Why I Don't Offer Posting Services

Posting an ad on Craigslist should be one of the simplest tasks that any web-savvy person can do. Login In, Pick Your City and Section, Create a Title and Body & Post The Ad.

Sounds simple, right?

I wish it was that simple.

Craigslist has millions of people searching and posting every single week. With the amount of ads that get posted on a daily basis, they're bound to get people that abuse the service. This has led Craigslist to become more difficult to post to for small business owners. Often times their ads get ghosted (a ghosted ad means that YOU can see the ad when you go to Craigslist -- but nobody else can) or flagged for removal by the Craigslist automated system (NOT the community).

As a small business owner myself, I have difficulty using Craigslist effectively. While my ads do not get ghosted regularly and I often have no problems posting - my time spent in the back end of Craigslist trying to maneuver increases with each month that goes by.

In order for me to make any money posting ads for small business owners I would have to charge upwards of $7.50 per ad. I have viewed other Craigslist Posting Services on the internet and found prices under $2.00. I question the validity of these posters and their efficiency.

In order to post multiple ads a day (which is against the Craigslist rules anyhow) you have to own multiple phone verified accounts, have access to numerous IP addresses / proxy services and log in and out of each account to make a new posting. The expenses on a system like this could easily reach into the thousands of dollars a month if you were working with a dedicated marketing campaign.

A better solution, in my opinion, would be for Craigslist to offer "National Small Business Accounts" that are pre--paid in $100 amounts. Allow the NSBA to post 10 ads per day (but no more than 1 ad per city) at the cost of $5 per ad. They can use their own office computer, 1 IP Address and 1 Phone Verified Account. Craigslist would make more money, the small business com,unity wouldn't feel so handcuffed when using Craigslist and the advertising wouldn't have a huge effect on each community category.

So ... that's the deal. I don't offer Craigslist ad posting for other companies because quite frankly - I don't need the hassle of trying to out-maneuver Craigslist.