.: A Searching Lesson – Take advantage of eBay’s searching

By:Brian McGregor

Category:Home / Internet / Tools and Resources / Online Auctions

76 million times each day, members use eBay's search box when they're looking for items that are of interest to them.

It occurred to me that very few of these members would know how eBay's search worked. Put another way, knowing how eBay's search system operates might help you in finding bargains.

For a start, words keyed into the standard search box are only matched against auction titles, and not against the contents of auction descriptions.

eBay's searching defaults to an "all present" style of search. This means if you key in two words such as ‘finding nemo’, the search will return auctions where the title contains both words in any order. It won't bring back auctions if the auction title contains only one of the words.

If you want to do a search of an "either or" style, you place parentheses around the words and separate them with a comma and no spaces. So, if you key in (finding,nemo) your search will return auctions with either finding or nemo in the auction title.

Of course, with the finding nemo example, what you really want to do is find auctions where finding nemo occurs as a phrase. To do this, you place quotation marks before and after. So, if you key in "finding nemo" your search will return auctions where the titles contain the exact phrase finding nemo.

If you're not sure of the spelling of a particular word, or if the word you want to search on is a preface with several endings, you can use an asterisk as a "wild card". For example if you're interested in a Vuitton handbag, some sellers misspell vuitton or type it in incorrectly. You could search on vui*, and this will bring back auctions with vuitton or vuiton in the title, or indeed vui followed by any other combination of letters.

These are probably the main search weapons you need to save you time, and to help you home in on the items you want to find. If you wish to explore eBay searching in even more depth, you will find a very useful description of the process here:

http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/buy/search_commands.html

Digg del.icio.us Blink Stumble Spurl Reddit Netscape Furl

Article keywords: ebay, selling, buying, online auction, online auctions, sell, seller, sellers

Article Source: http://www.articles32.com

Brian McGregor is an eBay and internet entrepreneur. He recently created the 'eBay Master Class' for eBay sellers. For your free copy, please go to http://www.workwinners.com/ebm-request.htm

.: New Online Auctions Articles

1). Silicone Bracelets - Online Fundraising Campaign
For an Online fundraising campaign, the fundraiser organiser can place an up-front order or exact order, and then allow the customers to order directly exact number of silicone bracelets online from the website.

2). Things You Need To Know Before Selling On Ebay
This articles goes over Ebay rules and policies and what you are not allowed to sell in an auction.

3). 5 Secrets To Becoming A Successful Seller On Ebay
This article gives the secrets neccessary to become a successful seller on Ebay

4). How To Discover Great Deals At EBay
Everybody loves a good deal! Lots of buyers and sellers spend quite a bit of time searching for fantastic deals on the items that they want and need, and as they discover those deals, they experience a decided leap of satisfaction.

5). The eBay Auction Site
Which other site is more familiar to the ears of any person with any idea of what the internet is? Of course, there are those that do not know what eBay is but most of them don’t know what cars are either. That is why the title of this article is simply, The eBay Auction Site. You know what it is, I know what it is, and really, the only explanation we need for what it is, is its simple title.

6). Effectively Finding Products to Sell on eBay: To Consign or Not to Consign
I remember the first time I sold something for someone on eBay. It was a great feeling. Not great, like, I’m getting married tomorrow or, I just won the lottery, but another type of great. I felt as thought I had helped someone out and made some extra money. Those two things combined can create such a fulfilling feeling. This act, however, that of taking ownership of someone’s belongings, then selling those belongings and receiving a commission is commonly called consignment.

7). Steps You Can Take To Ensure You're Getting A Great Deal At eBay
Everyone loves a great deal! Many people spend quite a bit of time searching for good deals on the items that they want and need – and when they find those deals, they experience a certain amount of satisfaction. These people typically haunt garage sales, stores that are holding sales, wholesale warehouses, flea markets, and especially online and offline auctions.


.: Top Online Auctions Articles

1). How to build positive Ebay feedback quickly.
Presented by Tradeco As a new Ebay member, you will have no feedback. This can affect your credibility with both buyers and sellers. Furthermore, you are prevented from listing items with “Buy it now” or as a “Featured Plus” listing, until you have a feedback score of 10 or more. To build your feedback, you could battle through the early days, doing business as usual, with feedback increasing every time you make a sale or purchase.

2). What were the top selling eBay items for 2005?
Amazon and eBay reported on their top-selling items for the past year. This is including popular tech toys and gadgets. In the consumer electronics category, the top seller for the Seattle-based e-tailer was the silver CyberHome CH-DVD 300S progressive scan DVD player. In second place was Apple Computer’s 2-gigabyte iPod nano in black, followed in third place by Apple’s 512-megabyte iPod Shuffle.

3). Don't Let Negative Feedback On Ebay Get You Down
Remember the student in school who complained (or even cried) because they only got a ninety-nine percent mark on an assignment or test. Meanwhile, some of us were relieved (if not ecstatic) to have merely passed. I actually witnessed one case where the math student insisted that he was not wrong. On rechecking the test, the teacher realized the answer sheet was wrong and not the student.

4). How to Increase Your eBay Auction Response in 10 Easy Steps
Getting a buyer to your eBay auction listing is one thing. Making them actually bid on your item, is another. There are many factors that go into making an auction successful such as starting price, your marketing copy, and timing, to mention a few. Those factors apply to any auction, and sellers who know how to use those factors right get good response to their auctions.

5). Spotting Fakes and Frauds on eBay
Fake items abound on eBay, and it takes much effort not to be duped by scammers who peddle these wares. There have been many painful stories relating how a seemingly legitimate item turned out to be either fake or defective.

6). Increase Your Ebay Sales With A “SquareTrade” Seal.
SquareTrade are eBay’s chosen provider of dispute resolution services. If you want your buyers to have a little more confidence in you, you can get a SquareTrade seal, and put it on each one of your auctions. The chances are that you’ve seen these seals around. They show SquareTrade’s blue and green logo, along with the eBay user’s ID and the current date.

7). How To Stop Ebay Auction Sniping.
Every day, hapless bidders get beaten to the punch by auction snipers who jump in at the last minute. I know how annoying it can be, as I once had it happen to me three times in a row on the same item! The thing is that the only people who can help the poor bidders are us, the sellers. The Problem. Bidders will bid on an item and then wait for days until it finishes, only to have someone else outbid them at the last minute.


Page loaded in 0.060 seconds.