Whereas $90 will buy a two-weekend run for an eight-line print classified ad in the Greensboro News and Record, sites such as CraigsList and realpeoplerealstuff.com will post classifieds, both text and video, online for free, generating revenue from advertisements directed towards users.

Peter Zollman, founder of Classified Intelligence, encourages newspapers to keep their hold on classifieds by offering “combo deals, where an online ad is paired with a print ad.”  This strategy would allow a newspaper to keep the immediate revenue but also build its reputation as “the dominant local go-to portal.”

Evan Neubeiser, founder of Digital Media Communications which currently postso over 4,300 video classifieds a week for The Houston Chronicle says that users are becoming more savvy about using an integrated multimedia approach, a rising trend that newspapers may want to note.

Source: Media Life through I Want Media