Saturday, July 11, 2009

Q&A: MSN chief Jorgensen on future of Microsoft's Web portal

Microsoft’s Erik Jorgensen is corporate vice president for MSN, overseeing one of the largest online portals at a time when Facebook, Twitter and other social networks are competing aggressively for the time and attention of internet users. Jorgensen, also MSN’s chief media and technology officer, discussed the company’s current strategy for MSN — and plans for its future — in a recent interview.

On MSN’s partnerships, such as its arrangement with BermanBraun Interactive on the “Wonderwall” celebrity site: One of the things we’ve learned is that having a different user interface for different topics, different content, is important. It can’t just be one. There’s certainly a role for templates and for getting more standardized as people traverse different categories, but you have to understand which categories fit with which templates... Partnerships work for us. We’re not going to be the creative minds behind all great media. In each market, we’ve got to reach out and have the kind of strong partnerships that allow us to create the kind of content experience that Wonderwall is.

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