eBay, Mediaplex Team For "Real Time" Banners

In a big coup for the online advertising player, Mediaplex on Wednesday snared a five-year contract to serve eBay‘s banner advertising on other Web sites.

The deal, the financial terms of which were not disclosed, comes after a test of Mediaplex’ MOJO technology, which integrates banner ads with advertisers’ back-end inventory systems, or other databases. Mediaplex launched ads for eBay that showed a photo of an item being auctioned, the current bid price, number of bids, and time remaining until the auction closed. Mediaplex says the test generated a click-through rate higher than eBay’s average rate.

“This convergence of real-time advertising and trading is a very powerful marketing tool for one of the most highly interactive sites on the Internet,” said Brian Powley, executive vice president of sales and marketing at Mediaplex.

According to figures distributed by Nielsen//NetRatings, eBay ranks as a top ten Internet advertiser, coming in sixth (in numbers of impressions served) to at-home Internet users, and eighth to at-work Internet users. According to Media Metrix, it is the number one shopping destination.