself a box sizer (reducing box sizes save on packing material and dimensional weight).

13) If you can manage 2 ebay accounts, do it, once for being a top rated seller and one for selling things that don't qualify for top rated seller. 

My dad is one of those crazy sellers on eBay with a gazillion feedback, I'm just starting out. I had many conversations with eBay regarding selling, this is what I have learned.

Oh Just remembered..

14) No HTML in the description - Fancy templates or linked photographs - hurts your search rankings.. They consider this a negative on mobile

Sum awesome tips  here. I never knew about the html in templates hurting ranking. Its a tough call there. Ranking is king but again having a more professional and detailed templates can set you aside from the pack make you look more professional. Probably depends on what your selling of you want that professional touch. On cheaper items probbly doesnt matter as much. On more expensive things or silver or something like that probably not a bad idea to have a professional template.

1) Always use 12 photos - No matter what - It's going to give you the biggest bump. Make up photos, whatever it takes, show the item next to a ruler, the box it ships, anything you can think of.

Great tip like you said even if pics are redundant have as many as possible.

2) If you have say 50 shirts to sell, always do GOOD TO CANCEL, this will maintain all your watchers and sold counts and this will also boost you in the search relevancy.

Actually I've heard differently. I heard having too many items makes you rank worse so you rank better having 10 items avail and just updating quantity when you get low vs having 50 that never ends. do 30 days and either relist at 30 or keep changing inventory so it doesnt come down. i find if you got good ranking even if your listing ends and get relisted you normally pop up to same spot. obviioiusly nobody knows all the iner workings of ebay search algorithm so we all just speculating a bit

3) Being a Top-Rated Seller helps boost search rankings.. Their are pro's and con's some cons are you have to include tracking numbers, so no sending out baseball cards using postage stamps. It's going to count against you, you have to maintain 90% of what you sell with tracking. So some items will cost a little more to sell but the benefit is great.

   a) Using fake tracking numbers to keep you in compliance will ultimately get you busted.

great point. many on here tend to not think its worth having to take returns. to each his own but i agree better ranking, plus you can charge a 20% stocking fee so your return compliant but also keeps you in the green and discourages returns. also on shipping i get express overnight packages for $12 when retail at post office is almost 20 so there are some big discounts.

4) Always use Fast and Free shipping (They get a bump also in rankings). So when you're selling multiple "Fast and Free is the way to go" along with Good To Cancel, with 12 photos.

agree you get an icon next to your listing which grabs attention. shows your fast and reliable. roll product costs into shipping vs charging same price but seperating shipping

5) Ending times on auction, It's different based on gender and merchandise categories.  Call eBay and ask for advice on when to end an auction for particular categories.

good idea. or subscribe to terapeak and you can get exact numbers on whats best time to start and end. i think ebay has an analyitics app in beta stage. not nearly as good as terapeak but probably better than nothing.

6) Theirs a new feature, not all accounts have it enable, its still in beta called, Relist your items up to 3 times automatically if it don't sell. Using this feature will re-list the items at no charge and no use of a free insertion.

i dont think this is necessarily a new feature. if you have a store you have those automated settings where you can relist either when it sells out, when listing ends or either or.

7) If you need additional keywords to trigger that don't fit in a title, create Item Specifics for those keywords.

Always use the Ebay Global Shipping program, all you have to do is mail the item to ebays shipping center which is a commercial address, I sell a lot of items through it.

9) 1 day handling and 14 day+ return policy, gets you better search results.

exactly. if your a top rated and power seller you can also add on a restocking feee so yes you offer returns but it kind of discourages them. also if you do take a return you still make 20% plus get to resell the item

10) Get yourself a label printer, if your doing first class postage on small packages, I use the QL-710W brother - Prints out a small label that can easily fit on small envelopes and packages.

how much do these cost? i was recently in the market for a new printer i wound up going with a laserjet but considered specifically a lable printer. ultimately i decided with a laserjet its cheap, toner is cheap, way more prints than a inkjet and i dont have to have 1 lable printer and 1 regular. label printer if you do quantity probbly cehaper in long run as its meant to print labels efficeient. lotsa black lines and barcodes take lots of ink or toner.

11) Get yourself two scales, I have 3, one for measuring lbs, one for ounces and one for grams (I use for selling precious metals online)

good idea. its terrible if you guess under and abuyer has to pay for shipping to get their package. even selecting an ounce or two toher which most people probably do to stay on the safe side you could be costing yourself big money in the longrun.

12) Get yourself a box sizer (reducing box sizes save on packing material and dimensional weight).

good idea

13) If you can manage 2 ebay accounts, do it, once for being a top rated seller and one for selling things that don't qualify for top rated seller. 

good idea. better search ranking also if you want to have one perfect account and another account to maybe sell more questionable items you may not get 100% feedback for. lets be realistic everyone wants something for nothing no matter how well you describe some things people will be unhappy. i recently had 20 silver coins i wanted to sell. pretty banged up i took pics and went out of my way to say look bid on this based on spot price, these are in pretty horrible condition but none the less are an ounce of silver. sure enough despite 12 pics and basically me saying they are in horrible condition bid accordingly i got a neg lol

10) Get yourself a label printer, if your doing first class postage on small packages, I use the QL-710W brother - Prints out a small label that can easily fit on small envelopes and packages.

how much do these cost? i was recently in the market for a new printer i wound up going with a laserjet but considered specifically a lable printer. ultimately i decided with a laserjet its cheap, toner is cheap, way more prints than a inkjet and i dont have to have 1 lable printer and 1 regular. label printer if you do quantity probbly cehaper in long run as its meant to print labels efficeient. lotsa black lines and barcodes take lots of ink or toner.

I paid around $75 for mine, the cool thing with the label printers are that they are thermal and require no ink, it's just heat. So all you need to do is buy thermal paper for the printer you get. I buy continuous feed paper from here: houselabels.com/brother-dk-2205-4

It's cost effective, lets say a label for USPS is about 6 inches, each 100 feet roll makes 200 labels and you pay like $4 a roll so it comes out to about .02 cents a label.

500 sheets of paper cost $10 bucks at wall mart so the cost is .02 each also

So you save money, you just peel and stick on the box for .02..

If you use a laser jet, you need the paper, the toner, tape to put it on the box, takes up more space, and it uses more energy.

I have both a laser jet and the label printer, so much more easier with the label printer.

500 sheets of paper cost $10 bucks at wall mart so the cost is .02 each also

Plus ink.

I too use 6x4 thermal labels with my label printer, no toner, no ink, just the labels. What's nice is that it prints and peels it for me. All I do is grab the label and apply it to the package and it's done.

Who buys paper?  I'm sitting on around 7000 sheets found in lockers!

However, I bought another color ink cartridge yesterday for 47 bucks.....

Great idea on the thermal printer....I keep thinking about it but it's one of those things you just keep putting off looking into so you never get around to it.  New goal for the next couple of weeks, I want to get one of those set up in the shipping area!

Any suggestions for brands?  And is it any harder to print postage through ebay than it is now?  Does it print out a receipt too?

Who buys paper?  I'm sitting on around 7000 sheets found in lockers!

However, I bought another color ink cartridge yesterday for 47 bucks.....

Great idea on the thermal printer....I keep thinking about it but it's one of those things you just keep putting off looking into so you never get around to it.  New goal for the next couple of weeks, I want to get one of those set up in the shipping area!

Any suggestions for brands?  And is it any harder to print postage through ebay than it is now?  Does it print out a receipt too?

Once you get one, you then think to yourself, how did you live without one so long. If you're looking for a brand, It depends what you want to do with it, Look at the compatible brands for ebay shipping, then fedex shipping, usps shipping, amazon shipping, etc and find one that's right for you based on how you ship and where you ship from.

I was that way, I used to use a 2 inch tape gun, then I switched to a 3 in gun and kicked myself for not doing it earlier.

When I used to ship from my pet food store, I was so against getting one of these machines..

mrboxonline.com/image_thumb.php?img=images/BETTERPACKEXTRALARGE.jpg&w=750&h=699.94246260069

My wife, just bought it $300 dollars and then I learned to love it, greatest little machine ever.  Especially when you're shipping 30 lb bags of food.

I no longer have the machine, sold my store,  don't really have the need for it with lockers anymore, but if I ran a locker business out of a big warehouse and shipped a ton of stuff, I would in a heartbeat buy one again.

Funny, My wife sells on ebay too, she's just had to mail out 2 small items where the label from ebay don't fit for the laserjset and goes to me, how do I hook the label printer up to my machine.

Good thing it's wifi