:: INDIA EMPIRE - EDITOR'S DESK ::

EMPIRE CONSULTANCY

From the Editor's Desk

June 2006

Best Regards

Sayantan Chakravarty
Editor

Most of you will recall that in the first couple of years of the 21st century the dotcom boom was the most talked about story in newspapers and magazines across the world. Then, in the next two years, the storylines turned turtle, they were mostly about the great bust, and how millions of dollars of venture capital funding in dotcoms were losing their way in the untenanted cyber highways of the internet. That was the period when news dotcoms that had hired huge staff at unrealistically high salaries rapidly closed, B2B sites that had promised much were unable to develop workable business models, and downed shutters. The bust story was repeated everywhere, too many players had overestimated the size of the market, and were blown away.

In the dotcom ocean, the ones that could really develop and sustain themselves generated great content. Most of the survivors actually moved from strength to strength after bravely withstanding the storm that was sinking others around them.

Our cover story talks about two Indian websites with a global presence—naukri.com and makemytrip.com. One of the ways of looking their success is to see how well and how often they advertise on high-viewership television shows—international cricket matches involving India, for instance. On match days spot rates can hit the roof, but both Naukri and Makemytrip have been able to consistently advertise themselves over the past one year. You'll also find naukri and makemytrip banners on top websites, widely circulated magazines, prime locations such as airports. Naukri has about 5.9 million registered users, and is streets ahead of other job sites in India with 120 million page views a month. Makemytrip gets about 750,000 unique visitors every month, that's really good for a travel portal. Both are growing rapidly, their content is strong, customer service good, and both have heavy traffic from outside India. Both were founded by IIM-Ahmedabad graduates who gave up corporate jobs and decided to walk the streets less walked. Their story has been pieced together by our consulting editor Rakesh K Simha, currently camping in New Zealand.

In keeping with our promise, we continue to cover NRI events, this time at London. Our investment section also looks strong and the columns read well. Hope you read well too.

www.indiaempire.com

Editor
Sayantan Chakravarty

Consulting Editors
Sanjay Sharma
Rajeev Sharma
Rakesh K. Simha
Gopal Misra
Anu Biswas

Contributing Editors
Vatsala Kaul, Dinesh Raheja (all India), Srikanth Beldona, Sagoree Chatterjee, Dharminder Diwan, Arnelle Hartenstein (all US), Rajesh Kumar (New Zealand), Ramesh Mathew (Qatar), Shuchi Sinha (Switzerland), Indrani Talukdar

Media Research
Ummul Saba

ART & DESIGN
Debashish Dutta (Creative Director)
Jaydev Bisht (Senior Graphic Designer)

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