Ebay just seems to be another one of those darling Internet
phenoms like Google that just seems to do no wrong. With nearly
15 billion in sales last year and over 10 million visitors every
month (and still growing!), it seems like Ebay might be taking
on giants like Wal-Mart in a few years. Ebay auctions can be
very profitable for sellers but it takes hard work and sacrifice
to make an Ebay business successful.
To people first entering into the world of online auctions, the
most important thing might seem to be the product itself. The
better or more popular the item, the higher the bids should
reasonably be. As true as this seems, succeeding with Ebay
auctions is actually more complicated.
Marketing is a part of any business and definitely plays a huge
role in separating a successful one from those that fail. In
every form of marketing, the main point is to inform the
customer of the advantage they receive by using your company to
buy a product or service.
To make money on Ebay and ultimately succeed, you need to focus
on the product description. After all, people cannot actually
see or touch the items they are buying using Ebay auctions. All
that they have to go on when deciding whether to bid (or
hopefully, how much to bid!) is a picture and your product
description. You have to inform them about your product and
convince them that they are getting more by buying it from you
than someone else selling the same thing.
Feature
Product descriptions boil down to three things: Feature,
Advantage, and Benefit. An Ebay business must accurately
describe the features of a product to the customer or risk
negative feedback or even no bids for an item. Describe the
features of your item using positive (not inaccurate or overly
fluffy) words so that they clearly understand everything about
the item but still feel good about it.
Advantage
What advantage does this item have over similar items that may
be listed with other Ebay business owners? You have to convince
the buyer that your item is superior to others like it and
therefore demanding of a higher bid. This may require some
creativity on your part but just remember to be honest.
Benefit
Your customers will want to know what benefit they receive by
buying this item from you instead of some other Ebay business
owner. There are a couple of options here. First, you could
focus on the benefits of doing business with you and tell them
why you offer superior quality and service compared with your
competition.
A return policy is a good idea to focus on and will help your
customer feel more secure about doing business with you if they
know that they can return the product if it not what they were
expecting (of course if you remember to be accurate when
describing the features, this should rarely arise and is
therefore a fairly safe policy to incorporate that definitely
helps build a positive feedback rating).
Secondly, you can also focus on the item itself. How does this
particular item benefit the potential buyer? Is it rare or come
with some verifiable but interesting history? In all honesty,
you can be fairly creative here as well. Just don't promise
something that your item cannot possibly deliver upon.
Ebay auctions are a new and rather odd way to buy things. Not
seeing or touching the products requires a bit of faith on the
part of a buyer. Build that faith and trust with your customers
by delivering the best description possible so that they can
literally visualize this item and how it will benefit their
lives. Your Ebay business will succeed if you remember to
incorporate feature, advantage, and benefit in every product
description.
About the author:
Jason James website 'The Auction Resource Network' reveals his
inside secrets and sources that help him pocket over $10,000 a
month on eBay.
Claim your FREE 'Top 10 eBay Selling Secrets' eBook:
www.auctionresourcen
etwork.com
