I seldom sell stuff on e-bay. It’s the type of thing that’s not so easy to get into unless you’re quite accustomed and sell stuff regularly. For those of you like me, there exist programs that help you quickly create professional looking auctions.

My first reaction to said software was a tad of scepticism. People are interested (I thought) in the quality of the product, the price and that’s it. However having a professional looking page gives people the most important feeling they need – security. I listed an item twice with a very simple page layout over the past few weeks; both got zero bids and didn’t sell. So I’ve decided to try to sell these items using Auction Software to beautify my listings, and in the process, rate them as well.

Let’s get started with the first piece of software: Listing Factory 2009.

When you run Listing Factory it immediately begins a wizard that starts the process of creating a new project. Select a name and you begin by looking at the templates. I rather disliked this interface, as for starters the preview of the template is a small picture that you can’t get all that much out of, and the templates have labels that don’t really refer to what they will look like. Here’s what the “Grass” template looks like:

Other than being green, this template doesn’t make me think of grass at all. The interface is also quite constrained. Once you select a name and template you have an option of editing the listing description. They bring you to a window where you’re ‘supposed’ to make room for your description and write it in a new field. Note in the figure above where the solitary phrase ‘This is the item I am selling’ is written. Instead of highlighting what the user is supposed to do, it is instead masked. The whole process feels somewhat unintuitive as when you try to edit other areas of the template that seem selectable, they aren’t. In my experience it’s best to fore go the wizard, select a template and edit it yourself manually.

Once you’re satisfied with your page you can import it into e-bay without too much difficulty, although having to deal with both Listing Factory’s cluttered interface as well as e-bays can be quite the hassle. Overall I wasn't terribly satisfied with this software, although experiences may vary.

All that being said, my item listed with Listing Factory got two bids in just one day of listing, which is obviously much better than zero bids over seven days. I will continue to assess other listing software in the coming days.

Listing Factory has a 30 day trial you can get here. Be ready for a burst of music as the page loads. 

Post your comment

Submit