How to Create Your About Me Page on eBay

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It's one of the most fun and one of the least used features on eBay, and it has the potential to help your sales and increase your name recognition amongst bidders. If you're an eBay seller and you haven't created an eBay "About Me" page yet, now is a good time to consider doing so. It'll only take a few minutes!

About the About Me Page

The About Me page is a free page of HTML-based web space that eBay reserves for every member, whether you are a bidder, a seller, or both. You can use this space for almost anything, but since your About Me page will be linked anywhere your eBay member ID appears, the most obvious use is to promote your auction sales. Yes, you can also use it to talk about your kids, to link to photos of your boat, or to talk about how hard your college classes are, but these topics might be better suited for eBay Blogs.

When an eBay member maintains an About Me page, a small red and blue "me" icon appear next to their member ID wherever it is shown on eBay. Clicking on this icon displays the About Me page that the member has created.

About Me Pages

Traditionally, sellers' About Me pages contain one or more of the following, all of which benefit bidders or buyers in some way:

  • Company logo, if you have one. This helps to build brand recognition.
  • Linked photo(s) of your brick-and-mortar storefront(s), if your eBay sales are complemented by retail sales in your local area.
  • Details from your auction listings that are consistent from listing to listing, including such things as your warranty and return policy, accepted payment methods, shipper or carrier, and email and/or telephone contact information.
  • Link(s) to your other eBay auction listing(s) so that bidders can easily find other items you're currently selling.
  • Link(s) to your best feedback so that bidders can read testimonials about your products and services.

In addition to the items listed above, it's not out of order to include a few details about yourself—anecdotes or information that might help to humanize you to your bidders. This is important because bidders are more likely to search for you and your items directly in order to make a repeat purchase if they think of you as a person or business that they are familiar with.

Creating an About Me Page

To create you're About Me page, follow these steps:

  1. Visit the eBay community forum by clicking the "Community" button at the top of any eBay page.
  2. Scroll to the bottom of the page so that the section titled "More Community Programs" is visible.
  3. In the "More Community Programs" section, click on the link labeled "Create an About Me page" to be directed to an informational page that briefly details ways in which About Me is commonly used.
  4. At the bottom of the informational page, click the button labeled "Create Your Page."
  5. On the following page, you will be asked whether you'd prefer to follow a user-friendly step-by-step wizard or enter raw HTML code in order to create your About Me page.
  6. If you are familiar with HTML and would like to take advantage of the flexibility that it offers in creating your About Me page, select the HTML option. Note that eBay makes available a number of custom tags that can be used in creating your About Me page to further enhance its appearance and content.
  7. If you are unfamiliar with HTML or simply want the creation of your About Me page to be as painless as possible, select the "Use our easy Step-by-Step process" option.
  8. If you selected the HTML option, you'll be presented with an empty box into which you can type the HTML code for your About Me content. Keep in mind that your use of advanced HTML techniques (stylesheets, dynamic HTML, etc.) should be limited since any code you write will be encapsulated by eBay's own website.
  9. If you selected the user-friendly step-by-step option, you'll be shown a longer, wizard-style form that will help you to create a fun, complete About Me page from scratch with a minimum of fuss.

Using the Step-by-Step Form

The step by step About Me page form is designed to be easy to use, but a walk-through can still be helpful if you're not yet familiar with features that typically appear on About Me pages.

  • Title and opening paragraphs. The top section of the form, cryptically labeled "Add Text," contains boxes for an About Me title and two introductory paragraphs. Your title should be friendly, salutary, and brief—like "Welcome to Martha's About Me Page!" or "Thanks for Buying From Pete!"
  • Add pictures. The second section of the form provides space for up to four pictures that can be added in the same way that pictures are added to your auction listings. If you have pictures of your brick-and-mortar storefront, of items representative of those that you sell on eBay, or even of yourself, this is the ideal place to display them.
  • Details about eBay activity. The third section is used to display your current auction listings and your recent feedback to visitors. If you'd like visitors to be able to easily access your most recent feedback, select the number of recent comments you'd like to display from the first drop-down list labeled "Show Feedback You've Received." If you'd like visitors to be able to easily access your current auction listings, enter a title like "My Auction Listings!" and then choose the number of listings you'd like shown. These will be displayed as links, one per line, similar (though not identical) to what buyers normally see in search results.
  • Favorite web links. The final section of the form is a place for you to post links to your favorite websites. If there are places outside eBay that you'd like other eBay members to visit, enter their names and addresses here.

Once you've completed the web form, click the Continue button to proceed to the following page, where you can select the basic layout (visual arrangement) for the information you've provided. Based on the small example diagrams, choose the layout that you like best. At the bottom of the page, you'll see a sample of what you're About Me page will look like with the currently selected layout. Feel free to select each layout, in turn, to see which you like best.

Once you've decided on a layout, click the Submit button to save you About Me page. You'll notice that the "me" icon now appears next to your ID whenever it is shown on eBay—at the tops of your auctions, in your feedback profile, and even on your My eBay page.

About Me Common Sense

As a final note, keep in mind that you're About Me page is public and that it is posted on eBay's website. While there are some explicit rules related to your About Me page, they can easily be summarized: don't put anything on your About Me page that someone might find offensive, don't put anything on your About Me page that you wouldn't want a stranger to know, and don't put anything on your About Me page that might hurt eBay or lead members to an eBay competitor or alternative sales avenue.