Facebook launches automotive marketplace in Australia
Facebook has launched its Automotive marketplace in Australia, offering a service for dealers and the public to sell and buy used cars on the social media platform.
The service, which has been running in the UK and US, is being rolled out in Australia and other markets over coming weeks and comes a week after the company launched its ‘today in’ local news and community information aggregator across ten regional cities.
Facebook claims the vehicles category is one of the most popular categories for Marketplace globally, with service allowing consumers to browse used car inventory from auto dealerships through listing partners.
Current listing partners include Carsales, Autotrader and The Drive Network. Facebook is understood to be looking to expand the partner list.
As part of the service, users will be able to run real time chats with sellers through Facebook’s messenger service.
Christine Chia, Facebook’s APAC marketplace partnerships manager, said: “People are already using Facebook to find their next car; in fact vehicles is one of the most popular categories on Marketplace.
“That’s why today we’re making this experience even better for car shoppers in Australia — by working with leaders in the auto industry, we’re expanding our used car inventory to give people more options to choose from, as well as helping local dealerships reach even more customers.”
The service has launching today and will become available across Australia over the coming weeks.
Interesting. I’ve had my car on Carsales for about three months. It’s a somewhat expensive car at $50,000 second hand.
I would say there’s been one potential buyer with the money needed to buy it but he couldn’t quite get high enough.
The rest of the potential “buyers” have offered ludicrous swaps like a restored 1985 hot hatch (and me give him $10k on top). I can’t work out if they’re all mad or fraudsters.
Anyway, no sale.
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