Craigslist, why so popular?

[hestati]

I had to deal with Craigslist recently. Why is it so popular?

Design from 1990s
Horrible search functions
Spam
Shady postings

The website is not pleasant and yet everyone uses it. What's the secret behind it's popularity? When I lived in Canada, we had Kijiji, much better than craigs, yet in the states Kijiji is not popular at all.

 

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[mws87]

Actually, one of the reasons I like craigslist is because it's simple and to the point. That's probably one of the reasons it's used often here, almost anyone can navigate craigslist.

I agree with the annoyance of shady posting, spam and nonsense. Then again, you'll find crap like that in physical classified ads also. I kept getting emails from the prince of Africa and the London lottery. I trolled them for a while, but they stopped emailing me. One threatened to call the FBI :'(

Unfortunately, I won't be posting any fastlane events in my progress thread from all the inheritance I've received from generous strangers and lotteries I've won overseas without entering.

 

[Gale4rc]

Supply and demand, it has both. New startups don't, which make entry to market hard.

 

[BlakeIC]

Simplicity and popularity

 

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[Digamma]

Metcalfe's law, network effect. You get there first, it's pretty hard to kick you out.

 

[Kevin Peter]

In that sense, eveneBay is most cluttered.

I believe craigslist originally gained popularity as a text based (clean and simple) as you put it, because, it did two things well.

1. It was well organized and easy to navigate and functional. To put it simply, it works and accomplishes the goals of its users without tacky ads popping up (which were popular at the time of its inception) or "bells and whistles" that don't provide functionality.

2. Originally, the text based approach probably felt very comfortable to people who were previously used to reading newspaper classified ads. Craigslist was an easy transition for many readers to make.

 

[hestati]

Sucks though. I'd much rather use Kijiji, but they really tried with a huge marketing budget in US and couldn't compete.

Maybe one day someone will be able to come up with something innovative...

 

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[BigBrianC]

It's got content.

 

[daivey]

I had to deal with Craigslist recently. Why is it so popular?

Design from 1990s
Horrible search functions
Spam
Shady postings

The website is not pleasant and yet everyone uses it. What's the secret behind it's popularity? When I lived in Canada, we had Kijiji, much better than craigs, yet in the states Kijiji is not popular at all.

im in canada, I prefer craigslist because it's simple and it works.

kijiji is annoying. to many ad spams.

 

[P3HSB]

Its free to post!

 

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[Leo Hendrix]

Free, fast, simple user interface. No frills besides spam.

It is also direct - Links you straight to customers,principals, whoever your targeted/intended audience is. No 3rd party except CL itself.

 

[SimonP99]

I had to deal with Craigslist recently. Why is it so popular?

Design from 1990s
Horrible search functions
Spam
Shady postings

The website is not pleasant and yet everyone uses it. What's the secret behind it's popularity? When I lived in Canada, we had Kijiji, much better than craigs, yet in the states Kijiji is not popular at all.

It's so popular because it serves local communities, it's established and it is free.
I sold my truck on Craigslist for $13,000 in under a WEEK for FREE.
I sold a batch of leftover marble flooring for $1700 in a week for FREE.
Whenever my wife and I have a clean out we sell a lot of our stuff on Craigslist for FREE.

That being said marketing on Craigslist has been nothing but a pain in my a$$ because of their
never ending efforts to thwart affiliate marketers.
Another reason it's so popular

 

[Rem]

In my area all I see are people who are looking for help moving and then I go over to services provided and people offer to help others move. Am I missing something here. Is this code for something else or are that many people moving all the friggin' time AND are they too stupid to go and look at all the moving services and pick one? I find craigslist to be mostly a waste of my time.

 

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[SBS.95]

In my area all I see are people who are looking for help moving and then I go over to services provided and people offer to help others move. Am I missing something here. Is this code for something else or are that many people moving all the friggin' time AND are they too stupid to go and look at all the moving services and pick one? I find craigslist to be mostly a waste of my time.

I'm pretty sure @GrumpyCat used to make money by matching up people with "help wanted" and services offered posts. He could probably tell you exactly what's up with those types of people.

But in short, yes, I think many people are that stupid.

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Oh, and I like Craigslist because it's simple and free (seems to be recurring throughout this thread.) It is also very good for getting instant feedback on a market. You can post something on CL and immediately see what kind of response it brings.