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How to Start a Korean Advertising Campaign on Naver

I still can distinctly recall the first Naver TV commercial back in 2003.Three things from the ad stuck in my mind: then rising-star Jeon Ji-hyun’s good looking face, the all green background of the ad (green turned out to be Naver’s representative color), and the word Naver. With that single commercial, Naver turned from nobody to somebody in the search engine market in Korea and took the top spot from Daum in terms of market share not long after. It was the TV commercial that helped raise awareness of Naver, but what’s behind Naver’s success are its user-friendly search system and advanced technology. In fact, Naver recorded 80% market share in 2013 amongst other internet search engines, according to BizSpring, a web analysis firm based in South Korea.

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(Source: BizSpring)

Online Ad market in South Korea

According to Korean Click, an internet market research firm, Naver accounts for 72.3% of PC-based search ads and 73.9% of mobile based search ads, followed by Daum, Google, and Nate. More recently, foreign brands are expanding their market share through website localization and usage of Naver to publicize their products in the Korean market. Korea’s online ad market is measured to about $2,260,000,000 (Korean Digital Media & Marketing Intelligence Center) as of 2013 and the market size is expanding year after year.

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(Source: BizSpring, KoreanClick and Naver Online Ad)

Types of Search Ad products on Naver

Naver has four Search Ad products: ‘Click Choice’, ‘Brand Search’, ‘Mobile Banner’, and ‘Click Choice Plus’. In this blog post on ‘How to start Advertising campaign on Naver’, we’ll explore the very basic yet effective ‘Click Choice’.

Understanding Click Choice & Naver

Click Choice is based on Pay-per-click (PPC). Exposing a website on the search portal is free of charge but advertisers pay when the advertising website is clicked, based on the number of clicks. Naver Click Choice is different from Google AdWords in that Naver leverages its diverse platforms including Naver Blogs, Naver Cafes, Knowledge In, etc.

For more information on best practices for PPC, you may wish to review our previous blog: Best Practices for International PPC Campaigns.

Various networks where Click Choice exposes advertising websites
Search Network:

Power Link, Biz Shopping, Naver Unified Search

Naver Advertising

*Power Link and Biz Shopping will appear at the very top and the bottom of a search result page.

Contents Network:

Blogs, Knowledge iN, Contents partner, News

Naver PPC

*For any blog posts or Knowledge iN Q&A pages, a website of high relativity will be advertised at the very bottom of page. Among the contents partners are popular online shopping malls in Korea, such as Auction, G-Market and Lotte Mall.

Mobile Network:

Naver mobile page, Mobile partner page

mobile network

*A contact number will additionally appear on the mobile network. Bidding price is fixed at $0.7 and a website of high relativity will randomly appear in the ad section.

How to register Click Choice

Here are the six steps to follow to register on Click Choice and this blog will cover the first steps to select a product and website:

  1. Select a product/website
  2. Set a group strategy
  3. Select a keyword
  4. Enter bidding price
  5. Enter advertising message
  6. Confirm registered content

1-1. After logging into your advertiser account, go to Click Choice and click [광고등록]

Naver step1-1

Click Choice Registration1‑1

1-2. Add a website by entering its name and website address. Register any required documents and choose business category. For exposure on mobile networks, please enter business location and contact number.

Naver step1-2

Click Choice Registration 1-2

Summary

Naver is a leading search engine in South Korea, which handles 80% of all web searches in the country. If you set out to expand your market and promote your products in South Korea, Naver Ad campaigns will help spread the word.