Cell Phone Surfers Use EBay Too ? Optimizing Your Listings For ...

With the growing use of smart phones and other mobile devices, more and more people are accessing the internet while on the go. As an eBay seller, you need to be aware of your buyers? usage and how they are connecting with your auction listings and adapt to their needs. To help you along, I?ve come up with these quick tips for optimizing online auctions for mobile devices.

Let?s not forget that eBay has a mobile website that strips out any HTML you might have decided to use to make your listing look all nice and pretty. Once all that HTML is gone, what does your listing look like? Is it even recognizable? And even if those mobile users are viewing eBay?s full site, just how well is it showing up on those tiny screens of theirs?

Now that you?ve started thinking about these things, the first thing you?ll want to be sure of is that your listings can be easily found. Mobile users are most likely to use the eBay search feature to find what their looking for, though likely with shorter keyword phrases thanks to the frustration of typing on keyboards so small, ?fat fingering? is a common issue. Consider anything different a mobile user might type in when searching for what it is you?re selling and be sure to include that in your title.

Next, it is very important to make sure that your auctions are professional looking. On a mobile device you are largely limited to having a well-written item description. But another aspect is having images that will display the features of your item, even when being viewed on a small mobile device such as a smart phone.

Don?t confuse detailed images with super-high resolution images. The first provides a buyer with details about the item they are buying. The latter uses up lots of bandwidth and will take a long time to load on a mobile device running on a slower connection.

Even if a mobile user is accessing eBay?s full site, the internet connection they?re on is likely to be slower. So, the next item for optimizing for mobile users is to create a cleanly coded listing that will load fast, uses images that load quickly, and doesn?t use any strange code (tables embedded within tables for example) that can increase load times.

And let?s not forget where mobile users are looking at your listings from; probably while on lunch break or, much to the displeasure of everyone around them, at the movie theater. At any rate, these users probably want to move quickly. Be sure to check your listings for questions often and answer them quickly. If someone doesn?t hear back from you before the end of their movie, then they might not ever come back.

Finally, consider using the ?buy it now? option. This way, your buyers will be able to purchase your item right away and pay through PayPal, thereby satisfying the on-the-go attitude of your typical mobile-device user.

We have really just begun to scratch the surface of how to best optimize your auction listings for mobile-device users. If you really want to get into it, start accessing your listings from your own mobile device. By viewing your listings the same way your potential buyers do, you?ll gain greater insight into how to improve your listings for those kinds of buyers.

Stu Lisonbee is a former eBay employee and PowerSeller who helps others learn the process of making money on eBay, including powerful tips for dealing with and using eBay dropshippers.

Source: http://internetbasedbusinessarticles.com/114493/cell-phone-surfers-use-ebay-too-optimizing-your-listings-for-the-mobile-buyer/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=cell-phone-surfers-use-ebay-too-optimizing-your-listings-for-the-mobile-buyer

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