Making the very best eBay listing to sell your second hand SLR lens

With the DSLR market now booming everyday there are more and more people turning to eBay for a cheap and plentiful source of second hand (and new) camera lenses. If you have a lens to sell you'll want to make sure you get the best price for it you can. Second hand SLR lenses are excellent for holding their value, especially those lenses that are better quality or hard to come by.

All of this can be lost if you produce a dull uninformative product listing on eBay. Your item will be overlooked by many bidders and you'll miss out on those all important bids in the last 5 minutes - leaving you with a shortfall on your selling price.

To give your lens the best possible chance you'll need to give the potential bidder the idea that you are a careful, honest, reliable, seller with a discerning eye for a good lens and the photographic knowledge and ability to back that up. The lens you are selling has been used to good effect and is ready to provide the new owner with a tool that will give them many years of satisfaction - you may have all these requirements but even if youhaven't by following the guidelines below you'll certainly give the right impression.

You also need to provide all the information you can so the potential bidder doesn't have any doubts or feel they need to ask you a question. If there is 5 minutes left of your auction and you have a question from someone keen to place a bid if you can't reply you've lost that persons money, and that could be a significant amount if the current bidder is happy to get into a bidding war.

Category

Ensure you drill down to the level in eBay that is right for your type of lens. Don't just drop it into the 'Camera Lenses' category, make sure that you use the 'Lenses for Digital SLR' or the 'Lenses for 35mm SLR' categories

Title

Give your item listing the most accurate production description you can. I've seen so many items not make a decent price because the lens was titled 'zoom lens' or 'Canon AF lens' - this won't draw in either the idle viewer or those that are looking for something specific. Indeed, those that are looking for a specific item will probably search for it using the built in search box so this item won't appear at all in those results.

Make sure that if lens isn't made by the camera manufacturer (i.e. Nikon, Canon, Pentax etc) that you list the model of camera this lens will work on. So if it's a Sigma 28-70m zoom for Canon make sure your listing has the word Canon in it i.e. 'Sigma Zoom 28-70mm f/2.8-4 DG AF Lens Canon EOS Mount'. Your lens will appear on the general listings page and you want the Canon user to click on your listing so putting this into the listing title will help make sure they don't skip past your Sigma Zoom 28-70mm f/2.8-4 DG AF Lens Canon EOS Mount lens thinking it may be the Nikon version.

If the lens is in particularly good condition, or has a bag or is boxed with a receipt you should consider adding a sub title to your listing. This information is your 'unique selling point', it's this USP that will help you get a good price over the other lenses that are being sold at the same time as yours.

Pay attention to details - a single lens is not a 'lense' more than one lens are 'lenses'. If you are selling a single item it is a 'Lens' multiple are 'Lenses' getting these small details right will improve your chances of appearing when someone searches for your lens.

The listing

There are a number of things that all good lens sellers on eBay include in their listings. This information will help your lens stand out for all the others and provide the potential buyer with all the information they need to make a bid. The main things to include are:

What condition is the lens in?

Generally I would recommend Mint, Excellent, Good, Worn, Damaged/Spares

• Mint - Anything that is brand new or in brand new condition, must have box, original lens caps, instructions
• Excellent - Works as good as new (no scratches, dust etc) but without the box instructions/original caps (still has lens caps though)
• Good - A lens that will provide good service but may have dust inside the lens or a very fine scratch. Condition of the exterior may be looking a little on the used side
• Worn - Dust inside and possibly fungus too. Filter mounts could be damaged and the caps may be missing.
• Damaged/Spares - no longer functions in the way originally intended. Maybe repaired or used for spares

After giving the lens your condition appraisal from above you must going into a little detail to qualify why you've decided on that particular rating.

If the lens has fungus inside (if older lenses have been stored in a damp environment they are prone to fungus. Fungus inside a lens looks like tiny tree roots spreading across the glass), if the aperture blades have oil on them, if there is dust in the inside of the glass (and if so is it on the front or back glass) and if there are scratches on the glass (again, is it on the front or back glass). If the answer to these items is yes then include it - if the answer is no, so there is no fungus, no scratches or no dust then say so. By stating the lens is clear of any or all of these things it will avoid a potential buyer having to ask the question thereby giving them more reason to bit straight away and giving your listing credibility by showing you have looked after the lens and are aware of the issues the buyer will be concerned about.

You should then describe the functionality of the lens - is the aperture ring snappy and sharp (does it cleanly 'click' into each stop?). Do the aperture blades move cleanly? Are the filter rings in good condition or worn? Does the lens have a filter attached and how long has this been attached - will this filter be included in the sale?

What is the exterior of the lens like? Are the grips in good condition or worn? Is the wording (the zoom and aperture markings) visible and clear? Is the mount in good condition and is it firm when attached to the camera?

If you've had the lens for a while state this in the listing too.

Photos

These had better be good, you are selling a camera lens after all!you need to have a minimum of 5 pictures - One showing the lens, the caps/hood/box/receipt etc and any other items that will be included in the sale, one from the side showing the grips and lettering, one showing the top and side to display the glass and the filter threads, one showing the side and end to display the camera mount and finally one looking through the lens with the aperture rings opened at their widest.

Ensure your photos don't have any distracting backgrounds too them, for the last one try and take it on a black background to show the dust or lack of in the lens. For the other three try and take them by a window for good light and use a large sheet of white card that goes from flat (with the lens on it) and curves up the wall (behind the lens) to provide a background without any distractions in it.

Arty shallow depth of field shots are good, they show you are an 'good' photographer which makes your lens more credible to the buyer, but you do need to make sure you have shots of the lens with all the important areas in sharp focus.

Other items

Include a description of the items being included in the sale. If the lens caps are original i.e. the same make as the lens include this information in the listing. Many lens buyers prefer to have Canon lens caps with their Canon lenses and Nikon lens caps with their Nikon lenses - picky, but if it gets you a better price for your lens then it's worth it.

Does the lens come with a hood or original packaging, is there a lens case included?

If a filter is included in the sale tell the user how long it's been on the front of the camera. If the camera has a receipt, even if the camera is out of guarantee, include the information and a picture.

To Serial number or not to serial number?

Some sellers will include a serial number in their listing. For Canon lenses this is helpful to decipher where the lens was made as there is a manufacture number (like this: UU0910) that tells you what factory made the lens, the date and year. A manufacturer number is also helpful to research if the lens had known faults and the maker had recalled them above or below a certain number.With expensive second hand lenses It would allow you to check it on stolen equipment lists and it also helps prove the lens is what the vendor says it is. However, there are other reasons to exclude this information. A serial number can be used for fraudulent insurance claims or other less than honest actions.

My particular view on this is to have some text on the listing saying 'Serial number available to serious bidders' then give the number out to people who've a reasonable feedback and a history in buying camera equipment. If you give it out in your listing you could find you perfectly legitimate camera lens being passed off as stolen (for a insurance scam) by a unscrupulous eBayer; this could would then cause problems if a legitimate bidder carried out a stolen goods search on the serial number.

Summary

If you follow the tips here you will put yourself in as good a position as possible to realise the full value of the lens you want to sell on eBay. By doing all the items I've listed you're not only giving your lens the best chance of selling for the highest price, you are also starting out in giving yourself the online persona of someone who knows about lenses and is a professional and credible seller - this is the best possible way of ensuring you have many more top price sales of your old or second hand lenses!

Why not head over to our store pages and see the best new and second hand Canon, Nikon, Pentax, Olypmus, Minolta, Leica auto focus and manual focus lenses the web has to offer!