Naturally, there is more going on behind the scenes, but a prospective buyer neither knows nor cares about your problems – at least, until it's time to receive his merchandise.

So how can we improve our copy, our what-we-say-about-it? One of the most powerful tactics that I teach my students is to personalize our copy. I learned this firsthand when selling Torso Tracks, way back when Suzanne Somers was all over the infomercials raving about them. My sales were OK. Just OK. Then I changed my listing to discuss the actual use of the machine. I admitted that it wasn't my favorite activity in life, but that I used it while watching Law & Order reruns every night, and it wasn't bad under those circumstances. I got real “folksy” in my description. Apparently, buyers appreciated my candor because my sales soared. Such a simple thing, yet easy to do and very lucrative indeed.

In this auction the seller understands the power of humor:

http://www.auction-genius-course.com/listings/green-lantern.shtml

There were 18,173 views of this auction, which is very respectable. The bidding opened at $89.95, and the price rose to $136.50. Trying to compare this to current eBay auctions, it seemed to do quite well (although, not being a Green Lantern expert, I'm not entirely certain. :-)

Still, this auction took a great deal of time. Was it worth it for a one-time sale? Obviously, it was to the seller. Here are two rules of thumb, though, when investing this kind of effort and energy:

* If your item is valuable (whatever that means to you), it's probably worth the time

* If you plan on repeated sales, then it is definitely, absolutely worth your time to tweak and experiment until you come up with a winning eBay listing