World leading classifieds platform eBay launched its Russian-language version one year ago, in March 2010, and despite problems surrounding the launch, Russian Internet users appear to like having their own version: the number of registered users increased by 73% in its first year. In addition, Russian users have proven to be the most active buyers and sellers compared with users of eBay in other European countries, said to RIA Novosti Alina Pravdzhik, eBay’s Development director in Europe.
Yesterday, the Russian-language eBay officially released its free classifieds service, which was launched in test mode last October. The service allows Russian users to place sale offers at fixed prices in any of a thousand Russian cities.
According to the company, users have placed more than 15,000 classified ads since October 2010. Almost half of them have been placed by Moscow users. The second highest volume of ads, 16%, has been placed by users in St. Petersburg. The most popular categories for classified ads have been Items For Sale—accounting for roughly 50% of the ads, Services—accounting for 20%, and Real Estate—for 20%.
The eBay classifieds service supports only those deals transacted in cash and completed through personal exchanges between buyers and sellers. It does not support electronic transactions. This enables eBay to offer its classifieds service free of charge, and it means that eBay takes no commission for its service. However, it limits transactions exclusively to Russian sellers and buyers located in the same city.
Russia has many competing platforms for online classifieds services. Among them are Avito.ru, with about 2.47 million posted ads; Slando.ru, with about 2.58 million ads; and Barahla.net – not to mention Irr.ru, the Web version of the leading Russian classifieds newspaper.
The primary eBay service in Russia, online auctions, has been accessible to Russian users since late 2009 but still suffers from significant defects. Only offers from the U.S., UK, and Germany are available, and those offers are presented in their original language—they are not translated into Russian. Paying for offers is possible only through PayPal, even though the eBay-owned electronic payment service enjoys little popularity in Russia. Finally, due to lengthy Russian customs procedures and the relatively weak organization of the Russian postal service, delivery of purchased goods to Russian users can take weeks.
