Writing Listing Titles That Get Clicked

Your description does not sell the item. Your title does. A buyer scrolling a category page sees a thumbnail and a line of text, and decides in about a second whether to stop. Most sellers waste that second on adjectives.

Front load the facts

The first four or five words carry the whole title, because titles get truncated on phones and phones are where your buyers are. Lead with the item, then the key attribute, then the wear. "Black 40 Denier Tights, 2 Day Wear" works. "Gorgeous naughty little something special" does not, because it tells the buyer nothing they can act on.

The formula

Item, attribute, wear time, extra. Attribute is whatever your category's buyers filter by: colour, size, denier, brand, material, style. Wear time is the number of hours or days. Extra is the one thing that makes this pair different, a gym session, a work shift, a specific request. Four parts, no fluff, done. If you want to see what the description is then for, read how the rest of the listing carries the sale.

What to cut

Cut "for sale", because everything is for sale. Cut strings of emoji, which push your actual words off the visible line. Cut vague intensifiers like amazing, gorgeous and special, which every seller uses and no buyer searches for. Cut your own name unless you are established enough that the name is the draw. Cut exclamation marks entirely.

Words buyers actually search

Buyers search for the concrete: sizes, colours, deniers, brands, materials, wear lengths, item types. They do not search for adjectives. If you are unsure what your category's buyers use, read the messages you already get. The words buyers use in their first message are the words to put in your titles. That is free research sitting in your inbox.

Test and change

If a listing sits for two weeks with views but no sales, the photographs or price are the problem. If it sits with no views at all, the title is the problem. Change one thing, wait a week, look again. Sellers who rewrite dead titles rather than deleting dead listings usually find the item was fine all along.

Open your three oldest listings now and rewrite each title using the four part formula. It takes five minutes and costs nothing.