Facebook Just Launched a Less Risky Competitor of Craigslist
Facebook has a thumb in every pie, and to stay ahead, it’s been launching products like Instant Video to compete with FaceTime. Now it’s (officially) taking on the biggest buy and sell networks in the world: Craigslist and eBay. People have been using Facebook to exchange items for a long time now, but we have only had the luxury of a few small features that Facebook added, like the ability to list a price and mark an item as sold. Now they’ve finally revamped the system and given us Marketplace, a real contender in the secondhand shopping sphere.
The front page of Marketplace is filled with photos of things that people close to you have listed. You can search for something specific or look through categories. If you find something that seems interesting, you can tap on the image to see more details from the seller, including a description of the item, the seller’s name and profile picture, and their general location. You can also bookmark the item.
If you decide to buy, you can send the seller a message through Marketplace. Like Craigslist, Facebook does not handle the payment or delivery in Marketplace; that’s up to you and the other person.
Selling is just as easy as buying, and only requires four steps that should be very familiar. You just take a picture of your item, or add it from your photo library. Then, enter a title, description and price. Next, verify your location, choose a category and post!
Now anyone in your area can find your stuff and message you if they want to buy it. If you still want to take advantage of buy and sell groups, you can also post to Marketplace and a specific buy and sell group at the same time.
What will you use Marketplace for? Let us know @BritandCo!
(h/t TechCrunch, photos via Facebook)