eBay's Search is a mess.

[net-gnat]

I just listed a Wear-Ever Super Shooter on eBay - did a search for one to see the going rate.  Once again, I see that the search function is in a sad state.  Just for giggles, do a search for "Super Shooter" on eBay and one on Amazon.

On eBay you must use "Wear-Ever".  Too bad for a buyer who does not know the manufacturer.  Now where would you buy?

[dhbookds]

just did Super shooter search, the Wear Evers are the first ones up, but there are Super shooters made by other companies........Hamilton Beach for one.  Also there are "suggestions" just under the search term and Wear Ever Super Shooter is the first suggestion.......  did you search on a phone or what is the problem?

[dhbookds]

lol, that's funny...........the one that shows in the screen shot......first one on a 25,000 return search.......is yours........and I wasn't searching by best match....nor had I looked at your items before the search.......

[net-gnat]

So it appears that it works sometimes.  I tried it 3 times this morning and there were none listed on the first page.  The Amazon search gave me a page full.

[net-gnat]

Not complaining, but why would mine be first?

[dhbookds]

sometimes you're the statue, sometimes you're the pigeon

[net-gnat]

Cutesy! The search still doesn't work for me. I get super heroes.

[dhbookds]

are you sure the search is general and you're not in a particular category? 

try it for wear ever super shooter and then go back to super shooter........

I sell as many of these as I can find, mainly Sept -Feb, so I wouldn't worry about buyers not finding them.......

[johnrj1226]

In 2013 eBay switched from  Google to Cassini as  their primary  search engine - IMHO this was  the largest "faux pas" or just an old fashion  screw-up that eBay has made.  Out of the box  they  had issues - recall having to redo the wording of  my listing titles at least 3 times some my  titles would  better fit Cassini programming as stated by eBay (vs being a more seller friendly approach of adjusting their programming).  Then I had over 100 items listing & sales were approaching $10K/year but sales slide down hill ever since to almost non existent - what the hay! 

When I  do/did a search on eBay I  will/would a ton of not even closely related items  to what I am looking for.  6 years later not much  has changed.  At least Cassini is consistent. LOL

[hillbillymedia]

I just did the search under "all categories" and got 25k+ results. I have been getting some very strange search results lately though and many times search is coming back at zero.

[fuzzface50]

Like Dh I only put super shooter in the title and got over 25,000 and the op was first for me too. 

I have searched these before because I sell them off and on so I wasn't surprised when it took me where It did. but there are multiple of categories that description fits.  For the bleep of it I put in toy category just in case someone searches there a lot and see you get those water blasters. 

I guess I should get mine up, they seem to have gone up in price since I used to sell them.

[dhbookds]

I often wonder when these questions come up, why the poster doesn't identify the item in the search term...  I'm sure not an expert in search, but to me the natural search would be for Super Shooter Cookie Maker or Cookie press.  For maker I get 321 pertinent returns, for press, I get 1069............

[coolections]

@net-gnat 

Worked great for me. Typed Super Shooter and got 25,700 results. Almost every one, at least on the first page, was a Wear Ever brand. If you go to the left side of the search results page and click on cookie press you will eliminate all the accessories and now you'll have 1069 cookie presses to choose from. There are so many choices you will be spending hours trying to decide which one to buy. I compared the results with Amazon and Ebay has them beat 10 fold.

[eburtonlab]

@hillbillymedia 

I just did the search under "all categories" and got 25k+ results. I have been getting some very strange search results lately though and many times search is coming back at zero.

Search has been much worse since early June or late May when it began returning lots of mismatches due to apparent keyword substitution. In some cases search will return "0 exact matches" but then include matches with all the search terms under "results matching fewer key words".

In this particular case, though, using the search terms "super shooter" (without quotes) returns a lot of different items that use both terms including cameras, golf clubs, water pistols and cookie presses. Slight variations of the keywords will also return matches to "super shooters" or "super shot" or other items that contain those words in the title or item specifics.

If a user has suggestions enabled, eBay will suggest the following additional terms to narrow the search:

super shooter cookie press

super shooter electric cookie press

supershooter

super shooter cookie

wearever super shooter

Under the search bar, the following links appear for me:

Related: wearever super shooter  super shooter cookie  super shooter electric cookie press  hamilton beach super shooter  super shooter new

And on the left side some common categories for the search will be highlighted, including "cookie presses".

If anyone is interested in seeing some examples of inappropriate keyword substitutions or ways to get around the broken search using an exclusion term, see this thread:

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Technical-Issues/Ebay-item-search-results-flooded-with-unrelated-items...

[johnrj1226]

Nothing to do with  this thread but this thread reminded me of a funny story about my late mother- in-law, a totally nice person, never  saw or said a bad thing about any body and asked little in material things.  This  happened at  Thanksgiving at  her home all five of her children were their w/their families.  She went up to my wife and told very quietly & secretly she want a "Salad Shooter" for Christmas.  My  wife  said  taht  was good and bought her one. Well at Christmas we gathered once again at her house & he received 5 Salad Shooters from  each of her children - she told  each the same thing.  She & my father-in-law  put a $ limits on all gifts  that would be exchanged at  her  house - usually less that $10.00 - she had  her reason and it was a good one.

Am very  fortunate to  have a partner just like her Mom.