eBay: The Missing Manual

Further Education

Most eBayers are self-taught. They might read some great books (like this one), go through the information in eBay's Help section (Section 11.2), or ask questions in discussion groups (Section 10.1.1). Mostly they just jump in and try the site: bid on an auction, pay for a purchase, go step by step through the Sell Your Item form (Section 5.4.2). If you're someone who prefers instruction to trial-and-error, though (and since you're reading this book, you probably do), you might be interested in taking an eBay workshop or class.

Take a Workshop

Workshops are scheduled, Web-based hour-long chats on a particular topic. Each chat is a combination of lecture and Q&A. Someone leads every workshop: the leader could be an eBay staffer, an outside guest, or an everyday eBayer. Workshops cover just about every eBay-related topic you can think of. Here's a list of recent and popular workshop topics:

• Using keywords.

• Search strategies.

• Figuring out what to sell.

• Getting publicity for your auctions.

• Dealing with eBay changes (category, policy, procedures, new features, and so on).

• Protecting yourself from identity theft.

• Best practices for sellers.

• Shipping tips and tools.

• Cross-promotions.

• Digital photography.

Workshop schedules vary. Some months, eBay offers a dozen or more workshops; others, a mere handful.

To see a list of recent and upcoming workshops: from eBay's home page, click Community → Workshops. When you do, the Workshops page (Figure A-13) appears.

Note

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