August 02, 1999 09:31
MBT International Announces $3 Million Branding
and Advertising Campaign, Major Site Remodeling
Initiative
CASTLE ROCK, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 2, 1999--MBT International (OTC BB:MBTI), owner of the premier Internet web sites focused on E-commerce and auctions for the agricultural, farm equipment and horse industries, today announced a $3 million branding and advertising campaign for
its www.agrimall.com site.
The sweeping campaign will be launched on August 15, 1999, and will incorporate innovative advertising approaches that will brand the AgriMall.com name to all major contributors in the $300 billion agricultural market.
Commenting on the campaign, Andy McKinnon, chairman and CEO of MBTI stated, "We will blanket the agricultural industry. Our success for this initiative will be measured in the millions of anticipated hits, site visits and banner ad
impressions we receive.
"Our advertising dollars stretch exponentially further than most Internet businesses in that we only have to target our specific rural audience of sixteen to eighteen million instead of the entire web community.
"By the end of this campaign, every major player in the North American agricultural industry will know our name. We fully expect to solidify our position as the undisputed leader in this vast, virtually untapped electronic
marketplace."
The media blitz, valued at approximately $3 million, will include a mix of traditional print, radio and television messages, plus exciting cutting-edge Internet advertising solutions. This effort will include key registrations with
leading search engines in the Internet community.
The company also announced that the AgriMall.com site is undergoing extensive remodeling along with MBTI's other sites in order to drive significantly more traffic through these portals.
Mr. McKinnon continued, "We are finalizing strategic alliances with the top names in the Internet community to assist us in this endeavor. We anticipate a heavy flow of additional traffic and business, and see the need for a truly state of the art web site featuring the dynamic, graphic-intense functionality found at other leading Internet sites."
MBT International Inc. is engaged in the development of industry specific Internet portal sites, which encompass auctions, broker-assisted buy and sell programs, searchable databases and graphic-intense display of products.
The company currently has over 400,000 users and is the parent company of AgriMall.com (www.agrimall.com), Horsenet.com (www.horsenet.com), BookStable.com (www.bookstable.com), and the recently launched
LifeatHome.com (www.lifeathome.com), a similar vertical portal targeted at the trillion dollar home improvement and real estate markets, as well as its latest
acquisition of IMall Global and its properties (www.equestrianmall.com), (www.horsechat.com), (www.equiseek.com), and (www.equiauction.com).
MBT International, Inc. has an agreement to work with EchoStar Communications Corp. (Nasdaq:DISH, DISHP), the nation's fastest growing direct broadcast satellite (DBS) provider with over 2.6 million customers, whereby MBTI programming and online purchasing capabilities will be offered over a high speed interactive channel.
In addition, the company has signed agreements with the following: Triplus, a Trimac Company (TSE:TMA)(MSE:TMA), to handle the freight component of the sales transactions; Texas Equipment (OTC BB:TEXQ) which is in the process of establishing a large storefront featuring John Deere equipment in AgriMall.com; and Silicon Graphics, Inc. (NYSE:SGI) for technological development.
MBT International Inc. is presently viewing possible strategic alliances with other companies in the communications industry.
For additional information on MBTI, please visit the company on the World Wide Web at www.mbtinet.com.
Certain statements in this release are forward looking. Although MBTI believes its expectations are based on reasonable assumptions within the bounds of its
knowledge of its business and operations, there can be no assurance that actual results will not differ materially from its expectations. For factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from expectations and underlying assumptions, see reports by MBTI filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
CONTACT: MBT International Inc.
Andy McKinnon, 303/688-0244 (CEO)
amckinnon@mailcity.com
or
Phoenix Alliance, Inc.
Phil Huss, 970/259-7241 (IR)
phoenixalliance@frontier.net |
