eBay Online Auction Guide

Neat "Receipt" Scanner

2008-09-15T23:13:00.004-04:00

Neat Reciept Scanner

ended - Friday, September 19, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $53.00

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a "like new" hand held scanner used for scanning small pieces of paper such as receipts and business cards. The item's picture shows quite a few accessories, so since it isn't mentioned, it's believed that this is complete and not missing any parts.

In the auction's title, the seller makes the biggest mistake in the entire auction. And just what is that horrible mistake? The misspelling of "receipt"!!!

Why do I make such a big deal about spelling errors, especially in the title?

I make a big deal because poor grammar and spelling is one of the biggest problems that I constantly see at eBay and across websites of all content. It's easier than ever to construct simple sentences and through the use of word processors and sites like Dictionary.com, spelling mistakes should be a thing of the past.

Does it really matter?

Yes it does if you, the seller, want to make money!

Spelling errors are the buyers best friends. When seller cannot spell the item correctly, the auction is not going to show up in that many searches. As a result there is much less traffic to the auction. Less traffic means fewer bids and a substantially lower final selling price assuming that it sells at all.

This auction in particular already has three bids and is up to $22.49 in the bidding process. With a few days left and no reserve price, obviously this is going to sell. For comparison, I saw this same exact item for sale with a similar amount of time left for its auction, and that bidding price was already up to $75. Then again, that other auction had a slightly better title with everything spelled correctly!

The smart sellers know about this mistake and will use it to their advantage. And how does the smart seller use this technique? By using the correct version and all other common misspellings of the word(s).

For most common items and famous names & titles, you can assume that most buyers know how to spell it correctly. That's a safe bet. You can also assume that no matter what, some people will never learn the correct way and will continue to spell it however they see fit. Some people go against grammar rules (such as the famous "i before e except after c" as in this auction), and others will try to spell items phonetically, assuming that they can even say it properly.

The strategy is fairly simple to cash in on those buyers. No matter what, you'll want to have the correct spelling of the item once in the title and again in the description. This will ensure that your auction will eventually show up in the search engine (increasing the auction's search engine ranking is a different strategy).

If you still have room in the title after using good key words, the most common misspelling of the item should be added. After that, use a creative way to add the other misspellings to the main body of text in the auction's description. Taking the few extra moments to use this strategy will help your auction get exposed to the maximum number of buyers possible.

Getting back to this auction, the title could also use more key words and search terms. If this item has one, the model number should go into the title. "Accounting," "personal," and even "finance" could be good search terms. There's a lot of valuable real estate in this title, and it's a shame to let it go to waste like that.

Remember, the default search engine setting has eBay only looking in the auction's title! You have to go into the advanced settings to have it also search in the description!

The auction's description isn't bad. I don't like the grammar or wording, but seeing the selling prices of other personal, hand held scanners, this one should sell for a high price fairly easily. The seller could improve his credibility and professionalism by spelling the item's title and other official information exactly as it is printed in the user manual. Again, if there is a model number, it also needs to go in this section.

Remember - You don't want the buyer to have any doubt as to what it is exactly that they're viewing in the auction. If they're not sure, chances are very good that they'll go look at another auction. Even if they send you a question they're still going to look around while waiting for your response. You did the work to get them to your auction, so why give them the chance to look elsewhere for basic information that should be clearly labeled?

The PayPal only paying option really isn't that big of a deal anymore since eBay is really pushing buyers and sellers to use it.

Finally, the picture could look a little bit better. It looks pretty informal with all of the pieces spread out on the bedspread like that. The spread makes for a great backdrop for items, though this could use a little adjusting with the overall layout.

Overall, I gave this auction a low score because of the seller's sloppy approach to selling this scanner. Misspelling the item in the title is a big deal, and as pointed out above, it's already costing this person money. The auction's description needs to be rewritten with more of an emphasis on the item for sale and its details. The picture could also be retaken, but that's more of a minor issue.

Miniature LONDON TOWER BRIDGE - Pencil Sharpener -Neat!

2008-09-02T11:17:00.003-04:00

Miniature LONDON TOWER BRIDGE - Pencil Sharpener -Neat!

Auction ended - Thursday, September 4, 2008

Auction grade: B+

Starting bid: $2.50

Final selling price: $3.25

Up for sale in this eBay auction is brand new desktop pencil sharpener modeled after London's famous Tower Bridge. This is part of the "Landmark Series," and the seller claims this comes with the original box.

Overall, this is a fairly well organized auction on eBay. The title focuses on several good search engine words and phrases, and that should definitely help bring in curious customers. The picture clearly shows the item for sale, and the seller even gave us the item's basic dimensions. It would have helped a little bit if the seller could have provided a little extra information about the "Landmark Series," such as other items in the collection or if there's a website with more information.

I'd be very surprised if this pencil sharpener sold for that much higher than the current bid of $2.50. Let's face it, unless this is an antique, made out of solid gold, or encrusted in precious jewels, these types of items usually have low selling prices. Does that mean that you shouldn't try to sell one yourself? Certainly not.

There are at least three good reasons for selling small, cheap items:
1) Each small sale will help increase your feedback rating and scores, even if you make a very small profit.
2) This is a great way to gain personal experience and try out different selling techniques. The fees are very low for selling cheap items, so there's little risk in trying a different way of constructing your auction.
3) Small items can be grouped together with other miscellaneous or, ideally, other similar items. Selling items in lots is a much better way of moving cheap merchandise and has a higher chance of earning a larger profit. It can even work out cheaper doing one auction instead of multiple auctions and paying all of the fees associated with them.

German / Soviet POW story

2008-07-28T13:13:00.006-04:00

WWII booklet/book! PRISONER OF WAR! STORY! NEAT!

Auction ended: Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a book about being a Soviet prisoner-of-war during World War 2. There's just one minor catch with this book - it's written entirely in German.

For starters, this auction's title is very childish and does very little to sell the product or even capture your imagination. "STORY!" and "NEAT!" is just plain dumb when talking about a person's ordeals through one of the world's largest and costliest conflicts. This technique is also insulting to those people who have an actual interest in this subject. "German", "Soviet", and "Russia" would have been much better words in the title.

The auction's description is also horrible. At no point does this seller even try to describe this book or make an attempt at selling it. According to this seller, this is "a REALLY NEAT WWII BOOK" about "A STORY ABOUT A PRISONER OF WAR!" that is "INTERESTING READING!!!" and "READY FOR YOUR COLLECTION!!!" (in there twice, so it must really be important).

This is complete crap when it comes to marketing the product. You can easily tell that this seller has not done any product research and, apart from looking at the barb wire on the cover, knows nothing about this book or the author. When it comes to selling a non-fiction book, it definitely helps to have at least a little bit of background information about the person who went through the experience and wrote the story.

Apart from the horrible title and description, the seller did a good job with the pictures and low starting bid.

So can this auction be salvaged and turned into a winner? I honestly don't know.

The main problem with this auction and item for sale deals with the book itself. This is a book written in German (no English translation as far as I know). That problem alone is going to vastly limit the target audience here in the U.S. There are many people interested in P.O.W. stories, but the language barrier is something very hard to overcome. This seller would probably be best off marketing this book to high school and college foreign language departments, though it's probably too advanced or difficult for most of those students.

If I were to pursue this auction, I would just include it in a lot of other German or World War 2 books and other small items. It's easy to find basic information about the seller and talk about that in the auction's description, but that alone won't make the sale. If you're not knowledgeable about this author or subject, it's not worth it to take the extra time to educate yourself. You could be marketing other items instead.

plush Oscar Mayer Wienermobile toy

2008-07-09T13:22:00.004-04:00

OSCAR MAYER WIENER MOBIL PLUSH NEAT COME AND SEE

Auction ended - Friday, July 11, 2008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a "gently used" plush Oscar Mayer "Weinermobile" toy.

For starters, the auction's title could definitely use some improving to help appear in more eBay searches. "WIENER MOBIL" is best off being one word and spelled correctly as "Wienermobile". There aren't that many items for sale related to this unique car, but it's still necessary to at least spell it correctly.

This seller is also unnecessarily wasting space by doing something like "COME AND SEE" in the title. Considering that this is a rather unique item for sale, a generic eye-catching phrase like that isn't really that useful. Now if this seller was selling something more generic such as clothes or a decoration, then a phrase like that could be more beneficial. In this case the seller could add more search engine relevant terms such as "toy", "car", "unique" or even "hot dog".

The auction's description is almost non-existent. The only new information that's not in the title is that this is a small toy and in great condition. Otherwise, what is written there is in one giant run-on sentence.

The description is the perfect spot to spend a few minutes and tell us potential buyers a little bit about this one-of-a-kind vehicle that has captured the imagination of many people throughout the last seventy years. A little bit of research can go a long way. Remember that you're not only educating the buyers and adding value to this item, but you're also adding more search engine key words and terms.

The description is also the place to use alternate spellings of this famous car. Not everybody searching for an item like this one knows how to spell it correctly, so in the description you might casually reference other spellings such as "Weinermobile" or "Wiener Mobile".

This seller's picture taking skills could use some enhancing. The carpeting is a good background, but the first picture is blurry and both pictures need to be zoomed. Too much of the background is showing in the pictures.

The last area of correction deals with all of the text relating to shipping, payment, terms of sale, and about the seller. To cut right to the point, the seller needs to learn to organize her thoughts and write clear sentences. The seller spends way too much time and energy trying to explain all the ways she can be helpful with shipping, but it gets confusing after a while. Rethink your thoughts and write a few sentences as clearly as possible. You can even use bullet points if necessary.

The last thing you want is for the potential buyer to reach this point of your auction and suddenly become sad or confused. This is when you want the buyer to be happy, pumped up, and ready to place a bid. If they see something that makes them think twice about committing to the sale, they're probably going to leave your auction. You did all that work to get them there, don't let them leave after making it all the way to the bottom of the auction!

"At this point in time I will only except PayPal, Money Orders and Cashiers Checks. I DO NOT except personal checks, so please don't ask!"

On a final note, it's "accept", not "except"!

D.R.G.M. tin railroad watch tower

2008-07-07T14:53:00.004-04:00

Antique Bing Tin Tinplate Railroad Watch Tower

Auction ended - Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Auction grade: C

Starting bid: $69.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an antique tin railroad watch tower.

The title for this auction looks pretty good. The seller seems to have hit most of the major key words and search terms based on the item's description. However, some really good key words are missing, but that will be addressed in just a bit.

The item's description is also pretty good. The seller seemed to do a reasonable job telling us some details about the item for sale. The description isn't exciting and doesn't really create that "must have" feeling, but basic details about the watch tower are there.

I would like to know how the seller can back up this claim: "Very unique hard to find piece." A statement like that implies that the seller did research into the product, but if that was true, then the seller would have mentioned more information about the history and approximate age of this vintage item. The seller would have also discovered more key words for the title.

So far the auction looks pretty good. However, this is the part where the auction takes a turn for the worse and the seller drops the ball on doing some research.

Basic Internet research shows that "D.R.G.M." stands for "Deutsches Reich Gebrauchsmuster", known in English as "German Reich Registered Design". This abbreviation was used on items manufactured in Germany between 1890 and 1945. The seller would have to do a bit more digging to find exact information about this particular item, but knowing the year range is a good start.

The other problem with this auction deals with the pictures. It's good that the seller took multiple pictures of this item. But if the pictures are blurry, from bad angles, and obscured by reflections from the flash, does it do any good to even use pictures? No, it will only waste your own time and money. The best approach is to invest in a small tripod and learn to take longer exposure pictures that don't use the flash. Natural daylight will provide an ample amount of light, and using a tripod will greatly help keep your camera steady and the pictures in focus. This seller may also want to make a designated picture taking area complete with a neutral backdrop. In addition to looking bad and unprofessional, having other items not for sale in the background will confuse some of the potential buyers.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction. Additional work on the seller's part will help increase the value of this railroad watch tower and bring in buyers searching for different terms. The extra bit of research is definitely worth it for items with high starting bid prices like this one.

Toy WW2 era cannon

2008-07-01T11:49:00.003-04:00

VINTAGE WW 11 ERA SMALL WOOD CANNON 8-1/2 IN LONG NR

Auction ended - Thursday, July 3, 2008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $1.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a wooden toy cannon. The seller claims that this toy is from the 1940's though nothing in the statement backs up this claim.

For starters, if you want to market something as being from the Second World War era, do not type it as "WW11". That is flat out wrong! "WW2" is fine along with "WWII", but do not substitute the I's with 1's. In addition to severely limiting yourself in the search engine, this is also insulting to the veterans who served in the war. If you're going to use that time period to help market your item, you could at least learn how to use a proper acronym.

In addition to correcting "WW 11", "IN LONG NR" could also safely be removed and substituted for words such as "toy" and "collectible". Don't waste space in the title when there are still search engine relevant terms not being used.

The auction's title has two main goals:
1) Get the auction into as many different searches as possible to maximize its visibility.
2) Be attractive enough to capture a buyer's curiosity enough for them to click on the link.

The auction's description is a complete pile of unorganized mess. The first sentence briefly tells us about the item for sale, though there really isn't any new information. It's just a repeat of what is already mentioned in the title. The only new thing is that we now know this is from an estate sale.

The rest of the description is the seller rambling on how he goes to auctions and estate sales for the purpose of reselling items. By doing so for apparently over thirty years he's accumulated a bunch of stuff, so now he's selling a bunch of it to make some room at his place.

Psychologically, this seller would have been better off not telling us his life story about buying items for dirt cheap and then reselling them to other people. By doing so the seller presents himself as one of those "shady salesmen" who just want to make a quick buck and move on to the next person. People are less inclined to buy from someone they see as a "middle man" versus a collector or a "regular" person selling some items from around the house.

In truth, there's nothing wrong with purchasing items for the sole purpose of reselling it. That's how many of the small retail stores operate throughout the country. Most people don't see any problems with this practice, and many of them support it without even realizing it.

Let's take a look at this seller's auction and how it shows off the "bad side" of reselling.
A) This seller types in all capital letters and cannot form complete sentences. This person also has problems using correct acronyms.
B) The picture sucks and the cannon looks like crap. It's really showing its age and needs to be refurbished.
C) This seller brags about buying items for wholesale, in auctions, and at estate sales.
D) This is a PowerSeller and many of his other auctions have this similar shoddy format.

So in other words, this person presents himself as only being out there to make a quick buck, likes to brag about how he can find deals, cannot type, and clearly doesn't take the time to take decent pictures or put together an even semi-professional auction. As a buyer, does that make you feel good about giving your hard-earned money to this person?

The best approach is for this seller to stop talking about the estate sales and other sources of cheap items. If that's your only way of acquiring items, then don't mention it at all. Focus instead on the actual item for sale first, and then our own policies after that.

Small collection of vintage video games

2008-06-24T14:51:00.005-04:00

Vintage Coleco Adam&Atari

Auction ended - Thursday, June 26, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $10.00

Final selling price: $57.78

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of vintage video games as well as catalogs, newsletters, and programming and hacking guides. These games and guides are for old Coleco, Adam and Atari gaming systems.

For starters, this auction's title really needs additional key words such as "games", "video games", "guide", "book", "newsletter", "collection", and even "lot". Any combination of those additional words should help bring in more potential buyers.

The actual item description for this auction needs to be rewritten with a bullet point format. It's good that the seller listed all of the games and literature in this auction (everything listed counts as additional search engine material). The big problem is that the text needs to be spaced out better to make it easier to read. In this case, a set of bullet points for each gaming system would be perfect.

Just to play it safe, the seller is better off mentioning that this auction does not come with any of the actual gaming consoles. Some people will mistaking believe that they're supposed to be included, and it'll just end up costing time and money in the long run. When selling items like this, you're best off being clear about everything up front.

The picture for this auction is nice and clear. I like how all of the game cartridges are laid out up front with all of the newsletters and books in the background. It's a very professional layout.

Apart from the title and description, the only other part of the auction that bothers me is that shipping cost. $14 seems way too high for a bunch of lightweight cartridges and some newsletters. The high shipping cost will deter some buyers from placing a bid, and it will limit the final selling price.

Set of "Dragon Marine" accessories

2008-06-11T11:14:00.004-04:00

Dragon Marine 1/6 lot #3

ended - Friday, June 13, 2008

Auction grade: F

Starting bid: $7.99

Final selling price: $7.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of apparent military gear or something similar to that. The seller calls this "Dragon Marine" lot #3.

The biggest problem with this auction is that the seller is not descriptive at all and doesn't even explain anything about "Dragon Marine". Was this a real military unit? Is this something from a past war such as World War 2? Is this a fictional / fantasy military such as GI Joe? What is "Dragon Marine"?

Depending on what this is will depend on the key words that need to be added to the auction's title. Right now, basic words such as "military", "weapons", and even "collectible" can go into the title, but more is still needed to attract even more potential buyers.

The auction's description is horrible. It's like this seller isn't even trying to sell this lot.

"you get all in picture....alot of neat stuff for diarama etc questions?"

Apart from misspelling "a lot" and "diorama", the seller completely failed in describing the item for sale and creating that "must have" desire that makes people want to place a bid. The seller makes the buyers figure out what's for sale and if they want to pursue it or not. It's hard to find an example of a lazier approach to selling on eBay.

So what can the seller do to improve the chances of this even selling on eBay?

The simplest approach is to describe "Dragon Marine" in the auction's description. If this was a real military unit, let us know a little bit about it. Copy some information from a website if needed. Remember that information in the auction's description is still searchable in the eBay search engine, but only if the user selects the "search title and description" box on the search results and advanced search pages. The search box on eBay's main page only searches through auction titles.

The auction's picture is clear, but the seller still needs to make a listing of the different pieces of military gear included in this lot. If the seller can look up basic information about "Dragon Marine", then the seller should also be able to research the weapons and other military gear for sale.

Remember, the less information that you include will lead to the fewer number of potential buyers that will find your auction. If the auction does sell, then it'll most likely be for the least amount of money you're willing to accept. The goal of any auction should be to attract the maximum number of buyers and increase the final selling price as high as possible.

1) Do your homework. Research the product and tell us about it in the description.

2) Let the buyers know exactly what is for sale.

3) Use as many relevant key words in the auction's title.

4) Keep the starting bid and shipping costs as low as possible to attract bidding.

Old valve seating tool

2008-06-04T12:19:00.007-04:00

Valve Seating Tool

ended - Friday, June 6, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $5.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an old valve seating tool for use in engines. Nothing more is stated in the auction.

The main problem with this auction is the distinct lack of information and text in the title and description. Seeing how the auction's title is repeated in the description, this auction has a grand total of only six unique words. Unless this is an old tool that still works in today's engines and is in demand, this seller is going to have a very hard time having potential buyers find this auction.

The auction's title is in desperate need of a few more key words. In this case, words such as "engine", "old", "vintage", and even "mechanic" would work well to help this auction appear in more search engine listings.

This is all that the seller stated in the auction's description:

"Real Neat Old Valve Seating Tool"

Looking at the different combinations of words in the text that most people would use to search for an item like this, I can use most of my fingers to count out the different combinations. Considering this is eBay with many similar items for sale, that's a very low number of search terms to draw in the buyers.

The target consumers for an item like this is going to be limited. It's already established that those looking specifically for a valve seating tool will find this auction, but what about those mechanics and collectors who would like something like this but search for it with different terms? What if they're just looking for older or just engine tools in general?

This is where adding a little bit of extra text in the description is key. By typing out basic information about this tool such as the type of engines it can be used with (diesel, gasoline, etc.), if it was made to be used with any car manufacturer in particular, or even the different types of valves (intake, exhaust, etc.) it can be used with will definitely increase the chances of other buyers finding this auction.

Sure, some of that stuff may seem like common knowledge for most people, but remember that even basic information like that is filled with relevant key words and search terms. Don't underestimate the potential of typing out even the most basic information about items like this one. You never know how the potential buyers are going to search for a tool like this, so you're best off trying to cover as many angles as possible but without taking a long time to make the auction. Time is money, so if this is believed to be a cheap item, don't spend all day thinking of different search terms.

If you're going to take the time, cost, and effort to make an auction, you may as well try to draw in as many bidders as possible. If it involves spending an extra ten to fifteen minutes doing some basic research and then typing a description, then do it. You're just wasting time and your own money if you're not going to try to draw in the extra buyers.

Despite the title and description, the rest of the auction looks pretty good. You can clearly see the engine tool in the picture, and the shipping cost and starting bids are fairly reasonable. I don't know if other people are experiencing this same problem, but this is a very tall auction template filled with a lot of empty space in the middle of it. I had to do quite a bit of scrolling before reaching the bottom of the page.

It's surprising that a PowerSeller is able to make sales with other auctions as basic as this one. Many of this seller's other auctions have very simple titles and descriptions, but quite a few of the pictures are really poor. This seller obviously has many good items to sell, but if he put in a little more effort with the text and pictures, imagine how much more money he could be making.

My last suggestion to this seller is to set up an official picture taking area. Take a light brown or blue cloth and create a neutral setting for each item for sale. Taking some pictures on the deck, others on the kitchen counter, and even others out in the garage is unprofessional. Unless an item is very large or heavy, try to take all of the pictures in one official area and keep things consistent.

1978 Kiss trading cards

2008-05-29T11:39:00.004-04:00

1978 KISS ROCK BAND UNOPENED PACK

ended - Saturday, May 31, 2008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $5.00

Final selling price: $5.50

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a set of unopened Kiss bubble gum trading cards from 1978.

Aside from not typing in all capital letters, the seller needs to find a way to add "trading cards" into the title. If there's enough room "bubble gum cards" would also work. No matter what, you always need to mention the actual item for sale in the title.

The actual description for this item is a lot worse than the title. One of my rules is to never mention yourself or your company before talking about the item for sale. It's fine to add it in the description to help the potential buyers decide to buy from you, but you never want to talk about yourself first. The buyer clicked on the item to learn more about it, not you!

So why does this description suck and need to be rewritten? Here are some items needing immediate adjusting:

1) Everything it typed in all capital letters (big no-no in the online world).

2) There's absolutely no spacing between sentences, making it hard to read what this person is trying to say.

3) The actual item information is very limited and the fourth and fifth sentences in that giant mess of text.

Here's all that the seller could say about this item for sale: "JUST PURCHASED A UNOPENED 1978 KISS ROCK BAND PACK.NEAT ITEM."

That's it. All of the other text deals with the seller taking about his company, shipping and payment information, and other items for sale. There's no information about this package of playing cards or even any basic information about Kiss.

The problem with being this basic and non-descriptive is that unless you're already a huge fan of the rock band, there's absolutely no desirability in this auction. Nothing in the text or picture wants to make you place a bid. It's a workout reading through the unorganized (and at times grammatically incorrect) text and it leaves you more depressed than anxious to buy the item for sale.

I know that this is a PowerSeller who apparently does quite a bit of business each month here on eBay. Almost all of this person's other auctions are listed in the same format, so obviously this person isn't going to be changing their ways anytime soon. After all, why go through the trouble of changing when you're already pulling in good business? The answer is in the form of a pair of questions: How much more money could you be making if customers weren't turned away by the fact that the auction is very basic and hard to read? Is it worth it taking the extra couple of minutes to present a much better looking auction that creates desirability and makes even more people want to buy from you?

If this were my auction, in the description I would first mention everything that I could about the actual trading cards in the first paragraph. After that would be a small paragraph either talking about the rock band or card collecting in general. If I had the extra time I would probably talk about both subjects and how the cards are an investment and appreciate in value. Finally, after creating that high level of desirability I would talk about my auction company. In this case, bullet points showing off the high levels of business and customer satisfaction rating would be excellent.

Remember, sell the product first and then yourself second. Most people don't shop by looking at eBay user names but by the title and picture of the items for sale. People are there to save money and acquire rare and hard-to-find items.

Had it not been for the clear picture of the unopened trading cards, I would have given this auction a failing score. Between the title not mentioning the actual item for sale and the horrible text in the description, this auction has a lot of areas for improvement.

Antique brooch jewelry

2008-05-27T11:01:00.004-04:00

ANTIQUE BROOCH VERY DIFFERENT

ended - Thursday, May 29, 2008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is some kind of antique piece of jewelry. Virtually nothing is known about this brooch as the seller didn't provide us with any useful information.

The auction's title is a start for the seller's lack of words or a description for this pin. Words like "jewelry", "pin", or even "fancy" have been omitted from the title. Instead, the seller chose a very simple title with only two main key words.

Here's all that the seller wrote for the description:

"ANTIQUE BROOCH VERY OLD AND IS VERY DIFFERENT THEN I HAVE EVER SEEN, REALLY NEAT BROOCH"

In addition to writing in all capital letters with a larger than average font and therefore insulting our (the buyers) intelligence, the seller failed to mention anything specific about this item for sale nor create any desirability for this piece of jewelry. The actual picture of this brooch also isn't that great as it's very hard to make out any details.

So with virtually no good information in the description and a bad picture of the item for sale, what could the seller have done to make this into an auction with a much greater chance of selling for a decent price?

First, the seller needs to learn how to take better pictures. When it comes to selling items online, it's critical to have at least one good picture that clearly shows off the details and/or any special features of the item for sale.

Second, the seller needs to learn how to do online research to find out basic information about the item for sale. This isn't rocket science and with only a few minutes of work it's fairly easy to find out even the most basic details about virtually anything. Doing so will help you think of different terms and key words to use in the title and auction's description. This may also help you think of a selling technique to help market the item, which brings us to our next point.

Third, this seller needs to create desirability for this antique piece of jewelry. Whether it means talking about how nice and stylish it'll look on a shirt or as pair of a decoration in your hair, you need to give the potential buyers reasons on why they should buy this product from you. Remember that eBay doesn't do any selling by itself. You're the one responsible for marketing and selling your items!

Fourth, and last, if you're unable to find out any specific information about an item for sale, make an educated guess. Let the buyers know that you're guessing, but tell them what you honestly think about the item for sale. NOTE - Be careful when using this technique and make sure you do research first. You can really make the buyers insulted if you're guessing is way off.

To me, it looks like the main decoration on this brooch is one of those thin and decorative, hand held Chinese fans. That kind of information would be good in the description and title.

It's a little surprising seeing a PowerSeller with this poor of an auction. Then again, many of the seller's previous auctions involve this poor layout and selling style. At least one auction earned the seller a piece of negative feedback because the seller wasn't clear in the auction. The title said one thing while the description said something else. To top it off, the seller's response to the negative feedback criticized the buyer for not paying attention in the auction.

The lesson to sellers is this: Pay attention to what you're doing!

Tour service brochure for Chicago's 1933 World's Fair

2008-05-20T11:49:00.005-04:00

THE GRAY LINE, A Century Of Progress,World's Fair

ended - Thursday, May 22, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $1.00

Final selling price: $3.25

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a bus tour guide for when Chicago hosted the "A Century of Progress" themed World's Fair.

This auction's title can easily be rewritten to include more key words and avoid having a subtitle. For low cost auctions like this one, it's actually not worth it to have the subtitle because that directly cuts right into your profit (assuming the auction even sells). Save the subtitles for higher priced auctions.

"Chicago", "World's Fair", "Gray Line", "bus tour", "vintage", and even "antique" should all be able to fit into a new title, along with possibly adding the years of the fair itself.

The auction's description leaves a lot of room for improvement.

"This is a very good Print in very good condition for The Grey Line bus tour's of The World;s Fair Chicago."

- "very good" - redundant when used twice in a row like that

- "Print" - "print"

- "Grey Line" - "Gray Line" (just like how it's printed on the brochure)

- "bus tour's" - should be "bus tours"

- "World;s" - "World's"

- "The World;s Fair Chicago" - could be rewritten such as "Chicago's 1933 World's Fair"

Apart from that poorly constructed sentence above, there isn't any other information about this item or Chicago's 1933-34 World's Fair. This is a golden opportunity to add a little bit of extra information to A) add in a few extra key words, and B) educate and get the customer more interested in the fair and this item from that period in time.

The auction's pictures also need to be improved. I like how the seller made an official backdrop for the pictures. That part looks very nice and shows that the seller is trying to be professional. The unprofessional parts are how the seller shot in a widescreen resolution (16:9 or 16:10 instead of the usual 4:3 that most people use) for a tall and narrow item. It's fine to shoot pictures that way for wide items, but not for something like this. The seller also should have rotated the camera onto its side to take vertical pictures of the brochure.

Personally, I also believe that the seller is displaying too many pictures of this brochure. Old flyers and brochures typically have low final selling prices, so every extra item added to this auction (subtitle, extra pictures, etc.) just lowers your final profit. In this case I would just use the two main fold-out pictures that show the brochure in general. It shows the buyers enough information without them being able to read everything in the brochure and not placing a bid.

Overall, this auction can be trimmed down and improved to slightly increase the chances of having it being sold on eBay. I used the term "slightly" because sold individually, most old and vintage brochures like this one typically sell for very low prices, if they sell at all. This has a reasonable starting bid and a very low shipping price, but there still isn't much of a market for items like this to be sold by themselves. If this was my auction and I had other old brochures similar to this, I would just group them together and sell them as a lot (after I scan them and keep a copy of it for myself, first ;) ).

On a side note:

"I am liquidating a estate and have allot of very neat things"

- "a estate" - "an estate"

- "allot" - "a lot"

used Red Wings away Federov jersey

2008-05-16T12:02:00.004-04:00

DETROIT RED WING JERSEY, VINTAGE FEDEROV # 91

ended - Sunday, May 18, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $14.95

Final selling price: $44.75

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a used road hockey jersey for Federov (# 91) of the Detroit Red Wings.

The title' for this auction doesn't look that bad. Apart from not having it in all capital letters, I would also add "road" and/or "away" in front of the word "jersey", and if there's still room available in the title, "hockey" is always a good word, too.

The auction's description needs to be rewritten so that it's easier to read and follow what the person is saying. The red lettering wouldn't have been my first choice for the color of the text, but I appreciate the seller using it for the spirit of the hockey team.

"I HAVE 2 OF THESE AND DECIDED TO SELL ONE."

I would have left out that piece of information. The seller already mentioned that this is in good condition. Not excellent, but just good. Now that we know that the seller is holding back one of these jerseys for himself, we also know that he's holding back the better of the two jerseys. Psychologically, as a buyer, I don't like the feeling of placing a bid on a used and most likely inferior item.

"WE HAVE A GREAT HOCKEY TEAM, BUT NOT MANY JOBS HERE. I WILL BE SELLING OTHER ITEMS ALSO."

Again, the seller is being too wordy about non-auction related material. This is the seller trying to use sympathy to sell this jersey. We all have our own problems and it's no secret that Detroit's economy has been going down the drain for the past many years. That's what happens when incredibly corrupt people are elected into the local and state public offices and nobody stands up to stop them from their evil ways. Detroit has been going downhill and seeing increasing crime and corruption ever since the 1960s. Again, this isn't exactly a new trend for the once great American city. I'm originally from that city and most of my relatives still live in the Detroit-metro area.

Getting back to the auction, this seller needs to stay on topic and focus on selling the jersey. It wouldn't hurt if the seller mentioned anything specifically wrong with the jersey (any dirt, tears, fading, etc.) and why it's only in "good" condition. The seller could have also listed a brief biography and some of Federov's stats from when he was with the Red Wings.

Even when selling on eBay, it's still necessary to get the buyer all pumped-up and eager to place a bid. I don't have that feeling when looking at this auction. The pictures are pretty good and it's nice seeing a classic Red Wing's jersey available for sale, but with the seller's bland attitude and text style there's no sense of urgency anywhere.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction and the price looks pretty good. With a few minor updates to the title and a general rewriting of the main body of text this should bring in some serious buyers.

vintage trinket / jewelry box

2008-05-13T12:52:00.005-04:00

vintage painted box

ended - Thursday, May 15, 2008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $1.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is some sort of vintage painted box. That's all that I can really say about it myself as the seller provided very little information about the actual item for sale.

The auction's title is virtually useless when it comes to search engine optimization. With the lack of key words and phrases, it's going to be blind luck that most people interested in this sort of item will actually find it from this seller. What good is taking the time, effort and money to create an auction if very little people are going to find it?

The auction's description is also very short and mysterious, providing the buyers with very little information about the item for sale. It's never a good sign when the seller types more information about their policies and other auctions than about the actual item for sale.

"6 1/2x31/2x2 inch box, Please look at my other auctions as I always have lots of neat stuff, I DO NOT ACCEPT PAYPAL"

For starters, the seller needs to space out the dimensions and make it easier to read. The version written above is garbled and cramped together, looking very sloppy and unprofessional.

We, the buyers, have no idea anything else dealing with this box. There's no indication of its age or origins, the material it's made out of, or even its overall condition. Nothing at all!

In the "Item Specifics" section, it's mentioned that this is a "trinket box". To me, that's an excellent key word that needs to be worked into the title and description. "Jewelry box" should also be used the same way in this auction.

Despite taking the time to take pretty good pictures of this painted box, the seller isn't even trying to sell it to potential buyers. The auction's description is a prime spot to write a small blurb about different ways the potential buyers can use and/or display this vintage box in their home. Don't just rely on pictures and a shoddy title & description to do that work for you. Take the time to at least try to make the advertisement more professional and enticing to potential buyers.

Looking at this seller's other items for sale, there's a definite pattern on the seller's lack of wording in both the title and description. True, this person has sold quite a bit of merchandise on eBay over the past year, but think of how much more could have been sold and for higher final selling prices. Obviously there's a demand for these older goods, but through proper internet marketing there is a great potential for even more sales.

One final note is that the seller is only turning away potential buyers by not accepting PayPal. That company may have some unfair policies and high fees at times, but you'll still come out ahead of the deal by offering customers as many ways of making payments as possible. This is especially true for those in today's fast paced world who would rather make an online payment and have their item shipped out that much faster.

Alpengeist roller coaster poster

2008-05-07T15:04:00.005-04:00

Alpengeist Roller Coaster Busch Gardens Poster 1997 NR!

ended - Friday, May 9, 2008

Auction grade: B+

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $5.50

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an attraction poster for the Busch Gardens Williamsburg (now called Busch Gardens Europe) inverted roller coaster --- Alpengeist.

The title for this auction looks pretty good. Between using the ride's name, what it is, and the theme park's name, the title should help bring in quite a few different searches. The only change I would have made would be to take out "1997 NR!" and add "Europe" right behind "Busch Gardens". Unfortunately, "Williamsburg" won't fit, but the park's current name should squeeze in there just fine.

The auction's description looks decent, too. I like how the seller mentioned the poster's overall dimensions and that there are a couple of wrinkles. It's also good how the seller noted that the frame is not included in the auction. It would have been nice if the seller could have gone into a little bit of detail about the ride itself and the theme park. Free tools such as Google and Wikipedia make doing basic research like that simple and easy, and the extra key words and phrases in the auction's description will help in the search engine results, too.

My only major complaint with this auction deals with the picture. A large reflection (most likely the camera's flash) is obscuring the top of the poster, and the poor angle makes it hard to read the text and make out some of the details. Always be careful when taking pictures of items behind glass and plastic as it's very easy to catch reflections and flashes in the pictures. In this case, the seller would have been better holding the camera steady and using a longer exposure or higher ISO shot instead of using the flash.

Overall, this is a pretty good auction. The attractive starting bid is sure to draw in bidders of amusement parks and roller coasters alike.

posable Shrek toy

2008-05-05T11:52:00.003-04:00

SHREK DOLL -- BRAND NEW!!

ended - Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Auction grade: C

Starting bid: $5.95

Final selling price: $5.95

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a fully posable Shrek action figure toy. The seller claims that this is brand new in the box.

For starters, the auction's title could use some extra work. The seller needs to add "toy", "plush", "NIB", "posable", and even "poseable". If the box was in perfect condition, then the word "mint" could also be added to the title.

It's interesting that it's written "poseable" on the box, yet technically that word is misspelled. The correct version is "posable". Dictionary.com confirms this information. It's also interesting that other types of posable Shrek action figures use the correct version of the spelling.

The auction's description isn't bad, but then again it's not outstanding and doesn't make me want to place a bid. The seller keeps calling it a doll despite recommending it for "action figure lovers" at the end of the description. The seller should have just stayed neutral and called it a toy or even a plush toy (only if it's soft). Dolls usually aren't fully posable like this one, and action figure collectors usually don't like it when people refer to their items as being "dolls". This is the same thing as when people refer to grocery store shopping carts as "buggies". It may not necessarily be wrong at times, but using an overgeneralization of a term just makes a person sound dumb.

It would have been helpful if the seller could have given us a rough measurement of the item's size. Is this one of those massive twelve inch tall figures, or is this one only half that size?

Sam Adams pint glasses

2008-05-01T11:09:00.003-04:00

SAM ADAMS 6 PINT GLASSES WHITE ALE NEW

ended - Saturday, May 3, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $15.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a set of six Samuel Adams White Ale pint glasses. The seller claims that they are brand new.

The title for this auction is pretty good. Apart from not using all capital letters, I would also find a way to sneak the word "beer" into the title. If need be, "glasses" can be shortened to "glass." The eBay search engine considers the two words to be the same. If the seller were to change it to "pint glass", he should also put an "x" in front of the "6" and make it "x6".

There's a toss-up on how to handle the auction's description for this particular auction. The problem is that the target audience for these glasses is a wide range of adults ranging from those still in college to those in retirement who want to build or add to their collection of beer memorabilia. If the seller wanted to specifically market the glasses to the partying college crowd, then the large font and color in the description is appropriate. However, if the seller wants this auction to be for everyone or mainly for those older than thirty, then this description needs a serious makeover with the font and actual text.

For the sake of argument, let's assume that it's better to market this to everyone instead of just the college crowd. Naturally, the wider target audience leads to a better chance of making the sale at the end of the auction. In that case the seller needs to cut the font size in half. The color is fine as it's easy to read and gives this beer-related auction a fun atmosphere.

"Get one of these awesome Samuel Adams White Ale Pint Glasses for your house, dorm or party or collection!"

The first problem in this sentence is that the seller is encouraging the buyer to get one of these fancy glasses. The problem is that even in the title this is being marketed as a set of six glasses. The seller needs to rephrase that line of text to reflect the actual set of glasses instead of just one of them.

The other problem in this sentence deals with the sellers usage of commas to separate different ideas for the glasses. It might read better if it was written "house, dorm, party, or even your beer or pint glass collection."

"Set of 6 Brand New Never Used Logo 16 OZ Beer Pint Glass."

Here the seller is resorting to capitalizing the first letter of each word for effect. Perhaps a better idea would be to capitalize all of the letters in the most important word or phrase, and then using bold or italic for the other important words. This will look a lot better and keep the advertisement looking more professional than the format that the seller used. Also, since the seller is talking about the set of six (not "6") glasses, the word "glass" at the end of the sentence should instead be "glasses."

"Product Type : towels"

That needs to be changed!

The picture of the pint glass looks pretty good. We can clearly see the logo and the fact that the glass looks nice and clean. It would have been nice if the seller provided a group shot of all six glasses together. For many of these auctions involving lots or collections, people like to see all of the items included in the picture(s). For an auction with starting bid and shipping costs that high, the price of adding a second picture into this auction is minuscule.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction if we assume that the seller is mainly targeting these pint glasses for the younger crowd. If the seller expects this auction to be for everyone, then some changes are going to be needed in the auction's description to make it look much more professional. The high shipping cost makes me want to believe that the seller is going to be extra careful with wrapping and shipping the glasses.

New Motorola V265 cell phone

2008-04-29T11:07:00.006-04:00

Motorola V265 (Verizon Wireless)

ended - Thursday, May 1, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $25.99

Final selling price: $25.99 (Buy It Now)

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a brand new Motorola V265 cellular phone for Verizon Wireless.

As expected, the title for this auction is surprisingly short and lacking a few key words & phrases. The seller needs to include words such as "cell phone", "new", and even "camera phone".

The auction's description looks very good. I like how the seller tells us a little about the phone in what appears to be his own words before giving us the technical information that most serious cell phone buyers need to know. The technical information neatly copied from CNET, which is fine since the seller made mention of using the CNET source in the auction's description.

To help aid the buyers, the seller should have made a listing of the different cables included with this phone. It's relatively safe to assume that the standard ones are included, but you know what they say about assuming.

The other problem with this auction deals with the starting bid and shipping costs. When you put the two together, unless you live in Ohio (sales tax reference, not an education joke) you're looking at paying around $36 total. While this is still cheaper than buying the phone in a retail store, many other online retailers are offering the same brand new phone for around this same price. In other words, people are most likely not going to make a bid since it's not an online bargain that eBay is so famous for having. People expect to find deals on eBay. Taking at least $5 off of the starting bid will help gain a lot of attention and potential bids.

The other problem is that this phone is over three years old. That integrated VGA camera with its mighty 640x480 resolution may have been fine back then, but that's nothing compared to what today's camera phones can do. The target audience for this cell phone is going to be limited.

The picture of the cell phone and cables is nothing to write home about. You can see the phone
, but it's a bad angle and you cannot make out the different cables hidden behind it. The seller would have been better off using an elevated shot of the phone and cables taken out of their bags and neatly laid out next to the phone. Pictures like the one above don't get people excited about the phone. Using personal pictures is better than only using stock images, but you still need to learn how to take better pictures.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction, but it still has a few areas for improvement.

Lot of original trilogy Star Wars action figures

2008-04-28T11:44:00.005-04:00

14 Original Kenner Star wars Figures

ended - Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $19.99

Final selling price: $19.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of sealed Star Wars characters from the original Star Wars trilogy. These figures were manufactured by Kenner at the height of Star Wars' main wave of popularity. My own research shows that they are all part of the Green Card version of the "Power of the Force" series.

The auction's title doesn't look bad, but I would still make some changes to have this auction appear in more search engine results pages. "Kenner" is good and "Star Wars" is always good, but I would add the word "Action" in front of "Figures" (more people will search for "action figures") and also find ways to add in other key words such as "vintage", "toy", "OT" (original trilogy), and even "lot".

The auction's description is going to need quite a bit of editing to make it easier to read and a little more professional. First of all, the large font needs to go. It may look cool if you've never listed an auction before, but it really shows the person's inexperience and inability to make good decisions. The red font is fine, but the size of the font needs to be cut in half. Unless it is one, don't make this auction look like a scam.

The next major area of correction in the description is something that I harp on for a lot of these auctions that I criticize --- spelling and grammar. This seller needs to learn how to make complete sentences and proofread what they type. Read it a few times and make sure it makes sense and sounds somewhat professional before publishing the auction.

"every ting" --- everything

"every ting you see in the 4 group lots plus as you can see" --- Yeah. It's actually one lot with three close-up pictures of some of the action figures. Not all of them in the main picture are also photographed in the other pictures.

"in the action display photo there are also an aditional Han Solo, and a Luke Skywalker in white Storm Trooper disguise" --- Perhaps it would read better if it was types something like: "As pictured, this set also includes a Luke Skywalker in a white Storm Trooper disguise and an additional Han Solo." With the seller writing it the other way around, it sounds like you're receiving both Han and Luke in their Storm Trooper disguises like they wear in Episode IV.

"all Items are new in there bubbles." --- The "A" should be capitalized instead of the "I", and also it's "their", not "there". Learn the difference!

"bene" --- been

"some one" --- someone

It's good that the seller mentioned in simple words how his uncle cut away the packaging for easier storage. That move severely devalued the action figures, but at least we know that the original packaging isn't complete.

In addition to correcting the entire text in the description, the seller should also make a bullet point listing of all of the characters and costumes in this collection. Why should somebody do that much extra work to earn the sale? Three reasons:

1) Some of the fans are looking for specific characters and that's how they search on eBay and Google (eBay listings are conveniently indexed by Google).

2) Most people want to know exactly which characters and variations are included in this auction.

3) The pictures are small and it's hard to see most of the details.

When selling items in lots, be prepared to take the extra steps to provide good, accurate pictures and descriptions. Many people have been scammed by items that were misrepresented or assumed to be in lots. Take the extra time to list the lot properly to protect yourself and aid the buyers. Don't make them guess or write you an e-mail to confirm whether or not something is included in the auction.

By making these changes and learning how to type sentences, this auction will attract more buyers. Whether or not it sells is still determined by the starting bid, shipping costs, and overall trend in the market. For an auction like this, it's also important to note that most of the serious buyers only want the action figures in their original, complete packaging. In this case the figures are still sealed and apparently brand new, but that's it.

Hubley die-cast Lockheed Electra

2008-04-24T12:39:00.005-04:00

Twin Engine Hubley Airplane

ended - Saturday, April 26, 2008

Auction grade: B

Starting bid: $25.00

Final selling price: $37.00

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a vintage die-cast toy airplane manufactured by Hubley Manufacturing Company. Specifically, this is a Lockheed Electra from sometime in the late 1930's. It's not stated, but this actual die-cast aircraft was most likely manufactured in the late 1940's after World War 2.

Starting out, the auction's title could use some adjusting for better eBay search engine optimization. Key words such as "Lockheed", "Electra", "vintage", "model", and even "die-cast" can be added. If needed, "Twin Engine" can be replaced with a better search word or phrase. Then again, since the seller already paid for use of the subtitle, those additional key words can also go down in that part of the title. Maximize your key words and phrases to make your auction appear in as many relevant search engine results as possible.

The auction's description isn't bad. I like how the seller goes into brief detail about this die-cast model airplane. I would like to have seen the seller give us the airplane's basic measurements from nose to tail and along the wingspan. It also would have been nice if the seller could have done some research and given us the general age of the metal toy. My basic research shows that it was probably manufactured sometime in the late 1940's, but that's just my educated guess.

The other correction I would make to the description is when the seller talks about the item's overall condition. While the aircraft looks pretty good in the pictures, it still shouldn't be considered "excellent". The seller even admits it when he mentions the paint chips.

"The plane does have a few small paint chips."

Looking at the pictures, I would presume that some of the paint chips are missing, most likely from the aging process. In the pictures it looks very good, but I wouldn't go so far as calling it excellent.

The pictures are great. The seller gets extra credit from taking the time to show use lots of different angles of the aircraft with the main landing gear raised and lowered. There's just no sense of scale in either the pictures or the auction's description. Judging by the relatively low shipping cost, I would guess that the aircraft isn't that large or heavy.

Overall, a few minor changes in the title and description should bring in more potential buyers. I'm a little bit mixed about the starting bid. If this aircraft really is rare and in excellent condition, the actual value of it would probably be three or four times the price of the starting bid. That's another reason why the seller needs to do a little more research and sell the idea of this being a very old and antique collectible item.

Conair personal groomer / trimmer

2008-04-23T14:20:00.004-04:00

CONAIR

ended - Friday, April 25, 2008

Auction grade: B-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an electronic personal groomer made by Conair.

The worst part of this auction deals with the auction's title. Just the manufacturer isn't going to cut it (pun intended) to draw in bidders searching for an item like this. Remember that by using the default search settings the buyers are only able to search through the different titles. You have to manually check a box that says you want to search through the titles and descriptions.

"Conair" itself is a good keyword. Anybody looking for that company's products while searching for just that name will find this auction. The problem is that it's harder for people looking for general grooming devices and other hand-held electronic devices to find this particular auction. Other good key words would be "electronic", "beard", "mustache", "trimmer", "electronic", and even "grooming device". Use those key words and phrases to your advantage and try to draw in more potential buyers.

The auction's description and pictures look great. I like how this seller listed all of the technical information and sales points in an easy to ready style and font. The only issue with that method is that it makes this seller look like a dealer. Whether or not that's true, the seller's other auctions (only about five total) have that similar look and feel to them. If this is a dealer, I would expect more than two feedback points for somebody who has been registered at eBay since August of last year.

The seller may want to make a note at the top of the auction and say for a fact if this is still new in the box. The item's condition says "new" and the stock photos are meaningless for showing us this exact item's condition. If it's still sealed in the original box, then that's another strong selling point and it needs to be made clear in the description.

The stock pictures look excellent and the low starting bid should definitely entice some bidders to place a bid on the item. I also like how the seller gives the buyers a couple of different shipping options. All of the prices are a little on the high side, but that's not much of a concern if somebody wins this auction for a really low prices. Professional trimmers like this usually cost around $40-70 in most stores.

Overall, this is a sharp and well created auction. My only main problem is with its title and lack of key words. With the title being the most important part of the auction here at eBay, it also weighs the most in my scoring system.

baseball card & autograph listing

2008-04-22T15:17:00.007-04:00

RYAN HOWARD CARD+FREE PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES AUTOGRAPHS?

ended - Thursday, April 24, 2008

Auction grade: F

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a 2008 Topps baseball card for Ryan Howard. Basic internet research tells us that he plays for the Philadelphia Phillies. Also included with this card, and the main selling point of this auction, is a listing of player's names and home addresses, implying that if you send them a card then they will autograph it and send it back to you.

To start the criticism, the auction's title could use a bit of work. The seller needs to decide on the main item for sale and focus on marketing that item exclusively. Seeing all of the text in the auction's description, I'd guess that the seller is really pushing for people to buy his listing of player's names and addresses. After all, it's virtually free for him to send out e-mails with that kind of information whereas baseball cards are physical items and need to be shipped.

If the seller were to focus on the actual autograph listings themselves, then key words such as "autograph", "sports", "baseball", "football," and even a few key players' names could be included. Put yourself into the shoes of a buyer and try to use different key words to try to find your auction. See which words are more common than others, and in those searches see how high your auction ranks in the various search listings.

The first time I read through the auction's description, the word "scam" came to my mind. Here's a person using a large font with all capital letters, lots of spacing, and horrible grammar trying to sell us the idea of writing to current and former players and asking for autographs. The concept is simple and from the sound of things anybody can do it and have success doing so. It sounds too good to be true.

Let's take a look at a few examples from this seller's sales pitch.

"YOU ARE LOOKING AT A 2008 TOPPS RYAN HOWARD CARD, IF GRADED I THINK WOULD GET A 8 OR BETTER" - Actually, no we're not. The picture shows other sports cards and this is the only point in the auction that the Ryan Howard card is even mentioned (besides in the title). It's not even clear if it has been autographed or not. What is known is that the card has not been authenticated by anybody, whether it has been signed or not.

"WANT FREE AUTOGRAPHS?,"

"THE WINNER OF THIS ITEM WILL GET A RAMS ADDRESS LIST" - St. Louis Rams? The title talks about the Phillies.

"IM SURE YOU TRIED YOUR LUCK PULLING AUTO'S FROM THOSE 5 AND 10 DOLLAR PACKS AND ENDING UP WITH A JOHN DOE OR NOTHING AT ALL,"

"THE AUTOGRAPHS YOU SEE AINT FOR SELL, JUST TO SHOW YOU WHAT YOU CAN GET THROUGH THE MAIL," - Ahh, yes. It's so easy, anybody can do it!

"THE 1ST WAS SIGNED BY 11 DIFF NFL HOFERS, 2 HAS PASSED AWAY MAKING THIS CARD EVEN MORE RARE,"

"I BEEN COLLECTING THROUGH THE MAIL FOR YEARS AND AND HAVE OBTAINED MORE THEN 2,000 AUTOGRAPHS AND HAD MANY NAMES PSA/DNA CERIFIED"

"WHEN WRITEING TO PLAYERS, BE SURE TO INCLUDE A SELF ADDRESSED STAMPED ENVELOP, MOST WONT BOTHER WITH YOUR REQUEST WITH OUT IT"

"USE THE BUY IT NOW AND ILL THROW IN ANOTHER LIST OF YOUR CHOOSE"

So there we go. Between the seller's horrible grammar, weird & non-standard abbreviations, inability to form complete sentences, "get rich quick" mentality, and "bait and switch" tactic with using items not for sale in the picture, this auction is in dire need of a makeover to get rid of that scam feeling. Right now it's hard to take this seller seriously.

It's obvious in this auction that the seller is really pushing for you to go along and buy several more of his autograph lists. It's almost pure profit for him to sell them since he claims that he just e-mails them right after he receives your hard-earned money. And with only twenty-one players on the listing, I'm sure the seller has many extra listings that he's eager to sell.

If this was my auction, I would concentrate on selling that Ryan Howard card first (including having a picture of the actual card and making it clear whether or not it has been autographed), and then sell people on the idea of writing to players and asking for autographs. If the seller would rather sell the concept of autograph collecting, then that should be the primary item in this auction instead of the card.

The seller has the right idea with that item combination idea, but the execution is bad. I can see where people might be confused and think that real autographed cards are included in this auction. Then again, some people will read only what they want to read (such as just the title in this auction) and place a bid without knowing everything.

In addition to fixing the picture and all of the text associated with this auction, the shipping fee is way too high for just a baseball card. At least one person made a note about paying the $3.50 fee for something that was just stuck in an envelope. If you're going to sell us the idea that mailing cards to and from former players is so cheap, you could at least extend the same courtesy to the buyers and not rip them off with those shipping charges. This is especially true if the seller e-mails the player address listing instead of sending out a printed copy.

I'm not going to even mention the flaws with buying this card and address listing, hoping to strike it rich with autographs. This blog is only dedicated to actual auctions and the seller's methodology. It's up to the buyers to figure out if this will really work or not.

For an extra laugh, check out the seller's comments in response to buyers' feedback messages. It's always tempting to give buyers sarcastic answers, but his method doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

NOTE TO SELLER --- If you're going to write a snappy answer, you may want to check your own spelling & grammar skills first to avoid confusion as to which one is the dumber person. You may have also noticed by now that it's harder to make certain words stand out for effect when everything is typed in capital letters! On a final note, there are keys on the keyboard called apostrophes. You may want to start using them at some point.

1 gb mp3 player

2008-04-21T13:33:00.004-04:00

Mp3 Multimedia Player 1GB Green

ended - Wednesday, April 23, 3008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $4.87

Final selling price: $5.50

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small, portable mp3 player. Not a whole lot of information is given about this particular mp3 player.

For starters, the title could use a little extra work. Key words such as "music" and "songs" would definitely help this show up in more search results. Also, if this is made by a known manufacturer, then that should also go into the title. If need be, the word "multimedia" can be removed as it's a less popular search term.

The auction's description is very short and doesn't tell us anything about the item for sale.

"Very nice mp3 player. Comes in a neat little case with the connecting cables, earphones etc."

Why go through the effort and cost of trying to sell something on eBay if you're not going to tell us about it?

The auction's description is your time to shine as a seller. This is your sales pitch. You've done the hard part and gotten somebody to click on the auction, and now it's your job to sell them on the item and finish the sale. Don't leave them hanging and wanting more information like this. This particular example shows a seller's lazy approach to trying to make a sale.

So what do you do if you don't know anything about the item for sale?

For starters, write down whatever is on the box. If the box mentions roughly how many songs will fit on the player, then make a note of it in the auction. Don't assume that your customers are totally up-to-date on the latest technology trends. If the box doesn't have any solid information, check out the manufacturer's website and look for information there. If that doesn't work then see what other online retailers are saying about the item.

For this mp3 player, we, the buyers, know practically nothing about it. The title says that it has a one gigabite hard drive and another part of the auction has it labeled as being new, but that's it. We don't know the manufacturer, which exact cables come with it, or even how long it lasts on average with a charged battery.

The stock photo doesn't exactly give us much information either.

What strikes me as being surprising is that this auction is being sold by an eBay PowerSeller. A person who should know about selling and how to market items properly has an auction this poorly constructed.

Overall, this auction gives me the impression of a seller trying to sell a cheap, knock-off mp3 player on an unsuspecting person. The bad stock picture, low starting bid, and lack of information all lead to that conclusion. If the seller is trying to sell an honest electronic device that performs and lasts just as long as the major competitor's models, then he needs to make a better effort at actually trying to sell the mp3 player.

Atlanta Braves sling bag

2008-04-17T13:43:00.004-04:00

NEW ATLANTA BRAVES BAG SLING BACKPACK SHOULDER CAP HAT

ended - Saturday, April 19, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $27.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a brand new Atlanta Braves baseball sling bag / shoulder bag.

Looking at the title, the seller has the right idea with using key words like that. This particular item is virtually guaranteed to show up in a variety of different searches that people may use. The only major problem (despite this being in all capital letters) is that the seller mentions "cap" and "hat". This auction is only for the shoulder bag and no hats are included. That's false advertising right there.

The auction's description looks pretty good. The pictures are clear and allow the buyers to see the details and features of this sling bag, while the different aspects of the auction are in their own easy to read sections. It's good how the seller listed the bag's basic dimensions. The only adjustments I would make here would be to proofread each section and fine tune the spacing and punctuation to make this look more professional.

This seller's feedback policy is one of the more common ones. Basically, this is an automated version that automatically sends the buyer positive feedback once the buyer leaves the seller positive feedback. This is fine since the amount of positive feedback weighs more than what people actually say in the feedback. Like other sellers, this one warns that if you leave them negative feedback without trying to resolve the problem first, then you'll also receive negative feedback. The sellers have the right to somewhat protect themselves against unreasonable and unkind buyers. Of course, it will no longer be possible for sellers to leave buyers neutral or negative feedback starting next month.

In my personal opinion, I believe this seller is too greedy in the starting bid and shipping costs. Something as compact like this that is being advertised as a "light weight" item shouldn't cost $9.95 for shipping. The high starting bid will discourage many people from placing a bid.

Overall, this is a pretty good auction that uses the right ideas and strategies. The main reason for such a low score is with the false advertising in the title. False hope is no way to get people to click on the auction.

Roll of old wheat pennies

2008-04-16T11:06:00.005-04:00

FOUND - OLD ROLL OF WHEATS FOUND IN BANK LOCK BOX!L@@K

ended - Friday, April 18, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $4.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an old roll of wheat pennies from the 1910's through the 1950's.

The title for this auction is horrible. People who use the default search settings are going to have a very hard time finding this particular auction of old coins. Instead of telling us where you found the coins, you need to instead be talking about the coins themselves. The title only gives you so much room to work with, and you need to fill it with as many relevant key words and phrases as possible.

For this auction, good key words in the title would be "coins", "pennies", "old", "wheat", "roll", "undiscovered" and even "vintage". Stick with words like that first before wasting the remainder of the available space with things like "L@@K".

The extremely large font used in the auction's description needs to be lowered. Using all capital letters is the equivalent to having a person shout at you in person. Using all caps with a font this large is like somebody standing in front of you and using a bullhorn to talk. It's very annoying and gives you the appearance of trying to scam a person. It's also insulting to the buyers.

The actual text in the auction looks pretty good. It's fine how the seller says how he found the coins, and it's also good that he mentioned some of the different decades for the pennies. However, previous customer feedback implies that not every roll of pennies that this guy sells will include coins from the decades that are listed.

"WE TRY TO PROVIDE ROLLS OF QUALITY TO ARE BUYERS."

This sentence says it all.

This stock picture of some of the pennies needs to be replaced with a real picture of the exact roll of pennies for sale in this auction. Buyers are going to be disappointed and will leave negative feedback if their coins don't look exactly like the ones in the picture (condition wise). I've seen it happen many times.

Finally, the last item of concern in this auction is the handling time and the fact that the seller only ships the items one day each week.

"HANDLING TIME WILL BE 4 BUSINESS DAYS. ALL
ORDERS WILL SHIP ON A THUR OF EVERY WEEK"

If you're trying to pass yourself off as a real eBay seller, you really need to find a way to ship your items two or even three days a week. Seeing how the postal service doesn't operate on Sundays, most people are going to have to wait at least an extra four days after the item is shipped before they'll receive it. I hate unnecessary delays in receiving my items as much as the next buyer. Do them a favor and make an effort to put the items in the mail faster.

Overall, this seller needs to make a few title and appearance adjustments if he wants to become a more professional and respected eBay seller.

Novelty Pepsi folding knife

2008-04-15T10:41:00.004-04:00

HERE A NEW PEPSI NOVELTY KNIFE

ended - Thursday, April 17, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small novelty folding knife with the Pepsi logo and slogan "The Choice of a New Generation".

The auction's title needs a lot of attention. Apart from being in all capital letters, this is also not nearly descriptive enough considering the age of this particular knife. A quick internet search for that slogan shows that it was first used by Pepsi back in 1984. Appropriate key words for the title would be "vintage", "classic", "1980s", and even "New Generation".

The seller has the right idea in the auction's description, just poor execution in its layout. I like how the seller described this knife and gave its dimensions, but the one giant sentence needs to be fixed. Adding in a few periods will make this auction a lot easier to read and understand.

"HANDEL" --- handle

The auction's picture isn't bad and you can clearly see the Pepsi logo and slogan on the knife. My only problem is that you can also see the seller's hand and all of the wrinkles to go with it. Next time place the knife on a table or towel and take the picture. Also, you may want to partially extend the blade so we can see it in the picture.

The final note to address in this auction is the extremely high shipping fee that the seller is charging. Those plastic novelty knives are very light weight and don't cost much to ship across the country. Seeing that the seller is based in Illinois and towards the center of the country, it should only cost a dollar or two to send it anywhere in the lower 48 states.

The main problem with this auction is that the seller is trying to force a profit for himself for a cheap item. Ripping off the buyers with extremely high shipping costs is not the way to do that. You'll only discourage them from clicking on the link to even view the item for sale.

When selling a cheap item like this on eBay, don't get discouraged if it doesn't sell for a high price. Most of those old novelty items still aren't worth much today unless you have something that is rare and in demand. Otherwise, expect to make almost nothing for a sale like this. This is still a good item to sell for two main reasons: 1) even a simple sale with no profit can increase your feedback score and possibly lead to more future sales, and 2) if you don't want to sell it individually, this could be offered along with another item or two as part of a package deal or freebie.

R2D2 statue / toy / model / robot

2008-04-14T10:51:00.005-04:00

R2D2

ended - Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Auction grade: F-

Starting bid: $6.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a model / toy / robot R2D2 from the famous Star Wars movies. I honestly have no idea for the purpose of this particular version of R2 as the seller doesn't say much about its features.

For starters, the auction's title doesn't give us any hints. By only saying "R2D2", the seller is cutting himself out of most searches for people interested in similar items. By not adding any key words or phrases about the item the seller is already setting himself up for failure. Any words or descriptions about this item or his role in the Star Wars movies would work well in the title.

The auction's description has "sketchy seller" written all over it. It's a bad sign that the first text you see in the description is the seller telling us about the shipping charges and how this is for serious bidders only and the fact that he has the right to retract any bids from new bidders or bidders with negative feedback.

After the text about seller telling us on what he wants in a buyer (funny, I thought it was supposed to be the other way around) the seller throws in a brief sentence about the actual item for sale.

"This R2D2 is approx. 7” to 8” tall and 3” to 4” inches across. He is battery operated and seems to be in good shape."

So here we have rough dimensions from seller more concerned about protecting himself than actually selling a product on eBay. Now we know that this is a battery operated toy and is apparently in good shape. It's too bad the picture shows the item covered in dirt and generally looking like something he found in the garbage.

After this continues a lot more text about the seller making excuses for himself and giving us buyers more rules and expectations.

"I describe my items to the best of my ability, but I am not an expert on any of the items I sell."

How hard is it to describe a toy? This seller has a hard enough problem giving us an exact measurement on the item's height and width. We also know that the seller is hiding something from us in this auction. The seller told us that this is battery operated, yet he didn't mention actually testing it and letting us know what this can do when it's powered. Despite that the seller claimed that this is in "good condition" despite looking like crap in the picture. A mechanical item like this being in "good condition" implies that it works correctly when you insert the batteries and turn it on.

So therefore: A) the seller tried it and couldn't get it to work (otherwise its features would have been mentioned), or B) the seller didn't try it and is implying that it works just so he can get the sale. Either way the seller is not being descriptive enough in the auction.

"I just find really cool stuff at great prices and sell them on EBay."

This backs up statement "B" from above. This is proof that the seller just wants to make a quick sale. This is also a case where you're giving the buyers too much information. Never use a statement like that in your description!

"All sales are final"

Buyer beware.

"Do to a few EBayer’s who think its funny to receive a great deal on merchandise then slam the seller for no reason we ask that you leave us feedback first."

Aside from the numerous grammar errors, this isn't the best approach to take when dealing with feedback. Again, this shows how this particular seller is more concerned about himself and making the quick sale and keeping a good feedback rating rather than giving the customer a positive experience. This excuse will be invalid once eBay starts their "seller cannot give buyers negative feedback" policy.

"We ship fast, pack well, and over communicate."

I guess "over communicate" does not include telling us more about the actual item for sale. So far in this description we've had many of the seller's policies shoved down our throats, but very little about the seller actually trying to sell us this item.

In addition to everything above, the seller is still trying to hide something else from us buyers. In a statement about shipping, the seller mentions that sometimes items still get damaged in transit because of the shipping company. It's a rare event but has happened a few times to him in the past ("2 OUT OF OVER 1100" to be exact). For a person who has shipped over a thousand items to online customers, why is it that this seller only has a positive feedback rating of twelve? The seller's information shows that he has been selling on eBay with this account since only December 7, 2007 (Pearl Harbor, coincidence?).

The seller's unnecessarily detailed information about protecting himself tells us that either A) this is a brand new seller who just copied another seller's information (and did a sloppy job at that, too), or B) this seller has been here before and been burned by a few things, but is basically starting over with a new account and trying to keep the past hidden. This practice does happen on all of the major online auction websites and stores.

So after reading little about the item and going through all of the seller's other statements, are you, the buyer, still willing to make a bid on this item? Probably not.

If the seller actually wants to make sales and keep customers happy, then he needs to change his attitude and approach to selling on eBay. Focus on selling the item first and then selling yourself as a seller second. Don't give buyers a list of demands and expectations even before they know about the product. You'll just turn them away and waste time and money in the process.

Las Vegas Four Queens glass decoration

2008-04-11T10:49:00.004-04:00

Neat Glass Laser Cube of 4 Queens Building in L.Vegas

ended - Sunday, April 13, 2008

Auction grade: B

Starting bid: $9.95

Final selling price: $9.95

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a neat little glass cube decoration of the Four Queens hotel & casino in the famous downtown section of Las Vegas.

The auction's title needs some adjusting to help draw in more potential bidders.

First of all, the seller needs to spell out "Four Queens" and "Las Vegas". Those keys words are just too important to leave abbreviated like they are in the title.

If this was my auction, I would take out the words "neat", "cube", "of", "building", and "in". The prepositions are just filler and can stay in the title if there's still room, but the others can go. Instead, focus on adding better key words such as "decoration" and "casino".

The auction's description isn't bad. I like how the seller mentioned the decoration being of the downtown Las Vegas hotel and casino, and I also like that he gave its rough dimensions. For the most part, the only other piece of information that I would like to know would be the age of this glass cube. Are these cubes still available for purchase, or where they discontinued years ago?

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction. The picture is good considering these items are hard to photograph. Changing the title should help bring in some bids, but if that doesn't work the seller may want to lower the starting bid by a dollar or two.

Retro Kellogg's snack plates

2008-04-09T11:27:00.004-04:00

NEW 2 VINTAGE KELLOGG RICE KRISPIES SNACK PLATES

ended - Friday, April 11, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $8.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a pair of retro-style Kellogg's Rice Krispies snack plates.

Despite being in all capital letters, the auction's title looks pretty good. All of the major key words are there and this auction should show up in quite a few different searches. The seller may want to change "KELLOGG" to "Kelloggs" (more people will search for it this way), and also find a way to sneak in the word "retro".

Technically this isn't a vintage set of plates (as the seller states in the description, they were released back in 2005), but rather vintage-style or retro.

The auction's description is adequate. The seller isn't very elaborate and only uses very simple sentences and sentence fragments, but the important notes are there. By not being elaborate and creative with the wording, the seller is missing out on potential key words and phrases that other people may use when searching for items. It would be helpful to know if the plates are plastic or ceramic.

The picture of the snack plates looks good. We can clearly see the retro design and it appears that the plates are in good condition.

The major problem with this auction is that the seller is being too greedy with the high starting bid and shipping costs. Google's product comparison shows us that online stores are selling the same retro plate (some even have it with bowl and mug combination packages) for similar or cheaper prices.

Remember that unless you have a rare or high in demand item, don't expect to make a fortune selling it on eBay or other online auction sites. Most people are there to bargain hunt, and if they can find the item for a cheaper price elsewhere, then that's where they'll go.

GI Joe aircraft carrier - USS Saratoga

2008-04-08T11:31:00.005-04:00

GI Joe USS Saratoga Air Craft Carrier Military MINT

ended - Thursday, April 10, 2008

Auction grade: B+

Starting bid: $25.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a vintage GI Joe USS Saratoga toy aircraft carrier from the 1980's.

The title isn't bad and the seller has the right idea of using relevant key words, but some changes still need to be made.

First, "Air Craft" needs to be together in one word. It's an "aircraft" carrier, and that's how most people are going to search for that item.

Second, this may be in excellent condition, but the seller shouldn't use that exclusive "mint" term for an item that has been used. It's not even mentioned if this comes with the original box.

The problem is that on eBay and other online stores, mint is used to describe the highest state of perfection with an item. Those are items that are still sealed in their original factory packages and haven't been touched or used by another person. This can still be used to describe items where it's absolutely necessary to remove the item from the box just to take a picture.

Since this auction is labeled as "used", the seller can use similar phrases such as "excellent", "perfect", and "like-mint", but not "mint" by itself. Save that term for unopened and unused items.

Again, throughout the auction's description the seller keeps mentioning that it's in mint condition. It may be in perfect working order and in excellent condition, but it's not mint. Sorry. Again, like in the title, the seller needs to refer to this as an "aircraft" carrier, not "air craft".

I like how the seller mentioned the manufacturer and the overall dimensions, but this description would look and read a lot easier if it wasn't a mass of sentence fragments. Use a little spacing and make this neater and easier to read.

"moving satellites" --- The seller is most likely referring to the various radar dishes and other antenna on top of the aircraft carrier. I doubt that this carrier has any orbiting objects out in space.

Overall, this auction looks pretty good, and a few minor changes will help bring in extra potential buyers and help with the overall accuracy.

Like every other boy back in the 80's, I used to play with GI Joe action figures, too. I had a few of the larger aircraft including the Cobra Night Raven , Tomahawk, Cobra Condor Z-25, and later the massive Mobile Command Center and Crusader Space Shuttle with Avenger Scout Craft (my personal favorite.) It was always hard to compete with that spoiled kid down the street with the USS Saratoga in his basement (forgot his name as it was 20 years ago and when we lived in a different state). My Mobile Command Center was pretty cool, but it wasn't added to my collection until later when we found it accidentally marked down too much in a store ($20 instead of the usual $80+). This makes me wonder how many of those toys and other 1980's action figure playsets are still sitting in various boxes in the attic at my parent's house.

Charleton Heston autographed photo

2008-04-07T11:55:00.004-04:00

Charlton Heston Signed 8x10 Autographed Signed COA Auth

ended - Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $149.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an autographed photo of the late Hollywood legend on and off the screen - Charlton Heston. The seller claims that this is a genuine autographed photo and comes with a certificate of authenticity.

The auction's title looks pretty good except that the seller said "signed" twice. One of those needs to be replaced with "photo" to help draw in more shoppers.

A more amusing note with this auction deals with its subtitle:

"Guaranteed authentic for life !!!!!!"

Unless they are destroyed or were originally signed with a pencil, autographs aren't known for fading or expiring. So therefore one would conclude that autographs that are declared to be authentic would automatically be authentic until it's no longer visible.

The auction's description needs to be rewritten so it looks more professional. Looking at the large font, all capital letters and misspellings, it's obvious that the seller quickly created this auction after hearing about the actor's death.

While I'm not going to criticize the seller for trying to profit on news about the actor (that's how many quick thinking sellers make a lot of money on eBay), I can and will criticize the auction for its poor look and layout.

The large font with all capital letters is annoying and an insult to fans of the actor and other sellers. It shows that this seller doesn't care about typing properly or taking the time to do things the right way.

"PLANET OF TEH APPES" --- Planet of the Apes

If you're going to mention some of his films, don't stop at just two films. Go for better search engine results and also mention other movies such as Ben-Hur, Midway, Earthquake, The Greatest Show on Earth, and even The Omega Man. Take the extra minute and do it right.

The other good parts of this auction deal with the actual photo and shipping charges. The picture clearly shows Charleston Heston and the autograph at the bottom of the picture. The free shipping is a nice add-on.

Personally, I believe this seller is being too greedy in the starting bid price. $149.99 seems too high considering: A) there are lots of other autographed photos and memorabilia now available, and B) apart from the autograph there's nothing special about this picture. Seeing the overly high starting bid and poor layout of the auction, this one almost needs that four letter "S" word as a warning. You know the word. SC_M.

Model railroad dummy engine

2008-04-03T13:52:00.004-04:00

N SCALE GP 38 DUMMY MINT NEW IN BOX SOUTHERN PACIFIC

ended - Saturday, April 5, 2008

Auction grade: B

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an N scale dummy train engine for use with model railroads. The seller claims that the engine is in mint condition and new in the box.

For model railroads, the N scale is the second smallest size of trains that people will build and have running around their home. The trains and scenery pieces are roughly 160th the size of their real life counterparts. This is ideal for people who have a limited amount of space but still want to enjoy this hobby, or those who want to build large and elaborate train sets without it completely taking over their home.

The auction's title needs some adjusting to help draw in more potential customers. Aside from not typing in all capital letters, the seller can also remove the "NEW IN BOX" part and just replace it with the common abbreviation NIB. Being in all caps with the rest of the title, "NEW IN BOX" isn't going to catch the person's eye, and most people won't search for that phrase when looking for more train parts. NIB or just "new" will work fine in its place.

In addition with that, the seller needs to find a way to add "train", "engine", and even "railroad" as key words in the auction's title. Remember that the default way of searching on eBay is just by looking at the titles, so you want to take advantage and have your listing exposed to as many relevant searches as possible. It doesn't cost you extra, and the more people that find your auction then the more likely you'll get a few bids.

The auction's description also needs to be rewritten. The bold print in all caps with unusual spacing needs to go. The seller did a good job listing information about the engine, but this looks very sloppy and unprofessional. Information about the engine itself should go in the first paragraph (or by using bullet points), and general information about model railroads should go into a second or even third paragraph, depending on your knowledge and experience on the subject matter.

Apart from fixing the title and description, the rest of the auction looks pretty good. The picture of the engine looks very good and I like how the seller added detailed information in the "item specifics" section of the auction.

eBay picture taking equipment

2008-04-02T12:42:00.004-04:00

TAKE GREAT PICTURES FOR eBay ~ PHOTO TAKING EQUIPMENT

ended - Friday, April 4, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $85.00

Final selling price: $88.95 (Buy It Now)

Up for sale in this eBay auction is some equipment to help take better, more professional pictures for online auctions. This includes a camera stand, two external lights, and an "item box".

The title that the seller is using is interesting, but it would still benefit from adding another key word or two. "pictures" and "photo" are fine, but the seller could still mention "digital camera" or just "camera" even though a camera is not included in this auction. A camera is required to use the equipment, so it's valid mentioning it in the title to help with the search engine results.

The item's description is neat, orderly, and easy to read, as you would expect from an eBay PowerSeller. Each item is described by itself, and the different colors give this auction flair. It's the seller's personal comments where I have my problems.

"Increase your sales, and your dollar amounts by taking better pictures - gair-on-teed!"

So if I write crappy titles, have horrible descriptions, and set unreasonable starting bids and shipping costs, I'll still increase my sales and dollar amounts by taking pictures with this equipment? If so, can I have that "gair-on-tee" in writing?

"Lighting is one of the main keys to success - background is the other. This unit provides professional results with minimal effort!"

Not exactly.

One of the real keys to success is to be able to find and capture the best angle(s). By the usage of forced perspective you can make items look larger than life and more exciting than just by using standard angles. Being able to properly present the item in the picture is more important than the lighting or background.

Check out more photography tips here.

"This unit will become a useful tool for all your auctions or online endeavors."

It probably is useful, but not if you are trying to sell items larger than 16x16x16 inches. Anything roughly larger than a pair of shoes (excluding the box) will need to be photographed some other way.

If such a tool is so powerful and critical for selling anything on eBay, I wonder how the seller managed to get a picture of the display model for this auction. When opened and spread apart, the entire display and additional lights and tripod is certainly a lot larger than 16x16x16 inches.

On a side note, the seller should mention that the camera in the picture is not included in this auction. Buyers can and will legally complain and demand a full refund if they don't receive a camera with the rest of the items. The same is true for the car in the picture.

Any time you include extra items in the picture and they are not included in the auction, you need to make it clear in the description that it's not included. It's considered fraud if you don't.

"Place your bid now before you forget, then set it on auto pilot until auction end - then check back to be sure you win t.he item."

A) Why place a bid and go through that process when the Buy It Now is only $4 more?

B) I'm sure other sellers would also like you to immediately place a bid before doing any external research.

C) Nice grammar.

Along with the seller's over-hyping of the photo equipment and the fact that not even a basic (a.k.a. cheap) digital camera is not included, I'll be very surprised if anybody places a bid for this auction. $85 + $14.95 is a lot of money considering you still need a camera and know how to take good pictures and write auction titles and descriptions that market and sell the item.

I gave this auction a low score because of not providing a disclaimer about the camera and car (very important) and for over-hyping the ability of this equipment. Just by using it you will not instantly become the next PowerSeller and make a fortune selling items on eBay. This is also overpriced considering its size limitations and lack of camera.

LOT of magic tricks

2008-04-01T10:55:00.005-04:00

Lot, Tricks restaurant magician's magic kit. Jim pace,

ended - Thursday, April 3, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $25.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of various books and magic tricks for those who like to entertain others, ideally in the restaurant environment.

First of all, the title definitely needs some adjusting. "Tricks" should go right after the word "magic" (catch people looking for either: "magic", "tricks", or "magic tricks"). Jim Pace might be better off left in the description and have more useful search words go into the title. "Illusions" could also go into the title, eliminating the need for the auction's subtitle.

Using a subtitle is a good way of catching somebody's attention and adding a few extra key words, but there isn't much use for it in this example. All of the key words could easily have been added to the auction's title, and with this being a relatively low cost auction, the money spent on the subtitle could have been saved or spent on another auction.

For the description, I like the seller's attempt to try to sell us the products. He gives us examples on how he used the products himself to entertain people and leave them guessing and wanting more of the action. I like that part. It adds value and desirability to the items for sale. However, there are still problems that need to be corrected in the auction's description.

The first issue deals with the general flow of the words. The entire text is one giant paragraph where he jumps from one topic to another. This would be much easier to read and follow if it was broken apart into separate paragraphs or even bullet points.

If this seller wants to appear to be more professional, it would help if he would correct the numerous spelling and grammar errors throughout the description. It's obvious that he typed everything all at once and didn't bother to do any proofreading.

"The restaurant workers handbook by Jim pace" --- "The Restaurant Worker's Handbook" by Jim Pace.

"Beat,em Cheat,em and leave them bleedin" --- "Beat'Em, Cheat'Em, Leave'Em Bleedin'"

"alot" --- a lot (allot is a verb)

"Needle through ballon" --- Needle Through Balloon

"Comedy square knot" --- Comedy Square Knot

"To buy all this great magic fortheprice l $78.75" --- Ummm, yeah.

Those are just some of the specific problems in the description. Other problems include numerous run-on sentences and generally disorganized thoughts.

It's interesting how the seller was able to list supposedly retail prices for the items in this lot. Reading his biography, it turns out that this seller used to own a small magic shop. Could it be that the "retail" prices were actually the higher than average prices he might have used in the store, therefore making it look like this is a great bargain?

I myself am a fan of magic and the world of illusions. I know that most of the equipment and props sold in stores is generally very expensive and overpriced, and the real way to save money is by shopping online. Also, because of the availability of information on the internet, it's possible to find out how to do many magic tricks for free, thus lowering the demand and value for actual books and DVDs on the subject manner.

Even if the seller were to redo the auction's title and description to bring in more potential buyers, I'll be surprised if anybody places a bid. The $9 shipping charge is on the upper limit of being reasonable, but the $25 starting bid is a bit high to entice buyers to click the bid button.

LOT of NASCAR items

2008-03-31T12:09:00.006-04:00

Toy Car Nascar Racing Lot of 3 Petty Cards Book(#6)

ended - Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $1.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of semi-vintage, assorted NASCAR memorabilia.

The auction's title looks a little bit weird because it doesn't make much sense reading it from left to right, but the seller did manage to hit the major key words. This auction should have enough exposure, but by rearranging the words more people will click on the link and take a look at what's for sale.

The auction's description is where the seller really dropped the ball. The text and flow of words is horrible, and the seller failed to describe the items for sale.

"Lot of Three Neat Nascar Racing Items"

This part isn't bad despite the seller capitalizing the first letter of each word. On a side note, all of the letters in NASCAR are supposed to be capitalized. After all, it is an acronym for "National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing".

"Included are one Nascar toy car
A set of Richard Petty Cards
and a Nascar Collectible Book"

If you're going to do the trouble and pay the money for listing an auction, don't you think you could have done a slightly better job with the description than this? Let's look at this one line at a time.

"Included are one Nascar toy car"

First of all, if you're going to make a listing, use a colon followed by bullet points to separate the items. Otherwise, you'll end up with a sloppy and unprofessional statement like this.

Aside from the grammar problems, the seller failed to mention anything about the "toy car". Many buyers and fans of racing would like to know that this is a recreation of Dale Earnhardt, Junior's #3 ACDelco Chevy Monte Carlo car that he used when he won the 1998 Busch Grand Nationals Series Championship. (It took me less than two minutes to find that information chock-full of excellent key words.)

"A set of Richard Petty Cards"

So are these playing cards you would use in games like poker and blackjack, or is this some type of a NASCAR collector card set featuring highlights of the driver? The picture doesn't show us anything useful about the cards.

"and a Nascar Collectible Book"

Looking closely at the enlarged picture, this is a March 1992 Speedway Limited Edition racing memorabilia pocket price guide. When most people describe a sporting book as being a collectible, that usually means that the book focuses on a player, team, or entire sport for a season and gives you all sorts of facts, pictures, and other pieces of information. What we have here is a guide telling you how much certain memorabilia is worth. Being an outdated pricing guide that is nowhere near correct with today's values and prices for certain items, the book itself isn't exactly a collector's item.

"Email me if you want names or details of each box."

Is this referring to this lot, or is there something else that the seller didn't mention?

How about just taking the few extra minutes and listing everything in the auction in the first place?

Luckily for us potential buyers, this seller provided a large enough picture for us to see enough details about the items (except for the Richard Petty cards). The problem (aside from the problems already addressed above) is that showing items in a picture does not equal actually writing about them in the auction. The eBay search engine cannot look at the picture to see if something that somebody is searching for is in your auction.

For example, if somebody had their heart set on finding that 1992 Speedway Limited Edition racing memorabilia guide, they're certainly not going to find it from this seller. I found one available from a different seller, and it's only $0.49 (auction ends in twelve hours).

This seller has a lifetime history of over 6,000 positive pieces of feedback. Many of this person's other non-NASCAR auctions look neat and professional, so, obviously, they know how to sell on eBay and they've been doing it for a while. The seller admits that they don't know anything about racing by saying "I am not sure about these cars or the drivers" in a previous auction for a couple of die cast NASCAR cars.

I cannot say this clear enough: By not doing simple research you are leaving money on the table!

Take the few extra minutes and do some quick Google and Wikipedia searches and see what you can find.

Impossipuzzle puzzle

2008-03-28T13:48:00.004-04:00

550 pc. IMPOSSIPIZZLE --BEANS

ended - Sunday, March 30, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $2.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a rather challenging type of jigsaw puzzle. This is known as an Impossipuzzle and is virtually guaranteed to keep puzzle fans busy for hours.

The auction's title is pretty weak and could benefit from another key word or two such as "puzzle", "game" or even "hard". The seller also needs to check their work and spell the item correctly.

The overall description isn't bad, but the flow of words and sentence fragments make it sound weird at times. For example:

"It is a fun but challenging puzzle to do" would probably sound better as "It is a challenging but fun puzzle to do."

"It is in good condition but used" should be something like "It was used but is still in very good condition."

"Winter is here, a nice way to spend your Long days." -- This is the wrong time of year to use this line. The seller has the right idea by giving the buyer a classic product usage scenario, but this is spring. As those waves of fresh warm air go rolling through the area it's time to get active and do things outdoors instead of staying cooped up in the house. This would be better suggested as a different type of birthday or "good grades in school" type gift.

The auction's picture looks pretty good and certainly gives the buyer a taste of what they're in for with a puzzle like this. The complicated and repetitive pattern is going to drive many people crazy as they search for the connecting pieces.

The last thing to touch on is the shipping price. I personally believe that $7.99 is a bit steep and that the seller is better off using a higher starting bid rather than guaranteeing money for themselves by hitting the buyers with high shipping costs. Most puzzles are very light weight and should only cost a couple of bucks to have it shipped economically across the country.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction, but a few changes with the title and description will definitely help with its exposure to more potential buyers.

Computer game bundle

2008-03-27T13:44:00.005-04:00

Wheel of Fortune & Rollercoaster Tycoon PC Game *NEW*

ended - Saturday, March 29, 2008

Auction grade: D+

Starting bid: $0.01

Final selling price: $0.01

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a computer game double pack with Wheel of Fortune and the ever-popular RollerCoaster Tycoon 2. This is brand new and still in the factory sealed case.

The title for this auction looks very good. The one small modification to make is adding the number 2 to the "Rollercoaster Tycoon" computer game in the title. That is a series of amusement park creation games, so as you can probably imagine, it's very important to mention which one it is of the series.

The auction's description is where the seller loses a lot of credibility. It's nice knowing that Wheel of Fortune is a fun game, but you don't need to mention it twice and in that manner. The overall flow of text just doesn't seem quite right. Here's what the seller says about Wheel of Fortune:

"The original game, Wheel of Fortune: A fun Game, is a humorous time consuming game featuring the beautiful but friendly Vanna White .

Vanna must spin the wheel to bring your fortune to grandeur, if successful, it could bring you lots of money.

Play it and have loads of FUN!!!"

This makes me wonder if the seller has even played this version of the game versus just rewriting what might be written on the back of the package or what others may have said at a place like Amazon. There's nothing wrong with typing the official description as long as you cite the box as the source and put the words in quotation marks. The marketing company is using that text to sell their product, and you can do the same thing, too.

The next part of the description is where the seller loses even more credibility and respect.

"Rollercoaster Tycoon is the secound game on this CD package."

A) It's spelled RollerCoaster Tycoon (not that it really matters).

B) This is the second game in the series. The giant #2 on the package does have a meaning.

C) "second" is misspelled.

So what does that tell us about the seller?

This is a person who does not pay attention to detail and doesn't even bother to check their work.

The next part of the description is a flat-out lie.

"Ride game as you would at Six Flags Theme Park!!"

Yes, this version of the game does incorporate some of the Six Flags amusement parks and roller coasters, but you are not able to "ride" them in the game. The ability to ride your coasters in the first person point-of-view was not added until the third version of the RollerCoaster Tycoon series.

What bothers me the most is that this is an auction by an eBay PowerSeller who specializes in computer software and electronic accessories. The auctions all have the same feeling to them, though many that I checked weren't nearly as bad as this one. The seller needs to go back and redo this auction. This time putting a little effort into it.

The complete lack of attention to detail and proper product research led to the low score.

Hardcover children books

2008-03-26T11:26:00.006-04:00

Lot of 5 Hard Cover Childrens Books.

ended - Friday, March 28, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of five hardcover books for children. Seeing the titles, it looks like these are for early children or those looking to help their kids start reading.

The title isn't bad, but it'll need a few changes to help draw in more potential buyers. First, I would combine "hard cover" into one word (hardcover) and also remove the "s" off of "childrens". A lot more people will search for "children" rather than "childrens". eBay does not consider the two words as being the same, so you'll have different search results depending on which version you use.

The seller will also benefit from having the following key words in their title: "early", "young", and "kids". "Books" is the most important key word, and any other relevant terms describing the target age would be helpful.

The auction's description is where the seller gets sloppy and inconsistent with their work. Four of the five listed titles are either misspelled or missing a word. Surprisingly, it looks like all of the author's names are spelled correctly.

"The Wind in the Willow" should be "The Wind in the Willows"

"Danny the Dinosaur" should be "Danny and the Dinosaur"

"Songs of Shiprock" should be "Songs of Shiprock Fair"

"The Horroble Book" should be "Horrorble Book"

Check your work before you post an auction!!!

Despite the stupid mistakes with the titles, I like how the seller listed the books and their respective authors. I also like how one of the books has a short little description. That's also where the seller is inconsistent with this auction. If you're going to tell us about one of the books, then why not also write a sentence telling us about each of the other books? Remember that you don't want to have your customers go somewhere else to research a title and see what the book is about.

The picture is pretty good and all of the books are visible in the image. It's just too bad that the camera's flash is reflecting off of the bottom book. That can be corrected through proper camera techniques.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction. The main reason for the low score is from the seller being sloppy and not checking their work. The picture is pretty good and the low starting bid should entice some people to place a bid. The $4.50 shipping cost is a fairly reasonable price for five hardcover children books.

The only serious issue is whether or not to sell books like this on eBay. Unless you have rare out of print, first edition, or autographed titles, it's hard to make money by selling used books on eBay. The best approach for selling common titles is to sell them by the lot in either random collections (like this one), or by a common author/genre/theme.

Old baby doll carriage

2008-03-25T12:36:00.006-04:00

Old Metal Baby Doll Carage

ended - Thursday, March 27, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $9.99

Final selling price: $9.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an old, metal baby doll carriage / stroller. There's no indication of the age or general condition of the stroller.

The auction's title needs a lot of work. First of all, the seller needs to know how to spell "carriage" correctly. In addition to that, the following key words would be most beneficial for search engine results: "stroller", "child", "vintage", "antique", and a word I hate to use because of its general overuse in other applications, "buggy".

The current title is bland and looks unappealing, and the lack of key words will prevent it from showing up in most default searches.

The auction's description doesn't add much to the desirability either.

"Old metal doll stroller. The wheeles are wooden. I don't know much about this item."

So as a potential buyer, right now we don't know anything about the stroller's age, general condition (it looks really shoddy in the pictures), manufacturer, or even if a particular type of doll was made for a stroller of that size. If the seller's mother-in-law is somewhat of an antique dealer, she should have been able to provide some kind of information about the stroller. At least we know that the wheels are wooden.

I like how the seller used a ruler to give the buyers a sense of scale in the pictures, though the main picture doesn't load correctly for me. Also, the ruler doesn't line up anywhere near the end of the stroller in the second picture. I would have been nice if the seller at least gave us the stroller's basic dimensions (LxWxH).

Overall, I'll be very surprised if this item sells on eBay. The main problems with this auction are with the poor title and lack of information regarding the stroller. By not having any information and charging at least $18.94 ($9.99 starting bid + $8.95 shipping), it's going to be hard to make the sale.

20 toy military aircraft

2008-03-24T12:41:00.006-04:00

Die Cast U.S.A. Toy Fighter Planes New 20

ended - Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Auction grade: C

Starting bid: $14.99

Final selling price: $14.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of twenty toy military aircraft. These are die-cast metal and look to be about 1/64th of their original size. I know that because I used to collect those exact toys a long time ago. I'm an aviation & military history dork :)

The title looks pretty good, but the seller will benefit by finding ways to add words and phrases such as "military", "bomber", "metal", "American", and even something like "LOT of 20".

The auction's description definitely needs some work. Here's exactly what it says:

"Up for your bids is this Really Neat set of 20 Fighter Planes. These are New, Never been played with. Just taken out of box to take picture. No broken parts. Absolutely a Must Have for the Military collector."

The first problem is the almost random capitalization of certain words. It makes no sense and I can only assume that the seller doesn't know how to write correctly. The same is true for the sentence fragments in the description.

My next problem is the way that the seller uses the generic "fighter planes" description for all of the aircraft in the collection. That is certainly not true. I know that the description on the box says "20 PC FAMOUS FIGHTER SET" and most people don't know or care that it technically isn't correct. This is just a seller trying to pass on some merchandise to the next person.

The description is another excellent place to use more key words talking about the different aircraft in the collection. Comments about the military would be useful as well as aviation in general. I'm willing to bet that there are some people that would enjoy setting up a display case with such aircraft, but they're going to have a hard time finding this auction.

The last problem that I noticed in the auction's description is when the seller mentions "No broken parts." That's a lie. Looking at the UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter on the right side of the picture, the rotors blades are bent and broken. Those blades are plastic and it's very easy to bend and brake them with improper packaging. The winning bidder is going to be very sad when they examine that chopper and see the damage. This picture is evidence that it's already broken while still in the seller's possession, yet nothing is mentioned.

Just for fun, here's a listing of all of the aircraft in the picture: F-15, F-18, F-4, F-16, F-111, B-1, F-117, A-6, E-2, A-4, AV-8B, F-14, UH-60, A-10, B-52, SR-71, X-29, F-22, A-26 (not positive about that one), and a C-5. Five of them don't even carry any offensive weapons, and four others are bombers. That leaves the rest of them as fighter and attack aircraft.

That's just me being technical. From a selling point-of-view, if you don't know anything about military aircraft, then you would have a very hard time trying to identify the different aircraft in the collection. For this being a small collection of toys, that really isn't necessary. It would be better to leave that blank rather than guessing and incorrectly identifying some of the airplanes.

A final note is that there isn't any mention of the shipping costs. The seller only says that the shipping amount is the total weight and distance to your zip code.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction for toy aircraft. I know that I'm overly picky about certain aspects of auctions and items. The title isn't bad and the picture is pretty good. I like the way the seller neatly spaced out the different aircraft and all of them are visible in the picture.

I do believe that the seller is turning away business by not accepting online payments through PayPal or even Google Checkout. By making people mail you their payment and waiting days (even over a week at times) before the item is even mailed out will discourage people from making a bid.

Camping knives collection

2008-03-21T11:02:00.005-04:00

*Collection of CAMPING KNIVES *SWISS ARMY TYPE & MORE!

ended - Sunday, March 23, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $9.90

Final selling price: $18.12

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a small collection of apparently used (explained below) small folding knives used for camping and hiking. This must be an extremely rare collection since the subtitle on the search results page says "Over 5000 years old! *All Authentic *NOT COPIES! Real!!"

Starting out, the auction's title actually isn't that bad. I would have thrown in the word "hiking" and downgraded some of the capitalization, but the title has a few good key words. Apart from the picture, the rest of the auction goes downhill fast.

As it is shown above, the auction's subtitle is a riot. I didn't know that we had the technology 5,000 years ago to make such tools. It's also good to know that these knives aren't copies and are very much real. The "All Authentic" part isn't exactly truthful as the folding knife with all of the add-on features is a Swiss Army-type knife and not a real one.

Rest assured, the seller does point out the look-alike Swiss Army knife by saying: "PLEASE NOTE: THE LARGE SWISS ARMY STYLE KNIFE, IS NOT A SWISS ARMY KNIFE. BUT IT IS ALMOST LIKE ONE. AMAZING QUALITY LIKE A SWISS ARMY KNIFE. *IT'S NOT CHEAP." This invalidates the "All Authentic" part of the subtitle.

Starting at the top of the description you will find phrases like "INSANE LOW PRICES!", "COLLECTION", and the ever popular, "Super Cool." Is this a cheap discount store or a professional eBay PowerSeller?

The seller then goes on to list the knives in the auction using her own random pattern and terminology. It would have been nice if the knives were listed in order as they are in the picture. Buyers like to know exactly what they're receiving, and it cases like this you need to point out each one exactly. The "UNIPRICE SKINNING KNIFE" and "*INSTA-OPEN KNIVES" were new terms to me and to Google.

"YOU FIVE KNIVES TOTAL." - A) Can you say that in English? B) By my count there are six knives in the picture and the description.

"PAYPAL, MONEY ORDERS, OR CHECKS IS ACCEPTED AS PAYMENT!" - It's good that they are accepted as payment.

"Recieved" - received

"inconvience" - inconvenience

"The shipping discount is 1 dollar off per action. If you don't agree with the shipping policy. Please refrain from bidding." - Ok, but do you discount for shipping multiple auctions? Also, the last two sentences would probably be much better if they were put together as one sentence.

"I sell used items, and problems can always be exspected." - So therefore these knives are most likely used. That kind of information needs to be made clearer for the customers. More importantly, if problems can always be expected, then why should anyone do business with you?

"I promiss good customer service." - Such a promise shouldn't be needed from a PowerSeller. At eBay, your feedback lets people know how well you handle such things like that.

"COMBINE SHIPPING DISCOUNT" - Combined shipping discount

"Hi everybody, My Name is Jan." - Howdy, Jan! It's nice to meet you!

"I list everything for only .99 cents." - Ummm, that's not true for this auction. If so, then the buyer needs a discount of $8.91. Spot checking a few of her sold items, some were listed with starting bids of $9.90, while others were only $0.69. That tells me that this seller cannot hit keys correctly on the numeric keypad nor does she even bother to check her work.

"No reserved. So everybody will have a fair chance to bid." - I like this strategy (honest!) as I'm not a fan of participating in reserve auctions myself. This would look better without the sentence fragments.

The shipping & handling price for these knives is too high. You'll just scare away potential customers when you charge fees like that. Scamming people with high fees is not the way to win back repeat business. The $1 off combined shipping discount with each add-on item isn't a deal to the customers when your fees are that high.

Overall, this is a very sloppy and unprofessional auction. The seller made absolutely no effort to correct the many grammar and auction errors throughout this entire auction. The region / culture for these knives is not Japan, and the seller needs to make it known for a fact whether these knives are new or used. The auction's picture is very good and the title isn't bad, but the rest of it needs a complete makeover.

What bothers me the most is that this auction is by a PowerSeller with almost 1,900 positive pieces of feedback in the past twelve months. Obviously, the seller does not care about the inconsistencies with the "I list everything for .99 cents except when I can't hit the keys correctly" starting bids or other problems. What's equally scary are the number of people who reward a sloppy and very unprofessional person like this with business.

With the Internet and free tools such as Dictionary, Google, and Wikipedia, it's ridiculously easy to do basic research and checking. Take the time to double check your work and keep things consistent. As a PowerSeller, you shouldn't have auctions that look this poor and childish.

1982 U.S. coins proof set

2008-03-20T13:42:00.006-04:00

1982 UNITED STATES PROOF SET !

ended - Saturday, March 22, 2008

Auction grade: C

Starting bid: $5.00

Final selling price: $5.00

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a 1982 proof set of U.S. coins. The coins are displayed in a holder and are in uncirculated condition.

In addition to taking the title off of all caps, the seller needs to add in key words such as "coin", "rare", "historic", "collection" and possibly even "uncirculated". Those are all relevant search terms (though some will debate as to whether or not they can be classified as rare and historic) and it will increase the number of search results. For best effect, I would definitely use the term "coin collection".

The auction's description is where the seller becomes very unprofessional. With the combination of the all capitalized text and various color patterns, it's as if the seller is copying universal auction text and just changing the blue parts to fit this auction. It looks tacky and just downright weird. This could also just be the seller's attempt at being creative. Either way, it doesn't work here in this auction.

The description is also where the seller dropped the ball and is going to miss being in a lot of searches. The seller should have listed every type of coin on the auction along with the presidents and scenes on each coin. It only takes a minute, but the possibility of drawing in other bidders not even looking for coins is enormous. Bullet points with each coin would probably be the best way to list this information.

The pictures look pretty good. I like how the seller is showing us both sides of the set of coins. That part looks fine.

It looks like the pricing probably won't go much higher than the current bid. By the time you combine the bid with the shipping price, you're in the price range that other sellers are using both on and off of eBay. Unless you're selling hundreds of small items each day, you're not going to be able to retire early selling low priced items like this on eBay.

Overall, the title and description need quite a bit of attention. Adding in those extra key words and descriptions will only help give the seller's auction the attention that it deserves. It's hard to make a sale when nobody knows that you're there.

Dale Junior remote controlled go-kart

2008-03-19T14:25:00.004-04:00

REMOTE CONTROL DALE JR CART CAR WORKS NEEDS BATTERIES

ended - Friday, March 21, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $9.99

Final selling price: $9.99

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a used Dale Earnhardt, Junior radio controlled go-kart. The kart has Dale Junior behind the wheel and ready to race around a driveway or other smooth surface.

As you can probably expect, the title needs work. First, the entire title doesn't need to be capitalized like that. The part that says "WORKS NEEDS BATTERIES" isn't necessary as those are low ranking search terms. The seller is better off with relevant key words such as "#8", "NASCAR" and even "go-kart". It's easy to use words and phrases relating to both the popular NASCAR driver and the actual toy car.

Looking at the description, it's obvious that the seller knows nothing about racing and Dale Junior, and this person has the typing skills of somebody in elementary school. I know that a lot of both buyers and sellers don't care about presenting themselves in a professional manner, but if you can't type, people will laugh at you and turn away from the sale. You're only hurting yourself in the end.

This item's description is a prime area to throw out a little information about the driver. As most race fans know, this is the old version of Dale Junior with his old number, sponsor and color scheme. In essence this is a collector's item that people are willing to collect. The problem is that many collectors are going to miss this auction because the seller failed to market it properly. A simple blurb about NASCAR and the driver will do wonders to the search results. It would also help to SPELL THE DRIVER'S NAME CORRECTLY!!!

This particular remote controlled car is a little bit different than the traditional and far more popular stock cars that most people sell online. This one has Dale behind the wheel of a go-kart (note - it's not spelled "cart") like he's racing in the Endurance Karting or other similar go-kart racing league. With this being different and rather unconventional, this is a great chance to draw extra attention to the auction. A special reference to this in the title and description will help draw in a few more potential buyers.

As a used item with moving parts, the seller needs to mention the go-kart's condition and say if there are any driving or control problems. All we know is that it works and needs batteries. We also need to know the size of the go-kart. There's no indication of the size or scale of the car in the description or picture.

In addition to fixing the title and description, the picture needs to be changed, too. This is a poor resolution picture showing the car from a horrible angle. It's very hard to see any details. The seller may want to put the controller in the picture, too.

For a used remote controlled car, I feel that the pricing for this one is a little bit too high. Considering that you'll be paying at least $20 ($10.49 + $9.95 for shipping) for the toy, that could be put towards a new remote controlled stock car. Most people are selling brand new 1/32 scale remote controlled NASCAR stock cars for around $22-25.

Overall, many parts of this auction need work and adjusting to help draw in more bidders. If you're going to go through the hassle and effort to pay for and list an item, you might as well do some research and try to draw in as many bidders as possible. Use online tools such as Google and Wikipedia to your advantage. A few minutes of research can go a long way.

2MP DSC-P51 Sony digital camera

2008-03-18T10:51:00.006-04:00

Great Deal! Sony DSC-P51- See It's Pictures- Extras!

ended - Thursday, March 20, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $48.75

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a Sony DSC-P51 digital camera. This is a 2 mega-pixel camera with a 2x optical zoom and a 6x digital zoom. Overall, this is considered a very basic digital camera in today's society. As a comparison, my own Sony Ericsson cell phone has a 2 mega-pixel camera.

For starters, this auction's title needs quite a bit of work. Apart from using the wrong version of "its" (check your grammar), the seller is also leaving out important key words such as "digital camera", "2MP", and even "Cyber-shot". In this case, the seller may want to mention it being a beginner's camera to help entice other bidders.

The auction's description needs a little bit of adjusting, too. For someone who starts their description by saying "Please read this description carefully!", the seller ironically chose a bad typing format. All of the camera, auction, and shipping information is in one giant paragraph. The darkish blue font on the white background looks pretty good, but the general layout needs to be fixed.

All of the camera's technical information needs to be listed separately and with bullet points. There's no point in hiding what little the camera can do, and by suggesting that people check other reviews on the internet means that they will find out the details anyway. You may as well be honest and list everything that you can about the camera right here in the description.

In addition to the camera's information, all of the accessories need to be listed separately and with bullet points, too. Let the buyers know that this comes with a few rechargeable batteries and a charger. Be proud of throwing in the hand strap and those massive memory cards (4mb and 64mb).

The pictures of the camera and all of the included accessories look pretty good. The sample images are where I have my problems. Apart from being very small, they also look like garbage.

This "landscape" shot looks like the seller took a picture of a painting or picture (you can see the flash's reflection on the bottom, tape holding the top of picture against the wall, and the upper edge of the picture in the top right of the image). If you're going to do the trouble of taking a sample image, show us a real full size image of a real landscape shot.

(Next time provide a link to a real landscape picture that you took, not a picture of a picture.)

Overall, this is a basic, used camera trying to compete with today's current cameras. I can't fault the seller for trying to sell the camera and hype up all of its features, but I'll be surprised if it sells. The camera's 2x optical zoom isn't going to make any real difference, and the 6x digital zoom is a complete joke (digital zoom itself is useless unless you like pixelated and low resolution images). The selling point of "Really neat is that the camera driver downloads to your PC from the camera itself!" isn't that special today. Almost all of today's cameras can plug into your computer with a USB cable, and some basic models even include a special "docking port" to do the same thing.

This camera did receive quite a few favorable reviews on different websites. That's true. It's also true that the seller will be lucky to get any bids with a starting bid that high. After encouraging buyers to look at the camera reviews, he is essentially making them educate themselves. How many people are going to want to spend at least $58 (starting bid + shipping) for an old, used, outdated digital camera when that much money can be put to a new one?

I would focus on selling the camera itself as an excellent beginner's camera and cut the starting bid in half. I also wouldn't tell people to research the reviews (keep their attention here at the auction). In addition to that, I would list the common picture resolution sizes and show them real sample images of what the camera can do in various lighting conditions.

The reasons for the auction's lower score are for the title needing a lot of work, the description needing spacing and formatting, and the poor / fake sample images.

Asian bowl & spoon

2008-03-17T10:59:00.004-04:00

Japanese Or Chinese Bowl with Spoon ????

ended - Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Auction grade: D+

Starting bid: $9.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an antique Asian bowl and spoon. The exact type of material isn't mentioned, whether it's ceramic or something else. The seller claims that her father brought it back from Japan sometime well before the 1960's. This bowl and spoon combination has been displayed in a china cabinet for quite some time and is in a nearly perfect condition.

First, the auction's title definitely needs some work. It's obvious the seller has no clue as to the bowl's origins besides the fact that it's from Asia. Both "Japanese" and "Chinese" are good words, but I would also use "Asian" and "antique". If this is ceramic, then that fact should also be mentioned in the title.

The other main problem with the auction title is that the seller is admitting that she has no idea about the item. The buyers who have specific knowledge about items like this may take advantage of the seller, while other average buyers who are just shopping are going to stay away because the seller can't tell them anything specific. The auction's title needs to look both vague and specific at the same time. Make it look like you're fishing with key words and not just guessing to the item's history. If you honestly don't know anything about the item, make a mention of it in the description, not the title.

The item's description is in desperate need of an editor. After reading through the seller's rambling, it's known that her father was stationed in Japan while he was in the military (big fault on the seller for not knowing when her father was there!), and when he came home he brought back this bowl & spoon amongst other items. The seller also mentions how the bowl and spoon were displayed in a china cabinet for a very long time, and at this point in time they're still in excellent condition. It's free of chips and cracks and apparently is extremely clean.

That part of the description is great (besides the butchering of the English language and complete lack of family knowledge). As a buyer you know that it came from overseas and the owners took care of it. By being in a closed cabinet it remained relatively free of dirt, dust and human fingerprints. This would most likely look good in your own collection.

The last part of the auction's description is completely unnecessary. Nobody really wants to hear about how you have a bunch of kids running around somewhere near Denver and how you want to buy them new clothes and take them to the local amusement park. Lots of people have children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews and want to do lots of things with them, too. Trying to use sympathy like this is not the best way to make a sale on eBay. Perhaps a special "I-want-to-spend-lots-of-money-on-my-grandchildren-please-help-us-have-fun" locally advertised garage sale would produce better results.

Using sympathy is one of the oldest tricks used in marketing. I'm not saying this is the case here, but online scam artists commonly play the roles of an elderly lady or mother of really sick children to force people to donate. By not actually knowing the seller you really don't know if their pet dog needs a $5,000.00 operation or if that elderly lady's home is about to be taken away from her. It's human nature to want to help others in their time of need, but two statements come to mind each time these stories happen:
1) Not every person can be helped. Everybody has problems and most of them will be worked out in one way or another. It's not possible or practical to fix every single problem out there.
2) Not every problem is legitimate. Scam artists will beg and plead until you're out of money before they move on to the next person and repeat the process. Without actually meeting the customers in person or even on the phone, it's very easy to impersonate somebody else.

In this auction we honestly don't know the seller and her comments about the children. The typing style generally reflects an uneducated, older female. She chose to tell us about the grandchildren for a reason. Her story is no different than hundreds of other sellers out there.

If you're going to use sympathy as a selling strategy, make it as legitimate as possible. If you have a life threatening condition and desperately need money for an operation, try to get the story backed by the local media. In most cases they'll gladly cover a story like that. Have a link in the auction to the official story and let people see it for themselves. In addition to increased sales, you'll also receive donations from random people.

Save sympathy for those people that really need it.

Getting back to problems with the actual auction, the pictures are plenty but blurry. The seller gets extra credit for posting multiple pictures like this, but it doesn't do much good when they're blurry and it's hard to see the details.

The final part to point out is the shipping and handling cost. The actual auction doesn't have a fee listed, but the search results shows a charge of $9.80 to send the bowl from Denver to here in Atlanta. The seller mentions charging an 85 cent handling fee, but unless the bowl weighs about eight or nine pounds, it sounds like she's overcharging by more than that.

Overall, this auction needs to be completely rewritten. The seller had a couple of good points with the bowl's physical condition and the extra pictures, but all of the text needs to go through a grammar checker. It would be better if the seller just presented herself as just a kind grandmother instead of a grandmother looking for extra money to spend on the grandchildren. If she was creative enough to label the item's location as "Purple Mountains Majesty" instead of the actual town name (Idaho Springs? Colorado Springs?), then I'm sure she can find a more creative way to sell her items.

1944 Greyhound bus time table & map

2008-03-13T11:20:00.004-04:00

1944 Greyhound Bus Time Table "Buy War Bonds & Stamps"

ended - Friday, March 14, 2008

Auction grade: B+

Starting bid: $5.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a vintage bus time table and map for Greyhound back in 1944. This is a special World War 2 edition that advertises buying war bonds and stamps on its cover.

For the most part, this looks like a pretty good auction. The title is very descriptive and the pictures are excellent.

The title could be modified a little bit by adding "vintage", "map", and "world war 2" / "WW2" key words. Space is going to be an issue, and in this case it may be necessary to remove the "Buy War Bonds & Stamps" part to make room for other key words.

The auction's description could also use a little bit of more words, too. The seller mentions that the time table is fourteen pages long, but it's hard to see it in the pictures. One picture has the cover of the time table, and the other picture has the large fold-out map. Is the map separate from the time table, or is all of that information printed on the other side of the map?

The seller also needs to mention the route map in the description. This is a vintage item that would look great framed and hanging on a wall. By mentioning something like that and giving people ideas of how to preserve this time table, you're creating a sense of value for the item. When people can realistically picture using the item or putting it on display in their home or office, they're going to be more likely to make a bid. Don't be afraid to mention how this map would be perfect for those interested in transportation, or for people who used to travel by bus back in those days.

The two pictures look really good. I would take a third picture and show the other side of the map. I like how the seller used a ruler to show a sense of scale.

Overall, this is a pretty good auction that only needs a couple of minor changes to bring in more customers.

Vintage Walt Disney World candy dish

2008-03-11T12:02:00.003-04:00

NEAT WALT DISNEY WORLD CANDY DISH FROM THE EARLY 1970's

ended - Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a vintage candy dish from the Walt Disney World Resort back in the 1970's. Not a whole lot of information was provided by the seller.

For starters, the auction title needs some work. Along with changing the text so that it isn't in all capital letters, the seller needs to add key words such as "vintage", "WDW", "70s", "monorail" and/or "Magic Kingdom".

The main body of text definitely needs more work. As you can see below, the text is nearly identical to the auction title.

"THIS IS A NEAT CANDY DISH FROM THE WALT DISNEY WORLD MAGIC KINGDOM FROM THE EARLY 1970's."

The thing to know about selling Disney merchandise, especially from the movies and theme parks, is that most of the fans are knowledgeable and particular. They know the names of the different characters, theme parks, hotels, lands, and attractions. They also know how to search for them on eBay using a variety of search techniques.

This seller really dropped the ball by not being nearly as descriptive in the auction's description. It isn't necessary to go into detail and history of the resort, but it's fairly easy to list each of the different scenes on the candy dish. Remember, the auction's description is searchable as long as the box is checked (in the advanced search options).

If you don't know the different scenes, there are dozens of WDW websites filled with pictures of the resort area. For example, one of them is The Florida Project. For selling a unique and vintage item like this one, you need to take the time to list it correctly. Otherwise, you're just throwing your money down the drain.

We also need to know the size of the candy dish. What is the diameter? How tall is it?

In addition to fixing the title and description, this auction is also in need of a new, clear picture. The one here is washed out and looks like it was taken back in the 1970's. It's hard to make out some of the scenes on the candy dish. A close-up picture of a scene or two on the dish would also help.

On a final note, the shipping rate is a little bit high. Unless this is a very large or heavy dish (an unknown, as noted above), the $8.95 rate is high.

Overall, this is a poorly constructed auction in need of some desperate work. I'm surprised that a PowerSeller created an auction like this one and expects it to sell. Especially with this being an Orlando-based seller trying to sell Disney merchandise.

USAF Sabre Jet Motor Lodge sign

2008-03-07T14:54:00.005-05:00

AIR FORCE SABRE JET MOTOR LODGE SIGN AGED METAL

ended - Sunday, March 9, 2008

Auction grade: B

Starting bid: $22.95

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for bid in this eBay auction is a vintage motor lodge sign featuring the USAF F-86 Sabre. The seller claims that this a current production sign with a 1950's theme to it.

I like this sign and the vintage look to it, but changes need to be made to increase traffic.

First, the title needs some adjusting. It needs to be written with regular sized characters, and certainly not all caps like it is now. Also, a few more keys words need to be added to the title. "USAF" and "military" will definitely help increase the number of viewers.

The other main part of the auction that needs adjusting is the item's description.

First, the seller needs to say directly whether or not this exact sign was made in the 1950's or if it was made today and designed to look like it was from that era. The title says "aged metal", but the description mentions "current production sign." Well, which one is it? Vintage items are popular these days, and some companies are producing modern day replicas of vintage signs, furniture, etc.

Second, the seller could easily have gone into a little detail about the F-86 Sabre. I know from my own independent military aviation studies that the F-86 was the primary fighter used by our forces during the Korean Conflict. It hunted and destroyed Soviet-made and Soviet/Chinese/Korean-piloted MiG-15 fighters in "MiG Alley" on the China-Korean border. Any facts and pieces of information like that are excellent add-ons for the item's description. By mentioning a little bit about the aircraft, USAF, military, and Korean War, all of a sudden you have a bunch of excellent key words. It will also help you look more professional as long as your facts are correct.

Third, the spacing and general format of the description needs to be fixed. A bunch of sentence fragments separated only by periods (no spacing) isn't the way to do it. Dimensions are best being listed separately so they stand out and are easier to read. Facts and observations should be listed first in one paragraph, and opinions and other pieces of information need to go in following paragraphs.

It's interesting to see that the sign has the aircraft spelled "SABER JET". The military spelled the aircraft as either "Sabre" or "Sabrejet" (no space). The seller even spelled it correctly in the title. Did the designer of the sign intentionally misspell the aircraft, or was it an accident?

Runaway slaves wanted poster

2008-03-05T11:05:00.004-05:00

1837 wanted poster 3 runaway slaves make offer

ends - Thursday, March 6, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $200.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an antique wanted poster for three runaway slaves back in 1837 in northern Kentucky. A $300 cash reward is being offered for the return of the slaves.

The title for this auction doesn't look that bad. Apart from putting the word "wanted" in all capital letters for effect, I would also add key words such as "vintage", "antique", "historic" and probably even "Kentucky". The "make offer" part could easily be removed and replaced with a better key word or words.

The main body of text needs a lot of work to make it more professional and easier to read. Things like periods and actual paragraphs will make it much easier to read and follow what the seller is trying to say. It's amusing to see how someone back in 1837 could write much better than someone from the same general area today.

I like how the seller says how he acquired the item and gives some physical details about the wanted poster. I also appreciate the seller's honesty when it's mentioned that at least one dealer could not tell if it's authentic or not. That's also going to be a death blow for this auction. Without some sort of certificate of authenticity to prove its age, it's highly unlikely that somebody is going to place a bid. Also, stuff like "so take a chance if real is valued at 5000.00 if not look how neat" doesn't exactly sound convincing either.

The seller mentions making him an offer for the wanted posted. It would help if the "Best Offer" was actually available for buyers. When setting up the auction, you need to select the "Best Offer" option when telling eBay that you also want to do a fixed price format. When it's activated, you'll see the words "or Best Offer" under the "Buy It Now" logo. It'll also appear in its own section near the top of the actual auction with its own link.

Is this seller trying to pull a fast one by advising you to use the "Buy It Now" link to make an offer even though it won't work that way?

The final things to change are the details in the "item specifics" section. The region/culture is not Asian or China, and I wouldn't classify this as being black memorabilia. When determining the target audience for this type of wanted poster, I would most likely use the general "historical memorabilia" tag in the "antiques" category.

On a plus side, the pictures are excellent. The seller did it right by showing the document from many angles and levels of zoom.

Overall, this advertisement needs extensive editing in the item specifics and main body of text. The seller also needs to enable the "Best Offer" option if he wants buyers to be able to use it.

Is this an authentic wanted poster from 1837 and an apparently good deal, or is this a hoax? I honestly don't know. How many other buyers feel the same way?

Nikon Coolpix S1 digital camera

2008-03-03T12:41:00.007-05:00

Nikon Coolpix S1 5.1 Megapixel

ended - Tuesday, March 4th, 2008

Auction grade: B+

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $28.00

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a used Nikon Coolpix S1 compact digital camera. In addition to listing some technical details, the seller also mentions a couple of problems with the camera.

The title of this auction does a good job mentioning the manufacturer and model, but the seller forgets to include key words such as "compact" and the critical "digital camera." The advertisement will receive much more exposure by mentioning the type of item in the title. Key words are critical in the title!

The main body of the auction is neatly laid out and easy to read. Certain details about the camera are easy to find. I appreciate the seller's honesty when he mentions the problems and missing equipment. The malfunctioning flash and mysterious circles in some photos will turn away most bidders. It could be user error like the seller says, but with an instruction manual and with most point-and-shoot cameras being very simple to operate, I would say that this is most likely a more serious problem with the camera.

For this auction, I would have liked to know how long the seller has had the camera and roughly how often it was used. Digital cameras aren't known for having the longest lifespans, especially when people take them on vacation.

Apart from adding key words to the title, the seller also didn't mention any shipping information. There's no mention on how much you'll have to pay to have this camera shipped from Columbus, Ohio.

Overall, this is a nice looking and well organized auction. A few changes will help bring in more potential bidders. I do give this seller credit for trying to sell a possibly damaged camera on eBay, knowing full well that the final price might be next to nothing.

Lobster wine bottle holder

2008-02-28T11:17:00.005-05:00

WINE HOLDER FOR TABLE LOBSTER

ended - Friday, February 29, 2008

Auction grade: B

Starting bid: $9.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a tabletop lobster bottle holder. The lobster's large claws hold the bottle in an upside down position, and this is sure to catch the attention from any guests or visitors to your home. It's common to find animal themed wine bottle holders like this in most home decorating stores.

The title of this auction definitely needs work. First, it doesn't need to be written in all capital letters. This is a problem for lots of people. They think that by having their title big like that will make their auction unique and stand out from the others. Well, that is wrong. The thing to do is put some words in all capital letters, not all of them. The human eye will have a better chance of catching the title with a few words capitalized rather than the title will all caps.

The title also needs a few more keys words like "bottle", "ocean", and "animal". The wording definitely needs to be rearranged so that it at least mostly sounds correct when reading it. Some thing more along the lines of "table lobster wine bottle holder" with a few more keys words at the end will do the job nicely. This way instead of just concentrating on the holder, you can also catch people looking for wine bottles and other ocean and animal themed items.

More search results = more chances for higher final selling price

Apart from the horrible title, this is a very nice looking auction. The seller does an excellent job in the description telling us about the wine bottle holder and why they think it makes a good product. The two pictures look good and show the lobster from a couple of angles.

The only other minor issue is with the shipping price. Considering this is a used item and its relatively small size in the box, the $11.69 S&H charge is a little bit steep. When people see that it's going to cost a minimum of $21.68 for this used item, they're going to have second thoughts. I would lower that price a little bit to help entice the buyers to click on the bid button.

The title is what prevented this auction from receiving an "A" score. Considering that it's one of the most important parts of the auction, it has the biggest impact on my grading scale.

India table cloth

2008-02-26T12:40:00.004-05:00

NEAT TABLCLOTH 100 % COTTON (NIP INDIA L@@K ! )

ended - Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Auction grade: D+

Starting bid: $9.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a brand new cotton tablecloth made in India. The seller claims that this is still new in the package, and the cloth itself doesn't have any holes or stains. From the pictures provided, you can get a good idea of this particular color pattern.

Right off the bat, that title for this auction needs some work. For starters, it's spelled "tablecloth", not "tablcloth" (same spelling error is made in the auction's description). The next thing to change would be to turn off the caps lock key on the keyboard. Having the entire title in capital letters loses its effect for gaining attention. This is just as bad as not capitalizing anything and leaving all of the letters in lowercase.

The seller also uses quite a bit of unnecessary spacing and wastes space. For example, there's a space in "100 %", and two extra spaces in "L@@K ! )". I would throw in extra words and phrases like "new", "table cloth", and "unique" to try to help it show up in other searches. Doing something fancy like "L@@K" is OK as long as you've already used all of the key words that you can think of for the auction. When you have the extra space in the title, weird things like that will help draw extra attention to your listing as long as not everybody else does stuff like that.

Again, the caps lock key needs to be turned off when typing the main body of text. I know that there usually isn't much to type to describe a new item like this, but it does help if the sentences are neatly spaced and easy to read. Nothing is more annoying than a seller who doesn't care about making things easy to read and view for the buyers.

It's good that the seller listed the dimensions of this tablecloth. Doing so will help buyers determine if it's the right size for their table. It's interesting how the seller used the word oblong instead of rectangle. They're both correct, but rectangle is more of a common search term. I would have found a way to also use the word "rectangle" in the description, whether talking about the tablecloth or table itself.

It appears a little bit odd having the "terms of auction" two lines below the auction's description. Between having a lot more text and having proper capitalization, it really looks out of place. It was probably placed there by the template that the seller used to create the auction. It's amusing how the seller spells "eBay" incorrectly as "E-Bay". If the seller cannot write eBay correctly, it makes you wonder if she is missing any important details about the item, or if the sizes are listed correctly.

The payment section also needs some professionalism. Apart from actually creating real sentences and capitalizing PayPal correctly (like she did in the "terms of auction"), for privacy and security reasons, it's bad that she listed her name and full address right there in the auction. Accepting checks and money orders in the mail is fine, but I would send the mailing information in the winner's e-mail instead of displaying it for the world in the auction, especially with this being a home and not a business address.

"Thank you and have a nice week."

Have a nice week? It's usually customary to wish somebody a nice day / evening / holiday. It just sounds odd to wish somebody a nice week.

The last thing to point out is the starting bid price. I did some online searching, and other designs for similar cotton tablecloths made in India were close in price. I saw a lot of online stores selling similar tablecloths from $20 to $50 (and much better designs in my humble opinion). That tells me that the seller may be trying too aggressive of a strategy, even if this is a brand new tablecloth.

Overall, many parts of this auction are sloppy and unprofessional. The differences in typing and spelling between the title, description, terms of auction, and payment show that the seller doesn't care about keeping things consistent. This is a lazy approach and shows a lack of respect to other buyers and sellers. Is that really important to sell an item on eBay? Probably not as much as what I'm criticizing, but it will turn away and annoy some buyers. Do you really want your buyers thinking that you're dumb or stupid?

A big factor for the low auction grade was the misspelling of tablecloth. By not spelling your main item correctly, you've pretty much signed the death warrant for this item. The viewing audience is greatly limited and the auction will not get nearly the exposure it needs. Such a major error nearly gave this auction a failing score, but the listed dimensions and extra pictures saved that from happening.

I personally expected a better organized and written auction from somebody who has gained over 2,600 positive pieces of feedback since July of 2001.

Movies for children

2008-02-22T10:37:00.004-05:00

box of kids movie's

ended - Sunday, February 24, 2008

Auction grade: F-

Starting bid: $10.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

In this eBay auction, the seller is attempting to sell a box of VHS movies for children. This is exactly what it says:

"Box of kids movie's evrything from power rangers to disney features. For everyone in the family."

There's no picture of the movies, number of movies, or even a listing of the titles. The buyers are completely in the dark for this auction.

Major work needs to be done throughout this auction, starting up at the title. For starters, it's spelled "movies" (no apostrophe), and partial movie titles would be useful. The seller mentioned "power rangers" and "disney" in the body of the auction. Both of those would be useful in the title. I would even replace the word "box" with either "collection" or "LOT". Using the word "box" makes it sound less important to you, and therefore more like junk to other people.

As it was mentioned before, the seller needs to let us know exactly how many movies are for sale, and which titles are included in the set. Is this for a box of ten or fifty movies? One would be a better deal than the other.

A picture of the collection would also be a useful selling tool. People like to see the actual items for sale when buying things online. In this case, I would lay out the movies into a neat grouping and take a general picture of the collection. Unless one of the movies is rare and deserves special attention, extra pictures aren't needed.

Without knowing any details at all, the starting bid of $10 and shipping cost of $10 is very high. Considering the lack of demand for VHS, and movie rental stores selling used VHS tapes for dirt cheap, that $20 price could be used to support your local merchants. You could have more movies for your family within an hour and without worrying about shipping or trying to contact the seller if there's a problem.

Overall, this needs major work in every part of the auction. If you're going to spend the money for a seven day auction and $10 starting bid, you need to take the effort and physically type out the entire listing of movies. You also need to use a spell checker to catch most of the basic errors. Just because you've heard about other people making lots of money on eBay doesn't mean that you will too.

With an auction like this, you shouldn't have to ask the seller basic questions like "how many movies are in the box?" or "which titles are included?" Don't make the buyers contact you for information that should be clearly displayed in the auction.

The Grinch pencil / straw topper

2008-02-20T13:29:00.003-05:00

DR SEUSS THE GRINCH WHO STOLE CHRISTMAS PENCILTOPPER 3"

ended - Thursday, February 21, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Starting bid: $0.95

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay advertisement is a collectible pencil topper of the Grinch from the Dr. Seuss "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" animated movie.

The title of the auction isn't bad, but it does need some adjusting. First, I would not make it in all caps like it is now. "Grinch", "Seuss" and "pencil topper"would be fine being in all caps, but the other text is not necessary. The "who stole christmas" part isn't necessary being worded the way it is now. If the seller wants to keep some of that information in the title, it's much better to word it the way it appears on the book and animated move: "How The Grinch Stole Christmas." You'll end up with a few more search results that way.

It's also worth it to split apart "penciltopper" and just do "pencil topper". I would also add the word "straw", since many straws and pencils have the same diameter, and children would enjoy using it on either one.

The main body of text isn't bad. I personally don't care for the look and feel, but that's just my opinion. The important things are to A) use key words and phrases, and B) not make it annoying. If it doesn't make it into the title of the auction, you'll definitely want to mention the book and movie titles in the main body of text. In this case I would do quick research and find out every story, TV show, and movie that uses Dr. Seuss's Grinch character and list them in the description.

This isn't just important for eBay searches, but for general Google searches as well. eBay auctions are listed in the Google database, so people searching for common terms in that search engine can still easily find ways to the eBay auction. This is just that much more traffic to your advertisement. More traffic = a greater chance for a high final selling price.

The dual picture showing the pencil topper from two angles is a very good idea. The only problem is that I cannot tell what the other character is on the Grinch's foot. Is that a bird, dog, person, or other type of Seuss character? It's hard to tell. If you can properly identify that character, then that information definitely goes into the auction, too.

Overall, this isn't that bad of an auction. It isn't spectacular like some of the other ones I've reviewed, but it's certainly not one of the worse ones either. A few minor edits and additions will make this into a much better and higher traffic advertisement.

zoom box

2008-02-19T10:47:00.004-05:00

zoom box

ended - Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Auction grade: F

Starting bid: $75.00

Final selling price: $75.00

Up for sale in this 10-day eBay auction is a "zoom box". According to the seller, "this is really cool kid friendly projector." That's it. No other text was listed in the auction.

In reality, there is no useful information about this particular eBay item. It's not even spelled correctly in the title (it's actually just one word - "ZOOMBOX"), but luckily for this seller, it still appears in a search for the word "zoombox".

Without a doubt, the title needs more key words such as "Hasbro", "Tiger", "digital projector", "home entertainment", and "DVD". All of that empty space is a waste of money considering the number of people who will not find this auction.

The main body of text also needs a lot of work. Telling us that it's a kid friendly projector is fine. But what else can you say? The online reviews weren't that promising on the unit as a whole, so in this case you need to talk about the different features.

It can project a 60" image. - Wow, that's huge!

It has a DVD player. - That's convenient!

The projector has built in speakers. - More convenience!

The replacement bulbs are cheap can last for 1,000 hours. - That'll save money in the long run!

This is a great projector for kids or those wanting to experience a home theater without spending a lot of money. - It's great for beginners!

By using some wording like that people will be less likely to do their own research and find out the negative aspects. My own searching brought up many tales of the poor resolution (hard to read text on the screen) and fact that you'll need a very dark room and your own speakers to really enjoy watching and listening to movies. The below VGA resolution had a lot of people complaining that it was very hard to play console games with this projector.

The stock image needs to be replaced with a picture of the actual projector. If this was brand new, then the stock image would have been acceptable, but in this case the projector has been used. We don't know any details about how much or often it was used, and we definitely need to see a picture of the projector. With the seller advertising this as being "kid friendly", we need to make sure this one isn't damaged or anything else.

Considering the lack of information, the starting bid is too high for this used projector. Other people are selling used projectors with better descriptions (including talking about the condition of the unit) for cheaper prices. It's no wonder on why there aren't any bids this far into the auction process.

Overall, every part of this auction (except for the shipping) needs to be revised, from the starting bid to the title to the picture. The very reasonable shipping cost of only $5 saved this auction from receiving an F- auction grade. If you're going to spend the money to put out a long and somewhat expensive auction like this one, you need to take the time to do it right.

new coustic crossover

2008-02-18T14:38:00.005-05:00

new coustic crossover

ended - Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final selling price: $12.50

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a previously installed device for car stereos. The seller claims that it wasn't used and there are some light scratches on the case.

For starters, the title definitely needs to have more key words added. "Car stereo", "electronic", "audio", and "XM6" are all very good terms to use, and any combination of them will definitely help this advertisement show up in more searches.

The main body of text could use some freshening up. I like the way that the seller tells us a little bit about the item and why it's up for sale. Seeing how the seller is selling something that an enthusiast is most likely going to purchase, it would have been better if technical stats about the crossover were listed. Technical details like that are usually found in the owner's manual and on the manufacturer's website. You can also find them listed on most electronic websites selling the product.

The reasoning for listing details like that is you don't want the customers to have to look elsewhere to find out more information about the product. If they look elsewhere, A) they may find the same exact product for a lower price, or B) they may find an updated or different version that they want to purchase instead. Either way you've lost the sale. It's hard enough getting somebody to click on your auction without having them lose interest because they want to know more.

It turns out another person is offering a brand new version of this same exact crossover for a Buy It Now price of $39.00. That seller happened to list the technical details of this piece of stereo equipment.

A big problem with this item is that the seller is trying to pass it off as a brand new item. The seller admitted to having it installed in his car, and he mentioned that there are some light scratches on its case. It's hard to believe that the unit has not been used.

It also doesn't help that this particular model of crossovers wasn't rated very favorable by the different online communities. In fact, it's even hard to find for sale from online merchants. This implies that there isn't much demand for this Xm6 Coustic Crossover. That'll definitely have a negative impact on the final selling price.

Overall, the most important thing to do is fix the title and make it more search engine friendly. The extra statistics and information in the main body would definitely help sell this item, but I don't believe it'll be the deal maker or breaker. Online merchants want around $50 for a brand new version of this crossover, so this previously installed (and possibly used) one won't fetch very high of a final selling price. On a positive note, the pictures do look pretty good. It was a good idea to post two of them with different views of the item.

Kellog's Nurti-Grain tankard / coffee cup

2008-02-15T11:18:00.005-05:00

Kellogg Nutri Grain Tankard, 1980, Employee Freeby

ends - Saturday, February 16, 2008

Auction grade: C+

Staring bid: $7.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a special tankard / coffee cup that was given to Kellogg's workers back in the 1980's. The seller claims that this one is in new condition, and he has the box and paperwork to go along with it. The cup looks pretty solid and would be a nice collector's item for people who used to work in the company, or those that were fans of the cereal or breakfast bars.

The auction title needs a little work. First, the word "freeby" is misspelled (it's actually "freebie", though the other version looks correct if spoken with a Texas twang). Second, when running an auction like this, I wouldn't necessarily mention that this was given to the employees for free in the title. That information is fine in the main body, but I personally wouldn't use it up there. Words like "coffee cup" and "vintage" would produce more search results.

Technically, the name should also be spelled "Nutri-Grain", thought I would also use "NurtiGrain" and bet that many people don't know that it's actually hyphenated. I would also add "1980s" or "early 1980s" in the title. I checked online, and it looks like the actual cereal went into production in 1982 and lasted into the 1990's. I don't know how long the healthy breakfast bars have been in production.

The text in the main body of the auction could use a little bit extra work. Despite a few grammar errors, the seller could have gone into a little bit more detail about the cup. Is it heavy? Is the entire cup made of metal? Does the top part easily detach?

For somebody who nicely listed the manufacturer of the cup and said "I try to describe the best I can", I would have expected a little more detail about the cup than just the height.

I like the picture of the cup. The cup is neatly displayed in front of the manufacturer's information and generic box. You can easily see the nice looking logo on the front of the cup. I also like how the seller tells you which days he ships the products. Seeing that information, you have a good feeling that the seller isn't going to sit around a wait a week before putting things in the mail. With him only accepting PayPal, you should expect your item(s) to be put in the mail within a day or two at the most.

A big negative is that the seller does not list the shipping cost. It's not free (he mentions doing combined shipping for items), but nowhere on the advertisement does it say how much to expect for the cost. Some sellers use shipping calculators while others just use a flat rate.

Overall, this is a decent auction. The title and main body of text definitely need some work, but overall it's a pretty good auction. Not listing the shipping cost was a big deduction in the overall grade of this auction.

Absolut playing cards

2008-02-14T10:06:00.004-05:00

ABSOLUT-CARD-DECKS

ended - Friday, February 15, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $9.99

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction are two sealed sets of playing cards by Absolut.

The main problem with this auction is that there just isn't that much text at all. Between the title and main body of text, there are a total of just twenty words. That's it.

The title needs to be taken off all caps, and definitely more key words need to be added. I would mention words and phrases like "playing cards", "new", "rare", "vodka", and "sealed". It isn't much, but it will allow more people to see the auction in the search results.

Again, for the main body of text, it needs to not be in all capital letters.

"ABSOLUT CARDS TWO DECKS NEVER OPENED, HAVE FUN PLAYING, GREAT FIND. ADD TO YOUR OTHER COOL STUFF!!"

I know that there aren't that many ways to describe brand new playing cards, but the seller could have at least done a better job at typing this text.

The picture looks pretty good. It was a nice touch adding the small Absolut umbrella in the shot. But seeing it there makes me wonder, does the umbrella go with the playing cards, or is it just there to make everything look neat? Buyers shouldn't have to ask themselves questions like that just by looking at a picture.

Another problem with this advertisement is that there isn't any shipping information anywhere in the ad. Nowhere does it say how much you'll have to pay to send the playing cards to your home or business.

Overall, this auction needs a lot more relevant words if the seller expects it to sell. Key words are critical to end up in more search results pages. Seeing this auction, I think the seller is greedy with that $9.99 starting bid. If the cards are worth that much (plus the mystery shipping costs), then we need to know what makes them so special. Is this the only pack of them in the world? Were they made by hand with top quality material?

Andrew Miller signed baseball card

2008-02-13T10:46:00.004-05:00

SUPER RARE 07 TOPPS FINEST ANDREW MILLER X-FACTOR #151

ended - Thursday, February 14, 2008

Auction grade: F

Starting bid: $220.00

Final selling price: $0 - no bids

Available here in this eBay auction is a 2007 signed baseball rookie card by Detroit Tiger's Andrew Miller. As to whether this is a rare card or not, I honestly don't know. I haven't looked at baseball cards for about twenty years. This criticism will be on the actual auction itself.

This auction is horrible.

First, the entire title (and subtitle) should never be in all caps like this one is here. Words like "signed", "baseball", and "rookie" should be used in the title for an item like this. Also, the seller misspells "awsome" and "peroid" in the subtitle.

The main body of text flat-out insults the buyers. There's a theory that the louder a salesman yells at you, the dumber he thinks you are. Notice how many low-end car and electronic TV commercials are that way. They actually believe you are dumb and they have to yell to get your attention. That's exactly what's happening here with this auction.

The entire text is in all caps and uses an unnecessarily large font. This is also one giant run-on-to-the-extreme sentence that's hard to read. Chat text is also used at one point (another big no-no). It's obvious the person didn't even bother checking their work when you see phrases like "BUY IN NOW", "CHECK OUT MY OTHER FOR OTHER RARE", and "GOODLUCK BIDDING".

This person is also misleading the customers by having two different cards in the blurry pictures, but only one of them is actually for sale in this auction. The other card is for sale in a different auction. Unless it's free or part of the auction, only have the actual item(s) for sale in the picture(s)!

These pictures need work. They are blurry and it's very hard to look closely without it hurting the eyes. Use of a small tripod or a flash will help reduce blurriness in pictures. It also helps to use a well lit area.

This auction needs an extreme amount of work for it to make it to an "acceptable" level. The only reason I didn't give it an "F-" was that the seller had the right idea by taking front and back pictures of the baseball cards. The execution sucked, but the right idea was there.

It's obvious that the seller doesn't know how to spell certain words and doesn't care about making a neat and easy to read auction. I took a look and saw similar problems in the seller's other auctions. The seller could be making a lot more money by actually taking the time to improve their auctions and not appearing to be a total idiot.

Why should I give my hard earned money to somebody who doesn't care and insults my intelligence?

I do take satisfaction knowing that the seller spent extra money by A) having a gallery image, B) having a subtitle, C) having a gift icon, and D) having a high starting bid. It's not a whole lot of money, but all of those auctions do add up over time.

"Bull" bobble head

2008-02-12T10:20:00.001-05:00

Vintage "BULL" Nodder - Fuzzy

ended - Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Auction grade: D

Starting bid: $7.90

Final sale price: $0 - no bids

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an interesting little figurine for a desk, mantle, or other type of display area. This is a head-bobbing bull that is kneeling down. The seller claims that this is a vintage item, but doesn't go into any detail.

First of all, the title definitely needs more key words if the seller expects people to find this item. For this item, I would definitely have found a way to include "bobble head" into the title. That's the more common and popular term used when describing this type of an item.

Up next, the text definitely needs more work. Apart from going back and checking the spelling and grammar, the seller needs to be more elaborate on why this is a vintage item. Has it actually been discontinued by the manufacturers and cannot be found in stores, or was is just covered in dust and looked sorta old by the seller? When was it made? Just by throwing the word "vintage" out there usually doesn't convince the buyers enough to make that purchase. Considering the high cost of the starting bid, the seller needs to explain why it's vintage and worthy of the buyer's money.

The actual picture of the bull isn't bad. If the seller believes that the sticker that says "RF Made in Hong Kong" is important enough to mention in the body of the text, then they probably should have included a picture of it in the auction. Unless it's something really special from that region, you usually don't want to advertise if something was made overseas in places like China or Hong Kong.

The last problem with the auction deals with the high costs. If a person were to place a bid and win, they're already paying at least $13.90 (starting bid + shipping). Considering this is eBay and lots of similar items can be purchased for much less than that, this is an expensive item with very little detail.

Overall, this auction needs extra work. The starting bid and shipping costs are way too high (unless for a fact it is vintage and worth much more than that), and the title and main body of text needs some extra work. The main picture does look good, and in this case a second picture is optional. It's no surprise at all that there aren't any bids since this item was listed back on Wednesday, February 6, 2008.

Looney Tunes shirts

2008-02-11T13:45:00.001-05:00

NEW Looney Tunes T-Shirts

ended - Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Auction grade: D-

Starting bid: $3.99

Final sale price: $26.55

Up for sale in this auction is a small collection of six t-shirts with various cartoon characters. The seller claims that in addition to being brand new, they are also exclusive and cannot be purchased in stores.

Supposedly some (or all) of the shirts still have their tags attached. It stands to reason that A) they may have initially been given away as promotional items, or B) they were discontinued and most likely sold for very low prices at bargain stores. If they do have tags attached, then my guess is that option B is closer to being correct.

Let's start at the top of the auction and see why it received such a low score.

The title definitely needs more work. It's way too vague and doesn't have nearly enough key words to draw in the bidders. In this case I would mention something like "LOT of 6" or "x6" to give the people a general idea of how many shirts are up for auction. I would also throw out a few character names or even some of the shirt sizes.

In the main body of text, it's good that the seller mentioned that the shirts are from a pet- and smoke-free home. Lots of people have allergies to one thing or another (myself included), and articles of clothing can potentially contain a lot of the allergic particles and cause a nasty reaction.

It's also good the the seller made a listing of the different shirts and their sizes. The seller does not mention whether or not these shirts are in children or adult sizes. It's safe to assume that they're for children, but back in the early 1990's, Warner Brothers did a big push with adult clothing featuring some of their more famous characters. Even if it's something that appears to be obvious (like here), you still need to mention whether or not it's a child or adult size (can also be mentioned in the title).

A big problem with this auction is that the picture sucks. You can clearly see one of the shirts, but that's it. The others are either wrinkled or covered by other shirts. Three of the listed shirts are hard to tell apart in the picture. An above shot looking straight down at the shirts would have been a much better picture.

Here's another problem:
"1 shirt. XXL. Has a print of Joe Cool. This shirt has three minor spots that you can barely see. I don't think these spots are permanent and they can be easily washed out."

First, this Joe Cool character is also known as Snoopy. One of those names will have a lot more searches than the other. It scares me that somebody advertising cartoon character t-shirts couldn't recognize this one.

Second, when mentioning flaws in an item, you need to take a good picture of those flaws if you expect to sell it online. People are very hesitant in buying anything damaged, especially when they have to take somebody else's word for it.

Third, the seller downplays the damage. Permanent is a strong word to throw out when talking about something that is damaged. If you honestly don't think that the damage is that bad, don't ever use that word. Just mention that a quick run through the washer will take care of the spots.

By not having a picture and trying to downplay the damage, that tells me that, in-fact, the opposite is true. This has the impression that the spots may come out if you use some serious scrubbing or a really powerful detergent. In other words, this is the seller saying "I warned you" when you write back and complain that the spots won't come out of the shirt.

Overall, this advertisement needs to be completely modified if the seller wants to try to sell these shirts online. Between a new title, more elaborate text, and better pictures, this one needs help. The only reasons I didn't give it a failing score was that the seller had the right ideas with listing the shirt designs & sizes, and by having a group picture with the shirts. The ideas were half-heartedly executed along with everything else.

Refurbished refigerator

2008-02-10T10:05:00.000-05:00

Sub-Zero 48" Refrigerator, Refurbished

ended - Monday, February 11, 2008

Auction grade: D+

Starting bid: $200.00

Final sale price: $200.00

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a recently refurbished refrigerator. Specifically, the seller states that this is 48" stainless steel Sub-Zero model fridge. The seller claims that the fridge was in the house when they moved there, but it needed quite a bit of work. Apparently the compressor is still having problems, so the seller is giving up and trying to sell the fridge.

First of all, the title needs to be changed. Important key words such as "stainless steel" and "fridge" need to be included, and I would take out "refurbished". Knowing the seller's situation about trying to get the fridge to work properly but ultimately failing, I would also completely remove the subtitle text under the auction's title. The problem here is that he's giving people reason's not to buy the fridge even before they click on the link.

It's important to point out that you don't want to outright lie to customers initially. You do need to point out important flaws or problems with your items, but don't tell them about it on the main search results page. If you're going to spend the money to list an item on eBay, you're going to want as many people to see your item as possible. Let them decide if they want to purchase the item after they've read everything and have seen the pictures.

The main body of text needs to be completely rewritten. Despite being full of grammar problems, the seller just kind of rants and blabbers about the fridge. All of the improvements that he made need to be pointed out in bullet points. The back story isn't needed, but it is good that he mentioned the repair man's analysis of the problem.

Overall, I'll be surprised if the seller is able to sell the fridge with this eBay advertisement. Despite an non-search friendly and uninviting title & subtitle, there's still the issue of this being a local pickup only (Oklahoma City, OK in this case). A major problem is that the fridge is going to be needing repair work by the next owners. In this case, if the seller hasn't done so, the fridge may be better off being listed on Craigslist.org. It's free to post advertisements like this for people in the local area.

Jeff Gordon car panel

2008-02-09T11:51:00.001-05:00

Jeff Gordon #24 Car Side NASCAR Bristol Sharpie 500

ended - Sunday, February 10, 2008

Auction grade: A-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final sale price: $440.00 (reserve not met)

Up for sale in this eBay auction is an actual piece of Jeff Gordon's car from the 2003 NASCAR Sharpie 500 race in Bristol, TN. The racing damage and tire marks show you how intense racing can get at that crowd favorite short track.

The seller states that there is no certificate of authenticity to accompany this item. Fortunately, most fans will instantly recognize that this is a real part of his stock car.

Overall, this is a pretty good auction. I would have used the term "car panel" instead of "car side", but otherwise the title looks pretty good. The main body text isn't bad. I would have rearranged some thing and broken it up into a few paragraphs, but the right words, descriptions, and dimensions are listed there. The customer has enough important information about the item for sale.

The pictures look very good. Having many of them like the seller has is always a good idea for these rare and/or high priced items.

Poker chips

2008-02-08T10:27:00.000-05:00

87 Antique Clay Poker Chips Engraved Eagle

ended - Sunday, February 10, 2008

Auction grade: B

Starting bid: $24.99

Final sale price: $86.89

Up for sale in this auction is a collection of eighty-seven poker chips. These chips have an older design and feel to them. The seller doesn't mention exactly how old they are, but by looking at the pictures it certainly looks like they've been around for a while.

Apart from some grammar problems, this isn't that bad of an auction. The seller has a few good pictures of the poker chips, and really, there isn't a whole lot you can say about them. It would have helped if the seller still had solid information such as the original box to prove their age.

The seller also mentioned that the chips could use a little cleaning. Obviously, if the seller did that part the chips would look a little bit better in the pictures and they would fetch a high final sale price. In other words, by not cleaning the merchandise the seller is throwing away money (a sales term known as "leaving money on the table").

A more enhanced title, fewer grammar errors, official documentation, and cleaner poker chips would have resulted in a higher auction grade.

Prototype Barbie Doll

2008-02-07T11:23:00.000-05:00

Rare Prototype Swirl Barbie Bendleg in Box/ Orig. Owner

ended - Friday, February 8, 2008

Auction grade: C-

Starting bid: $95.99

Final sale price: $585.00

Up for sale in this auction is a rare prototype Barbie doll with bendable legs. The seller claims that the legs can be clicked and positioned in three different legs. The seller also goes on to mention how she received the doll out of the box, but she restored the doll to a like-new condition.

I need to point out that the seller is lying to the customers in the title. The title says "Orig. Owner", but in the main body of the text it says that she's the second owner. When you say that you're the original owner, it implies that you were the person who received the item directly from the store or factory. In this case, this seller specifically says that she received the doll from a seller who in turn bought it from a store. Therefore, she is at least the second owner (assuming that the store didn't sell a returned item). Plus, she uses the wrong version of "its".

"I got this Barbie from it's original owner. She came to me out of box. The seller told me she got her as a gift in the American Girl box and that she came that way from the store."

I do like how the main body text is written in that pink and white color combination. Those colors are perfect for selling a feminist item like this one.

The way the main text is written is where I have more problems. Despite being full of sentence fragments, the overall flow of the message just doesn't seem to work that well. I can't quite place my finger on what exactly bothers me (besides the grammar errors), but something is there. I don't know if this is good or bad for an auction like this, but you can definitely tell that a woman wrote the text. Most of the time you want your text and wording to look gender-equal.

A big plus for this seller are all of the pictures of this Barbie doll. Some of them are better than others, but there are plenty of angles of the doll and accompanying box. The pictures allow you to get a true feeling for the item before making a winning bid.

Overall, I don't like this auction. Between the seller lying to the customers in the title to the style of text in the auction itself, this is not that good of an auction. The only reason I didn't go for a lower grade was that the seller A) had a good color combination with the text, and B) used lots of pictures. One of my rules is that you can never have too many pictures, especially when selling a vintage item like this one.

Haunted bracelet - WEALTHY LIFE

2008-02-06T12:20:00.000-05:00

HAUNTED~TIBET Multi Gem Bangle Bracelet~WEALTHY LIFE~

ended - Friday, February 8, 2008

Auction grade: A-

Starting bid: $0.99

Final sale price: $22.50

This is a rather interesting eBay auction. This seller specializes in working in the Wicca religion and is selling a special bracelet that will bring the wearer good fortune in wealth. A lot of people are skeptical as to whether or not those voodoo rings and bracelets really work (I'm one of them myself), but the seller does show a page full of customer testimonials.

Overall, this is a pretty interesting auction layout. The title isn't bad (I would have chosen a few different key words myself), and certain key words stand out by being in all caps. This helps catch the user's attention while they scan down the auction listings.

Personally, I like the text that the seller is using in the main body of the auction. That ancient style of font fits in perfectly with the item being sold. It helps make the customer believe that the bracelet works and the seller is an honest person.

The shipping fees are a little bit high considering how little the actual jewelry weighs.

Overall, this is a very amusing and effective auction. The style of text is excellent and I like how the seller included back information about their own spiritual history. That's a power way to help sell your items, especially for something like this. The reason I took off some points was that the seller included a little too many customer testimonials. That was overkill and will turn away some customers. The seller is trying too hard to prove that it works, and that'll just make more people skeptical.

Do you believe in magic?

Crocs children shoes

2008-02-05T14:44:00.000-05:00

CROCS kids shoes girls CAYMAN pink fuchsia size 12 13

ended - Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Auction grade: B+

Starting bid: $0.99

Final sale price: $18.76

Up for sale here is a pair of Crocs shoes for children. Specifically, this is a girl's size 12 and 13 in the Cayman pink style and color. The seller is claiming that this is a brand new set of shoes.

Overall, this is a very simple auction without a whole lot of text or other random information. The title looks very good and I like the way that certain key words are in all caps. Very popular words are used and it'll help this auction get listed in a wide variety of different types of searches that people will do.

The actual auction text is simple too. The pink text color matches the shoes and clearly tells the customer all of the necessary details. Do take note that there are grammar problems throughout the main body of text.

Personally, I don't see the hype behind this style of footwear. I've seen lots of people wearing those shoes in the theme parks in central Florida, and to me they just seem to be too cheesy looking and uncomfortable for lots of walking and long hours on your feet. If you're planning on selling shoes like that, you may be best off waiting until the warmer weather in April or May before cashing in on a quick sale.

Overall, this is a very simple auction. Perhaps it's a little bit too simple. It would have been better if the seller would have used a real picture instead of a stock image. The auction text could have also used some improvement. The title is excellent and a big part of the relatively high score.

Utah Ute Indian photo

2008-02-04T15:16:00.000-05:00

1913 Ute Indian Camp Panorama Photo Native Ame ORIGINAL

ended - Tuesday, February 5, 2008

Auction grade: A

Starting bid: $0.99

Final sale price: $365.00

Up for sale in this eBay auction is a 1913 vintage panorama picture of a group of Utah Ute Indians. The indians appear to be wearing traditional clothing, including weapons such as shields and tomahawks.

Overall, this is a clear and professional looking auction. The title is neatly written and includes many good key words. The main body of text is neatly spaced and easy to read (only one or two spelling and grammar errors). The seller took the extra step and went into the history of the picture, Ute tribe, and location.

With over 800 positive pieces of feedback in the past month, this seller means business.

Overall, this is an excellent auction. From the very good title, to the vast amount of information in the text, to the numerous pictures, this will bring in the buyers. The only reason I didn't give it a perfect score was that I didn't like how all of the text was centered in the main body of the auction. That is unprofessional and looks a little bit sloppy. Left-oriented paragraphs would have been a better option.

Chinese drapes

2008-02-03T15:33:00.000-05:00

vintage art chinese nouveau curtains drapes dragons

ended Monday, February 4, 2008

Auction grade: B

Starting bid: $9.99

Final sale price: $187.50

This seller is auctioning a set of drapes that have hung in their home for many years. These drapes have a Chinese theme going with several dragons.

The auction title has the right idea. A word or two could have proper capitalization, but the right key words are listed. This listing should easily show up in a variety of different searches.

The actual listing could use a little more work. There are numerous grammar errors throughout the listing. The main body of text should also be broken up and made a little easier to read and understand. Bullet points would be excellent when listing dimensions and key features.

This seller gets bonus points for the low shipping costs. By not ripping off sellers with those expensive "handling" fees, this seller is going to earn the right for more customers to do repeat business in the near future. 314 positive pieces of feedback (none of them neutral or negative) is an excellent sign that this is an honest seller.

Overall, this auction is pretty good. It's neither outstanding nor poor, but the right ideas are there. The main body of text needs the most work, as there are grammar and spacing issues throughout the text. A big plus is that the seller listed the dimensions, and the pictures are pretty good too.

Canon PowerShot A720 Digital Camera

2008-02-01T15:47:00.000-05:00

Canon PowerShot A720 IS 8.0 MP Digital Camera New

ended - Sunday, February 3, 2008

Auction grade: A+

Starting bid: $0.95

Final sale price: $185.05

In this digital camera auction, the seller is offering a brand new Canon PowerShot A720 IS 8.0 MegaPixel digital camera.

This guy is a PowerSeller, and the advertisement for this camera is sharp and professional. All of the text is easy to read, and highlights of the camera are clearly pointed out in bullet points. With over 4,300 positive feedback notes within the past 12 months, this is a seller who knows how to do things correctly.

The only part of this auction that bothers me is the stock photo. Personally, I want customers to see a real image of the actual item that they're about to purchase. Stock photos only lead to people questioning the legitimacy of the item. I know that it's common for dealers to sell items on eBay, and most of them use the same stock photos too. If you are a real person selling a real item, try not to use a stock photo.

Super Bowl ticket

2008-01-31T20:33:00.000-05:00

1-SUPER BOWL SUPERBOWL XLII TICKET- IN HAND - SIDELINE

ended - Friday, February 1, 2008

Auction grade: A-

Starting bid: $1,000.00

Final sale price: $6,100.00

This seller is trying to sell a single football ticket for the Super Bowl XLII (New England Patriots versus New York Giants) in Glendale, Arizona.

Apart from some minor spelling and grammar errors, this is a pretty good advertisement. Personally, I wouldn't use all caps in the title, especially in a highly competitive area for the next few days. For effect, I would use all caps for a word or phrase, but definitely not for the entire title.

An interesting thing is the way the seller makes it a point to know that you'll be sitting right next to him for the game. If you feel you got scammed or if the guy's a jerk, you can let him know and annoy him during the entire game.

This seller has a good idea of already reserving a room for a couple of nights for the buyer. He mentions that you don't have to use the reservation, but it is there an an option.

If the seller originally bought the ticket for $2950, I wonder if he's still going to make a profit by the end of the auction. The current bid is only $1755 with just over a day left for the auction.

Overall, I don't know why but I'm very amused by this auction. I like the main body of the text where the seller explains about the ticket and gives the buyer an option for the hotel reservation. The title written in all caps was a bad idea, and the seller needs to know the difference in words between "chose" and "choose".