Ebay and Google –Handbags in the playground

Talk about two big kids, eBay and Google have fallen out. Most of this occurred while I was away in the USA and surprisingly I missed most of the details at the time.
At eBay Live the first I heard of it was at a luncheon when an eBay executive described their decision to withdraw their advertising from Google as part of a routine advertising test. Believe that if you will.

Basically what appears to have happened is that Google decided to host a party to promote its Checkout service (a rival to Paypal) during the eBay Live event and invite many of the attendees. This upset eBay who promptly announced it was halting all of its advertising on Google. EBay is by far the largest advertiser and spends millions of dollars a year with the company. Google then cancelled the proposed party and that is position at the moment.

Interestingly I did read a report that someone wearing a Google shirt was ejected from the eBay Live Gala dinner. Which unless you like eating poor food and listening to over loud music in a venue that looked like an aircraft hanger was no great hardship.

Almost certainly this little spat will be over soon, both companies need each other. Google wants the income and eBay the traffic that their ads generate. However, I cannot help feeling that eBay tends to over react to any form of competition.
Remember the fuss they kicked up over Alibaba setting up an exhibition at a neighbouring hotel at last year’s eBay Live.

I don’t know what the lasting effect of the publicity will be but I do not see how eBay can emerge as a winner from this affair,so come on guys, kiss and make up.