KoreaCrunch

Dion Hinchcliffe got NHN’s search service, Naver.com example of Creating real business value with Web 2.0 on his ZDNet blog.

…Companies using Web 2.0-style techniques for business advantage: NHN’s Naver Search Engine. Never heard of Naver? You’re not alone unless you live in Korea. But the big secret is that Naver is annihilating Google there. Korea also happens to have the highest rate Internet use of any country in the world. More importantly, not only is NHN using Web 2.0 techniques like gathering collective intelligence and social collaboration to achieve market domination, but they sold over $228 million in online ads on their service last year, making their stock go through the roof in recent months. These are impressive results and note that much of this is revenue they’ve directly outcompeted Google for, one of the most successful Internet businesses in history who has also had a significant presence in Korea since 2001.

Dion’s thought is partially right. Naver’s search is very strong, their accumulated data are over korean web pages both in quality and in quantity. But, there are many similar services in other portal sites. So vast similar data is locked in each portal system. Korean web sites need to be opened in view of web 2.0. Anyway it’s very successful Naver’s search keyword business model. Naver already started this business in Korea before entry of Overture and Google.