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iResearch: SINA Leju Takes the Lead in China's Online Real Estate Ad Market in 2009

Although the Chinese real estate market saw a sharp turnaround in 2009 following the slump in 2008, total online ad spending by developers were down 15.5% compared to the same period of 2008. However, the combined market share held by major Chinese real estate portals rose substantially. Instead of dropping like their competitors, the top three Chinese property portals, Sina Leju, SouFun.com and Focus.cn, each saw growth in their market share during 2009, with the combined revenue accounting for about 80% of the total. This indicates that the top three portals were the preferred places for Chinese developers to place ads.

During 2009, online advertising revenues at the top three real estate portals also increased sequentially from quarter to quarter. They posted a combined revenue of RMB210 million for the fourth quarter of 2009, compared with the RMB110 million recorded for the first quarter. Brand recognition and persistent marketing innovations were cited as major reasons for their growth, according to iResearch. A representative event was the NASDAQ IPO in October of China Real Estate Information Corporation, a leading provider of real estate information, consulting and online services, merging the offline operations of E-House (China) Holdings Limited (NYSE: EJ) and the online real estate business of Sina Corporation (Nasdaq: SINA). The resulting synergy helped expand Sina Leju's influence and led to its ad revenues increasing 48.6% sequentially for the fourth quarter of 2009, compared with an average growth rate of 16.9% for the whole market.

iResearch expects real estate advertisers to pay more attention to the efficiency in placing ads this year as uncertainties remain in the Chinese property market. Online ad revenues at major real estate media are expected to return to a positive growth in 2010 because online advertisements' low cost/performance ratios and accuracy, as well as online real estate ads' high translation rates, will be favored by more and more real estate advertisers.

SOURCE Sina Leju