Listifieds: A New Classifieds Site
Listifieds is a very new classifieds site that was put together by two guys with “day jobs” in their spare time. Even though the content is thin, the site is impressive in terms of look and feel.
One of the co-founders said to me in an email that they were just going to offer the site in their local area, Bowling Green, Kentucky. But the response was so positive they decided to take the site national.
If you’re an entrepreneur, this sort of thing is very encouraging. It’s possible to set up a great looking site quickly and cheaply. If you’re an established media company this sort of thing can only fill you with frustration and loathing.
After all, how can two guys in their homes, with day jobs, set up a site that’s better looking and easier to use than incumbent media companies will billions in assets and classified revenues at stake?
October 25, 2006 at 7:36 pm
The problem is not in setting up the website (LAMP + other RAD frameworks for the web make it easy). The problem is marketing it.
Sure listifieds can make it in Bowling Green, but how will they make it in, say, LA? What will cause people from LA to head on over to listifieds and add/view classifieds?
Local solutions in themselves are not the difficult part (imo) - its getting mass acceptance (which requires working on each market individually). To extend, its the same reason I see sites like Backfence and think “okay - interesting, but what now? Are you going to cover 50,000 hyperlocal areas?”
Scaling is a tad bit difficult