eBay TV Ad’s Auction Site
Published August 5th, 2006
A group of major TV advertisers teamed up with eBay on Friday with plans for an online auction marketplace where they can bid on commercial air time to gain leverage against TV channels that charge exorbitant prices to run their ads.
The site, which will be called e-Media Exchange, will begin selling air time in January on a cable TV network as a way to pilot-test the service, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Nine advertisers, including Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, Wal-Mart, Toyota’s Lexus unit, Home Depot, and Brown-Forman have kicked in a total of $50 million for the test. They have also opened a site where buyers and sellers can sign up to participate in the media marketplace pilot test.
As they enlist more buyers in the service, the cost of the project may go upwards of $100 million.
The advertisers initially approached Google with the idea of building the site, but grew uncomfortable with the search king becoming a possible competitor to the site, as Google expands its own efforts to sell ads on radio and magazines. On Wednesday, for example, Google announced a deal with XM Satellite Radio to sell ads.
