Why optimise eBay listings?
eBay is one of the pioneers in eCommerce; it has been around for over 20 years. And, after all these years, eBay is still growing at a staggering pace. In fact, in the last ten years alone, eBay has doubled the number of active users on its platform to over 160 million. As the platform has become more popular among buyers, it has drawn in many more sellers and today there are more than 25 million of them offering goods across hundreds of categories.
Another fact that illustrates the level of competitiveness on eBay: there are over 1 billion live listings at any given time. It’s very hard to stand out when you’re competing with millions of sellers. The most proven method to grab buyers’ attention is by optimising your listings—once potential shoppers arrive to your listing they need to convert!
To help you maximise your eBay sales in time for the holiday season, Maxim Godin Co-founder and CMO of CrazyLister shares his top six optimisation tactics:
1. Use a unique value proposition
Many sellers ask what should they focus on to increase sales. The first thing they need to think about is:
-Why would anyone buy from you and not your competitor?
-What is so special about your business vs the competition?
-In other words: what is your unique value proposition?
If you want to build a reputation, you must develop a unique business identity—something you’re the best in. A value proposition is a clear statement that explains how your product solves customers’ problems or improves their situation, delivers specific benefits and tells the ideal customer why they should buy from you instead of the competition.
It can be many things, although it’s best to avoid using phrases like: the fastest shipping, the lowest prices, the best customer support…they are simply too easy to copy.
2. Use descriptive visuals
If you’re selling fashion or jewellery products, get a picture with someone wearing it. Pull in a favour from a friend and have them model for you. If that’s not possible, put a familiar object in the shot for size comparison, ensuring that the focus stays on your product and not the props you use.
3. Optimise listings for mobile devices
With 58 percent of eBay transactions being touched by mobile, making your eBay listings optimised for mobile is crucial for winning sales. Optimised simply means that they will automatically adjust for mobile devices. There are two key ways to make your listings mobile responsive:
-Code savvy users can create listings with HTML and CSS. eBay provide code pieces for mobile responsive listings and if you know how to code then you can create mobile responsive listings.
-Most people, however, are not coders and just want a simple solution to solve this problem so that they can concentrate on increasing sales. As of today the only solution that enables sellers create mobile optimised eBay listings without touching a line of code is CrazyLister. Every template in CrazyLister is by default mobile optimised so it will look great on any mobile device.
4. Add item specifics to all listings
Item specifics are details about the item being sold, such as brand, size, type, colour, and style. These details appear at the top of your listing description, making it easy for buyers to get the facts about your item. When you create your listing, review and complete the ‘add item specifics’ section for each item you’re selling. Item specifics help buyers to find your product and drive more traffic to your listings.
5. Communicate value in a few seconds
With so many distractions nowadays our attention span has decreased to less than 7 seconds—that’s less than a goldfish! Buyers don’t have the time or patience to go over your entire description. With such huge choice they can barely figure out what to buy, let alone read every single word in your listing description. Figure out what potential buyers need to understand in order to make a purchase and communicate this in a clear way in your listing description.
6. Avoid Javascript and Flash in your listings
One of the most critical issues eBay sellers face at the moment is the ban of active content which will be implemented in June 2017. eBay already started notifying sellers to replace all active content in their listings to avoid rendering issues. Active content is code used to enhance listings. This code is usually Javascript and Flash. You can create the same elements by using HTML and CSS instead.
With the ever increasing competition on eBay, you can no longer just list items and hope for them to sell. Listing optimisation is the most time effective process to increase your eBay sales consistently and grow your online business.
Maxim Godin is Co-founder and CMO of CrazyLister
Website: CrazyLister
Twitter: @GodinMaxim