It is at this time of year when I am taking my vacation that I can sit back and reflect on the past year. This past 12 months for SinoTech Group has been our most exciting (in our short history) when thinking about where we started the year and where we finished it.

In terms of achievements, I am proud that we have attracted some of the brightest digital marketers in China. I know there will be some smiles from Lonnie and David as they too also think they have the ‘best and brightest’… but I really do see the talanted team we have. I talk about passion and ‘fire in the eyes’… when we hire and I have got just that … A CEO could not have a better motivated team… Much thanks to the exec’s at SinoTech that keep this all going. I guess the challenges for 2009 will be to continue to grow the middle management skills as we grow the number of staff… This level of leadership in my view is generally lacking in China.

If I think what was the most challenging projects we worked with in 2008, I guess it would come down to two; Zenith Optimedia who uses our Media Planning & Reporting platform and Sensis, who we did a complex digital consulting project. The challengers where different in each case; Zenith was tough given the timeframes of taking our media planning being used in China and deploying it throughout Zenith Optimedia in 13 countries. Sensis, was challenging because we were doing detailed financial modeling on a number of web sites and exploring new ways of increasing revenue - all this in a very short space of time.

The most rewarding partners to work with have been the folks at Publicitas and DMS. These are both highly professional organizations run by Moritz and Grant respectively.  All dealing with these companies have been done in a spirt of co-operation… Thanks guys.

So what did we learn from 2008? What has been the experiences for SinoTech Group?

Publishers:

1. Yet to embrace new ad revenue models (however some bright starts trying new approaches). Almost all still use a cost per day model (CPD)

2. Mostly resisting the move towards standard ad unit sizes (such as IAB)

3. The move towards using site analytics (mostly internally) but some now providing more metrics to agencies and advertisers

4. Pressure on vertical sites/shoulder properties to attract advertisers and increase sell through rates…. Tier one properties are holding steady or growing.

Advertisers/Agencies:

1. The trend for Media Agencies to do search, social and creative & Creative Agencies to move into doing search and social….. becoming harder to differientiate.

2. Consolidation brings oportunity

3. Global down turn brings opportunities- and pain

4. Global down turn also offers an out for many Brands looking to refocus and make change.

Final Thoughts… 2008 was a great year for SinoTech Group. We made some great progress commercially, had a lot of fun doing it and have the team to make 2009 even better.

Thanks for all the suporters of SinoTech Group….

Cheers and hope you have a great New Year!

Matt