eBay Categories

There are many hundreds of to choose from, and it can seem a puzzling task to choose the right one. Many categories overlap, and an item could just as well go in one or the other, or so it seems. Fortunately eBay has a neat little tool on the ‘Choose a Category’ page to help you. Put the name of your item in the ‘Enter Keywords to find a Category’ search box at the top of the page. Be specific. Ebay will then put up a list of categories where items of that type are listed, in order of popularity. Usually you’ll choose the most popular category, but take some time to look through them all - your item might be most logically placed elsewhere.

You're going to need some reasonably up to date stamp catalogues, to save money try buying last year's - it won't be that much different to the current version. New and used Scott catalogues can be found on eBay and at amazon.com - these links will take you directly to those current listings.

Alternatively, use the ‘Browse Categories’ boxes to help you. If you’re selling British stamps from the reign of Queen Victoria, then use the Stamps>UK>Victoria category. For USA Air Mails use Stamps>United States>Back of Book>Air Mail. This may seem obvious but it’s worth exploring the stamps categories thoroughly. Many good items are listed in the wrong category, and get fewer visits and lower final prices because of this.

You can list any item in two appropriate categories, but beware, this doubles most For higher ticket items, it can be a low additional cost method of enhancing your listing exposure, but you need to be confident that both categories are relevant, and will attract potential bidders for your item.

One word of warning. Ebay is very watchful for so called 'category abuse', which is the practice of deliberately and repeatedly listing items in categories where they obviously don't belong. Some people do this to make their item stand out from the rest, but it's usually quickly spotted and removed by eBay. Do it too many times and they may suspend your registration. However, they also know people make mistakes, so the worst that will happen the first time you make an obvious category error is a friendly warning by e-mail.

Still there? Good! Now we'll move on to creating great titles and descriptions for your stamps on eBay.

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