Maybe the most interesting aspect of the light edition is the inclusion of a “Your Life Events Planner” section.  Directory usage is often linked to different life events like moving, getting married or having kids.  Each of these generates a need to contact new busineses in your area.  I think think its a great idea that a directory attempt to connect with these life events that generated so much value for advertisers.

Overall I don’t think there is clear value for advertisers in the light edition.  I’m not sure that a smaller former factor will really generate enough additional usage to justify the addition expense of advertising in both the full directory and light edition.

Disclosure:  Yellow Pages Group purchased Trader Media Corporation in 2006 and I was an employee of Trader Corporation from 2006 to 2007 which was owned by Yellow Pages Group.  I still own stock in Yellow Pages Group as a result.

We were less excited about the process to place ads. The process started with a fairly intimidating form that required all the ad information on single page and started with the contact name, business name and phone numbers. The page layout was also clutter with a lot of text and information for call center.

Overall a great improvement though and its great to see a local newspaper investing in the classified site and technology. We feel that creating local brand loyalty is a great way to defend against free online classified sites which are entering the market.

The ad creation process appears to be more involved that other sites like Kijiji or Craigslist but ad does carry more information than these services. The site also features several anti-fraud services to help prevent fraudulent ads from making it on the site. Currently the site has very little content in most major markets. It will be interesting to see what marketing services the site uses as it tried to gain content.

Probably the biggest challenge for the site will be differentiating against free. There are a number of other free classified sites and it will be hard for the site to get users to post their content. To grow paid classifieds the process normally involves discounting to build up content, to attract users so that the value of the classified increases. With a free site this is very little incentive to post into a fairly deserted site…

Roy Wood, the sites President and Founder, appears to be active blogger so we expect blogging and social media to be a strong point of impact for the sites marketing efforts. The company is located in Songtan, South Korea so it will be difficult for it market directly in more popular markets like the USA.

The SuperCarDirect.com model is surprising in that it gives up the dealer revenue in the hope of getting revenue from banner ads and axillary advertising on the site.  The site intends to focus on advertising from racing teams, tracks and events across the USA.  There was no mention of the automotive manufactures or automotive service businesses as advertising targets but these would appear to be more likely advertising targets.

A quick search of the site did not reveal many ads and this may be a result of no partnerships with automotive capture services.  Across the USA, most dealers third-party capture services to capture their vehicle inventory and put the information and photos into advertising.   This is normally done in combination with state regulared window sticker creation and data capture.   Most of these services charge the advertising site for each vehicle listing so it will be interesting to see how SuperCarDirect.com can partner with them using a purely free model.

The site will feature additional social interaction capabilities shortly with the ability to discussion local real estate markets and other connections from MediaCorp partner sites. Mocca has secured commitments from several local real estate companies, including Global Real Estate, ERA Singapore and HSR Property Group.

MediaCorp is committed to growing the site to 50-60M page views over the next 2 years with full advertising support from its radio, print and television partners. The site has also launched with celebrity auctions from its popular media partners which proceedings going to local charities.

CozyBug.com

The Swap Spots are an interesting innovation. For years one of the challenges in the classified industry is handling and moving larger items like appliances and furniture. By creating an additional aide to support this system Cozybug should be able to drive additional value for both the classified advertiser and buyer.

Like most new classified sites, basic advertising is free with small charges for additional details like more photos. The site also features rich content for the classified ads and includes a mapping feature for garage sales. Cozybug hopes the rich media will help differentiate it from competitive sites.