At its annual Developers Conference in Las Vegas eBay announced that it will begin beta testing a new contextual advertisement system that will place contextual ads for eBay auctions on their affiliates’ sites in exchange for a share of any resulting sales.
EBay’s contextual ad system will be called AdContext and will be similar to Google’s AdSense and Yahoo!’s Publisher Network. AdContext will examine the text on a Web site to look for keywords which will influence the targeted eBay ads that will be displayed on the site.
If, for instance, a site focuses on the NBA, ads for basketball jerseys, shoes, and memorabilia will be shown on the Web page. Given the fact that these ads will lead to auctions, they will be updated automatically as products are sold and as new ones are put up for bidding.
According to eBay, sites that use AdContext can potentially earn between 40% and 70% of any resulting sales made through the related ads. However, this figure will depend on volume. Affiliates can also earn between $12 and $20 for every new active registered user that they direct to eBay.
Rather than sending a signal that they will be competing with the likes of Google and Yahoo!, eBay seems to be displaying concerns of depending too much on Google for its traffic. EBay’s recent agreement with Yahoo! showed the beginnings of the solutions that will be sought to overcome this potential problem, and AdContext will be another step towards a more Google-free direction.
Sites will be able to display ads from both eBay and other sources according to eBay spokesman Hani Durzy. There is talk that eBay is looking into allowing Web developers to use its very secret reputation feedback system, though indications from eBay say that any such move could still be years away.
Commission Junction will manage the new sign ups to the program as well as the allocation of these contextual ads for eBay. They will receive compensation for their help.
Sources:
http://www.clickz.com/news/article.php/3612831
http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/topnews/wpn-60-
20060612eBayToImplementKeywordAdvertising.html
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