An mtogo user downloads content from the site to his cellphone.
GS: What is the most difficult aspect of your business?
MT: The most difficult aspect of the digital content business, is keeping up with changing demands in tastes and technology. For example, the top ringtone titles across all the different markets change at an extraordinary pace. In order to have all the latest ringtones in a timely fashion, mtogo must first ensure that we properly identify, obtain licensing and efficiently produce them to effectively deliver them to our customers. We must also constantly be aware of changing mobile content trends, new handset models and innovative content delivery technologies.
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GS: What's the best part of your business?
MT: The best part of the business is seeing the growth potential in this industry. We view ringtones, graphics, pictures, etc. as just a stepping stone to something much larger. Digital content in the United States will very shortly begin to develop more functionality and features. This new content via a user's cellphone, will allow people to purchase goods at stores, buy items through a vending machines, receive coupons, perform on-line banking, and even facilitate matchmaking (i.e. using GPS technology, when two users with the requested profile are within a certain vicinity, their cellphones will alert them).
GS: What do you offer that competitors don't?
MT: Mtogo offers a wide array of ringtones (American, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, etc.). Our competitors usually just offer one genre of ringtones. In addition, mtogo offers an entire suite of mobile-related features, such as mPhotos, which allows our users to edit and send pictures from their PCs straight to their mobile phones. Through our website, our users can also send ringtones, graphics, greeting cards, and pictures to their friends. Finally, mtogo very shortly will be introducing mBlogs, which will allow users to customize their blog page, and also upload pictures taken with their mobile phone directly to their personal blog page. Other websites have blogs, but do not have the picture functionality. Basically, our mBlog allows users to capture moments of their lives in both pictures and words.
GS: Break down the ringtones on your site by type (Chinese, Japanese,
etc)?
MT: We currently have over 1,300 ringtones. The breakdown is as follows: 20% American, 40% Korean, 35% Chinese, 5% Others. In addition, we are increasing our ringtone content by approximately 200 a month.
GS: How much are your ringtones?
MT: First of all, on our website the currency we use is mChips. The price of one ringtone is 6 mChips. The cost per mChip varies depending on how many mChips you purchase initially. For example, if you buy $5 worth of mChips, you will receive 20 mChips, however, if you buy $20 worth of mChips, you will receive 116 mChips. This being said, the price of one ringtone ranges from $1.02 to $1.50.
GS: How many customers download from mtogo.com each month?
MT: We have only recently launched, so we have not collected enough data yet.
GS: How do you get traffic to mtogo.com?
MT: Well, traffic to our site comes in two forms
Off-Line: retail stores (bookstores, tea/coffee shops, cellphone stores,
etc.) that carry our marketing collateral (posters, fliers, gift cards,
prepaid cards), newspaper articles (Korean, Chinese, English), newspaper
advertisements, magazines, etc.
GS: What are your goals for the next year?Ê Next 5 years?
MT: Our goal for the next year is to continue to develop our content and offer new products and services. At the same time, we must continue to seek out and develop new key partners. By doing this, we will expand our user base. Over the next five years, we see mtogo expanding into more commerce and community functionality. Ideally, we would like to be the first or at least one of the first to offer our members the new digital capability mentioned previously.
