Microsoft is bringing the fight to former joint venture partner Nine Entertainment Co as it launches MSN.com.au today. That will see redirect traffic to Ninemsn drop by a third. But there's a twist. Nine will handle the MSN sales.
Microsoft is talking a big game. The newly launched MSN platform will go head-to-head with existing Ninemsn platform and is eyeing up its audience. Traffic that previously redirected to Ninemsn from Microsoft products like Hotmail (or outlook.com as it's now known) and Outlook, will now divert to Microsoft’s own platform. The resulting 35% drop in traffic was outlined as a risk in the NEC prospectus last year and again by CEO David Gyngell in May this year. As of today, with the MSN launch, that risk has materialised.
Microsoft's director of advertising and online division Tony Wilkinson confirmed that the new site would be taking about two million eyeballs away from ninemsn.
"It’s hard to be precise, but we expect about a third of the audience which is on ninemsn to move over to MSN and the other two-thirds will stay with the existing ninemsn," he told AdNews ahead of the launch of MSN.com.au.
While msn.com.au would benefit from re-directs from Microsoft products such as outlook.com, he added that the full suite of Microsoft products had not been tapped yet. Microsoft is also talking about reaching 4 million additional users within its own channels such as Skype.
“To start with we have a great audience that have been using Microsoft for a number of years, and they'll be the first ones using MSN,” Wilkinson said.
“But we also have a number of other products where people aren't using MSN such as Outlook and Skype, which have four million Australians using those services.
“Once we've established the product, we'll start looking at promoting it beyond out own network.”
It's pitching itself as a personalised news portal, which will package up content from more than 1,000 different sources around the world and present it to users after being filtered through a newsroom of 20 locally-based journalists/curators.
Users will be able to curate their own news feeds, with preferences saved across devices.
The site will also integrate access to Facebook, Skype, Twitter, Onenote and OneDrive, and Wilkinson said this was part of what differentiated the offering from other news aggregators.
“I think the big difference here is that it's not just an algorithmic offering. There are sites around the place that offer that, or they just aggregate content without putting an editorial view over the top of that,” he said.
“We're also offering a news portal across multiple devices rather than just being a news aggregation site. We think it will be a one-stop shop for a lot of people to access a suite of Microsoft products they use everyday.”
But despite the talk of taking a chunk of Nine's online audience, MSN.com.au will be sold by Nine.
Wilkinson said that reaches a combined audience of 14 million Microsoft IDs per month.
“That means we have a great base for targeting. We can deliver great targeting at huge scale in the Australian marketplace,” he said.
Wilkinson touted native advertising packages for advertisers as part of its news aggregation proposition.
“One of the great things about our platform is that it's designed to take content from thousands of different companies, and one of those companies could be an advertiser,” he said.
“So it's possible to take content from the advertiser and integrate that into the environment whether it is standalone or a branded experience.”
Nine Entertainment sales and marketing boss Peter Wiltshire played down the potential impact on Nine's own traffic. While the redirects will hit traffic, Wiltshire said it was "good that consumers get a choice". He pointed out that MSN would be "competing with everybody" not just Nine Entertainment Co and that Australians have a strong affinity with localised content. "They will vote for what they want [from a content perspective]. We get to bring both products to advertisers in Australia."
Sign up to the AdNews newsletter, like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter for breaking stories and campaigns throughout the day. Need a job? Visit adnewsjobs.com.au.
Have something to say? Send us your comments using the form below or contact the writer at jamesmcgrath@yaffa.com.au.
Have something to say on this? Share your views in the comments section below. Or if you have a news story or tip-off, drop us a line at adnews@yaffa.com.au
Sign up to the AdNews newsletter, like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter for breaking stories and campaigns throughout the day.