Listia : The New Ebay or Craigslist, but EVERYTHING is FREE!

So, What is Listia?

I think I found Listia from searching the web for vintage clothing and corsets (one of my many shopping addictions). I have a love for 1920s-1950s dresses and fashion. Weird I know, but I don't want a cure for my shop-o-holic inclination, but that is another post all together.  So what is Listia? In Listia's own words: It's a new members-only site where everything is free and you can get some cool stuff without spending any money. You give away the things you no longer need, and get things you want for free.

It's all done using free credits instead of real money. Most people start with 100 credits, but this invitation gives you 150 to get more when you start. I'm already in and you can get started by clicking this special link: http://www.listia.com/signup/29207

The great thing is you continue to get free "credits" every time you participate on the site. So if you make a comment, add a listing, or invite a friend you start to accumulate experience points and when you get enough of those you get credits. Credits work like money so you can bid on items (and the items don't suck). Needless to say I'm a Listia addict.

I don't work for Listia

I realize I sound a bit like a star struck Listia sales person, but I assure you I have no stake in this company beyond you clicking on my referral link. The referral link only gives us credits and doesn't give me money or anything else.

Listia Features

Listia is clearly more robust then Craigslist but not as big of a powerhouse as Ebay. It's still a fairly new toy to the online space with a kind of hippy like mission, but who can complain about cool stuff for free? I'm talking GADGETS, stuff you don't want but your neighbor might. You don't want to deal with it but doubt you'd make very much money on Ebay so you Listia it. Plus if their is an item you REALLY want, you can always purchase more Listia credits.

Listia has categories you can search in or you can search by regions, whether or not people are willing to ship for free, or by how popular the item is. Once you find the items you like you can bid on them or save them in a "watch list" to come back to later. Then it will send you reminder emails when it comes close to the auction ending. It's all about THE convenience factor.


Listia is Socially Connected

You can connect your account with Twitter, Facebook and your email. Once connected Listia gives you the option to update those accounts when you list an auction item you want to get rid of (giving you the chance to have more people bid on your item and get more people signed up). If you are worried about Listia becoming a nuance to your friends and followers then you don't have to allow it to update those accounts. Still it's good to know that Listia is connected, right? It's that convenience thing, remember that when building your own online communities.

Features I wish Listia had:

• Save my searches, in case what I wanted wasn't there. It would also be nice if I could have searches emailed to me when the things I want finally get listed.
• When I am bidding on something and winning, often another bidder will swoop in 20 seconds before the auction ends and win. I wish this was more like another local auction house I like (refuse to share because don't want you bidding up my favorite things). Anyway with ____ site when two people are bidding it will continue adding two minutes until one of the two people give up. This allows the bidding to go on a little while longer but also makes the auctions worth more.
• Wish I could bid via text and/or twitter. That way it could DM me and tell me an auction I'm bidding on is ending and I could tweet back my bid!
• I wish photos where required for auctions (even if it was just finding the item online).
• Being able to auction off services and gift certificates would be nice. Services like website hosting.
• They ban listing currency, but I see a lot of people listing collectible pennies etc.
• Comment editing isn't allowed, but maybe this is a good thing-makes you think things through.
• Your private email should be hidden by default in the contact email box.
• You get 50 credits for every person you get to sign up to Listia, but I think you should also get 50 credits just for SHARING someone else's auction. Otherwise, why wouldn't I keep all of this great stuff to myself?
• I would love the experience points to be explained, better then they currently are.
• Maybe I'm just not generous enough, but I need more incentive to send stuff on my dime (FREE SHIPPING). Lots of people are willing to, but maybe for 50 credits I would be more apt to do this.
• The search for items is a little complicated. Would be nice if people got credits or experience points for tagging items with words they think of when they see that item.
• Items I don't like should be easy to remove. I'm thinking of something like my Facebook feed, where if you don't want to see that type of item or that person you just click to have it removed. It should be easy for you to undo this. Their are a lot of things, like baseball cards, that are uploaded in mass that I just don't want to see... ever.
• I wouldn't hate Listia if they gave sellers the option to pay a small fee to have their items featured. If it helps them, why not, but in a minimalist kind of way.

One last kudos: love the option to donate your proceeds to charity. More options with this would be nice.

Sign up, enjoy Listia and feel free to NOT bid against me! Your invitation is also a gift: Friends who sign up will get an extra 50 bonus credits as a special gift when they sign up! Just use this link:
 http://www.listia.com/signup/29207

So do you have questions or hate me for writing a whole post on one site I'm in love with? By the way I have a friend who knows the creators of Listia, so I will be sending him this. Keep that in mind when you write your comments back to me.

Also I've been getting some comments from people (spamming) trying to promote their sites or services (I reject and moderate these, just fyi). I don't reject a lot of comments but spam and greedy (unhelpful) self promotion is a no-no.

As always you are more then welcome to use any of my content, repost it, rewrite it, and broadcast it all I ask is that you link back to where you found it (http://interactivemedias.blogspot.com)

I would also love to hear YOUR comments, questions or concerns of my posts and reviews! What do you think, its ok if our opinions don't match up! Leave a comment or let me know what you would like to learn more about and maybe it will become my next blog post or video blog.

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Thanks for reading!

--Desarae A. Veit
Agency Couture