Wu: We saw some research on whether Internet users are concerned about paid results and how the paid pages affect their search experience. Studies found that the only thing users really care about is relevancy. As long as the information is relevant to what they are looking for, they are OK with paid results.
TT: In Taiwan, your partners include Internet portals Yahoo-Kimo, MSN, Seednet and Openfind, and news Web sites for the `United Daily News' and `China Times.' How are you going to utilize the two news sites, since most people log onto the sites for news instead of product information?
Thompson: Currently, we use a precision match, and will introduce another product called content manage in the next stage. For example, if an article on a news site is about digital cameras, we will put a small box in the corner that has a couple of relevant listings of that article. Typically, advertising and promotions try to hit people multiple times from a number of different angles to really stimulate buying. In this way we can double-hit the readers.
TT: What is your estimate of the market size for marketing by search in Taiwan?
Thompson: Taiwan is a great market in which to launch Overture, with a significant number of Internet users and a high penetration of broadband users. This is a very technically advanced marketplace for us to market by search. It's still too early to estimate the market size, and we can't disclose our target now. However, with our six partners, we can reach about 80 percent of Internet users here, so we have great business opportunities in Taiwan.
TT: From banner ads to search results, the industry has been looking for new ways to market online. In your experience, what are potential methods or devices to be applied by advertisers following the emergence of 3G mobile phones and wireless communication?
Thompson: This is a great question. I think the answer depends on what part of the world you're in. How people use wireless today varies in different markets. For instance, in a very PC-centric society, people tend to be email-centric and cellphones are merely complementary. Other markets, such as China, is much more driven by voice communication and wireless handsets because they have less penetration of broadband and PCs. In this market, the ability to able to extend the Internet to handsets becomes incredibly important. So we are in a process of investigating the best ways to do that and have a few market trials proceeding around the world. But from this transition we know that having the capacity to network to do interesting things is really the underlined requirement to take full advantage of. In terms of Overture, our desire is to provide our service to either fixed or mobile devices. It's a part of our overall vision.
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