Trade Me has recently updated its design, which on the whole is pretty good. However, they have also added in third party, graphical advertising. The site always stood out above the rest (the likes of eBay for example) for its clean appearance and no-clutter approach. I can’t help but think … why add the ugly advertising? Looking more like eBay is not a good thing.
Ok, yes, there is the fact that there is a lot of traffic in NZ going to these pages on a daily basis, so there is the potential to serve up a lot of impressions and demand a premium for it. However, TradeMe has a very sound financial model – it makes money and it makes it very well! It’s not like they needed to do it to increase revenue. I suspect that FairFax Media will have pushed this, opening up TradeMe as a new target for their existing customers who already advertise with them.
Will people really care? Probably not, but I’ve lost a bit of respect for them going down this path.
