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First and foremost, bear in mind that you have limited space to attract buyers to your cards. The title is limited in size, and while the body can be very large, at some point your information just becomes white noise because people won't spend more than 30 seconds reading your two paragraph shipping and return policy. You have to be brief, but informative; succinct but detailed.
The Title
The title is your best bargaining tool. People see your title in search results, and the accuracy of it will either motivate them to click or ignore. On that note...
The Do's
- Stick to a title format that includes the quantity, name, set name, condition, and the term "MTG". For example: 1x Dark Confidant Ravnica MTG NM
- Obviously you want the name, quantity and condition in the title. However, putting "MTG" in the title is important too: some people may search for the term to see what's ending soonest or most newly listed, since both represent opportunities to jump on something with a great price quickly.
- Call out if the card is foil, but not the other way around. People hunt down foils; make it easy for them to find your cards by saying so.
- Putting the set name in helps reduce ambiguity when it comes to reprints, and can potentially attract buyers looking to complete a set, or help buyers searching your listings to find other cards.
- You may want to put your seller name in the title, but I wouldn't advise this unless you're moving some major volume and people easily identify you. If you're moving major volume, then you're probably not reading this guide
The Don'ts
- Putting things like "L@@K", "HOT", "EXCELLENT PRICE", "!!!" and any other shameless self promotion is white noise and generally obnoxious. Your customers can decipher what's "hot" or an "excellent price" on their own. As a buyer, this kind of thing makes me want to avoid you because I feel like you're trying to snake oil me.
- Card rarity is mostly useless in the title. Some people put MR, Mythic, or Mythic Rare, so it's hard to get it right, and it's unlikely people are searching for mythics with no other criteria.
- Don't put NON-FOIL anywhere in your listing. It's safe to assume that unless stated a card is non-foil, and by putting non-foil you actually show up for the term foil, which is quite honestly annoying when people only want to find foil cards.
- Watch out for typos like the plague, seriously. I capitalized on a very low price for a couple of listings for "Lilliana of the Veil" a while back because the extraneous "L" in the middle kept it out of searches.
- You don't need 20 conditions for your cards! Things like NM-/EX+ and VG/LP are simply confusing. Grade conservatively; if the choice between NM and EX is questionable, go with EX. Try to limit to 4-5 conditions. I touch more on this in the next section.
The Body
The body of your listing allows you to share as much information as you want to about your listing. Unfortunately, this also allows you to share as much information as you want about your listing. It's easy to get out of control with an overabundance of details.
The Do's
- Reiterate the details in the title. This helps the buyer find parity between both and reduces confusion. It also forces you to look at the same data twice while creating the listing. I've had instances both as a buyer and a seller where this prevented a problem, either because they differed and it prompted me to ask a question or because it prevented me from posting an incorrect listing.
- Explain your shipping policy, and more importantly, keep it simple. I touch more on this later, but try to limit things to "$1.50 for the first item, additional are free." Talk about how you pack and ship (plain/padded envelope, first class/stamp). Call out international issues immediately, i.e. do you or do you not ship outside your country.
- Lay out your grading scale, but limit it to 4 or 5 possible conditions; for example I use NM, EX, LP, HP (Near Mint, Excellent, Lightly Played, Heavily Played, respectively). Grade conservatively; if you're on the fence between NM and EX, go with EX. Briefly describe each condition; for example: "EX - Wear can be seen without careful inspection, but isn't overly noticeable. Some white spots on the border, scratches, dirt."
- If you're using a stock picture, identify it as such.
- If you have a return policy, explain it, otherwise just indicate no returns via the listing's flag.
- Make your payment policy clear. Typically people just accept Paypal, but it's still worth saying "I only accept Paypal as a payment method."
The Don'ts
- Leave your life story out of the listing. People aren't going to spend a lot of time reading the listing and will be deterred if it's too long because they will have trouble finding relevant information. Get to the meat (shipping, condition, grading scale) and get to it fast.
- Grading policies can drive people to madness. If you have NM-, EX+, EX, EX- or EX, VG, LP, people won't know what the hell you're trying to say. There are hundreds of sellers out there, and people can't be bothered remembering whether it's your EX- that includes dirt and small creases, or if yours just means whitening around the edges. Distinguishing between semantically similar conditions can be frustrating too. VG (very good) and LP (lightly played) are nearly the same condition, so do yourself a favor and stick with one.
- Your listing doesn't have to be its own separate website. Unless you have some major branding under your belt, a simple text description is perfectly fine.
- If your shipping policy requires more than one or two lines of text, it's too complicated.
The Picture
The Do's
- While this may sound critical, as long as your grading scale is conservative but accurate you're probably fine going with a stock photo. That said, be sure to make photos available if requested, and tell your buyers that's the case.
- Always use an actual image on high dollar ($100+) listings. People are spending serious money; set their expectations immediately on what they'll be getting.
- Use a clear image on a monochrome surface if you're uploading your own, and use pictures of the front and back to avoid ambiguity.
- Use an image that matches the expansion and artwork. You'd be amazed how often this isn't accurate.
The Don'ts
- Crappy cell phone pictures reflecting strong light sources imply you don't care.
- Grainy and out of focus pictures imply you don't care.
- Images at sharp angles makes parts of the card hard to see and may make your buyer think you're hiding damage.
- Busy backgrounds can obfuscate card damage that your buyer should see before they purchase the card.
Money
If you have metadata that attracts buyers and makes it clear what you have to offer, the money is the the only thing left the nail down.
Shipping
I'm covering this first because I feel it's a stumbling block for many sellers.
The Do's
- KEEP. IT. SIMPLE. As long as your comfortable with it, have a flat rate and make everything else free. Don't make your buyers bust out a calculator before they consider buying.
- Add a shipping cost. This may seem counterintuitive, but it can help drive sales. If a buyer knows additional shipping is free, it can make them more inclined to buy multiple items from you.
- Use a hard sleeve and a padded envelope if you can afford it. At the very least make sure you use a hard sleeve to protect the cards.
- Ship with tracking. You're protecting yourself and the buyer if your transaction comes into question, and it's only $1.50 to ship USPS with tracking.
- Insure for free over a certain dollar amount. If someone is spending a few hundred with you, cover them and yourself; you can afford $4 or $5 out of the cost of the sale. Your buyer will appreciate it.
- Ship quickly and state turnaround times. Nothing longer than 72 hours.
The Don'ts
- People will figure out if you're trying to screw them on shipping and won't buy from you again as a result. More than $3 for domestic shipping is absurd.
- Don't try to swindle people by not combining shipping. Selling 4 of a card individually at a low price but ripping people off by charging $2 in shipping for each card is shady.
- If crafting ridiculous shipping contraptions is a hobby for you, find a new one. I've had cards shipped in cereal boxes folded over 4 times and duct taped together. You risk having the buyer damage the card when taking it out, and it's just generally frustrating to strategically remove half a roll of tape and printer paper for a single piece of cardboard.
- Delaying shipping is a strong source of neutral and even negative feedback, along with misrepresented condition. If you're not going to ship for a while and neglect to communicate that to the buyer directly you'll suffer for it eventually.
- If you use the jaws of life to get a dozen cards into a hard sleeve, your buyer is going to have a rough time getting them out. Either fasten a hard sleeve to a soft one, or use one hard sleeve for every 4-6 cards depending on how easy they can slip in and out.
Price
You need to know your competition and know market trends and values in order to determine your price.
Do's
- Price your cards competitively but not the lowest. Before you list, look at the lowest price that card or playset is currently listed for and price accordingly.
- Lower your price gradually if you're not getting views or cards priced lower aren't moving either.
- Make sure you consider your shipping price. Some cards have razor thin price brackets, and your shipping cost may cause problems.
- Adjust to market trends. If you're listing something and you've seen it continuously increase in price, aim a little higher and the market will probably catch up within a few days, especially if there's a tournament happening.
The Don'ts
- Lowballing immediately will cause you to potential money. Pace yourself on price reductions and try not to get to desperate if you can avoid it.
- Sky high prices are sort of pointless. You may think that you'll catch the market while that card is hot, but the odds that you'll price at a desirable amount and hit peak is very low. Unless you have something unusually rare like a foreign language foil, you're likely wasting your time.
- Don't be unreasonable with Best Offer listings. If you're posting a $20 card and you're adding Best Offer, $18 should be a reasonable amount to accept (and preferably accept automatically). I've seen sellers list $10 items with Best Offer and autoreject offers of $9.50 which is just stupid.
- If you're trying to pitch a low price with a huge shipping charge, then you're being deceptive and your customers will notice. You're better off being ignored than drawing negative attention.
Summary
These suggestions are all based on my personal experience, and are in no way a guarantee of success or avoiding problems.
As long as you're being honest, expedient, and detailed yet concise, you should have a fairly easy time selling on eBay. It may take a little while to get traction if you have low feedback, but over time selling will get easier as you get the feedback to back you up.
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