eBay Misspelling Hype: Seperating Fact from Fiction

No doubt if you have clicked to read this guide, you know something about the theory that searching for misspelled words in eBay auction titles with applications like www.fatfingers.com - can lead to bigtime profits and/or savings for you.

A few observations that might be food for thought.

I have been a member on eBay since 1997, not too long after it came to life a decade ago. Ever since it's humble beginnings, there has been chatter in various eBay newsgroups and chat rooms about the profitability of searching out misspelled words in eBay auction titles. Perhaps you have dropped the money to buy one of the 50 or so eBooks that spout the same old story of making big money looking for other people's listing mistakes. I have spent considerable time and effort investigating the profitablity of this venture, and here is what I have found to be true...

My belief is that the window of opportunity to capitalize on this phemomenon closed after eBay's first year in existence. Why do I say that? Because once the membership grew into the millions, too many buyers were making the same typo's as the sellers, thus creating enough of a pool of bidders to drive most auctions to their market value. I have used www.fatfingers.com (FF) since it was created, and before that, I used the other appplications out there that did the same thing. What did I learn? Using FF is a lot like gambling, the only time you are going to get a great deal, is under the following scenerio - You happen to find a poorly listed (misspelled keyword) auction title, that was just listed, with a below value Buy-It-Now option. That is most probably the ONLY time you will find a deal. I will show this to be true by example in a moment.
Fact is, there are tens of millions of eBay members...with tens of thousands of eBay members searching for the same items. Of these tens of thousands of members, how many of those buyers make the same misspelling error as the sellers? Let's be conservative and say 10%. So for example, there are 10,000 eBay members searching for Zildjian Cymbals on eBay. There are 10-12 auctions that have Zildjian misspelled. If 10% of 10,000 searchers make the same spelling error, that means that misspelled auction is being viewed by 1000 prospective buyers. What if the percentage is cut in half? Still 500 prospective bidders looking at that misspelled auction. As with everything in life, the truth is in the numbers.

A Roll of the Dice

In all the years I have been having a bit of fun gambling by looking for misspelled auction deals on Ebay, I have only 'hit the jackpot' once. Here's what happened...

A guy's father was selling his son's drumset, and in particluar, drum cymbals, after his son went off to college. The father had no idea what he was selling, and not only that, he listed the cymbals with the incorrect spelling and he attached a Buy-It-Now price ridiculously low. I caught this auction only an hour after it was listed and scooped it up in a heartbeat; Resold the cymbals on eBay and made a killing. Years, and years of searching out and only one payoff.

One Secret Worth Its Weight in Gold

If you have the time, and the inspiration, the only way to really have a fighting chance making any money with misspelled search programs like FF is to use the "Include Description" search when looking for misspelled words in eBay auctions. Often times a seller will list an item with a Generic Title like "Husbands Baseball Card Collection". Many savvy searchers looking for Mickey Mantle Cards (For example) will earch for "Mickey Mantle" in the Description of an auction. But most do not search for that person who misspelled the word "Mantle" in the baseball card collection auction description. I have heard of some buyers having some luck with this.

In Summary

The old adage that "Something that is too good to be true, usually is" is more times true, than not. Such is the case here. I invite you to use www.fatfingers.com and come to your own conclusions. I trust you will find that the "Make a million with Misspelled Words" phenomenon, is, by and large, a hollow money making proposition.

If you found this guide helpful, please take a moment to click the 'yes' button below.

Safe Bidding everyone.

msrs_online