Costa Mesa’s Synge Teams With Lycos Inc.
A deal to be announced today between an 8-month-old Costa Mesa online magazine, Synge, and the Internet search engine company Lycos Inc. brings together two key elements for success on the Web: packaging and reach.
In the nonexclusive deal, Lycos and Synge, launched in December, will share banner advertising revenue generated on the co-branded site. Lycos gets “saucy, fun and informative” content at no cost, while the fledgling Synge gets some brand-building.
Synge has 15 employees, six of them developing the editorial content. The company hopes to expand to 30 editorial employees by the end of the year and develop an electronic commerce area on the site, said Garry Wang, chief executive of Synge.
“The first phase of Synge.com is to build a content backbone and establish the tone and style,” Wang said. “The next step is to create a site that goes beyond the content.”
Perhaps, I’m just out of touch with the 18- to 30-year-old crowd that Synge.com says it’s targeting, but I just didn’t connect with the webzine’s current lead story on how to “cultivate that player persona and be the ultimate playboy or playgirl that you know you secretly long to be.”
(OK, so at 31 years old, maybe I’m jaded and set in my ways, but that’s between me and my therapist.)
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