1950s? 1950's? 50's? 50s?

1950s? 1950\'s? 50\'s? 50s?

Time for in informal poll.

When you search, which date format do you use most?

1950s

1950's

50s

50's

Enquiring and slightly unoccupied minds want to know!:roll:

Hollis

 

About a year ago, I did some searching and the numbers put 50s on top, as far as how they are listed. Maybe someone who has a tracking system can enlight us on which is searched most often.

I try to put a variety of the choises in my listings.

Lizzie

 

I don't search by decades however, I always use 1950s when I refer to a decade, without the apostrophe.

 

50s is how I search

In my titles I use the above, within my description I will put 1950s as well

 

I use 50s, but make sure to put 1950s somewhere in the description. (both if i have lotsa room and ran out of ideas)

I am listed on a website that says Fifties for everything, but i have really not seen that much just for the sake of length.

This is something intersting that I have learned through Sellathon, some people search 50* to get any combo of 50's 50s, etc. Not all search engines understand that but apparently ebay's does.

 

I always search 1950s, and I usually do a 1950's search afterward to catch anything I missed the first time.

I see a lot of people putting in the apostrophe - 1950's and 50's.

A side note - doing a search for 50s or 50's *should* bring up 1950s and 1950's as well, at least on eBay. At least it used to.

eBay used to not let you use a wildcard * (for example, 50*) without a certain number of alpha characters, but it looks like that was changed sometime recently. GOOD! That stupid rule drove me crazy.

Laura

 

okay - so I'm gonna change all my titles... sheesh.

I thought the general consensus a year or so ago was 50's or 1950's <B>with</B> the apostrophe. oi vey

lil l

 

I did a search a while back and did 50s vs 1950s and found that more results showed up with 50s. So I started using shorter year references in titles and used full year reference in description.

Guess what.............. lower hits! So is it the economy of the times or the word reference???????

yeeeeeehhawwwwww 6 days to Jamaica!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

l used to just list items as 1950s....etc no apostrophe.....but then l tried out a sample...after adding a search box to Sar's attic.....and guess what searches and therefor ehits improved by an average of 35% in three months...
so l have altered the lot on the site..and have started to always use apostrophe's..after all it is the correct way...

eats, shoots, leaves...which won a national book award....grammar is being looked at in all the media, especially in the press and net...

so l thought l wuld take action...and its paid off...

when you are searching on ebay next...try for example....50s dress and then 50's dress and then 1950s dress and lastly 1950's dress....interesting results l think you'll find....


hth
sara x

 

Laura...i found out that the wildcard is okay in general searches but doesn't work once you are in a store...weird...but that's how it is

 

I use 50's with the apostrophe. Great idea to add the 1950's in the description though!

Here are the search results as of this morning on E-Bay:

50s dress 630 items found
50's dress 934 items found
1950s dress 296 items found
1950's dress 428 items found

Searching 1950's does not bring up any items that just say 50's. Searching 1950's does not bring up any items that just say 1950s.

Jody

 

I use 50's in my titles.
When search on ebay, though, I never use any date as a keyword.
If I am looking for a dress I search 'dress'. Then I'll narrow it down by catagory by selecting vintage catagory. Then by date.

 

Looking into this further I found this page Search Commands.

This is what I didn't know:
"Your goal: You're looking for items where one word or another is present.
Command: Enter keywords in parentheses separated by commas. (No space after the commas.)
Example search: (Wedgwood,Lenox)
Returns: Items whose titles contain either the word Wedgwood or Lenox"

So this would be the search to do:
(1950,1950s,1950's,50s,50's,fifties)

That helps when you're search but still doesn't help you in determining what to put in your title.

Marie

 

From "The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation:"

So this is the rule, but again it doesn't help if we know the rule but those who are searching do not.

 

Didn't a couple of people last year verify that 50's was more searched than 50s, according to Sellathon?
I could swear that was the outcome.

I know I will often search to catch them all... (50's, 50s, 1950's, 1950s), but I doubt most searchers will do that!

 

I am late to this thread, so don't know even if anybody will read this, but.....

From an English grammar standpoint, when 50s is used to describe an era, it is used without the apostrophe,as Ellen points out above, i.e., "This dress from the 1950s...." or "I put this as dating from the 50s."

But when using it as a possessive, i.e., the correct usage is, "1950's dress." (dress of the 50s).

So, depending on usage, either designation is correct. But I've found on eBay that if I don't use the apostrophe in titles, even if I should to be grammatically correct, I am in the "running" with far more items, and I think far more searches. Alas, people in general today ignore punctuation, and in eBay titles, I think try to save space by leaving them out. So, my feeling, correct or not, is that one will get more hits without the apostrophe....

(from an old-fashioned, , serial-comma-using, anal communications major!)

 

I'm a serial-comma user too--fussy, careful, and persnickety.

 

Today's search with the winners starred - this is for all of Vintage:

1920s: 138
1920's: 262 *
20's: 94
20s : 77 - :(

1930s: 178 - :(
1930's : 301 *
30s: 182
30's : 202

1940's: 654
1940s: 474 - :(
40's: 790 *
40s: 728

1950's : 1099
1950s: 735 - :(
50's: 1977*
50s: 1687


Hollis

 

What do you mean by "winners"

winners according to sellathon/omniture

or winners compared to how much stuff is out there?

 

the most items when I used those terms in a search of the Vintage category on ebay

Hollis