There was a time when it looked like eBay would replace garage sales -- or the Goodwill box. But putting things up for sale was probably too much work. In fact, garage sale postings in 2009 were up 80 percent…
There was a time when it looked like eBay would replace garage sales -- or the Goodwill box. But putting things up for sale was probably too much work. In fact, garage sale postings in 2009 were up 80 percent…
Trulia, which is ranked a Top 7 real estate site by comScore, has followed the lead of Realtor.com and Zillow and added rentals to its site. The rentals section features all Trulia’s functionality, such as neighborhood information, mapping and ratings…
More than a year after it became apparent that it would do so, eBay has finally killed the Kijiji brand in the U.S., and rebranded its efforts as "eBay Classifieds." The rebranding, which does not affect more established Kijiji-branded sites…
BIA/Kelsey’s Marketplaces 2010 conference has just ended after two-and-a-half days of fantastic presentations from 49 speakers; top-level research from our BIA/Kelsey team; and really great evening events from MojoPages and Acxiom/Moon Valley (we’re talking fire eaters and San Diego Bay…
One of the last sessions at Marketplaces 2010 focused on what local niche or media sites can do to better leverage opportunities to grow revenues. Sitting on the panel were Tony Lee of Adicio, Ken Kalb from Analog Analytics and…
Vertical businesses that have relied on Yellow Pages and newspapers and other classified channels aren’t always seeing the same performance-based results that they might expect in the Google age. But many of them also aren’t likely to become keyword experts,…
Three years ago, BIA/Kelsey created the Marketplaces research program and conference because we saw that local advertising was quickly "verticalizing." Indeed, money and talent have poured in for the new breed of vertical products that would take their place among…
EBay is expected to dramatically boost its efforts in classifieds in 2010, so we welcome clues into its historical and current thinking into classifieds via eBay vs. Craigslist. EBay has been seeking redress from Craigslist, which has diluted its 28…
Facing up to the reality of a real estate market in which many houses for sale end up becoming “shadow” rentals, Zillow has added rental listings and information to its real estate services. At the same time, Zillow is attaching…
It would be a pity if The New York Times Co.’s Boston Globe were shut down, because its Boston.com site continues to innovate with local online advertising capabilities. Today, the company’s YourTown hyperlocal sites launched Flyerboards: a virtual bulletin board…
We’re always looking for what’s up and down in the economy. One likely contender: garage sales. According to coverage in the L.A. Times, garage sale postings on Craigslist are up 80 percent nationwide (and 50 percent in the L.A. area).
MySpace and Citysearch today confirmed the launch of MySpace Local, a new local city guide using functionality and feeds from Citysearch, including its taxonomy of categorization, geography structure, search functionality and content. A beta version of the site launches this…
One of the great mysteries is what Wal-Mart is really doing with classifieds. Last June, it signed up to use the Oodle platform, but not much has been heard from it since. In this week's Ad Age, Wal-Mart’s Duncan Dreschel…
Online leads for cars are broken. The vast majority of auto shoppers won’t even fill out a request for bid because they think they’ll get inaccurate, incomplete and tardy information from the dealer. But that doesn’t stop vendors from working…
Gabriels and Endeca have launched a new white-label auto portal. The effort formally kicks off a recently announced partnership to inject Endeca’s search capabilities into Gabriels' vertical sites. The new portal moves away from a simple listing product, offering a…
The New York Times publishes separate sports and business sections on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. It may soon move away from separate sections altogether. This past Saturday, there was not a single display ad in either the sports or the…
Oodle CEO Craig Donato led off day three of Marketplaces 2009 describing how classified advertising has gone through an evolution over the past five years, progressing from simply importing them online, to making them searchable and finally today integrating classifieds…
AOL Yellow Pages has greatly benefited from search engine optimization, with 50 percent of its traffic coming from SEO, according to Chris Spanos, GM, local search, who was speaking today at Kelsey’s Marketplaces conference in Los Angeles. “We have a…
Rob Curley and Chris Jennewein of Greenspun Interactive gave a lively presentation this morning at the Marketplaces conference representing the yin and yang of product features and business models. This is often in a state of imbalance at online newspaper…
