• General Information
• Change Default Location
• How to Post an Ad
• How to Search Ads
• How to edit your posting
• How to delete your posting
• Flagging Posting/Ads
• How to Contact us

The home page can be accessed using the url:  www.AdsMantra.com.

The site is designed as a web portal to allow buyers and sellers to interact electronically.  The design focuses primarily for free local advertising of products and services.  The site has been designed as a portal that will allow private and commercial users to promote and to sell their products and services by placing ads in the website.  The site targets users of all the cities and towns in India and highlights the top 35 most populous cities in the front page but provides access to all within a click.

The site aims to enhance user experience by giving access to any information on the website within 1-3 clicks.  This is achieved by using cookies to store the default location preference of the users to avoid selecting location each time they enter the site.  Obviously, the users are free to change location at any time.  Neither the buyers nor the advertiser need to maintain any user accounts or passwords to use this site.  The only requirement is that users should have a valid email account to be able to activate ads and to exchange emails with the advertisers.

The portal is envisaged to be a dynamic system that will be enhanced based on inputs from users to improve the features and functionality offered.  The site is expected to provide more value added services to the advertisers and the consumers in successive releases.  The user community is encouraged to provide their inputs via the “contact us” option to generate enhancement requests.  It’s only with the support and encouragement of the users that the site will grow in popularity and usefulness.

For technical users, the website is built on latest j2ee architecture and technologies, a modern RDBMS and is hosted at commercial cyber centers.  The full architecture and design has been developed by the Custom Design team of i-Plaza Global Services and all rights to the site are owned by them.

The default location provides a facility to select a location where advertisers want to post ads and buyers want to search.  The reasoning behind this facility is the assumption that most buyers and sellers will like to interact locally for the kind of products and services being offered at this site. 

To select default location, use click to change Location link on the left menu bar under the flags.  The selected location is highlighted in the title bar as “CITY/STATE CLASSIFIEDS”.  Thus if you select Bangalore as the location, the title will state “BANGALORE CLASSIFIEDS”.

Next time the users opens the website, the site opens with the default location already set.  Thus an advertiser will straightaway go to the category page of “Post Ad” or the person searching for products will go to the category page for the “Search Ad” menu.

For the technically minded users, the url on the top will change to the default location sub-domain.  Thus with Bangalore selected, the url will change from www.AdsMantra.com to http://bangalore.adsmantra.com/ . 

Note: the sub-domain mentioned above is available for all the states and the 35 most populous cities, for the rest, currently the users will need to select the location every time they want to place ads or search ads for their city or town.

Select the “Post Ad” menu tab and follow the 3-4 steps required to post your                advertisement;     these may look daunting but are very straightforward and should take a few minutes only to post your Ad.

STEP 1: Location Selection (not needed if default set)

If a default location is selected, you will see the category page (Step 2) otherwise the location selection page will be displayed. 

·         Click on the state or city that you want to post to.

·         If a default location was selected, please confirm that the location selected is correct per the banner on top.  To change location please click click to change Location link on the left under the flags to change location.  For help on default location click here if required.

STEP 2: Category Selection

Select the category/subcategory in which you want to post your advertisement.  If you select the main category then your advertisement will become searchable in all the subcategories.  Thus selecting “Sale/Buy” instead of “furniture” will make the item searchable for all sub-categories in Sale/Buy.

STEP 3: Create your posting

Please enter the following information (*) indicates a required field.

• Headline (*): Enter appropriate headline for your advertisement.  When users search for the classified advertisements, the headline will draw their attention.
• Category: You can change subcategory here.
• Advertisement: This is the place where you promote details of your advertisement.  Please describe the product details, condition, features, etc.  You can be specific and detail all the items that are included or excluded in the sale.  Optionally, you can provide the price and your telephone # here.
• City: Choose the city from the list. If you do not choose any city then your advertisement will be searchable under all the cities in that state.
• Location/Community/Colony: For major cities, specific colony or location details. 
• Email (*): Enter a valid email address; by default, this email-id will not be visible to the buyers instead an anonymous email address, e.g. xx-xxxx@adsmantra.com will be displayed. After you save the ad, an email will be sent to the email address specified during the posting.  This email will have the link to activate the ad; once you activate the ad everyone can see it.
• Email show to user: You can click this box if you want your personal email to be visible on the ad.
• Image 1 or 2:  You can upload digital photos that will make your ad more attractive to the buyers.  There is a size limit that is specified on the page.
• Agree to the "Term of services":  Please review the Terms of Service that primarily indicate the conditions for posting ads and using the website.  If you agree to the terms then please the check box to agree.
• Save: Press button to save all the data that you entered in this posting.
• Reset: Press button to reset all the data entered on this page if you want to start all over again.
• Once you successful save the ad, a posting confirmation message is displayed on the screen.  This confirms that all the data was successfully saved and a notification email has been sent.

    STEP 4:  Email Receipt and Activation

• Go to your Email system (specified during posting) and look for an email from info@adsmantra.com with “ACTIVATE/EDIT/DELETE …” as the subject line.  This email will have a hyperlink for activating the Ad.  (Note, if you do not get this email in your inbox, then look for the email in your junk or bulk folders.  This may be done by your Email anti-spamming software and you will need to click on ‘permissible user’ for routing emails from info@adsmantra.com to your inbox from next time.)  The email should be received within 5 minutes of the posting confirmation.
• Open the email and click on the link to go to the posting activation page.  The page allows you to Activate, Edit or Delete your posting.
• Click on Activate and the posting is available to all the users!

Select the “Search Ad” menu tab for beginning the search.  Searching for ads will be the most frequent activity on the site and has been designed with lot of flexibility in mind.  It should take users 2-3 clicks to find the items that they are looking for and are given different navigation features to search for items. 

STEP 1: Location Selection (not needed if default set)

If a default location is selected, you will see the category search page (Step 2) otherwise the location selection page will be displayed. 

• Click on the state or city that you want to search in.
• If a default location was selected, please confirm that the location selected is correct per the banner on top.  To change location please click click to change Location link on the left under the flags to change location.  For help on default location click here if required.

STEP 2: Perform straight search or select category

Choice 1: Straight Search -- you can enter any search string, change drop downs for city and category and hit the “search” button to quickly find items matching the search criterion.  The results should show as a list of items matching your search or it will display “No Listing found”.  You can change the search criterion and hit the “search” button again to zoom in on the listing (s) of interest.

Choice 2: Select the category/subcategory in which you want to search the advertisement.  The # of ads currently active in a category is given in parenthesis next to the main categories.  If you just select the main category for searching, the results will include all the subcategories under that category.  

The results from either method will give a list of ads that match the selection.  The ads with photographs will have a camera icon next to them.  You can click on the ad headline to see the result (see STEP 3).

STEP 3: View Ad and contact user

Once you are in the advertisement page, you should see all the details about the item.  Generally there should be enough description about the product or service that should allow users to decide whether they want to contact the advertiser for following up or not.  Most advertisers will not provide any personal contact information like email or phone# but the website provides an anonymous email id for every advertiser. 

To contact the advertiser, please click on the reply to the advertiser’s email that is repeated on the top and bottom of the ad next to the reply to option:

Reply to: xx-xxxxxx@adsmantra.com

You can contact the advertiser by either clicking on the anonymous email id or the envelope icon next to it.  You will be sending the email from your normal account and your personal email id will be visible to the advertiser.  At this point onwards, the advertiser and you will be interacting directly --  with the adsmantra.com having served it’s purpose of bringing you two together similar to paid newspaper ads.  Please review the warning on top of the ad about the fact that adsmantra.com is not providing any guarantees or warrantees explicit or implicit about the products or services being offered by advertisers.  Thus use the same common-sense that you do when responding to newspaper advertisers.

The system sends you a notification email once you save a new advertisement for the first time also has the details for editing your ad.  This is the same email that you receive with instructions to activate your posting. 

You need to go to your Email system (specified during posting) and look for an email from info@adsmantra.com with “ACTIVATE/EDIT/DELETE …” as the subject line.  This email will have a hyperlink for activating the Ad.  (Note, if you do not get this email in your inbox, then look for the email in your junk or bulk folders.  This may be done by your Email anti-spamming software and you will need to click on ‘permissible user’ for routing emails from info@adsmantra.com to your inbox from next time.)  The email should be received within 5 minutes of the posting confirmation.

• Open the email and click on the link to go to the posting activation page.  The page allows you to Activate, Edit or Delete your posting.
• Click on Edit button and the posting text is now available for editing the headline, text, image, etc.  Once you are satisfied with the ad, you can hit the Update button to save the changes.  The listing is now available to all the users with the updated information!

The system sends you a notification email once you save a new advertisement for the first time also has the details for deleting your ad.  This is the same email that you receive with instructions to activate your posting. 

You need to go to your Email system (specified during posting) and look for an email from info@adsmantra.com.com with “ACTIVATE/EDIT/DELETE …” as the subject line.  This email will have a hyperlink for activating the Ad.  (Note, if you do not get this email in your inbox, then look for the email in your junk or bulk folders.  This may be done by your Email anti-spamming software and you will need to click on ‘permissible user’ for routing emails from info@adsmantra.com to your inbox from next time.)  The email should be received within 5 minutes of the posting confirmation.

• Open the email and click on the link to go to the posting activation page.  The page allows you to Activate, Edit or Delete your posting.
• Click on Delete button and the posting will be immediately removed from the website.  We encourage you to do that once your item has been sold so that you don’t receive any further queries.

AdsMantra flagging feature allows users to flag inappropriate postings for removal, while maintaining other's ability to express freely on any postings. You can take action if you feel a posting is inappropriate by flagging by clicking on the following links (located at the upper right corner of each posting):

• miscategorized - wrong category/site, discusses another ad, otherwise misplaced.
• spam/overpost - posted too frequently, in multiple cities/categories, or is too commercial.

If a posting receives sufficient negative flags it will automatically be removed. Users whose postings are repeatedly flagged are subject to AdsMantra Admin review and/or follow-up action.

Hundreds of postings are removed through community flagging each week mostly due to violation of the AdsMantra terms of use and posting guidelines.

The www.AdsMantra.com website has been designed to provide the best user experience to buyer and sellers of various retail products and services.  It’s meant for both commercial and non-commercial users.  We recognize that the growth of this site’s popularity will grow by catering to the needs of the users.  Thus your suggestions for enhancements regarding new features, facilities, etc as well as improvements to the current features are openly welcomed.  You can use the Contact Us link on the website and selecting the Enhancement Request in the subject line with your suggestion entered into the comment area.  Click the Submit button to send your suggestion.  Please indicate if you like a response back.

Alternatively, you can send us an email to the following email address info@adsmantra.com .