Leo Burnett and UM tipped to win eBay classifieds' marketing business in Asia

The new business will be for several key markets in Asia-Pacific to be launched sometime in 2012.

The exact launch dates as well as the brand names for the sites in some of the individual markets have yet to be confirmed. Singapore has launched the eBay online classifieds site as Gumtree.

Gumtree was founded in March 2000 as a local London classified ads and community site, designed to connect people who were either planning to move, or have just arrived in a city, and need help in getting started with their accommodation, employment and meeting new people.

In May 2005, Gumtree was acquired by Kijiji, eBay’s internal classifieds group.

Gumtree now covers 60 cities across six countries in the UK, Ireland, Poland, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.

Reported in March 2011, Gumtree.com.au, has appointed media agency PHD for channel planning, and online and offline planning and buying.

On the classified sites market, the South China Morning Post's Recruitment Services division also launched a new job search portal in February rolling it out with a multimedia campaign led by WE Marketing. Capitalising on the trend toward online job searching, the new site, smartjob.com, targets 25- to 35-year-old, mid-career professionals.