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BHI, whose www.geopages.com is one of the most visited sites on the Web, currently offers 14 advertiser-supported GeoCities that have been trademarked and named after popular destinations like SiliconValley, WallStreet, Hollywood and SunsetStrip.

BHI's homesteading program, the first of its kind on the Web, enables anyone with access to the Internet to have a free Personal Home Page, or GeoPage, within its cityscapes. Since the program launched in July, GeoCities' self-generated content has lofted traffic sixfold to more than 350,000 hits a day and 500,000 visitors a month.

Grey Interactive West (GIW) began working with BHI on a consultative basis in June, according to GIW general manager Fred Walti. The partnership yielded the current appointment of GIW to develop and promote GeoCities to consumers and advertisers.

The alliance has led to the creation of innovative advertising and commercial sponsorship programs tailored to each GeoCity. "GeoCities is the purest metaphor for a community-based web application that we've come across," Mr. Walti said. "There's a dynamism associated with each community's atmosphere that is attractive both to its citizens and to advertisers."

"Our goal with GeoCities is to combine commerce and community on the Web and we've demonstrated a singular ability to generate brand-building levels of traffic," says BHI president David Bohnett.

Grey Interactive West has been working on a range of interactive development projects with various clients since 1993. GIW's current client roster includes numerous divisions of U S WEST, California Federal Bank, Interactive Enterprises, and Coldwell Banker.

The company has focused on helping service providers develop and launch new interactive products, services and applications. Recent work has stressed the development of commercial applications on the Internet. Grey Interactive West operates with a staff of 14 in both San Francisco and Los Angeles.

"We've been busy trying to define what it takes to make a business out of the New Media," Mr. Walti said. "We staffed this division with a unique blend of marketing experts from the packaged goods, technology, retailing and service industries. Our mandate is to do whatever it takes to make clients succeed in the New Media Marketplace. "We've been particularly successful in helping to develop GeoCities and look forward to working with BHI on market and opportunity assessment, product development, market launch and business building."

BHI is in the business of building online GeoCities -- cyberspace communities of netters who have their own home pages, create their own content, reside on cyberstreets resonantly named after landmark thoroughfares from around the world and consume the goods and services of advertisers and sponsors that are, as in real life, an integral part of the community. BHI, based in Beverly Hills, also creates custom designed commercial web sites.

To date over 8,000 Web surfers have applied for residence in BHI's 14 GeoCities, and a new citizen joins every ten minutes, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Mr. Bohnett, recently dubbed 'the Mayor of Cyberspace' by Beverly Hill Business magazine, is sure that "a sense of community is what makes it all click."