EBay shortlists four agencies for UK advertising account

The e-commerce site, which launched in 1998 and rolled out a UK service a year later, is currently enjoying more success than ever in Britain as people take to the idea of bidding for and selling goods of any description online.

In the fourth quarter of 2003, analyst Mark J Rowen of Prudential Financial estimated the listings on eBay UK grew by a whopping 134%.

Nielsen//NetRatings earlier this week listed eBay as its number two hot internet property. It said the auction site has done with things for sale what Google did with information. EBay is now one of the largest e-commerce sites in Europe and Nielsen//NetRatings expects to see continued European growth.

EBay currently has no UK creative agency, having relied on internet promotion, for which it uses MediaCom, and the appointment of a UK agency marks an effort by the auction site to help establish its global brand.

The search for an ad agency comes as eBay raises fees for many of the larger auctions on its site with consumers now paying a £100 fee for auctions with a reserve price of £5,000 or above. It has also introduced a 2% charge for running auctions with a reserve price of between £50 and £5,000.

The winning agency will work on developing a television ad campaign with a decision expected by March.

Last year, eBay appointed the former Unilever interactive marketing chief Simon Darling as group marketing director.

Darling replaced commercial director Linda Campbell, who was granted a two-year leave of absence to study an MBA in the US. He reports to UK country manager Douglas McCallum.

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