Regardless of what an ad says, good, clear, well-lighted photos are a must. A lot of what's mentioned here involves trust, so they should particularly include close-ups of any and all flaws or markings: this provides a kind of full, non-verbal disclosure and lets potential buyers can make their own assessment of whether such-and-such a marking rates the item an X out of 10 or not, and if they can live with it.
Buying items without close-ups in the past, I've been surprised in both directions--both finding that an item's cosmetic flaws were underemphasized in a description and that, say, what was described as an 8/10 looks more like a 9/10 to me (that's a nice surprise). When a seller gives the buyer data to make his own assessment, trust goes up. Of course this all applies only to cosmetic issues...
Buying items without close-ups in the past, I've been surprised in both directions--both finding that an item's cosmetic flaws were underemphasized in a description and that, say, what was described as an 8/10 looks more like a 9/10 to me (that's a nice surprise). When a seller gives the buyer data to make his own assessment, trust goes up. Of course this all applies only to cosmetic issues...