I am absolutely delighted to advise that we have now appointed two more directors to our board.
They are:
a. Mr Robert van Zwieten, former CFO of the Singapore Exchange. Robert brings with him vast experience at large corporations such as GE, ABN AMRO and Lehman Brothers. He holds law degrees from Leiden University and Columbia, and an MBA from Chicago GSB.
b. Mr Tom Navasero, Chairman, Glocal Media Networks. As a former VP of Intelsat, Tom brings with him a world of knowledge and experience in content creation, as well as a vast network of syndication channels. He counts Stanford and Cornell as distinguished educational institutions where he studied.
Both our new directors will be tremendous assets to the company, and their presence on the board is a strong endorsement of the value and potential of Hong Bao Media and our investor news service Investor Central.
I am also extremely pleased to announce the appointment of Ms Shareena Hatta as General Manager Malaysia. Based in KL, Shareena is overseeing content creation for the Malaysian market, as well as syndication of Investor Central and branded content. She has held positions at CIMB Private Banking and State Street, as well as NatSeven and Red FM. Shareena holds an MBA from Hult International Business School.
Please feel free to drop me a line, if you have any questions or comments on our latest appointments.
Best regards
Mark Laudi
Managing Director
Hong Bao Media (Holdings) Pte Ltd
mark.laudi@hongbaomedia.com
Friday 5 September 2008
Thursday 4 September 2008
Investor Central Malaysia launched
I'm pleased to advise Investor Central has been successfully launched in Malaysia, focusing on Bursa Malaysia-listed stocks.
Our program is being carried by DiGi’s and Maxis’ mobile TV channels, as part of their existing news channels. This is excellent exposure for us, because we are able to tap into the existing viewing audience.
The program is updated marketdaily.
Subscribers pay a flat monthly fee per channel or bundle of channels. But they do not pay datacharges.
We are producing fresh BottomFishing and SecondOpinion reports on Malaysian stocks, which allow retail investors to get access to investment opportunities without all the jargon or one-sided analysts’ opinions.
These content items will also be available individually to our subscribers of our soon-to-be-launched Malaysia-specific website http://my.investorcentral.org.
Our focus has been on-demand content for some time, where the viewer has control over what s/he watches and when.
But news is a double-sided coin: many people go in search of specific information. They want to zero in very quickly to the content they are interested in. But many others are news browsers, who want to “discover” what is currently making the news.
By producing both a linear program and on-demand, viewers have a choice. I’m eagerly awaiting the first viewership stats, so we can see which option viewers are more likely to take.
After more than two years since I left CNBC, it’s been an interesting experience to get back into producing and presenting a linear program. All the rigidities of a program, and the question which is never answered until the show is over of “what’s next?”.
Please contact me for a sample program.
Best regards
Mark Laudi
Managing Director
Hong Bao Media (Holdings) Pte Ltd
mark.laudi@hongbaomedia.com
Our program is being carried by DiGi’s and Maxis’ mobile TV channels, as part of their existing news channels. This is excellent exposure for us, because we are able to tap into the existing viewing audience.
The program is updated marketdaily.
Subscribers pay a flat monthly fee per channel or bundle of channels. But they do not pay datacharges.
We are producing fresh BottomFishing and SecondOpinion reports on Malaysian stocks, which allow retail investors to get access to investment opportunities without all the jargon or one-sided analysts’ opinions.
These content items will also be available individually to our subscribers of our soon-to-be-launched Malaysia-specific website http://my.investorcentral.org.
Our focus has been on-demand content for some time, where the viewer has control over what s/he watches and when.
But news is a double-sided coin: many people go in search of specific information. They want to zero in very quickly to the content they are interested in. But many others are news browsers, who want to “discover” what is currently making the news.
By producing both a linear program and on-demand, viewers have a choice. I’m eagerly awaiting the first viewership stats, so we can see which option viewers are more likely to take.
After more than two years since I left CNBC, it’s been an interesting experience to get back into producing and presenting a linear program. All the rigidities of a program, and the question which is never answered until the show is over of “what’s next?”.
Please contact me for a sample program.
Best regards
Mark Laudi
Managing Director
Hong Bao Media (Holdings) Pte Ltd
mark.laudi@hongbaomedia.com
Wednesday 3 September 2008
Lessons learnt from Neptune Orient Lines interview
We learnt three important lessons from a recent engagement to produce a television interview for Neptune Orient Lines, for internal consumption. Addressing critical issues for staff, CEO Ron Widdows spoke with me on camera in an interview just as I would have done it on CNBC.
First lesson: The questions weren’t scripted. Our guest was clearly prepared with the key messages he wanted to communicate. That’s his job. But he did so in a candid, authentic and sincere manner. It’s a credit to CEO Widdows and the corporate communications team that they didn’t stage-manage the interview.
I preach to whoever is willing to listen: if you want your audience to believe you, drop any hyped motivational speeches and cut to the chase. Internal audiences generally are quite cynical about edicts from the top. So, you have to be real. As Carly Fiorina likes to say, “people watch the walk, they don’t listen to the talk”.
Second lesson: segment, segment, segment. When it comes to online videos, attention spans are far shorter than on television. We digested the 27-minute interview into three 6-minute segments. I was fearful this would still be too long, but CEO Widdows spoke well, so as a viewer you didn’t really notice the time pass. He held the viewers’ attention well.
Third lesson: push for feedback ...correctly. One of the lessons of radio talkback is that in order to get listeners to call, you have to give them a provocative, closed question. Don’t just say “call to give us your views”, because the immediate unspoken response is, “why should I?!”
At the end of each segmented interview I delivered a short piece to camera to encourage viewers to provide their feedback. The questions I asked were, first, “was this interview of value to you?”, and second “would you like to see more such interviews”?
The IT team, in conjunction with the corporate communications specialists, ensured a link to a survey was close by the video screen.
Result: They received hundreds of comments from staff, which were hugely positive.
Needless to say we look forward to continuing to work with NOL.
Separately, we have a couple of other clients and projects in the pipeline, which I will update you on later this month.
Please feel free to drop me a line, if you have any questions on any of these.
Best regards
Mark Laudi
Managing Director
Hong Bao Media (Holdings) Pte Ltd
mark.laudi@hongbaomedia.com
First lesson: The questions weren’t scripted. Our guest was clearly prepared with the key messages he wanted to communicate. That’s his job. But he did so in a candid, authentic and sincere manner. It’s a credit to CEO Widdows and the corporate communications team that they didn’t stage-manage the interview.
I preach to whoever is willing to listen: if you want your audience to believe you, drop any hyped motivational speeches and cut to the chase. Internal audiences generally are quite cynical about edicts from the top. So, you have to be real. As Carly Fiorina likes to say, “people watch the walk, they don’t listen to the talk”.
Second lesson: segment, segment, segment. When it comes to online videos, attention spans are far shorter than on television. We digested the 27-minute interview into three 6-minute segments. I was fearful this would still be too long, but CEO Widdows spoke well, so as a viewer you didn’t really notice the time pass. He held the viewers’ attention well.
Third lesson: push for feedback ...correctly. One of the lessons of radio talkback is that in order to get listeners to call, you have to give them a provocative, closed question. Don’t just say “call to give us your views”, because the immediate unspoken response is, “why should I?!”
At the end of each segmented interview I delivered a short piece to camera to encourage viewers to provide their feedback. The questions I asked were, first, “was this interview of value to you?”, and second “would you like to see more such interviews”?
The IT team, in conjunction with the corporate communications specialists, ensured a link to a survey was close by the video screen.
Result: They received hundreds of comments from staff, which were hugely positive.
Needless to say we look forward to continuing to work with NOL.
Separately, we have a couple of other clients and projects in the pipeline, which I will update you on later this month.
Please feel free to drop me a line, if you have any questions on any of these.
Best regards
Mark Laudi
Managing Director
Hong Bao Media (Holdings) Pte Ltd
mark.laudi@hongbaomedia.com
