The competition in online retail is getting bigger and bigger. It’s no different on eBay. Therefore, to become and stay successful as an eBay seller, you should take a few things to heart when selling on the platform.
Below are the 24 best ebay selling tips to succeed on eBay. This list is based on my own experience as an eBay seller. If you have any other tips or suggestions, feel free to comment at the end of the article.
Table of Contents
Use a Powerful Title
Use a meaningful product title to promote your products. The title, together with the product image, is the figurehead, so it should attract attention and summarize the main product features. Drive SEO by including the most important keywords in the title that buyers use when searching for the item.
Use the Appropriate Category
eBay offers prospective buyers the possibility to search for items on a category-specific basis. In order for customers to find your article, you must of course assign it to the appropriate category.
Create Product Variants
If you offer variants of an item (e.g. T-shirt in different colors), you do not have to create a separate offer for each variant, but can set all variants in one fixed price offer. This saves you money, since you only have to pay for posting an offer.
Use High Quality Product Photos
Use several sharp and well-lit product photos that show the sales item from different perspectives. Blurry, out-of-focus photos are obviously a conversion killer, so possibly hire a professional. Depending on the product, you should include a scale in the photo to give the customer a sense of the dimensions.
Use Multiple Product Photos
On eBay you can post up to 12 photos per item with a maximum file size of 12 MB. You should also use this option, a single image is too little.
Add as many Product Features as possible
Fill your offer with as many product features as possible. These include, for example, color, style, size or material. The more accurate your information is, the more likely your item will be found by buyers in search results.
Create an Appealing and Detailed Product Description
More eBay selling tips: The product description is very important to convince the customer to buy from you. If a customer has already read the product description, this means that he has clicked on the product, the product title and the product image have thus already aroused interest. Now you have to provide the potential buyer with all the information in the product description that will convince him to buy.
Build trust by creating an orthographically accurate and honest product description. The description should be detailed, yet concise. Present in an overview (preferably via bullet points) all relevant technical details, how the product works, advantages/quality features and so on. Highlight important details in bold type. A FAQ list is recommended at the end to answer the most frequently asked questions.
Use Fixed Prices
On eBay, you can generally sell products in two ways: by fixed price or by auction. Even though in some cases “auction” may be the better bidding format, at least when selling commercially on eBay, selling by fixed price is preferable in most cases, if only because of the predictability through fixed prices.
Offer Price Suggestions
According to eBay, your chances of selling improve when you allow customers to suggest prices. Therefore, set that buyers may make price suggestions. You can set the amount above which price proposals are automatically accepted or rejected, so that proposals that are unprofitable for you are automatically filtered out.
Limit the Number of Units
In order to encourage customers to buy, it can be useful to artificially limit the number of products in order to simulate a shortage.
Commit to a Niche
Especially as a beginner it makes sense to focus on a few products of the same category at first in order to build up a brand in the long run and to establish it outside of eBay.
Sell only High Quality Products
The days when you can import cheap Chinese junk and hawk it on eBay for big bucks are over. Of course, you can and should continue to import goods from China, but always pay attention to the quality of the goods.
Statutory warranty claims apply to commercial sales. The customer can claim defects and you would then have to send a new product or refund the money. Poor quality merchandise also leads to bad reviews from buyers, which is why you should only sell high-quality products on eBay.
Get the required Certificates
It looks really bad for you if the products harm the buyer in any way (e.g. allergic reaction to ingredients of a cream, technical short circuit causes house fire etc.). Although these are extreme scenarios that normally do not occur, you should ALWAYS have tests performed by independent, verified institutes that confirm and certify the harmlessness of the goods – especially with electronic products or products that come into contact with the skin! Even if the Chinese dealer claims that the goods have already been tested and have the necessary certificates, in case of doubt you are always liable as the distributor and seller of the goods.
Offer good Customer Service
The customer is king, and this naturally also applies to online trading and eBay in particular. Always respond to customer questions in a quick, friendly and courteous manner. Good service increases the likelihood that buyers will remember you positively and leave you a good review.
Offer Free Shipping
From my own experience, customers are more likely to buy if you offer free shipping. Instead of offering a product for €17.99 plus €4 shipping, post the product for €21.99 with free shipping.
Keep your Delivery Times Low and Offer Tracking
Nowadays, customers are spoiled by fast delivery times. Clearly, you can’t compete with Amazon Prime’s delivery times. However, you should ensure delivery times of less than 5 days.
Always ship products using tracking numbers, otherwise you have no proof to eBay that the product was shipped. For smaller packages up to 1 kg I can recommend DHL Warenpost National. The price per package is only 2,95 € (plus VAT), a tracking number is available. From my own experience, the delivery with DHL Warenpost is even faster than with DHL Paket.
Offer Multi Discount
Offer discounts on multiple purchases to encourage customers to buy more than one item. According to eBay, this can increase sales by up to 10%.
Send Price Proposals to Interested Buyers
With the tool “Send price proposal to buyers” you can proactively send price proposals to interested buyers (i.e. to observers of your products) and convince them to buy after all.
Use Ads Standard
Activate “Ads Standard” to increase the visibility of your offers. According to eBay, Ad Standard items sell on average twice as often as items without Ad Standard. With this type of campaign, you don’t pay until an item is actually sold.
Note: You can use “Ad Standard” only if your service status is “Above average” or “Top rated” with enough account activity.
Make sure that your Profile gets good Ratings
Of course, it looks more confidence-inspiring if your eBay profile has been around for many years and has many good reviews. If you are a new eBay seller, it is important that the first reviews are positive, since otherwise customers may refrain from buying if there are negative reviews (for example, 2 reviews, both negative). In addition, eBay will suspend your account if too many customer complaints are received.
Accept “Delivery to Pickup Station”
In your eBay seller account you can activate the option “Delivery to pickup station”. By activating this option, you enable customers to have their orders delivered to Packstations and parcel stores. This will increase your sales.
Offer Realistic Prices
Whether a customer buys or not is largely determined by the price. If it’s too high, hardly anyone will buy; if it’s too low, you’ll miss out on sales. In order to set the “right” price for a product, you should inform yourself about the product beforehand. Look at the prices of similar products from competitors to get a clue.
Choose a suitable Store Name
Choose a store name that is easy to remember and reflects your niche or products. It’s best to use your company name.
Use Keywords (SEO)
Use appropriate keywords in the title and product description to increase your product’s visibility in search results and rank it on eBay.
If you have any other ideas or tips for selling on eBay, feel free to let me know. Comment on this article. I’ll add to the list of best tips for selling on eBay as I go along.
It makes sense to sell on multiple platforms: In the following article you will find the best tips for successful selling on eBay Kleinanzeigen (Classifieds).
A detailed guide to selling commercially on eBay Kleinanzeigen (Classifieds), you can find here.