subject: Free Classified Website Vs Premium Paid Listing Classified Website [print this page] When setting up a classified website, which do you go for? A free classified site, or a premium paid listing site? Let's weight the pros and cons of each option.
Free classified website.
Pros: You can looking started quickly with a free classified site. Since it's free, it will encourage more users and sign up and post ads on your site. You never need to worry about setting up payment gateways.
Cons: Since it's free, you won't be seeing any money in the short term. You will need to ride out the initial cashless phase until the site starts to pick up momentum. You may also looking more spam ads since postings are free. More time is required to review and approve ads since.
Premium paid listing site.
Pros: You looking to earn revenues instantly if you can looking people to post ads on your site. You can be sure that over 90% of the listings are serious ads since they are paid ads. You never need to give time wading by using far too many unwanted ads.
Cons: It's harder to looking people to sign up and post ads as your site is still new. You will also need to give more time setting up automated payments.
So which is better - the free listing or premium listing option?
We recommend adopting both. You can easily setup your site to be a free ads site when it's new. That will encourage new postings and signups. Even though you won't be earning any money, it's easier for the site to gain traction. The goal is to build up enough momentum for the site to make money on autopilot. That takes time. You are trying to establish the site early on. So if you charge fees, it's going to be counter productive.
It takes anywhere from 6 months to a year to build an established site. How soon the site becomes prosperous depends on far too many factors. Mostly, it depends on how much time and money you need spent on advertising. You need to promote the site aggressively in the beginning since no one knows about the site.
If the advertising is effective, you will start receiving ads. Although you may need to give more time reviewing ads as they are free to post, you will also be gaining credibility.
Once you feel that the classified website is established enough, switch to a paid model. You never need to give up the free listing yet if you never want to. For scenario, all postings can remain free, but for premium listings, ads will enjoy special benefits such as higher rankings, more prominent placements, etc. That will be killing two birds with one stone. As free ads are still available, the site can continue to grow rapidly. Now, with the premium listing, you will also be able to start profiting from the growth of the site.
