Howzit MSN relaunches with more local content

South Africa’s alleged most visited homepage, Howzit MSN, has relaunched with more local content, some additional unique channels and social networking convergence.

Howzit MSN, operated by Kagiso Media since July last year, was named SA’s biggest homepage by AC Nielsen just days before the relaunch.

Howzit MSN senior editor Justin Zehmke, says: “We are re-creating the entire portal and increasing the online content relevant to SA.

South Africans want local content – this was proven late last year when we added a significant number of channels to the portal and saw a related increase in visits.”

The unique channels include Zalebs, a gossip channel devoted to SA stars and music talent, an online shopping channel, a sports and an Afrikaans channel.

In the six months to June 2010, the homepage saw an average of 21-million page views per month, and this leapt to 26 million by September. The January stats reveal an average of 29-million page views.

“We appointed a local editorial team and have both improved and increased this content. In addition, we’ve given it a better look and feel; accompanied by immediate access to Facebook, messenger and Twitter on the same page. We are sure traffic will increase and make this the one-stop portal for South Africans.”

According to Digitalmark’s Ian Drummond: “The web is full of content, ads and talk. That’s a good thing. But it can be hard for people and advertisers to find focus and stand out. That is about to change. With the new howzit.msn homepage you can place your brand in the one place that brings everything together. Offering simple navigation, enriched content and focused advertising that keeps MSN users within constant reach of the advertisers message.”

Zehmke says this is a part of MSN’s global strategy to modernise and update its landing pages across more than 50 global sites