marketing, websiteI built a website where users can post free classified ads. Something like craigslist. Now since I want to launch it I’m not able to find good ways to market the website and make users use it.
I believe the website will be used and popular, but I’m suffering from the cold-start problem. In other words, when I will launch the website it won’t have any postings on it because it’s completely new! So how can I get users to use my website so I can have some content on it so the users can find it useful?
Creating fake ads might destroy the trust of the users or could even be illegal. So any alternatives?
Off-line marketing is the only method I use for my own project cold starts (now have several successful websites - “free community focused” - longest running one now over 3yrs old and have developed my own means of cold start up.
Its now much easier with my own market place (several thousands of users across the boards) new project is simply marketed on my existing boards and other self developed marketing channels.
2.door to door - homes and businesses and personally invite - make sure you have a paper hand out and leaflet.
posters on every notice board - send poster around the country to friends and family to post up.
most people won’t “just use your site” because you talked to them - take a paper form and ask if they have anything to advertise right now- fill out the form and publish the ads yourself on their behalf.(make sure you have your own camera to take pics of the item)
tell all your friends to publish something even if its an old pair of shoes, old door knob… anything as a give away.
network with people in other states and countries to do the same - at ground level.
then repeat above, but target advertisers for paid subscription to advertise - say 12 months advertising for 10 bucks (with a 3 year lock in price guarantee - minimum signup 3 years ($30)
offer 1/2 price if they advertise right now (have your paper form & camera handy) - its good to get some commercial gear up. (I had a hotel advertise 20ish beds + they where giving the old linen away to charity - offered to do this myself - took the linen and advertise - “drop off provided, charity only enquire.”
and another resort had a couple of old snooker tables - be prepared to be a picker - load up the car with stuff
and do deals - “I’ll take ya stuff now and drop off 70% of the sale later”
if its fit for your website - take the opportunity -
only provide 10 spaces at the above price.
do another round of paid advertising now at a $250 per year lock in contract. (min 2 year)
network with your friends around the country to do the same thing offer them 30% on advertising sales.
repeat as many times as you like. - keep increasing paid advertising prices to reflect your visitor usage. (maintain existing advertisers at the price they locked in)
I have a handful (about 6) advertisers that pay about $250 per year and I have offered to lock this price in for “life” as a return or thank you for the kick start
allow 12 months before deciding if its working - meaning commit to a min of 12 months of hard yakka (foot work) - then you can move to online marketing and pace it up.
always….and I mean always maintain your ground level marking as above - I now go out every 6months for about a week and repeat the first steps. posters go out weekly. and a condition of advertising is now subscribing to email newsletter (of course users can opt out)
Today I’m usually met with “I have heard about your website” and the most common one is - “I didn’t know the website was locally owned” - I offer these people huge advertising discounts and still publish their ads on their behalf. - these are my regular users and they always share the word to their friends and family -
Go to some developer/webmaster forums and start a thread about your website. Tell the people what it is and what are the advantages. I believe they will make a lot of registrations. In my country we have a webmaster forum and very often I see a thread about new projects who seeks for registration and people are helping :)
And yes fake adds are bad options, so don’t do it :)
Wish you luck
Maybe you wanna share the link? :-)
I agree with @Steve’s above answer. To generalise the idea, I would say: Think about who your potential users are, find out where you can reach those best (which websites do they visit? Which places do they go to? Where do they hang out?). How do they usually end up posting something on craigslist, and what advantage and incentive can you provide for them to do so on your site instead? Give them a reason to trust you, so they feel compelled to use your website. Fake ads are therefore a big no-no, be trustworthy.
It’s just getting the word out to the right people, have a great product, and give them a reason to visit your site. You might wanna start with the people close to you (send a mail to your whole address book, post it on FB, etc…). Make it personal, cause that will likely be their reason for wanting to help you (don’t over-commercialise the thing to your friends).
If you want lots of postings to get it going, I was just thinking: why not contact sellers who post massively on other sites (for instance, people who make a life business out of selling computer parts on eBay - they usually have thousands of items for sale)? Give them some kind of advantage for being the first ones, and take it from there.
Or partner up with another site/company?
At the end of the day, it’s just being creative with marketing possibilities, and coming up with the strategies that will be most effective. You could even spend a day on a busy shopping street handing out flyers, the possibilities are endless!
Ads can be done too, but I would probably do that once you have a solid user base to start with.
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