This is great idea, but...

[pwynnnorman]

It would be more efficient if people could be encouraged to post the price and location of their item in the subject line of the ad. That way, readers can skim things quickly instead of having to open the ad to find out the basics.

[pwynnnorman]

It would be more efficient if people could be encouraged to post the price and location of their item in the subject line of the ad. That way, readers can skim things quickly instead of having to open the ad to find out the basics.

[Norsire]

I think you need to add horses for sale, boarding, training and ect if you really want clssifieds to take off...of course charge, but from the looks of the current classifieds they are bombing and no one is looking at them or responding to them much. I vote again for sale horses, studs, boarding, training and ect. Good luck with the classifieds.

Home to the stallions Zillionair, Billionair, Issue of Gold, Gold Card, and Pure White Gold.
http://www.norsire.com
Realtor RE/MAX Renaissance, Million Dollar Club

[Lily]

Norsire, I believe it's been said many times that we will not have the ads you mentioned (horses for sale, boarding, training, etc.) online because these classifieds are not meant to compete with the magazine classifieds.

If you are interested in placing that sort of ad, perhaps you should try the magazine classifieds. http://chronicleforums.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

[Kareen]

I understand the magazine doesn't want ads to be competing against the 'mother-operation' on line. However being based in Germany I have to say I find the internet the way more convenient way of advertising. The chronofhorse is known internationally to be by far the most popular equestrian sports mag in N.A. but boy are ads expensive...
Maybe a lower end internet branch accessible only for the on line users wouldn't even be that much of a competition for the actual mag. I for my part would be happy to pay for a nice photo or website link ad to only appear on line. But putting up an ad in the 'real mag' would not only burst my advertising budget for a month but also bring up more people than I can handle at once. Any suggestions?

Froh zu sein bedarf es wenig...

http://www.germanhorseconnection.com

[starlite]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Norsire:
I think you need to add horses for sale, boarding, training and ect if you really want clssifieds to take off...of course charge, but from the looks of the current classifieds they are bombing and no one is looking at them or responding to them much. I vote again for sale horses, studs, boarding, training and ect. Good luck with the classifieds.

Home to the stallions Zillionair, Billionair, Issue of Gold, Gold Card, and Pure White Gold.
http://www.norsire.com
Realtor RE/MAX Renaissance, Million Dollar Club
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I've had two different people email me about my breeches so far. No sale just yet, but we'll see http://chronicleforums.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif I'm glad I bought an ad!

[horsesrlife65]

I can see both sides of the argument, but tend to agree with Kareen.

I think it would be quite beneficial to all involved to allow the advertisement of additional items (horses, boarding, etc).

Those who don't subscribe to the Chronicle still would have exposure to the name and would be giving them business that they (COTH) might not have had otherwise.

Just a thought.

[Erin]

Remember, we're trying to start out small. http://chronicleforums.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

Other items are under consideration for the future, but for now, we want to start with just some very basic things that are NOT usually included in the magazine.

[Instant Karma]

I think this is a great idea, but I also think that the prices for a listing are too expensive. $20 for an online posting seems a bit steep IMO.
What about the $10-$20 items? I think under a certain price the listing should be free, or maybe make that something for premium members. Or even a monthly classified access amount, if someone has a ton of old tack they'd like to sell, they could have an unlimited amount of classified postings for a month for $50.

Erin and Instant Karma
"Anytime I see something screech across a room and latch onto someone's neck, and the guy screams and tries to get it off, I have to laugh, because what IS that thing?!"
~Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey
http://hometown.aol.com/ws6transamgirl/index.html

[Horsaholic]

I think it should be a percentage of the item price that should be charged, however I understand it is probably easier to maintain with a flat rate. I am still using ebay to sell showclothes, bridles, etc. I would definately pay $10-$20 to sell my saddle on the COTH and probably will in the near future. My 2 cents..

[Horsepower]

Erin, I have loads of tack for sale but have not posted because the price to run ads that may not attract buyers is very high. I would suggest a different system. Let us run our for sale items and if they sell, you get a set percentage of the sale price! I would run tons of stuff here then!

"The older I get the harder the ground hits."

[Erin]

TBmare, that would be the ideal... but the implementation of it would be VERY complicated. Either we'd have to let people post their ad and sell their item, then try to collect the percentage from them (and risk them skipping out on paying), or we'd have to invest in software that would do it for us and have our own mini Ebay.

Option A would be a LOT of work for me, and Option B would likely be expensive. http://chronicleforums.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_rolleyes.gif So we thought we'd try this way first.

Obviously, we're not getting the kind of traffic here we were hoping for, so we're going to start looking at other options and considering some changes. But just wanted to let you know that, unfortunately, it's a complicated situation. http://chronicleforums.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_razz.gif

Thanks everyone for the comments, though. Keep them coming! http://chronicleforums.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

[Jeannette, formerly ponygyrl]

I've wondered if there couldn't be a way to allow "on-line conversation" in the ads - as was done in the admittedly not to be repeated in your lifetime auction...

I understand that life could get complicated fast if the threads weren't locked - "I" could go onto someone else's thread and say, "BTW, I have these breeches for sale, too, in a different size" or whatever - but it would be traffic, and a lot of what got me looking at auction items was seeing conversation about the items.

I flat out don't look in this forum, and I thought I would, but it's so static, I forget to, really! Even if conversations spun off topic, I would think the more people look at a thread, the more are likely to bid/want to buy, the more are likely to decide to sell stuff...

[Wasilida]

Just thought I'd bring this thread to the top because I was just thinking to myself about the ads being too expensive. I have a couple of items in the $40-70 range that have barely been used, will start to rot here soon, but paying 15-25% of the sales price for an ad that might not result in a sale is throwing good money after bad! Especially hard to take since the retail price I paid is alot more than what I would expect to get selling it here.

Anymore more progress on changing the pricing structure?

[Sporthorse Shop]

I too agree with the people saying to put horses for sale, boarding, studs etc online. There are lots of people who don't subscribe to the chronicle who would look at it online. Erin keeps saying to just buy an ad in the magazine. Well, if they weren't so darn expensive and ran for more than a week, I would. But, they are not. And, even if I did buy a text ad, it just gets lost in all the mumble jumble of the other text ads. When I browse the magazine's text ads, there is just too much to look at. There is no easy way to just quickly browse through them like there would be in a forum setting, where people can put the vitals in a thread's title and viewers can browse or even user their browser's search function.

So, I don't see how this is competing. If someone is not posting ads at all on the chronicle because of the cost, the chronicle doesn't get to make a single dime off of them.

Another thing about the pricing. Only charge $5 for all ads in the forums (if you decide to do horses or higher amount items I can understand a higher charge, though not much). You will pull in a lot more money then you ever will charging $20. People are willing to spend $5 on the chance that they might sell something rather than $20. I was going to put a piece of tack up, but then I saw the ad price and said forget it. Now if that ad price had been $5, I would have done it right away. This is just common business sense. It is a well know fact in the business world that people will usually just throw out $5-10 easily, without thinking about it. When you go above that, they start thinking and then decide not to. The chronicle should try it just for a month or so and see the results. See if they make more money than with their current prices and experience higher traffic. Not like, it costs them anything to do that.

[LBlue]

I tto think having online ads on the forums for horses for sales, etc is better than the ads in the Chronicle magazine.

I don't even read the ads in the Chronicle, it is impossible to sift through them in their current format, especially if you do it online. I only look at sites that have easy to read and use classifieds, such as this site.

[KimPeterson]

I agree online ads are easier to read through to find what you want..and the online ads STAY online longer/seen by more people than a magazine publication.

[Wendy123]

I find the ads too hard to look through so I gave up. The posters don't put enough info usually in the line so you can scan for something you are looking for.