Users don't read blah blah blah blah blah

8/05/2008 at 05:57

eBay sellers have long said it, and now it’s been proven: people don’t read everything that’s on a webpage. Research by usability guru Jakob Nielsen shows that users read approximately 20% of text on an average webpage. And the more words there are on a page, the smaller the percentage that people will read.

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard a bewildered seller say “but I said it was used in the listing; why did they think it was new?” So now we know: they just didn’t read it. What’s a seller to do?

I’ve taken a look through my own and some other sellers’ non-positive feedback today, and it seems that around half of it is from people who didn’t read the listing “properly” in the first place, so making listings that communicate more effectively could in future be the difference between keeping your eBay account, or not. Here are half a dozen easy changes you can make to your listings that should help buyers read more of what you need to tell them.

Prioritise information
The more important information should be at the top of your listing. For most items, “most important information” includes the photograph.
Put your listings on a diet
If it can go, get rid of it. Your listing page should be about selling, not your T&Cs or the history of your trading on eBay, and certainly not “thanks for looking” and all that guff.

Keep listing page T&Cs minimal, and if you must have long lists of legalise, have that on a seperate linked page in your Shop.

Use headings for scannable listings
Buyers won’t read reams of text to find the information they want. They’ll scan through quickly to see if it’s there; so show them it is by using headings to highlight important areas.
Use bulleted lists
We’ve all seen those listings with a block of text going on for three screens with no paragraph break in sight. Few of us read them, and neither will your buyers.
• Bullets are easy to read
• Bullets can be scanned quickly
• Bullets are a great way to present product attributes
Keep formatting simple
Don’t make important information look like advertising, or something that’s seperate from the rest of the page flow. Big red text gets ignored because it looks like a banner ad, so don’t use it to communicate important information. IT SHOULD GO WITHOUT SAYING THAT WRITING ALL IN CAPITALS IS A REALLY BAD IDEA.

Bold text stands out so you should use it.

Put information in predictable places
eBay are training your buyers where information is on a page. Shipping prices are in the shipping prices box; returns policy is (or should be) in the returns policy box. Condition (used/new) should be in the item specifics box as well as in the body of the listing. Omitting information from the expected places makes life more difficult for your buyers; don’t make them need to read through your entire listing, because they won’t.
Don’t distract
Scrolling galleries of cross-promotions should never be at the top of your listings; sell em what they’re looking at before you sell em something else.

If you’ve read this far, congratulations ;-) and let me tell you, this works. I changed my own listing from
A packet of fifty beautiful Czech glass beads, 6mm diameter, in silver metallic finish

to

Size: 6mm diameter
Made of: Czech glass
Quantity in packet: 50
Finish: silver metallic

This not only cut the number of people who “bought the wrong thing”, it also slashed the number of ASQs I get. Listings that communicate effectively make life easier for everyone.