How Many Cities Can I Post On Craigslist? How Many Times Per Day?
Craigslist is an ad posting online community, whose integrity and credibility rests on the quality of ad posts and buyers that access it. Since its a free service and is accessible to almost anyone, it is susceptible to abuse, fraud and spamming. This has to lead the developers of the site to crack down on possible perpetrators.
They have also instituted certain rules and mechanisms to regulate the usage of the site. Using the usual behavior of spammers, Craigslist has put certain restrictions that limit the posting behavior of its users.
How many cities can I post it?
You can only post in one city at a given time. You can post one ad after every forty-eight (48) hours. The reason for this is that spammers tend to spam the system by posting multiple times in multiple cities.
When you access Craigslist, it automatically directs you to the community or city nearest to your location. Ideally, the suggested behavior is that you post on the community of the city nearest to you. The logic is that a valid and responsible seller will post an item for sale in his or her person or disposal, and the transaction would logically be traced or conducted to the area nearest to the seller.
Craigslist also suggests behavior that fosters community building among its users. It seeks to function like an online community that caters to the actual community where its users are in. Posting on other cities just to increase the frequency and number of ads posted by one user defeats this purpose, and is actually spamming the network.
How many times per day?
You can post one ad per day, in one category, in one city. You should also post unique ads. Repeating posts of the same ads will be considered as spam and you will be blocked or ghosted. Posting one post after another will also constitute possibly spamming and you can also be blocked.
Once blocked, you would have to redo all the content of your account since you will have to make a new one. That is hardly worth all the trouble of posting as many ads as you possible so you can reach more people.
Instead of trying to beat the system and find loopholes, you can try creating quality posts that are comprehensive, accurate and compelling for users. This way, your posts run better chances of being posted. Make sure you don’t post using multiple accounts too.
The system can track this and it will flag you as a spammer. While you are at it, you can also craft your posts so that you avoid using words that might be associated with spam, such as free or limited offers. These might have been tagged by the system as spam posts and might be flagged down.
To sum it up, the golden rule is: Post one ad, in one category, in one city per day. The next post can come in after forty-eight (48) hours.
How to avoid having your Craigslist ads being ghosted
Let us paint a scenario that will best describe what this phenomenon is like. Say Abby wanted to post an ad for her house for sale on Craigslist. She posts her ad and the system says that the transaction has been completed and the ad has been posted. However, upon having her husband check her ad, he can’t find the ad. It seems Abby is the only one that can see her ad, no one else. What actually happened was that her ad has just been ghosted.
Ghosting is a phenomenon that happens when a user posts in Craigslist (CL), but the ad does not go public. It appears that CL has blocked the posting. What gave rise to this blocking phenomenon is the proliferation of violators posting prohibited items or services, or violating terms and conditions. To answer this problem, CL has come up with tracking software that detects posts that seem to be shady or are in violation of their present terms and conditions.
Although not perfect and subject to possible to loopholes, the system implemented has good intentions of raising the integrity of CL as a valid ad posting community. However, the one-size-fits-all nature of the blocking also affects well-meaning and honest CL users. It is possible for people, such as Abby, to experience ghosting, without warning and no prior explanation as to why their posts are being blocked.
To avoid this, here are some useful tips.
1. Check the information that you use
The ghosting tracker can sense repetitive contact information, such as emails and mobile numbers. If you use the same number and email for several CL accounts, the tracker might flag you for spamming the feed. This can result in your post being ghosted
2. Check if you are using the same IP Address.
The tracker will flag your post if it registers the same IP addresses, that carries several CL accounts. To avoid this, you can try several things. You can change our IP address or use a proxy server. You can even log on using different computers.
3. Do not create multiple accounts.
Assuming that you are a legitimate user and would really like to post something that does not violate the terms and conditions of CL, then being conscientious about what you post should not be a problem. This should not lead you to create multiple accounts, for why would you have to?
4. Clean your ads.
Sometimes it might just be an honest mistake. Due to the numerous ads you’ve posted, it is possible that you create a new one that replicates an older ad. To avoid this, you can do the regular maintenance of your ads and delete old ones.
Overall, the ultimate commandment to prevent being ghosted would be: Do not violate the rules. This might be very simple, but it also makes the most sense. You stand more chance of being blocked if you do not do anything suspicious, let alone, malicious.
