The company set up the Expo.org domain to make it easier to remember, and implemented some feature tweaks and updates to the site.
Microsoft’s dynamic listing service called Windows Live Expo officially turned on the “Open For Business” sign after several months of beta testing. The site offers an alternative to services like Craigslist or Google Base for selling items or services on a one-to-one basis.
Changes to Live Expo included making the Expo.org domain name available as a more memorable URL; it redirects to expo.live.com. The site now has the look and feel of other Windows Live properties.
Integrated feedback lets Expo users share their views on a particular listing with others on the site. At the bottom of each listing, logged-in users can click on a “Cool listing!” link to give it a vote of approval, or a thumbs down link to “Report abuse, illegal or obscene content.”
Microsoft has integrated some of its mapping capabilities into Expo. Clicking on a “view map” link open a street map for the listing. The link to “driving directions” pulls up a new window with Live Local; users can plot their way from start to end.
Each time a listing is viewed, it appears on the home page of Expo. Users can use the list generated to go back to a listing quickly from there. Microsoft also said it has improved Expo security with regards to spam and fraud.
Classifieds represent serious potential for online revenue. Craigslist has been alternately blamed and credited for starting the phenomenon, as classified ad revenue for newspapers has plummeted throughout the industry.
That revenue has been moving to the Internet, and the big online players all want a piece of the action. The issue now is how to capture that revenue when people have become used to free listings.
Microsoft places ads from its new advertising network on Live Expo, as a way of monetizing the listings there. Live Expo could be Microsoft’s gateway for businesses, especially smaller offline ones, to sample online listings before committing to paid search ads, which would be lucrative for Microsoft.
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David Utter is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business.
