Craigslist: Little Ads, $81 Million In Revenue

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Craigslist: Little Ads, $81 Million In Revenue

By WebProNews Staff - Thu, 04/03/2008 - 06:52

Company could easily top $100 million if desired

The website devouring the classified industry could hit $100 million in revenue in 2009 with a couple of minor changes, with the old-line newspaper industry helplessly watching from the sidelines.

Though the powers that be at Craigslist, founder and customer service rep Craig Newmark and CEO Jim Buckmaster, aren't commenting on the story from industry analysts Classified Intelligence (CI), they are pulling in an appreciable amount of money on the famously minimalist site. They could do even better.

CI said in its report on Craigslist that the implementation of its $25 job listing fee in three more locations could boost the company's revenue into nine-digit territory. Through assessment of Craigslist postings in January and March, CI pegs 2008 revenue for Craigslist at $81 million.

Take the job recruiting fee of $25 Craigslist charges in a handful of major metropolitan areas. Kick it up to $75 across the board (that's the price in San Francisco), and revenue for 2009 should climb to $150 million for a company based in a Victorian-style house that looks like it saw much better days a half-century ago.

The customer service credo of Craigslist, and its modest appointments both in headquarters and in site design, stand in stark contrast to the glassy offices of the newspapers that bore the brunt of the no frills, no fee approach to classifieds that are a hallmark of the site. Craigslist looks like what it is, a site launched years ago as a personal project that never forgot its users.

Some feel like Craigslist should do more, namely the bombastic VP and general manager of eBay's classifieds competitor, Kijiji, Jacob Aqraou. He doesn't care for the dated look of Craigslist, or the English-only listings that have only branched out into other languages in recent months.

As CI noted, the sniping comes across as odd, since eBay happens to own a 25 percent stake in Craigslist. The competition is real, however, with Kijiji, Freecycle, and the Village Voice's Backpage all trying to present themselves as a better classifieds option.

Although some may dispute Craigslist's real impact on newspaper classified revenue, one publishing professional cited by CI called Craigslist a catalyst that forced newspapers to reconsider their business models.

There isn't one cause for newspaper fortunes to be in decline. Craigslist is a popular target, especially since CI said in 2004 that San Francisco newspapers lost as much as $65 million in recruitment ad revenue alone due to the site.

Craigslist simply found a niche where demand existed, and they make as much money as they care to earn. One can imagine how much they would make if they tossed an AdSense ad unit into their templates. But to Newmark and company, such a prospect looks unfathomable.

News Tags: Financial, Classifieds, Craigslist

84 Comments

By tony (WPN reader) - Fri, 01/30/2009 - 08:23

The problem with craigslist

The problem with craigslist is that flagging. If people dont like your ad for reason ,because you selling cheaper item then what they have, they flag you. And its not fair and i know 85% wished they would come up with better flagging system

By Perth clotheslines (WPN reader) - Sat, 01/03/2009 - 08:18

Perth clotheslines

Who cares about craigs list. As an Australian we've never heard of it. We have our own traging post.

By Guest (WPN reader) - Mon, 12/29/2008 - 16:54

Craigslist Flag The Needy...Asking For Help Is Not Welcomed

I was just asking for help on craigslist...and I got flagged numerous times. They don't flag the scammers, or people posting porn; just check the male personals . But someone in need, or asking for help your flagged quickly. But finally I found a website that truly helped me http://www.bailafamilyout.com its not a classified ad but I did find it on craigslist. Its a panhandle online site with real human interaction. They have chat rooms where you meet an greet and is really a nice site to go post your story of need. And yes the "flag police" flagged the website ad as well.

By mike (WPN reader) - Sun, 12/28/2008 - 23:29

alternative sites

I used to use craigslist until someone I know got scammed.

I use other sites like zimspost.com to buy and sell. It is still relatively new, but has come along way in the past few months. Whatever you choose, be careful and use your best judgment.

By tommy (WPN reader) - Fri, 06/05/2009 - 09:30

I checked out

I checked out http://zimspost.com and found it to be a great site. Thanks for the referal. i will use zimspost as my site to buy and sell.

By The Snowhawk in Lake Geneva Wisconsin (WPN reader) - Sun, 12/28/2008 - 20:40

Raise their rates???

It's greed that ruined Feebay and now people are going to tell Craig's List to raise their rates? I think that a bunch of BULL.
CL is doing just fine let them run their business their way and Feebay screw up what they are loosing already.
Funny this is that if Feebay would have kept thing going the way it was originally designed they would be the rulers of the market without much for competition but Nooooo they can't make enough money quick enough so they got greed to rule the company and screw up everything for everyone.
Here is one more this... How many of you PAY to put money in your bank account and PAY to take money out of your account? PayPal is using your money just like any other bank in the banking industry but they too have to screw-blue- & tattoo everyone that they come in contact with.

By Perth clotheslines (WPN reader) - Sat, 01/03/2009 - 08:23

Haha yep. U and me are like

Haha yep. U and me are like minded. Feebay sux. They wouldve made more money doing things cheaper.

By Marek Nowy Jork (WPN reader) - Sun, 12/28/2008 - 13:31

Made to stick

I think that that really popular/sucessful site does not have to be full of options/features and fireworks.
Maybe that's why craigslist is so successful: they concentrate on the content

By Internet Marketing Indonesia (WPN reader) - Mon, 11/10/2008 - 04:12

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By sitiwebgaeta (WPN reader) - Thu, 10/02/2008 - 07:39

guadagno di nicchia

Grazie mille per le informazioni raccolte in questo post.. La storia si ripete!

By Produc Articles (WPN reader) - Tue, 09/02/2008 - 13:53

wow

where do they get their revenue?

By Dan Delain (WPN reader) - Tue, 06/24/2008 - 23:22

Craigslist

I have used craigslists jobs posts in both paid and unpaid cities. I must admit the most annoying thing is when you ask for certain skills, you get replies from so many unqualified people that it becomes an issue. Thankfully the free entry brings in the volume and with companies like supercandidate.com you can test the people to see if they can do the work before it costs me my commission.

So in a nutshell, much better then monster.com etc because it is free to list but you have to team up with a great filtering online tool otherwise you may as well keep counting your lost chickens..

By Guest (WPN reader) - Sun, 08/31/2008 - 23:39

I agree - Use www.supercandidate.com - the best filter out there

Thanks for the update on this.

I went to the filter software supercandidate.com and I realise the quality of candidate you get when you can put your own video questions in. Not to mention that I can go off for a coffee and this product rings me to let me know when I have what I want - JEEE...

Why it took so long for something like this is a mystery..

Go you geeks at supercandidate - you just made my life a whole lot easier

By John Rogers (WPN reader) - Tue, 06/03/2008 - 13:06

Hope It's Not All Pay

I hope they don't keep adding fees little by little so that in a couple years it's $1 for all ads, all the way up to $100 each for big cities. It's bound to happen....

By Marianne McEachern (WPN reader) - Sun, 05/18/2008 - 13:56

What I find so amazing

What I find is so amazing is the search engine involvement. Listing from Craig's List hit the organic listing pretty regularly. For an online marketer that's quite a boost.

By David (WPN reader) - Sun, 05/18/2008 - 12:48

CL ads work

I live in San Francisco, basically where CL took off. I have friends here whose entire lives are tied to CL: roommate, job, boyfriend or girlfriend, car, social clubs, furniture, etc. You would be amazed! I use CL in other cities, but not with a whole lot of success, EXCEPT for one thing: real estate listings. These seem to be pretty good from city to city. My new site:

http://www.forumdeals.com

is going to attempt to find the best deals on CL and other forums for people to see, or submit. Sometimes I see CL I don't really need, but someone ought to know! Also, for tracking CL listings, there is this site:

http://www.my-cl.com

which will send users emails or TMs any time new ads are listed matching their keywords.

By clarence coggins (WPN reader) - Sun, 05/18/2008 - 08:17

Craigs List Posting

My biggest concern is that the pricing is like the Google Slap with adsense. It really a place where you need to know how to market effectively and how the system work otherwise you'll be throwing good money after bad.

When I first started with craigslist I was posting only 1 ad per city for 10 cities and 4 out of those 10 ads were being flagged. I started learning what ohter people were doing and I now post up to 900 and only had 1 pulled.

The biggest draw back to craigslist posting it the verification email process. I not talking about the captcha I'm talking about the email you get sent that you respond to. For the captcha I use this.

It still a challenge working with conversions. It is also going to be more difficult as the increase in revenue experienced will cause the fees to spread to other areas.

It was a good example of create an irresistable demand and then bill them.

I can actually see classified ads and website domain name reaching the prices of apartments and condos.

By Catherine (WPN reader) - Thu, 05/08/2008 - 12:35

my first website

Hello,Ive heard a lot about Craigs list, Im very new to the internet and ,I just recently published my first website .I really am convinced that Craigs list is the way to go for advertising it ! Im requesting an email to the address listed above with instuctions about where I can go place an advertisement on Craigs list ,Please remember that I am new to all of this and Iv never sent out emails that are not to friends and family ,If yoiu can help me that would be great .Thank you ,Catherine

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By BROOKE COLE (WPN reader) - Mon, 04/21/2008 - 21:10

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By Mark (WPN reader) - Tue, 04/15/2008 - 20:47

Craigslist

They could make so much more money it isn't even funny but I do not believe they are altruistic as they appear to be. They sure do have their hands full though and for working so hard and being the owner of the site they can do what they want with it. I wonder if eBay has any say in the goings on since they own part of CL?

By riker1981 (WPN reader) - Wed, 04/09/2008 - 08:10

Craigslist

Craigslist is good. Good for harvesting people's personal information. Since Craigslist started, I stopped rummaging through people's Mail boxes for their personal information. Now, I just pay $25 to post a job on craigslist and have thousands of people send me their personal information...muhahahahaha.Every month, I go down the list of states posting jobs and "mining" a wealth of information which I then sell to the Nigerian scammers. I am so rich. Yeah Craig is great!!

This is just a fiction guys but be careful when you send out your resume on craigslist.

By Guest (WPN reader) - Fri, 06/06/2008 - 09:46

Could you email me privately - Please????

Could you Please email me privately because I would love to discuss this 'post' you called 'fiction' in more detail.

Thanks, Lisa from Tucson, AZ

By Clarence Coggins (WPN reader) - Sun, 05/18/2008 - 08:01

That's Happens All over the Net

Identity Theft is on the rise. That is why company's like prepaid legal, lifelock, and other's who will be join the fray later are set up to rake in a bundle. Because the clever scammer doesn't need craigslist to get your information. It is already accessible whether a person supplies any information to anybody. Between credit bueraus and the us government the information is already out there.

The best thing a person can do is have some type of restoration services because we are all going to get hit sooner or later. I use this service to address that issue.

By Miguel Manual (WPN reader) - Tue, 04/08/2008 - 12:18

Craigslist, Kijiji, etc.

I am an avid online classifieds user. There are three sites I use regularly: Craigslist, Kijji and UsedEverywhere.com. In my humble opinion, I find UsedEverywhere.com to be the most useful and easy to use. It's faster to post ads and it has virtually no spam compared to Craigslist and Kijiji...especially Kijiji. It's much more local as well. I've been told they have representatives in each city that they're in. What does everyone else think? I'm interested in hearing.

By David Mitchell (WPN reader) - Sun, 04/06/2008 - 08:09

craigslist vs eBay

I have listed items not sold on eBay and put them on craigslist and sold the item in a few days.

By eFABE (WPN reader) - Sat, 04/05/2008 - 19:39

CraigsList

I had not heard of CraigsList until reading another great article by David A. Utter so I thought I would have a look at this list to see what all the fuss was about.

Well, it took me back a bit as I was not expecting something soooo basic, it sure is HUGE and I have no doubt it has given a large number of people a great service. However, for me I did not get a good feeling about it and decided against placing an ad on the UK area.

Well done to them though, it just goes to show, it really does pay to keep things simple. (umm, I think I will go back and rethink my own websites!!!).

By Guest (WPN reader) - Fri, 04/04/2008 - 08:57

Thank you!

I love craigslist.org. Thank you for understanding that people need a place to post many different types of ads for free. I never get any responses from newspaper ads that cost money and are extremely limited (no photos, # of words, etc.) But often people find my ads on craigslist. Thanks! Don't change a thing!

By WillieMae Beall (WPN reader) - Fri, 04/04/2008 - 08:48

good for the world

I think Craigslist is the next best thing to the invention of the internet.

I put an ad in there and the item was sold before noon the next day and the ad was free to me, now how cool is that?

My only regret for craigslist is how long will it be available to us,since he has allowed Ebay to be a 25% owner.

I have a multi-million dollar business idea that I would like to build a website for, but I am disabled and on a very low income and have no knowledge of how to build a website. I would like to allow individuals to invest in my idea and they would own a piece of the company. The only problem is because of the simplicity of the business I would not be able to announce what it is until it launches.

I craigslist is around for a long time, because it is like a shot in the arm for the world.

By MFK (WPN reader) - Tue, 04/08/2008 - 00:00

I can help you out with your website

Hey there - agree about your comments regarding craigslist.org - love that site. I design web sites and would love to discuss whether my skill set would allow me to help you out with your idea. Contact me at motivatedbostonian@yahoo.com - would love to hear from you.

MFK