Fernando Samaniego - International New Media Consulting

On Classifieds (Part II): Mobile Examples

Resumen del artículo: tras mi anterior artículo sobre las estrategias de las diferentes categorías de jugadores de clasificados, este post se concentra en las innovaciones que los móviles están permitiendo.

In my previous post I wrote about some of the larger players using different strategies, Craigslist, eBay and Oodle. All of them will have to leverage their R&D capabilities to assure healthy growth against the myriad of competitors aiming at this lucrative market. In all cases players will have to adopt and adapt the new technologies to better serve their clients and audiences. In the case of Craigslist it may have to raise, at least partially, its revenue in order to experiment and adopt some of the technology already being used by most competitors without necessarily having to abandon its “helping people help” philosophy that pleases much of its audience. EBay, which has promised large investments in classifieds, will transfer to them all the tools and experience it has acquired in its core business along the years such as refined searching and filtering. Implementing technological improvements will be a challenge to all of them, Oodle included.

On Classifieds (Part I): Craigslist, eBay, Oodle

Resumen del artículo: en este post se analizan las diferentes categorías de jugadores en el mundo de los clasificados online: los medios tradicionales, los "pure players", los actores del sector (p.ej. agencias inmobiliarias), los llegados a clasificados desde actividades aledañas y los agregadores.

For centuries newspaper’s exclusive turf, the online world has changed the way classified ads reach people and interact. Some newspaper groups (see below) have been more successful than others at transferring their offline skills to the online world. Large online media companies like Google (Google Base started in 2005 and has lost most of its steam), Amazon and Yahoo are not being counted among the new media companies successful in classifieds (Hotjobs.com and other examples notwithstanding). Nor has Microsoft: Live Expo was started in 2006 and officially closed last summer. Among the industry players Realtor.com (National Assoc. of Realtors), Rightmove.co.uk (founded by several large UK real estate networks), and Monster.com (TMP Worldwide) have been able to establish a sound presence. In the world of companies which specifically target internet classifieds we’ll analyze three projects because of their different backgrounds and strategies: Craigslist, eBay and Oodle.