Writing Auction Titles that Sell

Unless you have an incredibly compelling gallery pic or are selling Ipods for $9.95, your auction title is is what motivates your potential buyer to visit your listing. Ebay allows 55 character including spaces for your title. Use them wisely. A few tips:

• Use keywords in the first part of your title. Ebay's search is weighed toward the beginning of the title. Save the descriptive terms for later.
• It may seem obvious, but make sure and tell your buyers exactly what you are selling. A Nikon D80 will come up in a search for Nikon and attract the attention of someone searching for that term. Nikon D80 SLR Digital Camera will come up in searches for SLR, digital, and camera as well as combinations of those words.
• When you've covered the keywords, then add extra's and additional features as space permits. The example above may then read Nikon D80 Digital SLR Camera, Body Only. The point here is to give your buyer a "no surprise" reason to visit your listing.
• Any title real estate remaining may be devoted to to incentives, acronyms, or selling points. Examples might be free shipping, NIB, used once, etc.
• Absolutely avoid any cute gimmicks and wordplays like LQQK, GR8, or !!!!!! Nobody searches for those things and you are simply wasting space and appearing amateurish.
• Carefully check your spelling. Ebay's search does not correct mispelled words.

Writing a good title is not an art, but it can take some practice. If you sell a lot of similar items try different keyword positions and determine which pulls the most traffic / bids. It is easy to take writing an auction title lightly - however it is likely the only opportunity you get to attract targetted buyers.