eBay AdContext in “coming months” |
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I’ve been saying for awhile that Google needs more competition, particularly on the context ads front — hurry up already, Microsoft — and during the eBay Live conference in Las Vegas, a related and somewhat surprising announcement has come.
In coming months, the program, dubbed eBay AdContext, will allow websites to embed simple snippets of code that can then automatically act to showcase items for sale on eBay’s site, eBay officials said.
Although I like the concept and definitely will be signing up when it becomes available, I have to wonder what the cut will be on this one since some auctions are for very small amounts of money? Perhaps eBay will only show ads for items that have risen above a certain price? Like the screenshot of the auction shown above of the guy who auctioned off everything he owned?
The eBay cut isn’t very much really. Perhaps this is really why they raised eBay fee listing prices in January of last year?
The original reuter’s story said that the publisher’s would share somewhere between 40% and 70% of the sale. This leads me to believe that the sellers will have to pay for the service. Or perhaps they feel that the increase in sales will lead to a higher amount of final value fees to make up for the added expense. Hard to say until they release more info on it. I can’t seem to find the reuters link anywhere, but there’s a link to the MSN version of it here: http://www.thatedeguy.com/archives/2006/06/ebay-contextual-ads-coming-soon
Comment by thatedeguy — June 12, 2006 @ 10:40 am PST
Interesting. I wonder how many sellers will opt-in for that? Thanks for sharing the link, thatedguy.
Comment by TDavid — June 12, 2006 @ 11:20 am PST
That all depends on what the cost to the seller would be. I’d opt-in if the cost were an extra 1-2% on the final value of that item. Somehow, I don’t see them being able to add enough on to the final value’s to make this worth their while. There has to be a catch in here somewhere.
Comment by thatedeguy — June 12, 2006 @ 11:27 am PST
Reuters article here. 1-2% of the final value of an item that sells for $10 is 10-20 cents, $100 = $1-2 USD. Not going to get many sites showing ads for that kind of affiliate revenue. Not the desirable sites anyway, splogs will be all over anything that moves.
Publishers can earn more with other ad options like selling ads direct. We certainly won’t be giving up any prime ad real estate for that kind of money.
Will have to wait and see the final numbers on this one. We’ll still at least try it out.e
Comment by TDavid — June 12, 2006 @ 11:38 am PST
the 1-2% is what I assume eBay will add on to the seller side of things. The news sites are saying that the publishers(websites) will get 35-70% depending on volume. 35% of $10 is $3.5 and $100 is $35. For that kind of money, I would certainly put them on. It would be an intersting experiment just to see the CTR%. Still waiting on whether it violates the adsense TOS though.
Comment by thatedeguy — June 12, 2006 @ 1:45 pm PST
I’m one of the product managers for eBay AdContext. Just wanted to answer some questions here.
AdContext will not cost sellers anything extra. All sellers will have their listings eligible for display in the ad units automatically. If a person clicks through on a listing in an ad unit and ends up winning or buying the item there is no additional cost to the seller.
Comment by Ken — June 15, 2006 @ 3:44 pm PST
Thank you for stopping by to clarify that, Ken. Can you share (approximately?) when will the official details on this program be available on ebay.com somewhere?
Comment by TDavid — June 15, 2006 @ 3:54 pm PST
[…] Overall, as an eBayer since 2002, I like the fact they added the option to have these blogs. I’d like to be able to add the eBay AdContext when it arrives. When I mentioned AdContext a person named Ken stopped by in the comments to say he was an eBay product manager and that: “AdContext will not cost sellers anything extra. All sellers will have their listings eligible for display in the ad units automatically. If a person clicks through on a listing in an ad unit and ends up winning or buying the item there is no additional cost to the seller.” […]
Pingback by Make You Go Hmm: » eBay blogs now live — June 16, 2006 @ 10:30 pm PST
TDavid - You can visit http://affiliates.ebay.com/ads/adcontext/ now to find out additional details on eBay AdContext and apply for the beta program. I’ve posted a more extensive comment on http://www.problogger.net/archives/2006/06/15/ebay-adcontext-ads-first-impressions/ since there were a lot of questions about AdContext there too.
Also, in response to your question about who will be paying at the end of your post http://www.makeyougohmm.com/20060616/3455/, it’s eBay who will be paying. eBay has had an affiliate program for quite a while now and has shared revenue with affiliates who driving users and activity to eBay’s sites around the world; AdContext has the same payout structur as the affiliate program.
Comment by Ken — June 17, 2006 @ 2:39 am PST
[…] We’re having an informative conversation in the comments section with Ken, a product manager (unconfirmed) at eBay regarding the new eBay AdContext program. More details are surfacing, including what looks like they will be using Commission Junction for this program, as they have been using for their existing affiliate program. […]
Pingback by Make You Go Hmm: » Why would eBay AdContext use Commission Junction? — June 17, 2006 @ 8:53 am PST
Ken - Commission Junction? Say it isn’t so
Comment by TDavid — June 17, 2006 @ 8:54 am PST