Ten Commandments for Sellers

What to know if you want Buyers to bid on your Used or NWT Designer Clothing

Written by an eBay Shop-a-holic!

1.  Include a good picture or two:  Sellers, please, go back and review your listing after you've posted your item.   It is surprising how many items have terribly photos, photos of the wrong item entirely, or photos that  just won't open.    If you feel you need to apologize for the quality of the photo...maybe you should take a different photo...or get a new camera! 

Pay the extra few cents to include a Gallery photo.  (That is the one that shows up in the search, without having to open up your auction link to see it).  Buyers usually scroll down a whole page of listings at a time,  and many, like me, only look at with a gallery photo.   I don't have all day to open up individual listings one by one to see the pictures. 

2.  Include some basic measurements-hip, waist, bust, inseam!  Nothing is more irritating than to pick through a twenty-paragraph listing and find no words that actually tell me something useful.  What's "flattering and comfy" on you may be skin tight on someone else, and sizes mean nothing, there is no "standard", not even with the same manufacturer.  The only way is to measure! 

Sellers who say, "email me if you'd like the measurements" make me wanna scream!  I don't want to email you, wait for a reply, go back to the listing again to remind myself what it even was for, etc.   EVERYONE wants to know the measurements, please, just include them.

Saying, "ask questions early!" implies that you think the bidder has been watching your item for a week.  Maybe some people have time to look at thousands of items when surfing eBay, but many only look at those ending soonest.  And then there is no time to ask questions.  If you put enough helpful info in your listing, questions are seldom even necessary.

3.  Don't call me FAT!!  I am sorry, but I don't care if you lost weight and frankly, putting that in your listing is a HUGE turnoff .  I see it all the time, though.  As a buyer, I read that and think, "wow, I need to go on a diet, too.  If this seller went on a diet so she wouldn't have to wear this size, do I really want to bid, and admit that I am still fat enough to wear it?" 

I know you want to pat yourself on the back for your achievement, who wouldn't, good for you!  But it sure isn't going to help put me in the mood to buy your "fat" clothes.  Save your self-congratulations for your friends & family; let your buyer feel good about what size she wears right now. 

4.  Leave out all the petty, picky rules.  I am buying a ten dollar used blouse, not a new car, and I am probably bidding on five different ones, plus twenty other items, all from different sellers.  I am not going to spend a half hour reading through your rambling diatribe about how you've been burned and now require this and that. 

Here is what this eBayer actually reads in your listing, aside from the item description:  I check to see what the seller's feedback is, what the shipping cost is, and if the seller takes paypal, then I bid.  That's all.  If it's over $50 or so, I might check to see if the seller offers insurance.  If I win, I click on the pay now button in eBay, takes me to paypal, I pay, done.  I don't check for emails about the win, or go back to re-read the listing; these small-ticket items are not worth spending a lot of time dwelling over. 

Ebay has certain features that will set your parameters such as shipping methods and costs. return policy, payment methods accepted and not accepted, and eBay has dispute resolution and all sorts of other things already built in, they are professionals and have been doing this for years. 

Find out what the eBay rules and listing features are, and how to use them, and leave out all the excess commentary (unless you are a professional seller with an eBay store and need all the extra language for some reason). 

For most sellers, listing rules in your listing is just repeating what is already a rule, or you are perhaps making up rules that are not approved by eBay or enforcable anyhow.   Either way, it's distracting and probably 99% unnecessary as again, it's not enforcable unless it's an eBay or Paypal rule which already goes without saying.  (See what I mean about being redundant?) 

If you have some very specific information, such as you will be on vacation and unless payment recieved by a certain date, shipping will not occur for 2 weeks, by all means, include that.

5.  Disclose your S&H Fees!:  Make sure they show up in your auction listing.  I will not bid if I don't know what you charge to ship.  There is no reason to not know what shipping will cost you, plus what handling fee you want, before you list your item.  All you need to know is the items' size and weight, and that is not going to change! 

eBay offers various ways to build in S&H, from a flat rate to calculated by zip code, to offering buyers several options, to offering combined shipping discounts, all calculated at time of sale, by eBay.  Just figure out what you want to do, and build it into your listing.

Remember, postage rates are public information; don't gouge people on shipping, thinking they won't know what it really cost you to send it.  Many if not all buyers are also sellers.  They know what it cost you and how much you took as a handling fee, you are not fooling anyone.  It's fine to charge for handling, most everyone does.  Just be honest and reasonable.

Another word on shipping:  I refuse to bid on items where the listing advises the Seller will accept returns if they have grossly misrepresented an item, or sent the wrong item, BUT, they will not refund the shipping fees paid by the buyer.  Excuse me?  If you bungle the order and send me the wrong item, or make a major, deal-breaker mistake on your listing, then don't expect the Buyer to pay you shipping and handling for sending this mistake out and then also pay to send it back to you.  Not to mention the time and effort that the Buyer has now had to invest in returning your mistake to you!  Who do you think has to repack and reship that item to you? How rude, to suggest that the Buyer should get stuck with the shipping and handling costs, in either direction!  Please be fair, and if you err, make it up to your Buyer! 

When I screw up, I refund all the handling (since I screwed up the handling, how can I justify charging for it?!), I also refund the return shipping, I send the right item out immediately, and a nice gift as an apology, like a pair of earrings or a scarf.  Depending on circumstance, I may also refund part of the purchase price, or if it's a pretty low priced sale, I refund every last penny, bid and S&H, & tell the Buyer to just keep the item with my sincere apologies for the inconvenience and disappointment I have caused them.  It is called a cost of doing business, and customer service.  

Of course we all know there are Buyers with Remorse, who make mountains out of molehills so they can get a full or partial refund.  Or even damage goods upon receipt so they can return them. Shame on them.  If you know that's what you are dealing with and their communication and/or feedback supports your suspicion, by all means, put 'em through the wringer!  But don't paint all Buyers with the Guilty brush from the get-go.  After years of buying and selling with hundreds and hundreds of people, I've never once, at least not to my knowledge, been ripped off by anyone.   

6.  Use your title to give us useful info!  This includes telling us what the brand, color, and size is, and a brief description of what the item is.  If I see "womens blouse", with a non-gallery picture, trust me, I am not going to bother looking.  If that is all you think of your item, and that's all the effort you are putting into this, I will assume it is junk.   I scroll past 99% of clothing listings without even opening the auction to see more info.  If you don't catch my eye when scrolling, I'm gone. 

7.  Be honest, Be clean; (aka:"Do Unto Others..."):  If there is severe pilling, a missing button, the zipper doesn't stay up, the garment truly reeks of perfume or cigars, or there is a stain on the front,  and you still want to try to sell it, be honest.  Either someone is going to be okay with the flaw or not, but don't hope they don't notice, because they will.  And,  eBay rules are that all clothing and shoes sold should be clean.  Please adhere to this. 

8.  Please Do Not Scream At Me Like Used Car Salesman!   "LOOK!"  "Must SEE!"  "Fabulous!" irritates me.  Don't give me orders (LOOK!), and don't say things like "Fabulous!"  unless it's really true.  If I open your "Awesome!!!" listing only to find a used plain red t shirt with no special features, I am not going to trust you on any of your other listing descriptions, and I will stop looking at your items. 

9.  Suck it up and get a paypal account!  I rarely, rarely will buy from someone who expects me to drive into town, pay for a money order, address an envelope, mail it to some unknown address across the country, and then wait for them to cash it, pack, ship, and the item to arrive.  If you don't like e-commerce, or think the fees are too high, then get off eBay and open up your garage door, or take it to a consignment shop.  The security and the ease of paying via Paypal is invaluable to most reputable buyers. 

Sellers who have issues with paypal and insist on some other service, please realize you are hassling your buyers.  Whatever petty cost difference there is, you lose, in the long run.  People won't bid as much on your items if they have to deal with the hassle of being re-routed to some other service, typing in all their info again, it's a pain in the butt, and I avoid it like the plague.  I've blocked about a dozen sellers who have great stuff but I don't want to bother with the runaround and lots of times, I just click on "paypal only" before I search, so I don't have to worry about it at all.

10.  Pack neat, and Ship reasonably fast.  I don't appreciate getting a blouse crammed into a letter size envelope, three weeks after I paid for it, so you can ship it on the cheap and take $6 of your $7 shipping fee as additional profit.  (Yes, I know who you are.)  Those of us who bid and buy tons of stuff off eBay, know that most Sellers use Priority mail, ship a few times each week, either place the garment in a ziplock bag or wrap in tissue, or both, inside the Priority pkg, and most include a copy of the receipt, and a personal note or card.  That's pretty much the norm.  Some packages are even better, once you open the outside box, you find your item wrapped like a gift, or like a boutique would do, with tissue, ribbon, and a trinket/gift.  Those sellers go on my favorite seller lists, since it's like having a birthday present come in the mail when you get their deliveries.  Fun fun fun! 

Above all, eBay should be just that:  FUN.  No hassles, no lists of rules as long as my arm, no major disappointments from misleading or incomplete listings.  No month long wait for your item to arrive and if there is a problem, the Seller should handle it professionally and remember to always treat others, the way you yourself would like to be treated!