Boston's 'Weekly Dig' Tries Free Classifieds to Counteract Craigslist

By: E&P Staff The Boston Herald reports that The Weekly Dig, Boston's five-year-old alternative newspaper, is the latest to join New Times' free classified community Backpage.com.

The idea is to counteract the lost revenue from the ever-popular Craigslist.org.

"As more people gravitate to [free classified] sites, big advertisers, such as auto dealers, want to be there, too," the Herald concludes. "And they're willing to pay."

Taking a page from Google, the Weekly Dig will charge advertisers 50 cents a week to have their ad appear more prominently. The paper will also offer advertisers the upsell opportunity of having their ad appear in Weekly Dig's print edition for an extra $15. Most importantly, perhaps, Dig is going to support the new site with a marketing push that will include transit and billboard ads, street teams, and posters.

Jeff Lawrence, founder and president of the Weekly Dig, tells the Herald that he's not worried about cannibalizing his print classifieds, as he?s already losing them to Craigslist anyway.

"This allows us to capture some of those dollars instead of them going to Craig or elsewhere," Lawrence told the Herald. "We don't have to scream and cry and say, 'Woe is me, Craigslist is taking my business.'"