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eBay Tips
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Search Tips
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| About eBay search tips |
| Part 1 - Research |
| Part 2 - eBay Organization |
| Part 3 - General Search |
| Part 4 - Advanced Search |
| Part 5 - Final Note |
| eBay Search Tips | |||||
| Note: Clicking on the hyperlinks
in this text will open a new window. Close the window to return to the
Search Tips.
eBAY SEARCH TIPS
Searching the great marketplace of eBay can often be a bewildering and
even confusing experience, but the eBay search engine becomes your most
valuable tool when used properly. We will offer a simple approach to
finding exactly the item you want using the eBay search function to scan
the auction listings for all relevant information.
The eBay Search Tips will show you how to perform:
General Searches (Dolls, Jewelry) Specific Searches (Cabbage Patch Kids Dolls, Indian Jewelry) Exact Searches (1989 Cabbage Patch Kids Indian Dolls, Zuni Indian Opal Inlay Bracelet) |
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| Part 1 - Research | |||||
| Researching the specifics
of the item you seek will save you time and effort. This is especially
true if you are searching for an exact item. Obtaining pertinent facts
will help you zero in on an item even if it was listed in the wrong category.
Sellers are often not experts and sometimes are unsure of the purpose
of the listed item (e.g. Listing an eighteenth century hairpin holder
as a sewing pincushion). Sellers should also include as much information
as they can gather about their item to help potential buyers doing searches
to quickly locate the auction.
A typical research checklist:
1. The manufacturer or brand name 2. Date of manufacture 3. Make and model number 4. Slang names for item 5. eBay sellers accepted shorthand (more on this later) 6. Descriptive terms-color, size, material and any words that apply to define the item |
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| Part 2 Looking at eBay's organization | ||||||||||||||
EBAY AUCTION ORGANIZATION
(A little background info always helps):
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| Part 3 General Search | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
GENERAL SEARCH
eBay search tips will primarily be limited to finding items at auction
on eBay. You may also use the search functions to do an advanced
search, to locate auctions by item
number, find sellers,
track bidders,
locate eBay
stores and find completed
auctions.
The eBay home page
has a box where you can enter your search word/words directly and includes
a smart search option that links you to the search page. Most eBay pages
have a convenient search box you can use to do a quick basic search and
includes an option to also look for your search terms in the item descriptions.
Clicking the search button in the top menu bar takes you to the search
page. Note the Tips
link located next to the search button for quick access to eBay's search
tips help pages. Along the top are seven search options. The default
is a general search. The only required box is the Search Title. Enter
your search word/words and click search. You will be presented with a
list of Auction Title Lines that contain the word/words you entered into
the Search Title box. We will use "Indian Jewelry Zuni Bracelet" (note:
do not include the parenthesis we used to clarify our search terms) to
illustrate the steps in searching for a particular item.
We begin the search by entering the word "jewelry" in the Search Title
Box and clicking search.
Note the box on this page located upper left titled Basic Search. You
can enter addition search words here without returning to the search page.
More than seventeen thousand items for auction that contain the word "jewelry"
in the Title Line are presented in the default order of auctions ending
first. An overwhelming list to sort through.
Let's begin to narrow our search by selecting a category from the drop
down menu on the search
page. We select "Jewelry, Gemstones" and click search
and again we are presented with a long list of more than fourteen thousand
items in the category "Jewelry, Gemstones" that contain the word "Jewelry"
in the title line.
Next we add another word to the search title line and enter "Indian Jewelry"
and click search.
We have now pared our list to less than three hundred items. This represents
five pages of listings and we could certainly look at each item but let
us continue to define our quest by adding another word to the Search Title.
We enter "Indian Jewelry Zuni" and click search
and our list of auctions is reduced to a very manageable number, in this
case ten items. Most certainly a list we can manually sort through to
find the item.
We can further the reduction by entering more words in the search title,
"Indian Jewelry Zuni Bracelet". Click search
and we are down to a couple of items that have these search words in the
Auction Title Line. We have successfully found what we searched for using
common words and a general search. Sometimes we cannot find the particular
items we seek because none are listed on eBay. Continue to search for
your wanted item after a short time span because thousands of item are
listed on eBay every day.
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| Part 4 Advanced Search | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ADVANCED SEARCH
This eBay search function offers an easy method of doing specialized searching.
Clicking the Advanced
Search button located in the menu bar at the top of the search page
presents a detailed page of search options. The only required box is
the Search Title. You can tailor your search to quickly locate the items
you seek and sort the results by personal preference. Drop down menus
offers options to customize your search and quickly find the item. Most
of the options are self-explanatory. You can refine your search according
to price range, type of auction and specific categories. The words to
exclude option will eliminate items that don't meet your search criteria.
Clicking the "Title and Description" option tells the search engine to
look for your search words in the auction description as well as the Title
Line. The format option gives you a choice of how the search results
are presented. You can even choose payment methods and currency choices.
The Locator option allows you to select and search a particular geographical
region of listed auctions.
BY ITEM NUMBER
Absolutely the simplest method of finding an item at auction is the Item
Number search option. Enter the Item Auction Number and you will
go directly to the auction. The Item Number is located below the Auction
Title Line at the top of the auction. Want to easily monitor an auction?
Save the Item Number and use the By Item Number option to quickly go to
the auction.
BY SELLER
Use this search function to easily find your favorite sellers. Click
the By
Seller option and enter the sellers' eBay ID and you will go directly
to a listing of that sellers' current auctions.
BY BIDDER Selecting the By Bidder option and entering your eBay ID provides a list of auctions you have bid on. A very convenient method of tracking your bidding activity. SEARCH STORES A search function that searches the eBay stores. Store items are not included in the Auction Item searches. You can find a particular eBay store with the Search Stores option. COMPLETED ITEMS The Completed Items search function allows you to search for items after the auction has ended. The drop down menu allows you to sort the results by preference. SORTING RESULTS The eBay search engine allows you various options to sort your search results. The default option is Auctions Ending First but you may choose Newly-Listed Items First, Lowest-Priced Items first or Highest-Priced Items first. Select the results sort option that returns the search results you are seeking. MODIFIERS We have attempted to cover most of the eBay search options. Most of the common search techniques utilized with search engines (Google, Lycos) are applicable to the eBay search functions. You can add various modifiers to eliminate the unwanted returns and search for exact items. The following list of modifiers and examples will help you to quickly search for most anything. Note: Search Terms are NOT Case-Sensitive. You will get the same search results with either capitol or lower case letters. Example: INDIAN JEWELRY will return the same results as indian jewelry or Indian Jewelry. SEARCH WORD FORMAT You must enter the Search Title words following a simple format. For general searches without modifiers the words are entered with one space between them. Extra spaces or no spaces will not produce the wanted search returns so exercise care in entering your Search Title. Adding modifiers requires an exact format covered later. Remember to change your words and try different combinations of search words if you do not get the desired results. ADDING or SUBTRACTING WORDS A long list of results can be pared down to a manageable number by continuing to add words in the Search Title. Subtracting words for the Search Title may help you find your search item. Example: You are searching for Zuni Indian sterling silver opal bracelet and you entered the words into the Search Title box and got no results. Begin eliminating the descriptive words one at a time until you get results. Adding words to the Search Title has the opposite effect of reducing the number of results. EXACT PHRASING of SEARCH WORDS Enclosing your Search Title words in parenthesis will instruct the search to only look for the words in an exact sequence. Example: Enclosing "Zuni Indian sterling silver opal bracelet" will return only those results with the search words in the exact order you entered them in the enclosed parentheses. EXCLUDE a WORD You want to find Zuni Indian Bracelets that don't have turquoise. You enter Zuni Indian bracelets and add the modifier -turquoise. Do not add a space after the minus sign. Example: Your Search Title would be: Zuni Indian bracelets -turquoise EXCLUDE a GROUP of WORDS You want to find Zuni Indian bracelets that don't have turquoise, coral or jet. Enclose the excluded words in parenthesis separated by commas with no spaces and place the minus sign at the front. Example: Your Search Title would be: Zuni Indian bracelets -(turquoise,coral,jet) MULTIPLE WORD SEARCHES You are searching for items containing the words Navajo or Zuni. Enclose the key words in parentheses separated by commas, no spaces. Example: Your Search Title would be: (Navajo,Zuni) All items containing either of the words will appear in the results. MULTIPLE WORD SEARCH with ADDED KEYWORD You are searching for titles containing the words Navajo and Zuni plus bracelet. Example: Your search title would be: (Navajo,Zuni) +bracelet All items containing the word Navajo and bracelet or Zuni and bracelet will be returned. SEQUENCE of LETTERS You are searching for items that contain a certain sequence of letters Nav and Zu. You enter the sequence followed by an asterisk. Example: Your Search title would be: Nav* Zu* All title lines with words beginning with Nav such as Navajo, Navajos, navigate and all words beginning Zu such as Zuni, Zunis, zucchini will be returned. ADDING or DROPPING the "S" The eBay search engine considers the singular and plural forms to be two different words. Searching for bracelets will return only those titles with bracelets. Dropping the s to have bracelet will return only results with bracelet in the title. Remember to add or drop the s or include both forms of the word when searching. SELLER SHORTHANDeBay auction Title Lines are limited to forty-five characters. The seller uses this space to describe the item for auction in words the buyer is most likely to enter when searching. This limitation has produced accepted shorthand and abbreviations for many items. Examples would be CPK for Cabbage Patch Kids dolls, SS for sterling silver, NR for no reserve auctions, NIB for new-in-box and many more. Scan the items you are interested in and note the sellers' abbreviated notations in the Title Lines. Including these accepted notations in your search words will improve your chances for locating your searched-for item.
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| Part 5 Final Note | |||||
| FINAL NOTE You have listed your item for auction and try to find it using the eBay search engine and you get no results. Most sellers have had this happen to them and become frustrated that their item does come up from a search. Remember that eBay is a very big place and it takes time for newly listed items to show up in search results, sometimes a few hours. Do the search again at a later time and if your search words are the same as your title line the item will appear in the results PARTING THOUGHTS We have attempted to explain how to conduct a search for a particular item on eBay quickly and easily by mastering a few rules of searching. We have included numerous links to examples of what we are discussing so use them for more details. Closing the linked page returns you to the Search Tips section. Searching on eBay or the Internet is very similar and mastering the techniques to find things offered for auction at eBay will also apply when you want to search the Internet using any of the major search engines. As always, practicing the search methods will allow you to become skilled at locating auctions on eBay. Don't hesitate to try different things and note the results. You will soon become an expert at quickly finding exactly what you seek. Happy searching! | |||||
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