Hi,
Craiglist is one of the major website which servers local classifieds in US.
Does some one know how did they encouraged users to register their website and post ad ?
when craiglist started they even don’t have all these directory listing, social networking, and surprising there were less people who used internet.
My understanding is that it was local to one city first, maybe San Francisco? It grew within the community just like Yelp did and became popular by word of mouth.
How did you hear about Craigslist the first time? For me it was word of mouth. Same with sites like eBay. You probably didn’t see a billboard, someone told you about it.
Yep, started out in San Fran
Offline marketing is often underestimated (as I’ve mentioned before). Back before viral advertising the main way people became aware of stuff was through simply telling them about it. Granted things have changed due to the way people interact but offline marketing still has it’s place. 
I never heard they spent money on marketing directly. They were the pioneer in online classified ads, that gave them a big edge over any others.
One thing they do is getting involved in different social activities like charity organizations. That gives them huge exposure as well.
Can anybody beat them? EBay is trying their best shots. So far they made some progress, but not enough to beat CL yet.
webcosmo, how did you started your classified website?? I mean how did you attracted user to register your website and made them to post an ad.
That is my understanding as well.