It is hard to find work on Craigslist these days, and it’s not just in the Fredericksburg, Virginia area either. My clients all over the country are having the same problem.
Craigslist isn’t the problem. God no. Craig Newmark did the world an incredible service when he created his free online classified system, or is it a public bulletin board, or both? Either way, who cares. Bottom line is that I have earned money by using Craigslist and you can too.
You will find the same problem across all of the online classified systems: people want to pay bottom dollar. Paying bottom feeder prices is fine when it comes to hard goods, but do you really want to hire a service provider based solely on price? I know I don’t.
I focus on intangibles: quality, how long I’ve been in business, types of business I’ve helped grow, Google results (that’s probably how you found this post), etc.
In today’s climate, a SEO service needs to stand out from the crowd.
So when I am looking for local SEO work on Craigslist, I do a couple things: posting an ad that “I am an SEO God that will boost your Google rank for targeted keywords in Fredericksburg, Virginia” is NOT one of them.
The first thing I do is look at ads being posted by companies in the Fredericksburg, Virginia area.
Although truthfully, Fredericksburg Craigslist is a tiny fish. Most businesses in this Northern Virginia region advertise on Craigslist Washintgon, D.C. because that is where most users initially land. And since Craigslist charges for some ads now it is a better use of a business’s advertising investment.
Once I’ve targeted a few of these companies, I will try to find them online. If I can great, if I can’t even better.
The second thing I do is contact this business, in an approachable, “non-spammy” way.
I don’t pitch in my emails. I use this initial email as an introduction, point out some facts about what I learned about their company online, actions they can take to improve their visibility, and that I’m available to help if they need it (don’t forget to provide contact info).
The whole purpose of this exercise is to build relationships and help out a local business.
That’s it.
Create value and don’t expect anything in return.
Do that often enough and you will be rewarded.