INTERNET MEDIA: MTV Asia Online in move to expand regional site reach

MTV Asia Online is expanding its regional site reach, opening the doors to a new site, MTV Korea. In addition to MTVAsia Online (www.mtvasia.com) and MTV Chinese (www.mtvchinese.com), the site will feature greater streaming video content, tapping into Korea's superior broadband network. "In markets like Taiwan or Korea, the sites are much more media-heavy, with better Internet infrastructure, so users have greater bandwidth," said Asiacontent.com VP, business development, Paul Meyers-who was responsible for the site's strategy and development. "You'll see a lot more media, music, and video clips. Korea's definitely a more mature Internet market." MTV Asia Online has also been revamped, sporting a new look, faster access and easier navigation. Garnering 170,000 unique visitors for December alone, including more than three million pageviews for the two sites, the site is taking the concept of Web community very seriously indeed. A recent online survey voiced requests for greater interactive action, coupled with more user-generated content and video clips. "The thing we need to keep in mind here is that all that cool, sexy, eye-candy stuff is great, but if it takes three minutes to access the page, those visitors are not going to come back," he said. MTV Asia Online is also tentatively "doing ecommerce", sparked by a joint foray with 'Net Megastore, a regional online CD provider. Brandishing the channel's youth tag to advertisers, sponsorship has shot up - and following the October '99 launch of MTV Chinese, advertisers have included Acer, Star East, Adidas and Estee Lauder. Running a "beyond banner" December package for youth cosmetic house Za, new 'Cool Stuff' make-up lines were introduced on MTV Chinese and a surfer feedback contest on the "coolest colours for the Xmas party season" was run. According to Mr Meyers contests present opportunities to answer questions, sign up for newsletters and learn more about the products. Outlining the need for Internet advertising to become more visually arresting, he believes the onus lies with the advertisers. "This is just the beginning - as advertisers become more comfortable and sophisticated with the Internet, they'll recognise its strengths, interactivity, measurability and brand association". "And for us publishers; trying to define the 'real goals' of client adspend online includes setting realistic expectations for them," he said. Today's savvy advertisers were also experimenting with varied banner styles. "Maybe 'banner A' will work on one site and 'banner B' will work better on another - it's all down to audience preference". As in traditional advertising, Mr Meyers believes campaigns need to be measured, "success on a micro-level is very hard to evaluate. You want to look at where you're advertising and what kind of results you're looking for ... is it branding, getting people to sign up for things or driving them to your site so you can sell online?" A sticky banner is not solely defined by high click-through rates: "All too often we see an online banner campaign just 'being an online banner campaign' - maybe that isn't the best approach," he said. "If it's part of a larger campaign philosophy with a number of goals for different media then it can be measured more accurately."

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