Forum lures big spender for Xmas promo

Hong Kong - Popular discussion forums Uwants.com and Discuss.com.hk have partnered Tetris Media to launch a user generated campaign themed "My Xmas Choice" that have attracted major advertisers to come on board.

Advertisers include Dell, Samsung, Nokia, Ebay, Ocean Park and Sony, which have signed up for the seeding campaign.

Ricky Ng, business director for Tetris Media said the concept of user-generated campaigns is popular among agencies as it is not a form of push advertising but allocating ad dollars to such campaigns can be quite a challenge.

With the current initiative, marketers are able to enjoy a media package that include sponsorship marketing, rich and interactive media banners as well as the opportunity to listen to users opinions on their brand choices.

Oscar Leung, general manager for Networld Technology in charge of discuss and uwants, said this is the first time the forums have organised such a large campaign for advertisers on its platforms.

He said "My Xmas Choice" campaign is a good branding platform for brands because it provides high exposure yet does not cause competition between the different brands.

Leung was initially worried about the user response but three days since its launch, he is confident there will be over 100 applications for each of the brands.

Users are asked to generate Xmas ideas of the brands in the first stage and five outstanding entries from each of the brands will be entitled to a voting session and the ones with the highest votes will receive a prize from the brand sponsors.  

Uwants.com reaches out to over 450,000 unique users per day consisting of Hong Kong users and Chinese living overseas, it has more than 1.2 million registered members. Discuss.com.hk reaches out to over 400,000 unique users per day and has more than 1 million registered members.