In the beginning was eBay. And God said: “Make a thousand announcements.” And Milanuncios.com was done. And God saw that it was good, and then he allowed it to become popular and to be the most megacool in eCommerce of second-hand items.
More or less, this could be the (abbreviated) story of the Genesis of the second-hand online market in Spain. Because it turns out Milanuncios is a survivor of the internet jurassic. Created by Ricardo Garcia in 2005, practically out of nowhere, without making much noise and (let’s be honest) with a website that left (and leaves) a lot to be desired in terms of design, it gained market share.
He devoured secondhand.es until he practically took it off the market. And he’s able to take eBay on a first-name basis. and afford the sung of signing its former general manager in Spain in 2011. Many years later, which in terms of eCommerce is a geological era, It boasts of being the most searched classified ads website in Google in Spain.
We recently began to see advertisements on TV for Milanuncios, but their story is that of the little ant that little by little has taken over an important part of the anthill. The big milestone: in 2014, (SCM) UK, owner of Infojobs, Fotocasa, Coches.net… and which had previously acquired the ashes of Segundamano (now Vibbo) plus a shareholding that some sources value at another 50 million. There is nothing.
How Milanuncios works
If you enter the web or the mobile app of Thousand Ads you will not find almost anything that you expect in a typical eCommerce website. No great photos, no offers, no promotions. A list of categories, a search engine and little else. A web design that hasn’t changed much since 2005, which could be classified as slightly below “old-fashioned” and slightly above “prehistoric”, but it works. And boy does it work.
Milanuncios is a classified ads website in the style of the antediluvian pages of newspapers on paper, but on the internet. There are no product sheets or many fields to fill in to place an ad, you can sell but also buy, search for or offer work, services, organize your bachelor party or make an appointment with a seer. There is literally everything.
Wallapop style, Milanuncios.com does not act as an intermediary in transactions. You put your ad, your contact telephone number and/or your e-mail and interested people contact you. No more. Probably in it, in the simplicity to place an advertisement and in the fact that advertising is free, lies the main key to its success.
Transactions on its website are carried out privately. In that sense, what is sold is a contact more than a product, and then it is the seller, by phone, e-mail or in person, who is in charge of selling you the product. In fact, the space available to describe the product is quite limited, and there is no standardization of characteristics in an Amazon or eBay-style product file. You can’t enlarge a photo to see product details or any of those things we take for granted on an eCommerce website. And, for its users, it doesn’t even need to, apparently.
2020: Milanuncios Express and Milanuncios Pro
In June 2020 the platform experienced one of its greatest evolutions: the launch of a new function to pay for items and manage their delivery without leaving home. The new service is called Milanuncios and is possible thanks to an agreement with Socialpay, a company specializing in secure payment solutions between individuals, and through partners such as .
Thanks to this service, once a sale is made through the platform, a courier will pick up the package at the address indicated by the seller and deliver it to the buyer’s home, always without maintaining physical contact and complying with the prevention protocols established by SEUR to protect its delivery men. The payment gateway retains the purchase money until the object is delivered and the buyer verifies that everything is correct.
A few weeks later, it was launched, a new ad management and posting tool for professional sellers. Intended especially for small and medium businessesin a scenario in which SMEs find it necessary to adopt new digital transformation processes to better reach their potential customers, this tool offers more management possibilities for reach the almost 3 million users that Milanuncios has.
Milanuncios Pro will allow users to more easily manage all the contacts they receive through the platform, as well as provide them with a publication tool created specifically to share large amounts of ads. In addition, all professional sellersnals that are part of Milanuncios Pro will be able to increase the visibility of their articles and will have the platform verification seal. This will allow businesses to identify themselves and offer a greater security guarantee for buyers.
Why is it still popular after so long?
For its simplicity. Placing an ad is a matter of less than a minute if you don’t complicate your life. In addition to being free, it is fast. But there are more keys apart from these two:
- Almost anything can be advertised in Milanucios. Something that many other eCommerce websites do not allow. In this sense, there are both product and service categories (from home repairs to photographers or tutors).
- You can’t just sell. You can also place an ad if you are interested in buying something and you want people to contact you to offer it to you.
- There are no online payment methods. Something that, paradoxically, likes many people who are reluctant to use their card or bank details for online purchases.
- Bring together very different categories on a website, from business transfers or franchises to buying Persian cat puppies. You usually have to resort to different, more specialized websites to find this type of thing.
- It is very focused on local purchase. That is, in the end you stay with the seller, see the item and buy it (if you want). The number of ads is such that, unless you are looking for very specific things, surely someone will be selling what you are looking for near you.
Of course, Milanuncios does not escape being a fertile field for the sale of articles of doubtful origin or counterfeits, or people offering things like buying repossessed cars (in theory, a repossessed car can’t be sold). Although this happens in practically all C2C eCommerce platforms. Like all of them, you have an option to report an ad if you have doubts about it.
And what is the business model? well what Announcements are presented in chronological order of publication. That is, if you want your ad to be in the first positions, you have two options: either you “renew” it a maximum of once every 24 hours, or you pay to be featured and renew automatically.
Offers in Milanuncios: how do I know which ones to trust?
This is a particular case, since Milanuncios does not require you to enter the sale price of an item, as many other websites do, although it does include it among its recommendations. So the first rule: do not trust too much articles without a price, where the name of the person who sells it does not appear (especially if you identify as a professional) or where there is not enough information about product features.
Since in a transaction without intermediaries there is no one to guarantee one or who to claim if a product does not arrive or does not meet expectations, it is always better that when you contact the seller ask to see the item in personif it is close to you, or to give you details and guarantees (more photos, photos, details, etc.) as well as your personal data to be able to identify it. If a Milanuncios seller refuses to identify himself, it is best to buy from another who does.
Be wary of megabargains, especially if it is luxury or high-end objects. In this segment, the bargains do not exist, and the scams do (and many). An outrageously cheap price should make you suspect that they want to give you a pig in a poke.
Summarizing: Milanuncios.com is a classic website in every sense of the word. However, it is obvious that there is an important market for people who do not want to complicate their lives when it comes to selling or buying a product.
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