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| UPDATED: 2006-04-13 |
 Oodle On Express Lane With Washington Post 
By: David Utter 2006-04-13 This week, the classified aggregator site Oodle will have its services available through the Washington Post Express Web site.  Being included as part of the Washington Post's (WPO) online presence delivers a huge boost to Oodle. With a presence at express.oodle.com being promoted by the Washington Post, Oodle can gain a lot of exposure to the powerbrokers who reside inside and outside of the Capital Beltway.
Oodle CEO Craig Donato said his company had no difficulties making Oodle ready for the 500,000 readers of the Post's Express newspaper. The Post distributes the free weekly Express at Metro stations, college campuses, and other busy locations throughout the DC area. With Oodle, the Express site can make classifieds available to its readers in a convenient, full-featured manner. Also, people who place paid ads with either the Express or the Washington Post will automatically have that ad available through the Express website. Aggregations sites like Oodle could gain greater interest from the state governments in the US. The federal government plans to shut down America's Job Bank, a website that lists millions of jobs nationwide, in June 2007. Other small startups that could maneuver to make deals with state legislatures lacking a separate job site, or just looking for an upgrade, include Indeed.com and SimplyHired.com. Any of those three will face competition from bigger players in the online classified space. Monster Worldwide (MNST), operator of the Monster.com job site, would be one with a keen interest in boosting the appeal of its shares by securing some lucrative government contracts. Monster.com had been negotiating with the Indiana state government to provide such a service. But contract negotiations between the state and Monster Government Solutions ended in March, with the state announcing it would rebid the process again from scratch this summer. Complaints from the Hoosier State Press Association contributed to ending those negotiations. Traditional newspaper publishers may have the edge over their online-only counterparts. CareerBuilder.com, jointly owned by Gannett (GCI), the Tribune Company (TRB), and at the present time, Knight-Ridder (KRI), has the three major newspaper publishers and scores of local papers providing it with listings. Those local connections cannot be discounted when politics enters the discussion. While Craigslist has drawn a lot of attention, and blame for the overall decline in newspaper classified revenue, the company seems satisfied with its niche. Online auctioneer eBay (EBAY) holds a minor stake in Craigslist, however, and its desire to grow its business and boost its stock out of the "neutral" and "hold" ratings some analysts have given it could make eBay CEO Meg Whitman a dark horse candidate for government business. That may not seem likely, but no one expected eBay to plunk down $2.6 billion for VoIP firm Skype and place $1.5 billion in bonuses in front of Skype like a carrot either. Microsoft (MSFT) now offers an online classified service with its Windows Live Expo, and Google (GOOG) has its much-discussed Google Base project. Microsoft appears more interested in beating up Craigslist, which looks more like a traditional Microsoft target. Google's continued enigmatic behavior makes it difficult to determine just what the company wants to do next. Although entries in its Google Base index have been cropping up in home, auto, and job searches on Google.com, the search advertising company appears even more of a dark horse than eBay when it comes to pushing for government job search business. Jobs notwithstanding, the online classifieds arena has plenty of competitors big and small, for a variety of listing categories. The high-dollar real estate industry looks like a tempting target for efforts by Google, Microsoft, or even eBay. --- Tags: Oodle, Washington Post, Monster, Craigslist, eBay, Microsoft, Google Add to | DiggThis | Yahoo! My Web | PreFound.com Keep up with IFN and bookmark us today - 
View All Articles by David Utter About the Author: David Utter is a staff writer for InternetFinancialNews and WebProNews covering technology and business. |
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