If you are new or just getting started in the wholesale real estate business, you probably want to get down to nitty gritty.I respect that so lets get started.
If you don’t already know, Craigslist is one of the most visited websites online today. It gets billions of hits and it is one of the top searched sites for every major city in the US. Not only is this site free, it’s great to boost web traffic and get in front of a targeted audience. As a wholesaler, craigslist should be on top of your must do list everyday. Although it may seem as easy as placing an ad on the site and calling it a day, its not as easy. As any marketing campaign you implement, there should be a schedule and an order of doing things. Here are my tips that will help you when posting craigslist ads for your real estate wholesale deals.
- Repetition – Make sure you put up 20 ads or so a week. Craigslist lists the ads based on the date they were posted so the later the day goes, the farther down on the page your ad will show. Make sure you post ads in the morning and in the afternoon. Friday and Saturdays are the best for some odd reason.
- Headline – Your headline is high end real estate. When an investor or potential buyer goes onto craigslist and looks up property in the “real estate” tab, they might use keywords in the search bar to narrow down the number of ads. By placing the words wholesale and investment on the headline, you will draw more attention from the search tools.
- Un-Spam it Yourself- Never have a link back to your email, or an anonymous link. Just put a phone number along with a link to your website. When posting ads for wholesale real estate I get a lot of lame marketing attempts of no-name websites trying to get me to post my deal on their site. By limiting the ways people get a hold of you, you control the flow and filter the spammers.
- SEO – Put your websites name inside the city box next to the headline. If someone does a search for wholesale deals in their city and up comes 30 different ads, yet 10 of those say your website, you will get people going to the site just to check it out. Its very important that you make yourself stand out, even this little bit helps go a long way.
- Picture This – Having a picture whose root file name is cash buyers or wholesale deals, will help you in many ways. First of all, nobody wants to see an ad for a wholesale deal with out a picture. Its one less thing they can filter out. Also if you name your picture wholesale deals or cash buyers, when someone google’s images for wholesale deals or cash buyers in your city, your image will come up in the top search. That’s a quick ninja tip.
There you have it. Those were five basic tips and things to know when posting wholesale deals on craigslist. I know about other sites like backpage and kijiji, but who cares for now. Start with the sites that matter and work our way over when you begin branding yourself more.
5 thoughts on “5 Tips for Using Craigslist to Wholesale Real Estate”
Excellent advice! I picked up #4 and #5 and will be implementing them into my marketing. Thanks!
Great Post
Never thought about tip #4. Good idea.
Another tip (or tool actually) that I use as a Realtor to reach out to for sale by owners (and even brokers who are listing properties on Craigslist) automatically is this http://trck.me/FSBOmber/
It’s good for having an automated “inquiry” about properties as soon as they get listed on Craigslist. For FSBOs you can mention that you’re an investor who is interested in their property or for Realtors that you are looking for deals.
The thing I like most is that I was able to set it up then it runs everyday thereafter. Much better than paying my assistant or having to do it myself everyday.
Is this information still relevant for Craigslist after their update to thier ghosting policy?
Is this information still relevant for Craigslist after their update to their ghosting policy?