Common questions about eBay.

1. What is the relationship between product identifiers and eBay catalogs?

It is understood that sellers can actively associate product listings in open categories with eBay Catalog product catalogs. eBay's product catalogs are usually used to store all product standard data, including titles, descriptions, pictures, product details, and product identifiers, so that buyers can create more product-centric shopping experiences without having to search for hundreds of identical product listings from different sellers. To this end, eBay needs product identifiers to provide detailed information such as MPN and UPC to match product connections with products in the catalog.

eBay once said that it would force sellers to explicitly link their products to the catalog, but now it has changed its position and uses product identifiers to create links.

2. Will eBay verify that product identifiers are correct?

GTIN (UPC, EAN, and ISBN) only contains standard lengths and includes a check digit to help ensure correct input. While eBay checks that this basic format is correct, there is no evidence that they check that the GTIN matches the title, description, or brand name.

In 2016, Amazon began matching UPCs to the GS1 database, but eBay has not followed suit.

eBay does prompt sellers to search for matching products in the eBay catalog and view details to ensure that a match is found after they enter the product identifier. Since there is no standard format for MPNs, eBay may not perform any validation on the MPN.

However, using an MPN or UPC that does not match the item being sold or selecting product details from the eBay catalog that do not exactly match the item being sold is a violation of eBay's search and browse operation policy.

3. eBay says the seller's MPN is invalid. How to solve it

Many sellers are told that product identifiers are invalid. Most of the time, it is caused by simple listing errors, such as entering "see description" in the MPN field or entering the same number in the MPN field.

So how to fix this? MPNs are usually made up of letters, numbers, and dashes. If your code contains spaces or recognizable words, it may be a model name or other data. Avoid entering text such as "Does not apply," "NA," or "see description."

Also, make sure to select the correct category and item status. If you don't have an MPN, leave the field blank instead of entering random text or making up a number to satisfy eBay's requirements.