EBay launches international ad division

Ebay, the online auction and e-commerce site, is launching an international advertising division to capitalise on the growing number of brands that want to launch cross-territory branding campaigns. Ebay Advertising International will be led by head of European strategy Christian Kunz.

Kunz, who has been promoted to director of Advertising International, will continue to be based at the website’s international headquarters in Bern, Switzerland, while Philip Rinn will lead the international sales team in London. Rinn was promoted from business development director for eBay-owned Shopping.com.

In the past, ad campaigns on eBay have been handled separately by territory-specific ad teams. But Kunz says that many of its clients – such as film companies and motor brands, want to run global launch campaigns rather than on a country by country basis.

The unit aims to be a one-stop shop to advertisers and will deal either directly with clients or through their media agencies. It will offer bespoke campaigns as well as cross-territory ad deals.

Kunz says the plans come as eBay attempts to reposition itself as more upmarket, with less emphasis on the auction aspect of the site, and more on its role as a general e-commerce portal. He says that revenue from online advertising, such as banners and page takeovers is small “but growing rapidly”.

The website is one of the top 10 most popular in the UK, according to Nielsen Online data. In June, it attracted 15.2 million unique users in the UK.

The division launch is supported with an online resource centre www.ebayadvertising.com.