Worldoo.com: Not kidding with connections

The three-month-old platform for children has tied up with television channels. It is looking at monetisation in the coming three months and is in talks with brands for brand integration.

Worldoo.com, an online ecosystem for children from Focus Kids Communication, is three-months-old now and has already tied up with the biggies in the children's television space including Cartoon Network and ZeeQ.

The company has also tied up with other companies/brands that cater to similar audiences, that is, children in the 6-12-year age bracket.

According to the company, Worldoo.com has attracted over 26,000 children and has got around 1.13 lakh unique visitors and over 2.5 million page views till now.

As of now, the company is not looking at monetising the site. Though it has partnered with companies like Shemaroo, Sentosa, Amar Chitra Katha and Crossword, it does not charge any fee. There is also free reading material on the site, which can help kids improve their knowledge.

Harsh Wardhan Dave, head, experience and brand, Worldoo.com, says, "We launched in mid-April and as a brand policy, we didn't want to clutter the site with banners and ads. There was a single thought behind this and it was that Worldoo.com was something where parents could trust their kids to go."

Dave tells afaqs! that advertising will happen in the next three to four months but on an integration level, "there will not be banners hampering the user experience."

The company is in talks with brands and banking, finance and insurance categories have shown interest in advertising on the website. However, advertisements will be in the form of brand integration. "We are speaking to brands and creative stuffs are happening at the back end," Dave adds.

The initial investment in launching the website is pegged at Rs 1.8-2 crore. Designing of the website (user experience and user interface) was done by Dubai-based Red Blue Blur Ideas (RBBi).

"Though the focus right now is to grow the website and the number of users, we will be able to break even in three years," Dave mentions.

Worldoo.com has run two rounds of television campaigns on children's channels like Cartoon Network and Pogo.

On the on-ground space, it has carried out activities like Worldoo safaris, where the team goes to societies and interacts with children. The company believes that it gives it real time feedback about the site. Although it is on the verge of closing ad deals with a few brands, the company claims it does not want to be heavy on advertising.

Talking about the content structure of the website, Rahool Talukdar, head, experience and design at Worldoo, says, "Content structure is that 80 per cent is from partnerships and 20 per cent is from our own IPs like jokes and news. We are soon launching DIY landmark that will talk to kids about the idea of art and science and it's a myth that science is difficult. We are responsible people and are looking at inculcating a philosophy that with your ideas you can create anything from anything around."

The company has got the mastermind behind shows like Pogo's MAD and ZeeQ's Tennovations to help the website. "We believe that more and more people should look at Worldoo.com as a single point source in terms of information, knowledge and excitement. What is missing from our platform right now is sports and we are looking at doing something on that front by creating our IPs. Then, we also do events which are big. A lot of people say that kids don't read or write. We did a simple story writing event on Worldoo that has got 4000-5000 page views and 5000-6000 children volunteered to write their own stories," Talukdar adds.

Talukdar says that the company strictly wants to be on the digital space. Having said that, it also plans to expand to other platforms such as mobiles and tablets.

Worldoo.com has recently tied up with CRY (Child Rights and You) wherein children can donate to fellow kids in need. This is Worldoo's first social initiative where citizens (users of the site) can 'gift' Stars (Worldoo currency) from the earnings they make by browsing Worldoo to less privileged children. Based on the number of stars accumulated on 'Gift a Tara', as it's called on the platform, Worldoo.com will donate Rs 1 lakh to CRY for the empowerment of underprivileged children. In the first phase of the initiative, Worldoo aims to hit a mark of 5 lakh stars.

It is pertinent to note here that the money being given through this activity is funded by Worldoo's parent group, advertising and digital media agency Focus.

For the record, other websites in the virtual world space are TheSecondLife (global) and Godrej's GoJiyo.com (Indian).