Good morning. We will now begin NAVER's 2024 Q2 earnings conference call. For the benefit of our investors joining from home and abroad, we will provide a simultaneous interpretation service for the presentation and switch to consecutive interpretation for the Q&As. Good morning, I would like to thank the analysts and investors for joining our NAVER's 2024 Q2 earnings presentation. I would like to thank everyone for joining us. As always, we have CEO Soo-yeon Choi and CFO Nam-sun Kim joining us on our call today to walk you through NAVER's business highlights and strategies and financial highlights, after which we will take your questions. Please note that the earnings results are K-IFRS-based, provided for timely communications, and have not been audited by an independent auditor, and hence are subject to change after such review.
With that, I will turn it over to our CEO to present on the business highlights.
Good morning, I'm Soo-yeon Choi, the CEO. In the Q2, NAVER focused on strengthening its platform capabilities by integrating its core competencies in AI, data, and search, to provide differentiated experiences for users, creators, and partners within the NAVER ecosystem. This approach yielded success, not only in service delivery, but also in monetization. In Q2, search platform revenue increased by 7.5% year-over-year to KRW 978.4 billion. Search revenue grew by 6.1% year-over-year, due to the expanded introduction of competitive bidding in place ads and improvements in targeting exposure and targeting. Display revenue also increased by 8.1% year-over-year, driven by the success of new ad products such as Home Feed ads and also performance ads.
On the service front, we are focusing on increasing user time spent and generating new revenue and technology within the NAVER app. The daily average number of visitors to our Home Feed, which recommends is based on individual interests, hit a record high in June and is rapidly growing as one of NAVER's key services. In particular, the proportion of users aged between 10 to 30 is close to 40%, so contributing to the increased usage of the year, we plan to conduct UI improvement tests to attract new users and increase incoming traffic. In addition, we will introduce a new exploration feed that facilitates quick browsing and trend discovery through image-centric content. For a Clip, the monthly average daily pay account surpassed 50 million as of June, demonstrating steady expansion of the user base.
In addition to production of Clip s, recommended in the Home Feed and Clip tab has grown more than 3 times daily, indicating a continuous expansion of the Clip ecosystem. In Q2 or the second half, we plan to recruit the third batch of Clip , creators, expanding the number of categories to 25 to better cater to users' detailed preferences. Furthermore, to enhance the synergy with existing NAVER services, and search, we are working on strengthening the integration with shopping, using the sticker feature within Clip and encouraging the production of Clips within place reviews through Clip editor integration. As a result, by the end of Q2, the average daily time spent on the NAVER app, main screen has grown, by 13% compared to the same period last year, recovering to pre-social distancing levels.
Moving forward, we plan to continue improving existing services and launching new ones to provide search, shopping, and feed-type content tailored to user needs, either by creating an environment where users can stay engaged within NAVER continuously. We're also taking proactive steps to quickly secure trendy and personalized content tailored to individual user preferences. In April, we restructured the organization to consolidate previously dispersed content production and management teams. Also, we're rolling out various creator training and reward programs to encourage high-quality content production. The Photo Dump Challenge, which started in June, has become a fresh way for millennials and Gen Zs to express themselves with participants in their teens to thirties, accounting for 88% of the total.
The user-generated content, primarily images, produced from this challenge, has naturally been featured on the Home Feed, which has led to an increase in creator earnings. In fact, the highest earning bloggers compensation have seen a significant rise up to 10 times compared to pre-Home Feed launch. Many bloggers, having seen the potential for early generation, have started participating as Clip creators, strengthening the unique creator ecosystem of NAVER. Content produced within NAVER is recommended across various services such as search, shopping, places, and maps through AI, providing a satisfying search experience for both creators and users. This also creates revenue opportunities for NAVER. We are implementing various measures to strengthen the competitiveness of our advertising platform.
The gradual expansion of fee services and the introduction of new popular services like Clip and Chzzk have increased the traffic and user time spent securing new advertising spaces. To enhance the value of this increased inventory, we are continuously launching highly effective advertising products and improving ad efficiency through sophisticated AI-based targeting. Feed ads are demonstrating their efficiency by achieving higher CTR and conversion rates compared to regular ads, thanks to enhanced targeting. In particular, dynamic NAVER dynamic ads, which display AI-based personalized ads based on user shopping data, best exemplified by how the NAVER platform effectively leverages its strengths from discovery to conversion. These ads show high click-through and conversion rates due to strengthened retargeting, achieving nearly three times higher CTR and ROAS, compared to other feed ads.
The ads received positive feedback from both advertisers and users, leading to an increase in the number of paying advertisers and subsequently boosting revenue. Starting in the second half of the year, we plan to further enhance our advertiser tools with a focus on optimization and automation using AI to develop a more convenient advertising platform. We will use data generated from advertiser sites to optimize campaign budgets and refine the functions to target the right audiences. In addition, we plan to enhance NAVER's advertising platform capabilities by enabling bulk registration of responsive creatives and providing automatic bidding features tailored to specific objectives, thereby solidifying NAVER's position as a useful and attractive platform for both users and advertisers. Next, I will provide an update on our commerce business.
In Q2, NAVER's total commerce GMV grew by 4.1% YOY, reaching KRW 12.3 trillion. GMV, excluding uplink marketplaces, saw 87.6% YOY, driven by the continued growth of brand stores and service changes. Brand stores continue to cement its position as a new marketing channel by offering seller tools, data, and marketing spaces through the Brand Solution Package. Both the number of registered brands and GMV saw a steady growth, with an increasing number of consumers seeking reliable brands. In particular, the Delivery Guarantee services, which is expanding around brand stores, has had a positive impact on GMV. Sellers using the Delivery Guarantee service saw approximately 21% higher GMV compared to those who don't.
Moving forward, we plan to expand our database for a complete coverage through efforts such as increasing fulfillment centers and providing standard pricing. In the Q2, Brand Stores maintained strong growth across all categories with notable increases in GMV, driven by major brands, in particular in the furniture, interior, fashion and food segments. Furthermore, the introduction of Sunday delivery and same-day delivery in April for faster shipping, the launch of free returns and exchanges for Delivery Guarantee products in May, significantly improved inconvenience for both sellers and consumers and contributed to the continued growth of Brand Stores. NAVER Plus Membership also contributed to the expansion of rural customers by offering users tangible value. The membership features a customer-friendly structure, allowing users to earn more rewards the more they use the service.
Also, by partnering with various content providers and offline ecosystems, it provides greater value to customers. As a result, the paid membership subscription retention rate has reached 95%. Moving forward, we plan to continuously attract loyal customers and users through the Plus Membership and further expand NAVER's unique e-commerce ecosystem. On the service side, growth has slightly slowed compared to the previous quarter, due to the post-pandemic base effect and weakened travel spending, driven by rising inflation and interest rates. Nevertheless, by enhancing reservation platform features and expanding into new sectors like mobility, we continue to achieve a robust growth, surpassing market averages. Despite the impact of high interest rates, inflation, and intensified competition in the U.S. resale market, Poshmark achieved a positive operating profit in Q2.
In terms of revenue, both advertising and Posh Share have received a strong response. Looking ahead, we aim to position Poshmark as a distinct platform compared to its competitors by enhancing Posh Lens, improving the search engine, and launching new services. Finally, just as the feed service introduced in the NAVER app helps users explore and discover new content, we're preparing to bring similar innovations to our commerce. Working beyond traditional price comparison services based solely on the lowest prices, we aim to leverage NAVER's unique data and AI technologies to offer a more differentiated and personalized shopping experiences in Smart Stores in the second half of the year. We plan to introduce personalized benefits and recommendation features in feed format to streamline the shopping journey, making it easier for consumers to discover their desired brands and products.
In addition, we will provide an intuitive interface for exploring Smart Stores products, ensuring a trustworthy shopping experience for our customers. Moving forward, NAVER Shopping will continue to focus on multiple initiatives to create a seamless flywheel that allows customers to explore, discover and purchase a wide range of reliable products more easily. Next, allow me to provide an update on our Fintech business. In Q2, NAVER Pay's TPV reached KRW 17.5 trillion, marking a 20.1% increase YOY and a 5.2% increase QOQ. Non-captive TPV, driven by the ongoing expansion of our third-party ecosystem, increased to 40% YOY to record KRW 8.8 trillion, surpassing 50% of the total TPV for the first time.
Offline TPV grew eighty-two percent YOY to KRW 2.6 trillion, backed by the sustained growth of online payments and O2O payments. Despite lapping the introduction of Samsung Pay to NAVER Pay, offline TPV continued to grow as users were locked into our service. In the platform business, we're continuously expanding our lineup of loan and insurance comparison services with the launch of new services such as rent loans comparisons, savings insurance comparisons, and travel insurance comparisons. The NAVER Pay mortgage and rent loan comparison launched earlier this year has surpassed KRW 2 trillion in TPV within the six months, receiving a lot of attention from financial consumers. In particular, their mortgage comparison service now includes all five major banks as partners, broadening the options available.
Moving forward, we plan to provide a fast and convenient experience to financial consumers seeking to reduce their interest burdens. We understand that the recent vendor payment delays to Q10 by Q10 affiliates have created significant challenges for many users and sellers. NAVER is committed to supporting merchants and protecting consumers by swiftly implementing safeguard measures and actively exploring solutions for mutually beneficial partnerships with sellers, including fast settlements. Next, I will discuss our Webtoon Q2 business results. Webtoon was successfully brought to the public markets to leverage its powerful global flywheel and expand its reach in the under-penetrated markets. With the funds raised, Webtoon aims to further scale up its global creator ecosystem, which includes 24 million creators, and strengthen its position as the leading storytelling tech platform.
In Q2, Webtoon revenue posted KRW 382.9 billion, representing a 3.6% increase YOY, but a 3.0% decrease QOQ. On a constant currency basis, excluding deconsolidated and transferred operations, as reported by Webtoon earlier this morning, Webtoon total revenue grew 11.1% YOY, driven by continued strong growth in paid content and advertising in Japan. Breaking it down by segment, paid content revenue increased 11.5% YOY, driven by the release of over 70 new titles in Japan, continued efforts to build up the local creator ecosystem in Japan, as well as the expansion of global distribution of successes, such as Savior of Divine Blood. These various efforts have drove RMPU and payout ratio to record highs in Japan.
LINE MANGA topped the overall app market in Japan across iOS and Google Play Store for paid trendy in May and June. Advertising revenue grew to 2.3% YOY, with particularly notable growth in Japan, where revenue jumped more than twofold compared to the previous year. Lastly, IP adaptations revenues saw even growth across all geographies, increasing to 24.9% YOY. In the second half of the year, we plan to continue upgrading our platform with AI-driven personalized recommendation models like the ones rolled out in Korea in June to further improve user retention and expand monetization. In Japan, we plan to continue expanding the proportion of original content and strengthening our global flywheel, powered by our local creator ecosystem, content, and IP.
In the rest of the world, including North America, we will seek to drive organic user growth through IP adaptations and strengthen our ad capabilities to foster growth. Next, I'd like to share NAVER Cloud, our B2B business results. The delivery of NAVER Cloud, featuring HyperCLOVA X, continued smoothly in Q2 for its launch in November last year. We have signed MOUs and are actively engaging in discussions about the implementation of HyperCLOVA X with companies like the Bank of Korea, Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power, and HD Hyundai. We will share updates once these discussions bear tangible results. In addition to the companies already announced, we're also exploring opportunities to provide HyperCLOVA X API products targeting the financial industry to secure further references in Gen AI.
Moreover, we are focusing our efforts on enhancing the performance of NAVER services, such as search, commerce, and ads, by leveraging HyperCLOVA X. In search, we have already adopted Gen AI technology to understand search content, ranking algorithms, and natural language processing to reflect the latest information more quickly and cost effectively. In commerce, we analyze our user purchasing patterns using Gen AI to recommend products with a high conversion probability through our services and ads. In advertising, AI-based enhancements have increased ad efficiency. For example, in performance display ads, a launch of customized targeting and advanced click conversion prediction models led to a 23% increase in conversion rates, for some products compared to the previous quarter.
Notably, fee placements will now feature more relevant ads through integration with the content AI recommendation engine, resulting in a 29% increase in CTR and illustrating that AI applications are indeed translating into tangible revenue growth. We're also using machine learning algorithms to automatically analyze the performance of each ad or campaign and develop optimized targeting strategies. This is expected to further enhance our ad performance. NAVER is committed to ensuring that AI not only fosters tech innovation, but also enhances the quality of our services, providing a superior user experience while simultaneously driving revenue growth. LINE WORKS revenue increased by over 40%, YOY, bolstered by substantial growth in both the number of paid IDs and also ARPU.
Moving forward, we plan to integrate HyperCLOVA X into LINE WORKS to enhance features like message summarization, email drafting, aiming to provide improved product quality and drive subscriber growth and revenue expansion. Furthermore, the digital twin technology, developed and commercialized by our NAVER Labs and our NAVER Cloud team for future growth, is now achieving tangible business results, with notable references, including the National Museum of Korea and a well-known theme park in Korea. The technology has also gained international recognition. In fact, NAVER recently launched a project to build a digital twin platform in collaboration with Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing. Going forward, we plan to build a digital twin platform through mapping and precise 3D modeling of major cities in Saudi Arabia.
This will facilitate the development of key services, including urban planning and flood simulation, and is expected to drive our revenue growth. Finally, our collaboration with Intel last April is progressing smoothly, according to the blueprint I shared before. Notably, revenue from AI chip validation projects undertaken jointly by both companies was realized for the first time in Q2, demonstrating NAVER's technological expertise in AI. We will continue to pursue our scheduled projects together and anticipate further revenue from these efforts. NAVER has set up a roadmap aimed at achieving carbon negative by 2040 to ensure long-term sustainability and made continued efforts to that end. As part of this commitment, as of 2024, all NAVER offices and data centers have earned the platinum certification and have exceeded the 50% renewable energy usage target through direct and third-party PPAs.
In June, we released an integrated report, detailing our ESG initiatives and achievements over the past year, and was named the top ESG company by the rating agency Sustinvest, in recognition for its sound ESG practices. In the second half of the year, NAVER will continue to leverage AI and data to deliver differentiated experiences to users, accelerate the deployment of our core products and platforms, and proactively identify new technology-driven business opportunities. Next, our CFO, Nam-sun Kim, will walk you through Q2 financial performance.
Good morning, I am the CFO, Nam-sun Kim. I will present Q2 financial results. NAVER's Q2 revenue posted KRW 2.61 trillion, up 18.4% year-over-year and 3.3% quarter-over-quarter.
Adjusted EBITDA, which excludes variables such as stock-based compensation and depreciation amortization expenses, saw an expanded growth and recorded KRW 638.4 billion, up 23.9% YOY and 9.9% QOQ, driven by the growth and recovery of the search platform and more effective cost management. EBITDA margin improved by 3.1 percentage points YOY, reaching 24.5%. Despite a one-time Webtoon IPO-related costs, including compensation expenses and advisory fees, NAVER achieved an OP margin of 18.1%, up 2.6 percentage points YOY, thanks to meticulous business planning and also effective execution, as well as the deconsolidation effect of NAVER Z, reflecting a continued enhancement in the company's business structure.
This quarter, NAVER saw its OP margin increase for 5 consecutive quarters for the first time in 15 years, a milestone achieved right after the financial crisis, demonstrating the robustness of its core businesses. Next, let me discuss revenue by each business segment. In Q2, the revenue from the search platform reached KRW 988.4 billion, up 7.5% YOY and 8.1% QOQ. Search ad revenue grew by 6.1% YOY, thanks to the expanded introduction of paid ad bidding and redesign of carousels, responsive creatives exposure, and enhanced targeting. Display ad revenue increased 8.1% YOY and 16.1% QOQ, driven by increased performance ad revenue from merchant, the launch of new products, and strengthened targeting.
Commerce revenue reached KRW 719 billion, up 13.6% year-over-year and 2.2% quarter-over-quarter. Within this, commission and sales revenue rose by 26.2% year-over-year, driven by the expansion of brands introduced to Brand Store, increased usage of Brand Solution Package and subsequent solution sales, and growth in KREAM. Membership revenue also increased by 12.6% year-over-year, thanks to continuing US rise in subscriber numbers and active users. Fintech revenue in Q2 reached KRW 368.5 billion, up 8.5% year-over-year and 4.1% quarter-over-quarter. Overall TPV in Q2 grew by 20.1% year-over-year and 5.2% quarter-over-quarter, reaching KRW 17.5 trillion.
Growth was primarily driven by non-captive TPV, which for the first time accounted for over 50% of the total. Offline TPV also maintained strong growth, soaring 82% YOY, fueled by the expansion of onsite payments and the continued growth of O2O services. Content revenue reached KRW 120 billion, down 0.1% YOY and 5.9% QOQ. But excluding the impact of NAVER Z's deconsolidation, it reflects a 4.1% YOY increase. Webtoon revenue in Q2 grew 3.6% YOY, driven by strong paid content and advertising revenue in Japan. On a constant currency basis, excluding deconsolidated and transferred operations, Webtoon's total revenue grew by 11.1% YOY.
SNOW, so its revenue declined by 37.7% YOY and 37.3% QOQ, due to the impact of NAVER Z's deconsolidation being reflected in Q2. Excluding this effect, however, the revenue rose by 19.2% YOY and 12.2% QOQ, driven by a rise in the number of paid subscribers to the camera app. Cloud revenue in Q2 2024 reached KRW 124.6 billion, up 19.2% YOY and 6.5% QOQ. B2B revenue grew by 19.1% YOY, backed by the inclusion of Intel IA Group related projects and Neurocloud sales and the expansion of paid IDs in LINE WORKS. Moving on to expenses.
Development and operation expenses came in at KRW 682.7 billion, up 6% YOY, due to the deconsolidation of NAVER Z and improved workforce productivity. When excluding one-time Webtoon IP-related costs, expenses dropped by 0.5% YOY, demonstrating the success of efforts to boost productivity, including efficient resource allocation. Partner expenses rose by about 0.9% YOY, primarily driven by recognition of Webtoon IPO advisory fees. Infrastructure costs increased by 20.9% due to the official launch of Chzzk and the acquisition of new infrastructure. Marketing expenses, on the other hand, decreased by 4.9%-4.3% YOY, due to the impact of NAVER Z's deconsolidation and improved marketing efficiency in the content segment.
In the latter half of the year, we anticipate increased spending on promotions, such as for shopping, and considering a more strategic and flexible approach in line with Webtoon's global growth objectives. Now on to PNL by segment. First, the combined search platform and commerce saw improved profitability YOY and QOQ, driven by the recovery in search platform growth and the expansion of monetization through guaranteed delivery and our brand package solutions. Fintech profit margin also expanded QOQ, driven by growth in payment revenue. In the content segment, Webtoon recorded losses, which were primarily driven by one-time IPO-related costs, but maintained a positive adjusted EBITDA excluding such one-time costs. Snow Side losses narrowed due to the impact of NAVER Z's deconsolidation. Finally, the cloud segment reduced its losses through top line growth, driven by increased AI-related revenue.
Consolidated net profit for Q2 totaled KRW 332.1 billion, up 15.8% YOY, but down by 40.3% QOQ, due to the base effect from the previous quarter's gain on the deconsolidation of subsidiaries such as NAVER Z. Now on to cash flow and balance sheet. Free cash flow in Q2 increased by KRW 220.5 billion YOY, due to more stable management of the balance sheet. However, it decreased by KRW 248.2 billion QOQ, totaling KRW 245.2 billion, due to corporate tax payments and the acquisition of new servers for the Sejong IDC. Over the past two years, efforts to liquidate non-core assets have successfully realized approximately KRW 970 billion.
With business growth and improved management of the balance sheet, our NAVER's consolidated adjusted debt to EBITDA ratio improved from 2.2 times at the end of Q2 2023 to 1.8 times at the end of Q2 2024. Similarly, the adjusted net debt to EBITDA ratio improved from 1 time to 0.4 time during the same period. Next, I will explain the impact of LY Corp's share buyback, which was disclosed on August 2 on the equity holdings of NAVER. LY Corp's recent share buyback is a measure to comply with the new regulations of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, which will take effect next year. To maintain its listing status on the prime market of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, a company must have at least 35% of its total issued shares as floating shares.
Therefore, LY Corp has initiated a public tender offer for its own shares. NAVER and SoftBank's jointly held A Holdings plans to participate in this public tender offer to reduce LY Corp's ownership stake by approximately 1%-2%, thereby ensuring that LY Corp's proportion of floating shares slightly exceeds the 35% threshold. The final details of the transaction and the exact scale of A Holdings' share sale will be confirmed in September. Finally, I'd like to provide an update on shareholder return. In accordance with the shareholder return plan established in May of last year, we have canceled, as of August seventh, approximately KRW 264.2 billion worth of treasury shares, equivalent to 1% of the outstanding shares.
Looking ahead, we will focus on investing in NAVER's growth, while also exploring shareholder-friendly return strategies. This concludes our review of the second quarter financial performance. We now welcome any questions from the investors.
We will now begin the Q&A session. If you'd like to ask a question, press star and number five on your telephone keypad. If you'd like to cancel your question, press star and number five once again. Out of respect for others on the call, we kindly request participants to ask up to two questions. The first question comes from Eric Cha with Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.
[Foreign Language]
Thank you for taking my question. I have two that I want to ask this morning. First, the company has kept your word that you will control your margin and continue on with an upward trend in terms of your bottom line, through improvement in the overall fundamental of the company and good execution of the plans that you have. So you are able to drive top line revenue growth. Now, my question relates to your long term growth. If we look out into three years, five years along the road, do you still think that you will be able to bring about double-digit top line revenue growth?
What is your level of confidence, if you believe that you are able to bring about double-digit growth, and if that is possible, what do you think is going to be the main driver behind that growth? My second question relates to your search platform business. We see the rebound in display ad is quite salient. How long do you think that this trend can continue? And what do you think are the key drivers behind such rebound and improvement? And also, your competitor have said that in order for them to accelerate their growth, they will also focus on display ad. What is your take on the overall competitive landscape regarding display ads?
[Foreign Language]
Thank you. This is the CEO. Responding to your question, the first question, that is because there persists quite a bit of volatility on the macro backdrop, in terms of the level of confidence, I cannot put my foot down. But having said that, we still believe that for three to five years to come, we are very confident that we will be able to drive a double-digit growth. And the main drivers behind such growth is, as you've seen over the years, over the past year, we have really focused on driving our product enhancement, which is powered by our AI capabilities, and we will continue to exert that efforts for, going forward one year or two years, really focusing the company's competitiveness in that very area.
So we have expectations to be able to drive business on the advertisement and commerce side, as well as content, mainly driven by Webtoons.
[Foreign Language]
So 2 years ago, we shared with you our objective that we would like to drive a double-digit growth and, you know, admitting that the overall market growth is somewhat going to slow in the future. In order for us to maintain that level of growth for the upcoming 3 years, we do understand that there would necessarily need to be certain changes to the strategy. We will, however, continue to exert our efforts in trying new attempts at our commerce ad and our main app business, so that we could provide a more enhanced and better value back to our users.
[Foreign Language]
Specifically for the display ad, you have to understand that we actually started off from the low base. It is from that base that we have started to speed up or accelerate, and the overall market also for domestic and overseas, we are seeing that acceleration.
[Foreign Language]
... Now, regarding the display ads market, we do not think that it is a zero-sum based game, compared to other platforms in terms of ad product, enhanced targeting, as well as creating of the ad creatives based upon and powered by AI. We are basically a later entrant into the market, but we see that we will be able to therefore drive a more steeper growth through scaling up of our capabilities. But we also have to keep in mind that it is not just the display ads that we are selling as a platform. We, as a NAVER, as a platform, we provide a combined solution, starting from the search ads, the display ad, as well as the shopping ad.
So from the top funnel to the bottom funnel, we are able to provide a product synergy across those different products, as well as really leverage NAVER's positioning. So once again, the DA does not exist on its own on a standalone basis, hence we believe that we will be able to drive overall and very robust growth engine from this ecosystem.
The next question comes from Dong-hwan Oh, with Samsung Securities. Please ask your question.
Thank you for taking my question. I have two questions I would like to ask. The first one is on your commerce business. We see that the overall GMV trend for commerce is slowing, and we see the gap with Coupang widening. I would like to understand what your projection is for next year's growth rate. Also, the importance of logistics is becoming ever more important, especially for fresh foods as well as household products. Are you continuously going to keep to your asset light strategy going forward? And my next question is that despite the Webtoon listing related expenses, your operating profit was quite good.
I believe that this is due to a lowering of your marketing expense, and I'm a little bit dubious as to how you will be able to continue on with that low level of marketing expense. As against the total revenue, how low could you go with your marketing expense, and does that have any negative impact on your top line revenue?
On your first question, recently, we are mindful of a very fast transformation and changing that we are witnessing from the online commerce market. But we, NAVER Shopping, we have a very strong intrinsic value that we offer and that we own within this market. First is the 3P, the third-party logistics model.
Compared to other companies, we have a very strong superiority in terms of providing a seller-friendly model, as well as being able to sustain high level of user traffic, which is helping us to maintain our very strong number one positioning. And I believe that this will also help us continue on with the growth rate that we have seen up to date. So this whole virtual cycle and flywheel moat that the company has, we will continue to keep to and safeguard that competitive advantage. We will continue to enhance and scale up our recommendation capabilities, expand on the brand store, adopt database commerce, and provide value and new experiences to the application users, so that we may continue on with that big of a gap with other players....
[Foreign Language] . On the FMCG side, our competitor, the big category player with a very high growth rate, they have been taking market share from the existing offline sellers or the offline providers. But we do recognize that that can trigger and deepen the competition in this market. So we will continue on with a high engagement model in employing our approach.
[Foreign Language] . During the first half of the year, we've been testing many different measures. For instance, expanding on the coverage of the guaranteed delivery, providing free refund and exchanges to the members of our membership program, and providing a installation, delivery, and rental delivery services as well, and also taking initiative on entering into a standardized unit pricing contract and agreement.
So we while we will keep on with our light asset approach, we are providing and we are putting in efforts to provide a benefit that is on par and no different to what is being provided by our competitor. [Foreign Language] But we also want to accentuate that within our ecosystem, basically, what NAVER's intent is to grow together with the participants of this ecosystem.
Of course, all the participants of the commerce ecosystem cannot have one single objective or purpose or one single value set. What therefore, we focus on, is to grow together with the brands and the small and medium vendors and merchants who are part of this ecosystem. And in order to do that, we want to be able to provide a broader user value back to these participants and really home in on specific areas that our competitors are unable to reach.
[Foreign Language]
Your question on marketing spend. It was never our intent to intentionally lower the marketing spend. We have to look at this from two aspects. First is on the content business and second on commerce. First, talking about content business, the reason why marketing spend has gone down is the first reason is deconsolidation of Zepeto, and second is for the Webtoon business in Japan. In Q2, the growth had been very good, which had an impact of us pushing back marketing activities into the third quarter.
[Foreign Language]
Now, if you look at commerce, actually the overall marketing spend or marketing expenditure had gone up. If you combine search and commerce together, profitability has actually improved. It's gone up. And this has been driven by a separation of our SA business, the search ad business. But if you just take and carve out commerce business, in terms of the fact that we had conducted a lot of free promotional activities that had actually, you know, lowered or had negatively impacted the profitability or the margin.
[Foreign Language]
... So when I take a look at these marketing line item, I think especially for our commerce business, what we need to really focus on is not just a short term at GMV, the volume per se. We need to always keep in mind that we have to have our return on investment, ROI, at always the positive number, not negative, which means that we need to be able to secure a very robust cohort of our users, so that even at ROI plus, we will be able to have a constant level of marketing expenditure. So from a long-term perspective, that means that we need to be able to provide more value back to our consumers, so that when it comes to marketing spend, we can still ensure ROI plus and be able to drive revenue faster.
The next question comes from Stanley Yang with JPMorgan. Please ask your question.
Yeah. [Foreign Language]
[Foreign Language]
Thank you. I would like to ask two question. First one, on your search platform, the combined ad business, revenue. If you look at the total revenue growth, we've seen a growth, and in Q2 it was about mid-7% level. What is your outlook going forward for the second half of the year? And in terms of the long-term perspective, if there is a stronger macro downturn, that is along the way, how far do you think that your search platform ad revenue can actually, you know, go? My second question has to do with your AI business, particularly on your Q services. There's been quite a bit of anticipation and expectations for the Q service, as it is your core product that is a B2C product that is powered by AI.
I understand that at this point, it's applied to your PC platform, but not mobile yet. What is the level of confidence that you have behind the Q product and even with the need to spend more, or, or your plans to further expand Q as it is a B2C service, based on AI? And also, what is your take on the timing of monetization from this product?
[Foreign Language]
In terms of the advertisement revenue growth in the second half, as you've seen from the trend from Q1 and Q2, where there was an acceleration, I think as we go into second half, it's actually not going to slow or it's actually going to speed up more rather than slow.
[Foreign Language]
No, but then it's very difficult to answer the question as to when the macro situation normalizes and takes rebound, what impact would that have on the advertisement, overall advertisement growth? I say that because not just for NAVER, but all of the advertisement platform that you see globally and the acceleration of the growth that you see all started from a low base. So even from an historical perspective, this is an elevated level.
[Foreign Language]
... Now, but compared to other global advertisement platforms, I told you also previously that we were a later entrant into this market through our advertising product enhancements and AI-based targeting enhancements. So we were late compared to others. So, compared to the overall macro environment, I believe that we still have a quite strong driver behind the acceleration of the advertisement growth within the NAVER platform. And on top of this, if you look at our shopping ad, the growth there has been quite slow up to date.
But by taking, for instance, increasing or expanding on the advertisement slots, or by introducing effective ad products, or doing more active sales activities against the advertisers, we are going to try to support that growth once again from the shopping ad, which I believe with, at the end of the day, will help with the growth of the NAVER advertisement going forward. And on your question related to Q, we are continuously running different tests and experiments to see the level of satisfaction that on the PC platform, the Q, in terms of the long tail query, the level of satisfaction that it's giving us, that it's giving the users, that is. And by the end of this year, we are also planning to apply that to mobile platform as well.
Now, also in regards to conversation-centric AI-powered agents or other, you know, enhancement of the shopping-related capabilities or the sophistication thereof, yes, we're making strategic reviews as to whether we could apply generative LLM, large language models, to these different types of products, but they will be in the form of a very strong coupling with our existing business models of our core businesses, such as search, advertisement, and commerce, and we are not thinking of a separate monetization business models per se, for this product. Now, but we have been able to see very clear results, positive results, when we apply our AI capabilities to our existing services, like search, and we've seen higher satisfaction from the feed service and higher advertisement effectiveness and efficiency.
So even if it will entail some more cost and expense, since we have ample capacity to make investment, we are considering expanding and doing different things with our AI-powered B2C services. If you look at LINE WORKS, this is a subscription model-based B2B business, and we have brought and incorporated HyperCLOVA X capabilities, and we are looking forward to additional add-ons and additional monetization opportunities from that endeavor as well.
The next question comes from Dong-yoon Lee with Macquarie Securities. Please ask your question. Thank you for taking my question.
I have a question relating to the stake sales by LY Corporation, and my question relates to going forward, as SoftBank and NAVER maintains their current shareholding structure at this point, do you think that NAVER will be able to continue on with its status as a majority shareholder and still have that control over Line? And also going forward, do you think that your business cooperation with SoftBank will further expand or it will contract?
Now, regarding the issues that have been triggered in the first half, regarding LY Corp, it's become very clear that the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Japan, their guidance basically was specifically with regards to the security related issues and the governance aspect.
At this point, we are in no position in reviewing whether we are going to change the level of our majority shareholder status or reduce the control over LINE that we have. We will stick to our previous strategy. There's been more clarification on the guidance that's been issued by Ministry of Internal Affairs regarding the governance aspect. We will faithfully comply with the requirements of the guidance, and the executives of the companies will also think hard as to identifying areas where both companies can actually generate more synergy, and our efforts will be focused on that.
Thank you. I think we've spent ample time on the Q&A, so this brings us to the end of the earnings presentation by NAVER. Once again, thank you to all the investors.
We ask for your continuous support. Thank you!