Co-branding free access provider Spinway,
Inc. joined the ranks of the 4 million member club Monday.
In just seven months Spinway landed deals to provide free Internet services
to hihg-profile advertisers including Kmart’s BlueLight.com, Ace Hardware’s OurHouse.com, and Spiegel Catalog, Inc., among others.
In doing so, Spinway set the pace to add more than 25,000 new consumers to
its advertising network each day.
Steve Seabolt, Spinway chairman and chief executive officer, said Spinway
is the fastest growing ISP around.
“The fact that we are the fastest growing free ISP, coupled with our very
unique advertising solution, puts us in a strong position to attract
additional advertisers to our network,” Seabolt said.
Spinway’s free service is built on revenues from advertisers seeking to
develop online advertising resources. Its ad technology transports full
motion video, rather than streaming graphics, at modem speeds as low as
14.4 kilobits per second. Spinway’s ads are sent directly to the consumer’s
desktop during a user’s down time, when they are reading Web content or e-mail.
Seabolt said that Spinway’s ad delivery methods do not choke its network to
deliver sub-standard connectivity.
“Our extensive advertising network and proprietary technology enables
advertisers to reach millions of targeted consumers with entertaining, rich
media TV-type commercials with no impact on system performance or sacrifice
of privacy,” Seabolt said.
To protect the privacy of its users, Spinway only provides advertisers
information in aggregate form, so personal information is never sold or
revealed to sponsors.
Daryl Schoolar, Cahners In-Stat Group
analyst for ISP strategies said Spinway does not sacrifice consumer privacy
or access rates to deliver its free Internet services.
“Spinway offers its consumers top-of-the-line free ISP access with 24-hour
customer service and delivery of advertising in a non-obtrusive manner,”
Schoolar said.
Schoolar added that he considered Spinway to be one of the dominant players
in the free ISP market.
Rival free service provider Net Zero,
Inc. topped the 4 million subscriber mark late in June.
Analysts estimate that 40 to 50 percent of its subscribers actually connect
to the Internet each month. Charles Katz, 1stUp.com chief executive said that its
3.5 million users trend with the industry average indicating that less than
half of a free ISP’s subscribers actually log-on each month.
Spinway counts active subscribers as users that are online through its
network for 15-minutes or more each month. A spokesperson confirmed that
the last time Spinway reported active data it posted about 42 percent
actual subscriber usage.
Plugging in Spinway’s 4 million subscriber milestone with past user
activity, it’s estimated that Spinway currently provides free Internet
access to about 1.7 million users each month.
Additionally, Spinway indicated that Blulight.com continues to be very
popular with first-time Internet users. The advertising partner said that
almost 40 percent of its subscribers are fist-time users.
