Objections are those points, sometimes small issues, which make a bidder or a buyer think again about going for your offering.

In your auction description you need to remove as many of these objections as you can.

These are kind of objections which your prospective buyers will have.

Objection 1 Is seller trustworthy?

The buyer usually doesn't know you. If they're serious bidders they will check you out. How will they do this?

a) A good Feedback Rating will be one way they assess you. Be determined in getting your feedback up, and making it all positive.

b) They might also click through to your About Me page. This page gives you opportunity to convey your personality and your honesty.

One of eBay's standard About Me page formats lets you display your recent feedbacks - always useful - and also your other auctions, again useful. This is in addition to anything about yourself which helps to show what a sincere and genuine person you are.

And finally, if you have a web site from which you sell products or services, you are allowed to place a direct link to it from About Me page. This is in marked contrast to your auction description page, where eBay does not allow direct links to web pages. So, create an About Me page and incorporate points mentioned.

c) A prospective bidder may wish to ask you a question. As you will know, there is a standard eBay facility whereby a bidder can ask a seller a question. You should really welcome questions. Why do I say this?

Well, if a bidder asks you a question, first of all you know they are interested in your offering. They wouldn't have wasted their time on typing out their question to you if they weren't. So, by asking you a question they are qualifying themselves in as a real prospect. And you now have chance to directly influence them in your reply to their question. Depending on nature of their enquiry, you have opportunity to convey your integrity, honesty, credibility, fair mindedness, helpfulness, expertise, knowledge, other appropriate products etc.

So, if questions are such good things, why not make it easy for bidder to ask one? Always have some text in your auction description offering to answer any questions, with a link to your email address. If you have a little knowledge of HTML coding you will know how easy this is to do. It is far better than simply relying on buyers finding standard "Ask seller a question" link provided by eBay.

d) You might consider a moneyback guarantee, if it's appropriate and you can "afford" it.

Why would you or should you do this?

Well, when you think about it, in online auctions, buyer is normally asked to take all risk. They usually pay seller up front - before item is delivered to them. The risk is all theirs that seller doesn't perform.

To some buyers, particularly on higher value items, this risk is so high that it can cause them to have second thoughts about bidding. You know you are trustworthy, but they don't. By offering a moneyback guarantee you are offering what is known as "risk reversal". You are taking risk off your buyer. In effect you shoulder risk.

I know this works, because I use it myself. In thousands of auctions I've run, I can count on one hand number of people who have invoked my money back guarantee.

If you can practice "risk reversal", it will help your auction success rate, and it is vital on Dutch auctions.

Objection 2 How do I pay?

Always maximise number of payment options you will accept.

You should provide different types of payment options for your buyers:

PayPal Nochex FastPay Cheque Postal Order Banker's Draft Bank Transfer Cash

You can accept credit/debit cards on your auctions if you open accounts with relevant payment processors. These enable buyers to pay you with a credit/debit card even though you aren't a business, and you don't have what is known as a Merchant Account.

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