What’s the Best Time to Post Apartment Ads on Craigslist?
Craigslist is obviously an incredibly powerful marketing tool for every multifamily marketer, although it is not as popular as it once was. That said, it can be difficult to assess the results a single community.
When that happens, it’s natural enough for the community to ask if they are doing something wrong or if there’s anything else they can do to help boost their performance. One classic problem is if there is a best time to post apartment ads on Craigslist. Finding data on that can be difficult, but with a bit of work in Google Analytics (we’ll share how we did it in a subsequent post) we were able to isolate traffic to community sites coming from Craigslist on an hourly basis.
Method
We did a study on 31 community or management company websites looking at three months worth of Craigslist traffic data to their websites. The websites we selected were for everything from a 75 unit community to a 2500 unit portfolio and included everything in between as well.
NOTE: We are not looking at actual traffic on Craigslist’s website. Craigslist does not share any of that data. What we’re looking at is traffic data to community or company websites that we were able to trace back to Craigslist through Google Analytics. Here is what we found:
Data Summary
Afternoon hours were generally the best time to post. We found that 8% of all the traffic we observed from Craigslist came from the 3pm to 4pm hour. Also, 44% of all traffic came between 11am and 6pm. The best individual hours after 3pm to 4pm were 11am to noon, noon to 1pm, 2pm to 3pm, and 4pm to 5pm. There was a significant dip of about 25% between 1pm and 2pm.
At night, the hours of 7pm to 10pm were the most successful, with the high point coming between 9pm and 10pm, which generated 7% of all observed traffic.
Another interesting thing we learned is that mornings—even late morning hours like 9am or 10am—are not a great time to post. The 9am hour only generated 3% of all visits. In fact, the 11pm to midnight hour generated more visits than the 9am to 10am hour. 10am to 11am was slightly more successful, generating 5% of all visits. Even there, though, it’s the 2nd least successful hour between 10am and 11pm. (Only 11pm to midnight generated fewer visits than 10am to 11am. )
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In terms of how traffic varies by day, Craigslist traffic patterns followed normal web traffic patterns:
Monday is the biggest day with traffic dropping slightly every day after.
There is about a 25% drop in traffic from Monday to Friday, but then an additional 25% drop for weekends.
So Mondays and Tuesdays are the best days to post, but any weekday is going to be a decent day to post.
It’s the weekends that are really poor, posting only half the amount of traffic that is generated on Monday.
For the most part, traffic patterns from one day to the next were fairly consistent. If an hour did well on Wednesday, it tended to also do well on Friday. There was one notable exception: Mondays compared to Tuesdays.
On Tuesdays, 10am to 1pm accounted for 25% of that day’s traffic. But on Monday posts during the exact same times accounted for only 15% of that day’s traffic. In contrast, posts from 1pm to 4pm accounted for 30% of Monday’s traffic and only 18% of Tuesday’s.
So what seems to be happening is that people are slower getting up Monday morning; they probably have stuff at work they have to do first thing, and so on. So it’s early afternoon before they’re ready to do things like search on Craigslist. Tuesday morning, in contrast, they’re more caught up on work and more able to start in on Craigslist fairly early in the day.
A few things surprised us from this data.
Don’t post in the morning.
There are a few things that surprised us in looking at this traffic. The first is that some of the common ideas in the industry about Craigslist turned out to be wrong, according to the data. We see a lot of communities that post first thing in the morning, presumably when the leasing agent, marketing director, or property manager (whoever handles Craigslist posting) first comes into the office. But as the data demonstrates, posting any time before 11am is a really bad idea because hardly anyone is on Craigslist–or at least hardly any traffic is coming from Craigslist–during those hours. In fact, the data says that you’re better off posting at 11pm than 9am.
Don’t post between 1pm and 2pm and 5pm and 6pm.
The first window is right when people get back from lunch and it would appear that they are focusing mostly on work tasks during that time and aren’t doing anything with Craigslist then. 5pm to 6pm, meanwhile is the rush hour window so people aren’t doing much on Craigslist at that time either.
Don’t post on the weekend—or at least don’t expect much if you do.
Another point is that weekends are actually a terrible time to post. Traffic drops 50% on the weekends when compared to the best day of the week, Monday. We’ve heard people say that posting on the weekend is a good idea because that’s when people have the time to search for apartments on Craigslist. But the data we gathered seems to indicate that people do most of their searching during the week, particularly on Monday and Tuesday.
Do post in the mid-afternoon hours.
2pm to 5pm are a great time to post. Those three hours alone account for around 20% of all Craigslist-generated traffic. But take a break at 5pm because traffic drops by about 30% from 5pm to 6pm before beginning to revive at 6pm and then really jumping at 7pm.
Do post around 8pm or 9pm.
This was the other big discovery: Traffic spikes again between 8pm and 10pm, with the 9pm to 10pm hour hitting the same level as traffic between 2pm and 5pm.
The Data (If You’re Curious)
In the table below, we show the percentage of traffic by hour for each day of the week. For ease of use, we have made the best-performing hours red. Note that we are using a military time format for the spreadsheet, so 13 equals 1pm to 2pm, 16 equals 4pm to 5pm, and so on. (0 equals midnight to 1am. )
The best time for posting cars to Craigslist – WizPoster™
We hear this problem more and more often: Dealers are spending money on Craigslist posts but not getting enough there are 50 billion page views per month on Craigslist. That’s a lot of eyes on your car ad if you’re posting your cars to craigslist at the right you’re posting all ads at once, you’re losing potential buyers! If potential buyers are not seeing your ads or you’re not getting new leads, you should think about what you are doing wrong when posting cars to Craigslist? The more eyes see your ad, the more potential leads you’ll have – guaranteed. Day of the WeekThere are different beliefs when it comes to which day is best for posting cars to Craigslist. Based on the research done on 800, 000 ad samples it shows that Sunday posts got the most views, followed by Saturday ones. Monday is the best of the remaining days of the week for posting cars to Craigslist. After Monday views are dropping until Friday, which is the lowest. On Saturday buyers are usually checking what’s new on the Craigslist. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday there is lower traffic on of the DaySome of the research has discovered that two times work best during the week and one on the weekend for car dealers ads. The data recommend posting during the employee break time slot of 10 am to noon, or at 5 pm Monday through Friday, when the workday ends for most people. During the weekend, mornings work best. Because people usually make some plans for the weekends and they are not checking posts on Craigslist that much in the other studies are showing that Friday afternoons and Saturday mornings are the best time of a day for posting cars to Craigslist. Let’s face it, most people buying cars have a job, the majority being from 9 am till 5 pm. Statistics are showing that people are checking Craigslist car ads before and after work. All things considered, you’ll want to test these suggestions and see what works for you the most dealers advertise between 10:30 to 3 pm, you can avoid the busy times and get a front-page placement if you post early morning or after 3 pm regardless if it’s manual or you have the patience, and plenty of cars to sell, an effective way to find the best times to run your ads is to evenly post different ones throughout the day. You can post cars to Craigslist three hours apart and see which ones get the most response. Posting throughout the day, especially on the busy days ensures your cars are showing on the first page of craigslist throughout the day. Because in a busy Craigslist market, if someone advertises their inventory at once right after you, your cars get pushed to page data you collect will reveal when buyer activity is the highest and you’re likely to get the most is where our WizPoster tool can make your life easier. Because with our craigslist posting tool, you can simply schedule car posts on Craigslist and the best and most effective times. This will save you a lot of time and avoid the biggest mistake that car dealers can make and that is – posting all your inventory at once. Contact our Craigslist experts and ask for us at +1-650-753-8000 or reach us at We are happy to help and advise you.
A Way to Get Your Craigslist Postings to the Top – ItStillWorks
i David Sacks/Lifesize/Getty Images Some active categories offer stiff competition when selling your wares on Craigslist. That means your newly created posting could quickly become buried a few hours later as new ads push your listing further down the page. Although you can’t immediately move your ad, Craigslist allows you to renew the ad every 48 hours so it reappears at the top of the page. You can continue doing this every two days until the posting’s 30-day life expires, at which point you have the option to repost the ad. Without an AccountStep 1Open the confirmation email that Craigslist sent when you first created the posting. If you can’t find the email, enter your email address in the “Resend Craigslist Posting” page to resend the email (link in Resources). Step 2Click the link in the email to visit the posting’s management page. Step 3Click “Renew This Posting” to automatically move the posting to the top of the page. If 30 days has expired, click “Repost, ” make any necessary changes and submit the ad. With a Craigslist AccountStep 1Log in to your Craigslist account. Step 2Locate the posting on your management page. Step 3Click “Renew” to move the posting to the top of the page. If the ad has expired, click “Repost, ” make any necessary changes and submit the new ad. References Warnings If you attempt to repost a paid ad, you will be charged again. Writer Bio C. Taylor embarked on a professional writing career in 2009 and frequently writes about technology, science, business, finance, martial arts and the great outdoors. He writes for both online and offline publications, including the Journal of Asian Martial Arts, Samsung, Radio Shack, Motley Fool, Chron, Synonym and more. He received a Master of Science degree in wildlife biology from Clemson University and a Bachelor of Arts in biological sciences at College of Charleston. He also holds minors in statistics, physics and visual arts.
Frequently Asked Questions about when is the best time to post on craigslist
What is the best day to list on Craigslist?
Day of the Week Based on the research done on 800,000 ad samples it shows that Sunday posts got the most views, followed by Saturday ones. Monday is the best of the remaining days of the week for posting cars to Craigslist. After Monday views are dropping until Friday, which is the lowest.
How do I get my Craigslist post to the top?
A Way to Get Your Craigslist Postings to the TopLog in to your Craigslist account.Locate the posting on your management page.Click “Renew” to move the posting to the top of the page. If the ad has expired, click “Repost,” make any necessary changes and submit the new ad.
How often should I post on Craigslist?
Craigslist suggests only posting once every 48 hours. Some dealers post as many as 10 to 15 ads per day, or more. Whether or not a dealer will be flagged for over-posting depends entirely on their posting habits and how they are viewed by the Craigslist community in their local area.