Frequently Asked Questions about Typo Buddy

  1. What is Typo Buddy?
  2. Why should I care?
  3. So how do I use it?
  4. What if I want to find the correct spelling plus the typos?
  5. I get lots of "junk" unrelated to the item I am searching for, what can I do?
  6. But what about homophones? or How do I include real word typos?
  7. I don't get any matches, what's wrong?
  8. How do I save my search?
  9. Why are there so many eBay links (but only 1 craigslist link)?
  10. Why are the craigslist results on Typo Buddy, not craigslist?
  11. It says there are 87 (or some other number) matches, but there were none (or less). What gives?
  12. What kind of typos do you look for?
  13. Gosh this is cool! How can I help?
  14. This is awesome, what other totally cool things should I know about?

What is Typo Buddy?

Typo Buddy is a tool to help you find commonly misspelled auction listings and items on Ebay, Craigslist and eventually other auction web sites.

Why should I care?

Say you are looking to buy a Louis Vuitton wallet or perhaps an espresso maker. When you search for those things on ebay you'll normally be in a competitive bid situation. If, however, you can find listings where people have accidentally misspelled the item or made a typo, then nobody else will see the listing and you'll be the only bidder. That is how you get a great deal on eBay!

So how do I use it?

There are lots of ways to use it, depending on exactly what you want to do. The simpliest (and the default) is to just type in whatever you are looking for spelled correctly. We'll search for the typos and misspellings of it (but by default not the spelling you gave us). We do this because our focus is on finding deals, and it is the typos and misspelled items that offer the best deals.

What if I want to find the correct spelling plus the typos?

If you are looking for a hard to find (or to hard spell) item you might want to include the correct spelling as well as the misspelled versions. No problem! We can do that too!

First, you will need to show the advanced options. To do this select "Advanced" as shown in the picture below:

Once you do this it will reveal several advanced options. From these options you'll want to uncheck the box which says "Exclude Search Term", since this causes whatever you typed, generally the correctly spelled version of the thing you are looking to buy, to be hidden from the search results.

So to include what you typed, uncheck the box shown below:

I get lots of "junk" unrelated to the item I am searching for, what can I do?

So sometimes a misspelling of one "word" is actually a correctly spelled version of another word or acronym.

For example: If you are looking for a Wii, we would include swii as one of the possible typos. The problem with this is that there are lots Swii sandals for sale on eBay, as well as tons of other things that match Wii typos (like sii Disney Seiko watches and I'iwi birds).

When these are obviously, like computer and commuter, we automatically exclude the real word "typo" (See "But what about homophones?" to change this behavior), but when they are less clearly real words like swii, sii and iwi, they get included and this can lead you to find a bunch of matches that are not what you want.

It's easy to customize your search to exclude these items from matching.

First, you will need to show the "Advanced" options. To do this select advanaced, as shown in the picture below:

Then you put swii in the box labeled "Exclude results with these terms". If you want to exclude more than one term, separate the list with commas. For example swii,iwi,sii. We use commas so you can exclude phrases with spaces in them.

Since Wii is a popular item we have set up a pre-made search in the list of popular searches. If you show the advanced options and then click on Wii you can see the list of excluded terms: disney,falkland,seiko,swii,iwi,sii,vintage,canon , since all of these match things that aren't Wii related.

But what about homophones? or How do I include real word typos?

Let's say you are looking for garbage pail kids. You'd be happy to find garbage PALE kids, but normally we exclude "typos" that are real words. You can change this behavior under advanced options by selecting "Include real words". You may want to use this in combination with excluding certain terms.

I don't get any matches, what's wrong?

Well it's hard to say, but the most likely possibility is that nobody made a typo or misspelling of the item you are looking for.

One way to test this is to uncheck the "Exclude Search Term" option and see if you get results that way. See: "What if I want to find the correct spelling plus the typos?" for instructions.

If your search is a good one and there are just no matches today, come back and try it again tommorow to see if there are new matches. See: "How do I save my search?" for instructions.

How do I save my search?

If you'd like to re-run a search, click "Save Current Search" to save it. Whenever you come back, just click the search in the "My Saved Seaches" box to re-run it. This feature requires cookies. If you erase your cookies you will erase your saved searches.

Why are there so many eBay links (but only 1 craigslist link)?

In order to give you the best results, we look for typos one word at a time. If you search for baby stroller, we make one link for baby typos (like: bwby,gaby,babh,bzby,etc) with stroller correctly spelled. Then we make a second one for stroller typos (like: stropler,sfroller,wtroller,strkller,etc) with baby correctly spelled.

Finally for some longer words with lot of typos like Abercrombie we have to split the search in to 2 links because the URL gets too long otherwise.

To get all the matches, you have to click on each of the links. Yeah, we know it could be better and we are working on it.

OK that's cool, but how come craigslist only has one link?

Since craigslist doesn't support boolean search the way eBay does, it is much harder to search for typos. We have to do some magic to make it all work. See "Why are the craigslist results on Typo Buddy?" for more info.

Why are the craigslist results on Typo Buddy, not craigslist?

So the craigslist titles are on Typo Buddy because craigslist doesn't support boolean search. (That means you can't search for phone OR fone) Since this is a basic building block of looking for typos, we have to do some fancy stuff to make it all work, and there is no page on craigslist that could should you what we show you. You still have to go to craigslist to read the actual ad.

It says there are 87 (or some other number) matches, but there were none (or less). What gives?

Sorry for the confusion! We were trying to say we found 87 typos and mispellings of the word you were looking for. We used the 87 words to search eBay, and we might have found thousands of items or none on eBay (or craigslist).

If you found none see: "I don't get any matches, what's wrong?" for some ideas.

What kind of typos do you look for?

 We look for all of the following:
  • missing letters
  • letters typed twice
  • letters transposed
  • letters replaced by a neighboring key
  • extra letters inserted by a neighboring key
  • phonetic mispellings

Gosh this is cool! How can I help?
  • If you write about us in your blog just posted a link, we'd really appreciate it.
  • We love it when people bookmark us with Del.icio.us
  • And when they add us to Stumble Upon.
  • Sharing the link on facebook or My Space is pretty cool too.
  • Of course just sending plain ole email to your pals saying something like: "Check out this neat tool I came across to help you find misspelled auctions on ebay and typos in craigslist ads: http://www.typobuddy.com" would be swell!

This is awesome, what other totally cool things should I know about?

We have a great site to help you find coupon codes for any online store. If you have coupon codes you can add them too.

We have a really popular tool to help you find secret Amazon discounts. You can search for things that are 90% off on Amazon!

There is also a neat site for saving money by finding discount gift cards on eBay. It is really, really simple to use.