Selling made easy: Creating the perfect eBay listing!

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With several design options now available, offered both within eBay and externally by design applications (such as 3Dsellers), it begs the question: What IS the perfect eBay listing design? As many sellers are aware, one of the fastest paths to more sales is to optimize your listings. An optimized listing makes it easy for buyers to find an item, as it entices them to view the item in its entirety before clicking “buy”.

Therefore, every eBay store owner needs to understand how to present its listings to buyers in a way that convinces them to make a purchase through them and not through a competitor.

The secret to a perfect eBay listing starts with putting yourself in the buyer’s shoes. Therefore, let’s first look at how buyers can find your store, then we will delve into what to do once they’re there.

The buyer experience can be compared to shopping for groceries. Imagine eBay is a grocery store. How do you make sure your product is displayed on the right aisle and shelf? Once a customer heads to the aisle where your product is located, what will make them look at your product instead of the dozens of other similar products? And, once they have your product in their hand, what’s going to entice them to buy it? Once you master this, you can then optimize your listings for more traffic and increase sales.

How to make sure buyers find your eBay listing

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The first step in optimizing your listing is to help buyers find the products you’re listing. The best way to do this is through structured data. Structured data is a standardized format for providing information about a listing and classifying it for content; for example, on an air conditioner listing it would be its features, the available fan settings, and temperature limits, the voltage, if it is smartphone compatible, and so on.

Structured data helps eBay put your product in the right “aisle” so a buyer can find it more easily. For example, when a buyer comes to eBay and shops for a tv, they can browse the category by factors such as screen size and brand, check out product reviews, and search for items that are brand new, nearly new, or pre-owned. Once they choose, they’ll be taken to the “aisle”—the browse page—with those products.

But, if you don’t tell eBay what your item is, it won’t know where to put it. A listing without product identification is the equivalent of an unlabelled brown box in a grocery store stockroom. If you haven’t used structured data to tell eBay where your items belongs a buyer shopping for that item might never see it!

eBay makes it easy to add this data. When you upload an item with a product identifier, eBay auto-populates a lot of specifics for you and makes item-specific recommendations that you can apply with one simple click.

Good photos + Great price = Guaranteed clicks

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Back in the eBay “grocery store,” you’ve gotten the buyer to your “aisle” and they’re looking at a wall of products, many of which look similar. How do you get them to click on your listing instead of the dozens or hundreds of others?

Put yourself in the buyer’s shoes. Take a look at the pages your items will show up on and think about what would make you want to click on something. Look at the sellers around you. Do their items look more enticing than yours? Image is the number one thing that makes a buyer click or not, and a poor photo can make a buyer question how professional the transaction will be. Make sure your photos look as professional as possible. Use a white background, don’t use the flash, take photos from multiple angles without props, fill the frame, take high-resolution photos and edit your photo to sharpen and enhance.

eBay offers some free pointers in regard to optimizing images for listings.

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Consider your price as well. Remember, online, buyers don't have to drive across town, they just have to check another listing to compare. So, use the pricing guidance tool in the Growth tab of the Seller Hub to see suggested prices and consider using Promotions Manager or strikethrough pricing to entice buyers with a deal.

Optimized titles also help. Longer titles (more than 75 characters) tend to receive more clicks, as do titles that include popular searched keywords related to that item. If you are unsure about which keywords to select, one great website to find popular keywords for eBay is WatchCount.com. A tip for what doesn’t work: titles with acronyms, ALL CAPS, punctuation or asterisks, or spammy commands like “wow” or “look.”

Sweeten the deal to make the sale

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Structured data got the buyer to your “aisle.” Professional photos and the right title and price enticed them to look at your item. Now the buyer is deciding whether or not to put your product in their cart. It’s time to close the deal.

First, make sure you are using structured fields to manage shipping price, returns, and handling times; it’s more difficult to manage references in multiple listings if your listings aren’t consistent and it’s important to make sure this info is accurate and up to date. As you will see in the screenshot below, our listing designer allows you to do this with a few simple clicks. Best of all, you can apply any setting to all your listings with one touch of a button. A tip from us here is to avoid any off-putting disclaimers (for example: I’m not responsible for any damage during shipping.) By highlighting that, you might lose the buyer.

 

Think about what you can offer to instill more confidence in your buyer, and assure them that this is the item they must have. Same-day handling is one feature that can build excitement and maintain good feelings in the buyer. Sixty-day returns can also entice buyers and increase their trust. Other ways to sweeten the deal for buyers include free shipping, eBay Guaranteed Delivery, and donating a portion of your sales to a good cause through eBay for Charity.

‍If your listing has beautiful photos and a great price, but you haven’t used product identifiers, buyers won’t make it to your listing. If you’ve used product identifiers and have great traffic, but your listing has issues, you won’t see sales.

The bottom line: all three of these tactics have to work together to create the perfect eBay listing.

#1. First Impressions are everything!

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The first section of your store should be focused on showcasing your brand. Therefore, think about it as your “hello” to your customer. Do you want to appear and professional and grab their attention? Of course, you do!

Think about it this way, what would be a customer’s impression of an order when they see how much attention a seller has put into their branding? Chances are, they will see your store as reputable and trustworthy. Therefore, think about a logo and perhaps a tagline which communicates the effort you keep to your customers satisfied.

In the design above, you see products clearly separated by categories which creates an organized environment and directs a buyers eye. You can see categories divided into relevant fields with current special offers visible to entice an immediate action. For a listing like this, a sleek, modern logo would be the cherry on top.

#2. Make your pitch

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As mentioned before, to have a great listing you need a high-quality image gallery. But what use are photos without a proper description? We believe a well-written, concise product description converts best. The above example executes this as it lays out a brief description of the product, what it can do, listing every feature clearly in a new line, and also offers some helpful tips for getting the best use out of the product.

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, as Da Vinci said. Therefore, using bullet points is a nice way to keep things short and simple.

• Buyers know what they want and writing a thesis of a description will simply cause them to lose interest.
• Tell them as much as possible using photos and graphics.
• Write original content.
• Place main highlights of your product at the top of the description to grasp immediate attention.

#3. Increase buyer confidence: eBay seller disclaimer examples

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The third section of your listing should tell your customers what happens the moment they lick the button to buy the product. Will there be any extra postage costs, how long will it take to arrive, what happens if the customer isn’t satisfied with the product or the product is faulty?

The best way to convey this is in the simplest way possible, ideally by using graphic icons. Why you may ask - because shoppers recognize icons they are interested in right away.

This enables them to process the information they need much faster. In the example above, the listing shows there is free shipping, a money back guarantee and free returns. This is usually enough information for a buyer to be satisfied with making a purchase. Keep it simple, as they say!

#4. Cross-selling will organically drive more sales

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The fourth section is the one you will likely be updating on a regular basis, yet is one which can double or even triple your sales! The reason for the regular update is to frequently update your cross-promotional offers and direct your buyers to listings that have the best conversion rate and/or profit margin. In the above example, the images are hyperlinked pointing to relevant listings within the sellers’ store.

This section is made up of images of some of the store’s available products. This is simple and easy to create, yet it proves to be very effective if the cross-promotional products are chosen well. We advise promoting products in the same category, something your buyers might want in a bundle. It could be products which complement the current item, such as an accessory, for example, if you sell sports shoes, you could add shoelaces, running shorts, water bottles, or socks.

With 3Dsellers Listing Designer, cross-selling has never been easier - try it out for yourself!

#5. Building your brand

The fifth section’s purpose is to give buyers information about your reputation and policy.

Some use tabs here to maximize the space given here since no customer wants to scroll through lines of boring policies this is a great way to keep things short and sweet. After all, they will unlikely read this information unless they have an issue post-sale.

This section is also great to highlight your store’s reputation. If you have had great eBay feedback, are a top rated seller or sold a high number of items, this is your chance to tell the world.

You could also add an ‘About Us’ section here to tell your customer the story of your business or why you do what you do.

#6. Kicking it off in style: the perfect eBay listing

The sixth and final section is the footer. Think of this as the customer’s last impression - so don’t shy away from dressing it up.

Finish it off with your logo and possibly a tagline, and equally importantly add your contact email address in the form of a “Contact Us” section. This is a fast and easy way for potential customer to contact you at the click of a button. Think of it as free constructive feedback.

Conclusion

When it comes to eBay listings - appearances are RARELY deceiving! So make sure your listings is up to the mark in terms of using great images, an optimized title, organized description, informative graphics and easy to understand policies.

You might not get it right the first or second time but soon enough your business will grow significantly if you list your items effectively! It’s a case of trial and error but we assure you the time spent will be worth it. This is arguably the most important area which determines your businesses success or failure. Consider breaking listings down into smaller sections in order to better understand your customer base and what they’re looking for.

While you’re at it, take advantage of our Powerful Listing Designer which takes away the hassle of building a listing from scratch.

Our Listing Designer will have you set up within a matter of minutes - all with a few simple clicks of a button. Don’t believe us, just look at this video:

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Follow this how-to video and take your eBay listings to the next level!

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Happy selling!

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