CyWorld, a social networking portal allowing users to keep in touch with friends in a virtual realm with photo galleries, message boards, and customised news, is extending its model into other nations.
"This year we plan to enter the US and German markets, and in China our popularity is slowly growing - this April we reached one million users," revealed Byung-Hwin Shin, the company`s director, at the recent SEK 2006 conference in Seoul.
Developed as a subsidiary of SK Telecomm, one of Korea`s largest telecommunications companies, the CyWorld community has grown to about 18 million users - more than one third of the country`s the total population. The site receives over 20 billion page impressions per month, he said.
Shin explained that 78% of CyWorld`s revenue - which he declined to reveal during questioning from a group of international journalists - can be attributed to "decorative purchases" where a user will purchase background pictures (skins) or background music, for instance.
"CyWorld cooperates with [the SK Telecoms instant messaging service] NateOn," he noted.
"Cy" means "relationship" in Korean, and Shin explained that CyWorld`s popularity can be largely attributed to the innate desire within people to form relationships - with the Web portal providing a convenient manner in which to do this.
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