If opening the Kijiji classifieds site to American users draws business away from Craigslist, eBay stands to lose a little bit too.
eBay’s Kijiji US Debut Competes With…eBay
The only part of Craigslist that isn’t under Craig Newmark’s ownership belongs to eBay. That 25 percent was picked up by eBay in 2004.
eBay opened Kijiji to the US market, after having operated it internationally since its founding in 2005. Ina Steiner at Auction Bytes said Kijiji users should expect to see something they won’t see on Craigslist, in the form of ads:
eBay has an advertising agreement with Google internationally, but has partnered with Yahoo in the US. So while Kijiji Canada sponsored links are powered by Google, it’s likely any sponsored links on Kijiji’s US site would be powered by Yahoo.
The possibility of eBay trying to streamline Kijiji sales with PayPal seems unlikely. Kijiji display an “Important Safety Warning” on each ad page: “Avoid fraud by meeting all sellers in-person to pay for items. Kijiji does not offer any transaction or payment services.”
Unlike Craigslist, eBay could easily stuff Kijiji with ads for revenue purposes. eBay can also charge for job and real estate ads as Craigslist does in a select few markets. With eBay being a publicly-traded company, they are likely to push for more revenue opportunities with Kijiji than they can with their Craigslist stake.
