New Listings - Themes need to be expanded

John John H. Talman

For instance - where should British Antarctic Territory be listed - I put it under Great Britain but I don't usually think of Great Britain when I think of British Antarctic Territory. When looking up listings of British Antarctic Territory you might find it under B.A.T., British Antarctic Territory, Br.Ant.Terr., Etc. Can all of these be grouped into one group so sellers and buyers can see all listings?

Michael Generali

When you are on the item creation screen, click on the Main Category green box. Scroll down to WORLDWIDE, click on that, and then click on ANTARCTICA.

John John H. Talman

When I clicked on Worldwide Antarctica under all sellers it said there was "No Listings". I know there are listings for British Antarctica and B.A.T. etc.. Not sure if I want to list under Worldwide Antarctica if it brings up no listings when you try to find other listings.

Mark Rosenberg

There are over 1,000 Listings currently in this category:
https://www.hipstamp.com/category/worldwide_antarctica

Mark Rosenberg

Also, note that when searching, we do automatically group together common abbreviations and mis-spellings for different countries. So for examples if you search for:

British Antarctic Territory: https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=British+Antarctic+Territory&parent_id=0
Br Antarctic Territory: https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=Br+Antarctic+Territory&parent_id=0
Br Antarctic Terr: https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=Br+Antarctic+Terr&parent_id=0
Br Antarctic Ter: https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=Br+Antarctic+Ter&parent_id=0
British Antarctica: https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=British+Antarctica&parent_id=0
etc.

You will see the exact same results.

I believe this does not currently apply to "BAT" for a technical reason (mainly that BAT is also a work people search on - as in the animal).

Michael Generali

The listings under Antarctica for Falkland Islands and Tristan da Cunha belong in the South Atlantic Ocean category. Sometimes Tristan da Cunha, being a dependency of St.Helena, is categorized with British Africa. Fiji listings belong in the Australia and Oceania category.

John John H. Talman

Thank you Mark. When I tried to find BRITISH ANTARCTICA, etc. under the diff. titles I got various results. They did not all come up with the same answer for me.I would have thought that B.A.T. would come up with a diff. answer than BAT but will try not to use B.A.T. in future if site reads it as BAT. How come when I searched Worldwide Antarctica site came up with no results but you use "worldwide antarctica" and come up with 1000 results. Is it the capitals? Perhaps site should list any Antarctica under just Antarctica and forget about the worldwide.

Mark Rosenberg

In general, you can either browse a category, or search for keywords, countries, etc.

I'm referring to the specific category under Worldwide > Antarctica which you can access from the browse menu. If you search for "Worldwide Antarctica" that wouldn't bring you to any category - that's just searching for items with the keywords "Worldwide" and "Antarctica" in the title - which there are no mathcing items.

That being said if you check the links I noted above if you do search for "British Antarctica" or "British Antarctic Territory" you would see the exact same results - down to the last item. Just click on the links to check it out. When you previously searched you may have been searching in a specific category, in which case then the results may differ slightly (depending on which categories the items are in).

John John H. Talman

Thanks again Mark; I was searching from the top of our Listings page where it says "Search items from all Sellers", then
"All categories" and "Search" to come up with a diff. answer than you. Will use browse menu in future if there is such a difference. Did notice that both B.A.T. and BAT items are listed under worldwide antarctica listing in browse section and did previously note B.A.T. on other search site but didn't try BAT. What about my idea on just giving Antarctica a listing on its own and getting rid of worldwide in front of it. Worldwide Antarctica comes up with nothing on search portion over my listings.

Mark Rosenberg

Antarctica is it's own category. You can't list items in the "Worldwide" category, it just groups together categories which are under it in the same way the "Europe" category does.

John John H. Talman

Mark: Obviously I have a lot to learn about Hip Stamps and believe me I am trying. This exercise has certainly brought many things to my attention. I am a seller of stamps and I have to think that a lot of buyers need to learn a lot more as well. I would think that many buyers might go the "Search Items from all Sellers" at top of listings. Under Antarctica I found 582 listings there but as you pointed out if you go to the Browse section you found 1000 items. What happened to the other 400+. Mike Generali told me to scroll down to worldwide click on that and then click on Antarctica. This is what I meant when I asked if "Antarctica" could be a listing on its own. Prior to this I didn't know you had to go to Worldwide and find British Antarctica there by clicking on Antarctica. On the smaller listing of Antarctica I wrote of the better British Antarctica seems to be largely missing. Is there not a way to make Hip Stamps easier for buyers and sellers?

Mark Rosenberg

We do try to make browsing and searching very easy and intuitive for buyers and sellers. Basically we try to make everything just work - regardless of what you're doing.

If for example, you search for "British Antarctica" in the main search bar (which says "Search Items from all Sellers") you will see all of the listings where the "Country" is "British Antarctic Territory":
https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=British+Antarctica&parent_id=0

Of which there are over 1,000 results. You can search for other terms such as "Br Antarctic Ter" and "Br Antarctic Territory" and you'll still see the exact same results. There's no other website/marketplace that does that - as you would need to type in every variation yourself elsewhere.

That being said, we're always working to improve browsing and searching further and I agree it would make sense for "B.A.T." to return the same results as well - and this is something we will improve in the future.

There's also a category called Antarctica, which is under the Worldwide category, and also contains over 1,000 results. However, Worldwide > Antarctica is not the same as "British Antarctic Territory", as it also contains "Australian Antarctic Territory", etc. since there's more "Countries" which fit into this category as well.

That aside, you can basically find these items either way.

What is it that you're searching for that you see 582 listings? Can you post the URL, since when I search for "British Antarctica" I'm seeing over 1,000 listings - not 582.

John John H. Talman

Mark: 582 listings versus 1000 listings Its the section over my listings that I wrote of earlier. IT states "Search Items from all sellers" then "all categories"
then "search". This is where I used to go prior to you bringing the Browse section to me. This was new info for me and I do appreciate it but was hoping I could go to section over listings.

Mark Rosenberg

Yes - that's the main search bar. What search term are you entering into it?

For example, if I enter "British Antarctica" and then click on search I see over 1,000 items:
https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=British+Antarctica&parent_id=0

Alternatively if I browse the Worldwide > Antarctica section I also see over 1,000 items. I do see that there are a few listings for "British Antarctic Territory" in a couple of random categories outside of Worldwide > Antarctica (where they should be) and we'll get those moved shorty.

However, not having anything to do with browsing I'm still seeing over 1,000 items. If you're still seeing 582, please copy and paste the URL from your Internet browser so I can see what page specifically you're looking at.

Rod Tilyard

Hi Mark, interesting you say that Australian Antarctic Territory list under Worldwide > Antarctica. All mine, as originally synced from eBay, list under Australia & Oceania > Australia > Antarctica. So apparently AAT stamps are split over two different categories?

Mark Rosenberg

Hi Rod,

You're actually correct - we'll need to look at Australian Antarctic Territory closer.

When a listing is created, there is both a "Country" associated with the listing, and it's placed in a "Category". These are two separate items. So for example, if you list the "Country" as "Australian Antarctic Territory" (or we import the listing from a third-party site), the "Country" is "Australian Antarctic Territory" and whether a buyer searches for the country, abbreviation, etc. they'll see all of the matching items regardless of what category the item is in. For example:

Australian Antarctic Territory:
https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=Australian+Antarctic+Territory&parent_id=0
or
AAT:
https://www.hipstamp.com/search?keywords=AAT&parent_id=0

You'll see all the same results.

With regards to categories, there's many cases where, as a buyer, you may expect (reasonably) to find an item in two different categories. The most notable example of this is all of British Commonwealth. Which is why when a Seller lists a British Commonwealth item, we ask that they list it in the category of where it is geographically located (we'll also do this automatically when you sync with a third-party site). That way the buyer can find the items when searching by Country, or when browsing by geographic region AND under "British Commonwealth". The reason the buyer can find it under "British Commonwealth" categories is because these categories actually link to other categories - so that items aren't actually split up into two different categories - they're actually available in both places (to the buyer).

This is actually what should happen with Australian Antarctic Territory as well. In that the country should be "Australian Antarctic Territory" and a buyer should be able to find it as such. But a buyer should also be able to find it whether they are browsing in Australia or Antarctica. We'll take a closer look at this one soon.

Mark Rosenberg

The above probably makes more sense with an example.

If you're browsing the category Caribbean > TURKS & CAICOS
https://www.hipstamp.com/category/turks-and-caicos/151/?keywords=TURKS+&+CAICOS

or you're browsing the category British Commonwealth > British Caribbean > TURKS & CAICOS
https://www.hipstamp.com/category/british-caribbean/297/?keywords=TURKS+&+CAICOS

You'll actually see the same items. No listings are split up between these two categories, they're simply (and automatically) available in both places.

Mark Rosenberg

or using Michael's example of TRISTAN da CUNHA

You can also find the same listings in both:
Worldwide > South Atlantic Ocean > Tristan da Cunha
https://www.hipstamp.com/category/tristan-da-cunha/274

and
British Commonwealth > South Atlantic Islands > Tristan da Cunha
https://www.hipstamp.com/category/south-atlantic-islands/302/?category_slug=south-atlantic-islands&keywords=TRISTAN+da+CUNHA&volume_name=tristan-da-cunha&volume_id=580

Rod Tilyard

Thanks Mark, seeing AAT under Australia and Antarctica will be perfect.

John John H. Talman

Mark: I found 582 over my listings when I entered "Antarctica" only. The reason I used Antarctica only was that you had said this was a separate category. You found 1000 listings in the browse section. Thus where are the other approx. 400?
Still feel a popular area like "Antarctica" with a 1000 listings should have its own main listing without having to go to browse and enter "Worldwide" first.

Rod Tilyard

In my ideal world I would agree with John. Showing the CONTINENT Antarctica at the top category level would be more intuitive.

Michael Generali

I saw that one gets the same results with the following searches. There are the same number of Tristan listings that appear under Antarctica and South Atlantic Ocean.

Worldwide > South Atlantic Ocean > Tristan da Cunha (11 listings)

Worldwide > Antarctica > Tristan da Cunha (11 listings)

It seems that only the country name really matters, not the placement of the country within a category.

John John H. Talman

To Rod Tilyard: Thanks for your support. I just want to make things easier for the buyers and the sellers and I am sure Hip Stamps is also trying to do this. Perhaps they are learning a few new things just as I have. Mark originally told me there was 1000 listings under Worldwide Antarctica but if you look at the AAT you first brought up it shows 1742 listings alone and British Antarctica shows 1148 listings and South Georgia 882. Not sure if there is any duplication with the listings and I think the number of lots listed under Browse - Worldwide - Antarctica seems to have grown to 1305 when I looked again. Confusing to this seller and I would think confusing to other buyers and sellers. Lets try to list them all together under one main Continental heading of Antarctica. Whether you are looking at search site above lists of lots or in Browse section the number of lots for Antarctica should be the same. Stamp collecting - One of the greatest hobbies in the world! John Talman

Mark Rosenberg

Hi John,

Thanks for the detailed explanation. I believe I understand what you're saying now.

When you use the Search bar - you're searching for keywords. On almost any website, including ebay, your keywords are simply matched against the keywords within the titles of the listings on the site. So if you entered "United States" you would only see items which contain "United States" in the title. You wouldn't see any listings which only contained "USA" or "U.S.", etc. On HipStamp however, when you search for any country, we automatically detect that you're searching for a country, and you will see the same results - which is a key feature which sets us apart from others, and makes it much easier for buyers to find the items they're looking for.

Entirely separate from searching using the Search bar would be browsing by category - in which you browse a category which contains listings in which the Seller assigned their listings to that category.

On other websites, again including ebay, those results will look very different from each other for the reasons stated above. On HipStamp, they generally look very similar because of the way we handle countries. We also take it a step further by linking certain categories together such that you see the same items where appropriate.

In many cases, countries are similar to our categories, but there are a few exceptions. Antarctica being one of them, in that "Antarctica" is not also a country. So if you search for "Antarctica" you'll just see listings which contain "Antarctica" in their titles; and if you just browse Worldwide > Antarctica you'll just see listings which Sellers placed in this category (which may not necessarily contain the word Antarctica).

Hopefully that makes everything clearer!

That being said, in the future we are planning to enhance the Search feature, such that in certain cases it may also make additional suggestions to you. For example, if you were to search for "Antarctica", since we know this is also a category, we may then suggest to you "Would you also like to browse the Worldwide > Antarctica category to see more results?" Or something along those lines.