Hello my name is Joshua Hunt-Smith, I am an expert level eBay seller (raredn) who possesses extensive knowledge on selling domain names on eBay.com. This post should help you optimize your eBay.com short domain name auctions and at the same time, also help you become a better eBay seller in general.

My home page is yeswebdesign.com because I have a passion for more than just domain names.

Ok, lets dive in.

Information Suitability:

For both new eBay sellers and Established eBay sellers wanting to optimize their eBay auctions to attract more bidders.

Why is my focus on the eBay.com website in particular?

Any country that’s able to make a domain name listing on the eBay.com site should list domain names there instead of your home country eBay website, as eBay.com is searched by more people looking for domain names (there may some exceptions, such as if you are selling a .co.uk domain or .ca domain name, which may sell better on eBay.co.uk and eBay.ca. Honestly though, any eBay site is probably not the best place to sell country code domain names). Note: If you’re selling other goods that are not domain names, this is a different story and listing auctions at your home country’s eBay website is often a good way to sell physical goods. If the physical goods you are selling are much cheaper in your country than in another country (or countries), you can target those countries for potential sales as well.

These first 4 steps below are for people have not sold on eBay before, feel free to skip reading the first 4 steps if you want:

• The main method for accepting payment on eBay is Paypal (You can visit Paypal.com to sign up for an account. You will find a sign up link both at the very top of the Paypal website and below the Paypal user login submit button), although some sellers see this as a concern because of potential for chargebacks, where a customer takes back the money they have put into your Paypal account through another Paypal account. Chargebacks are unlikely to be of concern from eBay buyers with reputable feedback ratings (a feedback rating is the number shown to the right of every eBay username, you can click on the number to see what other sellers or buyers have said about them).

• The first thing you need is an eBay account — you can sign up at the eBay website that relates to your home country (Simply typing the two words Register eBay into Google’s search bar should bring up the eBay sign up page for your country as the first search result displayed by Google).

• If you already have an eBay account, you may want to start selling. To do so, click Sell on the top of the eBay page menu from within your eBay account. If this is your first time selling on eBay, you will be prompted to enter a credit card or debit card into your eBay account (eBay also says in ’some cases’ they will require your checking account information). Note: if you really don’t want to put a credit or debit card on file, search google for the words eBay id verify and sign up for that – do note that it has a small fee.

• Once you have registered for an eBay seller account and are ready to sell a domain name, click on the Sell tab at top right hand corner of your eBay account. Then click on Start selling, and now enter the words domain name (and I would suggest entering your extension after the words domain name, such as .org) into the input box you are given. Ebay will suggest the computers and networking category, then tick the box shown below where it says computers and networking and tick the box that matches your domain name extension (.com or whatever). Now click continue down the bottom of the page. Read the rest of this blog post to see what to do from here.

Note on seller fees: eBay says it won’t charge your credit card for seller fees unless you accept for it to be used for paying seller fees. That said, I prefer to use Paypal to pay my seller fees. Doing it this way, the eBay and Paypal expenses are all paid for by the auction revenue alone, so long as you have enough funds in your Paypal account. If you do not, Paypal will withdraw money out of your bank balance that you have connected with your Paypal account.

Making an optimized eBay listing:

Put all your main keywords in your eBay title: Why, you ask? Both subtitles and the auction body text don’t have the advantage in eBay search results like the title of your auction does. The keywords you were thinking about putting in your subtitle and also the eBay auction body text only show when somebody ticks the ‘Include title and description’ check box that is sometimes shown as a tickable option under the main eBay search input bar.

So what keywords should you be putting in a short domain name auction? For an llll.com you should definitely be putting llll.com in your title (put it in capital letters, as LLLL.com will stand out more while still using the small amount of characters) You should also put the letters LLLL followed without .com somewhere in the auction title, in what order it doesn’t matter to eBay’s search algorithms. If you have both LLLL.com and LLLL (remember, I said both), you’ll get in eBay’s search results for people typing in and searching for LLLL.com, LLLL .com (notice the space between LLLL .com you need to account for people searching like that) and also plain LLLL.

The title is where it’s at:

What else could we put in the search title? How about the word ’short’ and the words ‘domain name’ — this will get people searching for Short Domain Name, as well as people searching for llll.com. Hey, what about the the number ‘4‘ and the word ‘letter‘ ? Yes, people will search eBay for the term ‘4 letter domain name’, so make sure you put ‘4 Letter’ into your LLLL.com eBay auction title (you still have room, even if you entered all the search words I mentioned above into your LLLL.com auction title. Also, always remember to put  ‘domain name’ in the title). If your domain name is a genuine CVCV (Consonant Vowel Consonant Vowel), AABB or VCVC style letter combination, please put that in the title too – yes, you still have room. If your domain name is not a CVCV, do not put it in your auction title, as all you’ll do is make domainers angry and quite a few people will not want to bid on your auction because of the misleading title.

What about LLL.coms and other domain names like keyword domain names and also country code domain names? As mentioned previously, put all keywords in your auction title. For a keyword domain name like say, EcologicalCars.com (I don’t own it), I could make the following eBay auction title: “EcologicalCars.com 2 Word Eco Green Car Domain Name“. This way, I have related the search terms eco and green as being related search keywords in the title, along with domain name. As for ‘2 word’, it probably isn’t the most searched term — if you can think of something better, by all means use that.

Gallery Image:

Always put a gallery image in your eBay auction, it takes up far more room in search results than a listing with no gallery image, making your auction far more noticeable to potential buyers. Making something colorful and fancy looking can draw attention but be careful what color and text styles you use, as eBay’s gallery pictures get compressed to a very low resolution, blurring what you thought might look good into a mess. Play around with gallery images with your domain name written on them until you find something that looks good once inserted in an eBay auction. Also if possible, don’t use the same gallery picture for each listing, variation makes the listings look less boring, but keep in mind varying gallery pictures is more time consuming, you weigh your options and decide whether it is worth your time. On the flipside, using the same gallery image lets everyone know you are the same seller, so this could have some benefit if you have made a good selling reputation for yourself.

The body of your eBay listing:

Presentation: Make your eBay auction look neat. I personally like to center my eBay auctions (you can use the styling options in your eBay auction). I like to say what the domain name is — for instance, something like ‘Quad Premium 4 Letter LLLL.com Domain Name’ if that is what it is, then I like to make the domain name itself written in large bold and clear writing. I like to put the domain name renewal date under the domain name, including what registrar the domain name is registered at. Note that I said renewal date (Not expiry date) – it lets new domain investors know that a domain name is renewable and that it does not just expire and disappear forever. Next, I mention that moving the domain name from registrar (insert yours) to the same registrar, will be free. Mentioning that there are no hidden fees associated with your domain name auction is a good idea too. I also mention if the buyer wants to initiate a transfer to a different registrar to please only do it if they understand the process involved (believe me, something along those lines is the best way to say it). There are people who think you can just push a domain name from one domain registrar to another domain registrar for free. Put spacing between lines in your auction, as it looks better on the eyes. Also, put a link cross promoting your other eBay auctions in your auction if you have more than that one auction.

If you have Dreamweaver or an alternative visual code editor, you can make some pretty fancy looking eBay auctions and then paste in the HTML into your eBay listing, although I don’t think this really is necessary for an eBay auction. A neat layout combined with basic presentation will get the job done in most cases.

If your domain name is available to people worldwide, write in the auction details, something like: International bidders welcome, as otherwise this can be unclear in your eBay auction.

Finish off the listing page:

After you have entered the domain name information into the body of your auction under where it says something like: Describe the item you are selling, scroll further down the page and enter your starting page. I most often start my auctions at $0.99 but if you want a certain price, start your auction at the minumum you would be willing to accept and take into account that eBay and Paypal (if you are using Paypal), are going to add seller fees on top of that. Next, set the duration of your auction. I like my auctions to go for 7 days and end late Thursday night USA time, as I have a feeling that there are more bidders then, but things could change.

Now scroll down the page a bit further and you will be asked about payment options you will accept. On eBay.com, the options at the time of writing were:

• Paypal
• Credit Card
• Money Bookers
• Paymate
• Propay

You can choose more than one option if you wish. If you are going to use Paypal there is an input box where you can enter your Paypal registered email address for accepting of payments

• Under payment, you will find shipping options
• First up US shipping
• Choose flat rate shipping under the select box
• From the services select box choose other
• In the cost input box dollar amount, put in 0.00 and make sure to tick the free shipping check box show to the right
• Now you have set up free shipping for the USA

If you are going to offer your domain name to potential customers world wide, you will find international shipping a bit further, under US shipping.

• Choose the flat rate shipping option
• Then choose world wide under the ship to select box (If you want to sell your domain names to only certain countries, choose custom location and tick the countries you want your auctions available too)
• Now under the services select box, choose ‘Other Int’l Shipping
• In the cost input box you must put 0.00 as in $0.00 dollars

Now if you have your shipping as shown above, you will have the words free shipping show up in front of your auctions in eBay search results that contain your particular domain name (or domain names).

Any other sections under shipping, I think people should be able to fill out and work out on their own without many issues. Now you should end up at the bottom of the page — click the continue button.

On the next page you can choose things such as making your title bold and featuring your listing.

If it is a domain up season, I will choose to have a better domain name that I am selling ticked under featured in search results. I would also then make the writing bold and choose a border out of the selections.

If it is not a domain up season, I will not choose any of the extras on that page – I will just click the list my auction button and my auction will immediately become live. If you want to set an automatic start time for the auction, you can choose that option on the previous page of your listing for a small fee. Be sure you understand the time zones and eBay time in relation to what you are doing there if choosing automatic listing time.

After the auction:

After the auction if I do not already have the customer’s details from them winning a previous auction of mine, I will ask the customer for their account number and email from the registrar you are moving the domain to. I will then add this to a list of customer details in a notepad on my computer (Do not ask customers for any passwords, you never need a password to move a domain name to someone else). When the customer pays, I search the notepad for the customers username and registrar details, move the domain name to them and leave them positive feedback.

Safe trading and use of eBay

eBay communication safety:

Number one rule of eBay communication: Always use eBay messages whenever possible for communicating with anyone on eBay. This way you can avoid scam emails that pretend to be eBay pages (they often look the same but are actually there to steal your eBay details that you enter in what usually is a fake login page). So that said, never answer an email that asks for personal information of any kind, most especially passwords and credit card details. If you have to login for something to do with eBay, you can do it by logging into your eBay account and checking if eBay has left you a message. Never enter a password to a supposed eBay page from a link in an email!

Fake second chance offers — second chance offer emails for popular items on eBay was once a popular eBay scam. Still may be but I have not seen any emails like that for a long time now.

About eBay accounts that have been hijacked:

Hijacked eBay accounts: Weak eBay login passwords and email phishing scams that ask for you to enter your eBay password are some of the methods used by people to hijack and enter someone else’s eBay account, along with the collection of data from spyware compromised machines.

What do people do with a hijacked eBay account?

• List extremely popular selling items on the hijacked eBay account for very cheap prices compared to retail. The hijacker would put an email address specifically for you to contact them to buy more of the item outside of eBay — the email address would be shown somewhere that could be easily seen in the auction details, usually saying something like: contact me at (their email address) to buy a brand new Cannon EOS 1D mark iii SLR camera for $600, or something else like that. This may be their current method but I have not come across these scams in quite some time. This could also be because I have not been searching for popular goods on eBay in awhile though.
• Could someone use a hijacked account to bid on a domain name? This is possible. There exists also the possibility of eBay accounts being created with stolen credit cards. But how does this relate to eBay chargebacks in Paypal back to the buyer once they have acquired your domain name? I’m not an expert on Paypal chargebacks but I do know they were happening frequently enough during the time of high llll.com sales prices in early 08 to cause quite an upset amongst domainers.

So you may think, “Should I use something like Moneybookers or an Escrow service to accept payment instead of Paypal?” You can if you wish but you will get very few bidders unfortunately — that is the reality of the present situation. Especially if you are starting an auction at $0.99 (side note: Did you know it costs a lot more to list an auction from $1 and a lot less if you start it at $0.99? Well that’s true, same goes for if you start an auction at 24.99 — listing fees costs almost half as much as starting at $25, and once again, the same goes for $49.99 and $50 ). Even if you start an auction for a much higher price and the domain name is worth it, using anything other than Paypal is off-putting. Of course with the value of some domain names, you would be silly not to offer the domain name with Escrow as the only payment option. If your domain name is valued up to a few hundred dollars at most, I would still go with Paypal personally. You can always say something like “Please only bid if you have reputable feedback reputation” if you want to be extra cautious.

Note: If you can’t find something you want to do in your eBay account, try the sitemap at the bottom of every eBay page.

Thank you

Joshua Hunt-Smith

Related posts:

1. Selling LLLL.coms on eBay? Don’t forget to put “LLLL” in the Title!
2. Buying Short Domains on eBay
3. PayPal MassPay