How to Sell on Facebook Marketplace for Free

Facebook introduced Marketplace in 2016, a place wherein users can sell their items. People caught up on it pretty fast. In fact, within 7 months since its introduction, over 18 million were already listed to sell on the platform, and that’s in the U.S. alone.

Facebook is clearly a perfect place to sell anything you have to offer given there are 800 million people from 70 countries are on it each month. And the best thing is, you can do so without spending anything.

Why Facebook Marketplace?

The retail landscape is becoming more omnichannel, with more options to sell in different locations. Facebook Marketplace lets vendors capitalize on interactions that have already taken place on Facebook. If you’re interested in selling products to target audiences, Facebook Marketplace is a good place to launch.

Benefits

In addition to having a convenient way to further improve the discovery of your brand and goods, Facebook Marketplace also has the following advantages:

  • No fees – Facebook is open for anyone to participate, what’s more, there are no sales fees either. If you’re scared of blowing your budget, this is a low-risk platform that won’t cost you a cent.
  • Immense reach – you’re not going to have to think about target marketing. You’re going to be able to get the brand and products to reach customers on Facebook, where they’re already browsing.
  • Personalized customer experience – Facebook Marketplace operates in a manner that displays items that are important to customers. This allows you to identify the correct customer, increasing the potential for interaction to lead to a sale.

How to Sell on Facebook Marketplace

  1. Sign in to your Facebook account and click Marketplace on your home page. Alternatively, you can go to https://www.facebook.com/marketplace to enter the Marketplace.
  2. On the Marketplace screen, click the + Create New Listing button on the left side of the screen.
  3. Click on what you’re trying to sell.  sell-facebook-marketplace-free-create-new-listing
  4. You’ll see a screen where you can list what you’re selling, the price for it, what category it belongs to, and other important things your prospective buyers need to know. Make sure you post at least three images or a maximum of ten photos of your item (from various angles) so that you can mark it for sale.
    sell-facebook-marketplace-free-create-new-listing-provide-infos
  5. After you have entered all the information for your item, click Next. Marketplace is selected automatically, which means that you can’t deselect it.
  6. Click the button to post your listing.

How to use Facebook Marketplace If You’re a Business

While you cannot list your products as a marketplace business, you can create a paid ad to display your products or services. These are advertisements that exist between regular product listings on the Marketplace and are designated as a paid listing to help consumers differentiate between what is a person-to-person and what is a paid placement by a business.

Marketplace Ads vs. Boosted Listings

As an individual, you can improve your current Marketplace listings by potentially growing the scope of your goods and selling faster. However, unlike Marketplace Ads, its targeting choices are limited, which can restrict its efficacy.

Boosting a listing is easy, all you have to do is decide how much you’re prepared to pay and how long you’d like the boost to run. Boosted listings will appear for people 18 years of age and older in nearby areas, and will automatically use the title, price, photos, and description that you put in the listing during setup. This can be helpful if you want to quickly sell an item, but the lack of targeting options can make it less effective.

Marketplace ads, on the other hand, are not about promoting the products for sale on the Marketplace like boosted listings. They are close to the advertisements on Facebook News Feed, Instagram, and Audience Network—just in one additional spot.

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Now, let’s see how you can use Marketplace ads for your business:

Build Your Personal Ties

When someone makes a transaction via Facebook Marketplace, it’s done directly via Messenger. Transactions made by Messenger hold people on the Facebook platform, enabling vendors to communicate one-to-one with buyers. This fosters a strong relationship with consumers, growing their chances of purchase.

Reach Customers Where They’re Already Shopping

Facebook has a lot of ad placement options, but what makes Marketplace advertising exceptional is that most of the people who are browsing here are already interested in buying. They are likely to press the ad and purchase the product as they see it close to other similar items.

Reach the Desired Outcome

Because marketers have the ability to scale advertisements not just on the Marketplace but across Facebook as a whole, there are more ways to achieve beneficial results. According to a Facebook IQ report, marketers using placement optimization campaigns witness 4.1 percent more reach and 5.2 percent lower cost per impression. This translates into targeting half a million users with the same budget relative to using Facebook-only advertising.

Facebook Marketplace Rules

Like every peer-to-peer marketplace, there are some things you can’t list. In the Facebook Marketplace Commerce Policies, you can find what you can and can’t list.

If you get deleted from Marketplace but don’t think you’ve broken any Commerce Policies, you can appeal to Facebook to rethink the decision. Also, if you see an item that you believe is in violation of Facebook’s Community Rules or Commerce Policies, you can report the item and the seller as well.

Prohibited Items to Sell on Facebook Marketplace

Facebook lists the items that are forbidden from being sold on Instagram and Facebook for commercial purposes.

Here is a list of items that you can’t sell on Facebook Marketplace:

  • Prescription drugs and supplements
  • Ingestible Supplement (such as Protein powder & steroids)
  • Weapons & ammunition
  • Animals (pet toys and cages are allowed not animals)
  • Adult products (contraceptives are allowed not sex toys and pleasure items)
  • Alcohol
  • Healthcare products
  • Body part & fluids
  • Gambling
  • Offensive & misleading products

Wrapping Up

Facebook has a massive user database that lets sellers get the prospective customer with ease.

Furthermore, corporate brands are not permitted to use the Facebook market, which ensures that small businesses and independent vendors have significant opportunities to build their market by targeting millions of potential audiences.

So, if you’re selling on your online store and want more exposure for your brand or want to improve your business sales, then this is the platform you should be looking forward to achieving your goals.

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