Classified advertising can be one of the most effective methods to promote your products and services online.
One of the greatest benefit of using classified advertising sites is that they are often completely free to use.
Some sites allow you upgrade your account and get more options. However, free classified advertising can be often be used to generate healthy profits.
Here are four tips to help you to write successful classified ads:
1. Have a compelling headline. This is the first thing targeted visitors will see. Your headline will undoubtedly be the deciding factor which determines whether your advertisements get seen or not. So be sure to invest your time writing a quality headline. Use "power" words in your headline such as "secrets", "discount", "limited time only". These words are proven to get the click throughs.
2. Provide good quality photographs and pictures in your copy. If you sign up for US Free Ad's premium service, you are allowed to add pictures to your advert. Relevant pictures make your advert more appealing and attractive.
3. Use bullet points in your adverts. People searching through adverts tend to skim sales copy, so bullet points help them to read your copy easily. If you post long paragraphs on your advert, people are less likely to read it and will probably click away.
4. Be sure to use a "call-to-action". This tells a visitor to take an action that you want him to take, such as to click through to your website, to buy your product, or to sign up for your newsletter. Writing a classified advert is really easy once you grasp the essentials. Once you have a profitable copy, you only need to spend a few minutes each day reposting it to the classified ads sites.
Here's a list of the most popular classified ad sites:
http://www.craigslist.org
http://www.usfreeads.com
http://classifieds.myspace.com
http://classifieds.yahoo.com
http://www.oodle.com
http://www.adpost.com
As well as providing you with the opportunity to sell your products, classified adverts can also drive traffic to your websites and, of course, get you backlinks.
Have you considered using classified advertising?
John,
Thank you for sharing this as this could not be more perfect timing for me. I do not use the classified sites enough, who am I kidding I really do not use them at all. I was looking at Craigslist this morning for my marketing efforts.
I used craigslist once for tools that I came across, just to clear out someones garage that was a sucessful ad, however not my business.
The key for me is to work within their TOS for my business and target properly.
One thing that I have learned is I am not my "market" just because I do not use them, does not mean there are millions of others who do not.