While Korean dramas and visual content are enjoying popularity in the Asian market, their faces and places are still not familiar to the U.S. and European markets and Korean content providers should keep that in mind, experts said Wednesday.

Their comments came at the 10th anniversary event of Broadcast World Wide, Asia's largest trade fair for broadcasting and visual content, which runs through Friday at COEX, Samseong-dong, in southern Seoul.

About 1,200 buyers are in Seoul to look at Korean broadcast content presented by not only big broadcasters like MBC, KBS and SBS but also cable TV stations and content manufacturers like Samhwa Networks . The BCWW was held alongside the International Trade Show for Content.

"You see a little bit of penetration of Korean dramas in the U.S market as dialogue is increasing between Korea and America in terms of ideas, talents and concepts," Edwin Chung, senior vice president of NBC Universal TV, told The Korea Herald.

"But because of language, social and cultural barriers, and the lack of familiarity of faces and places, that type of cross over will take some time. But as long as content is strong, Korean dramas can sell well," he said.

Arjen van Mierlo, CEO of Asian Operations of Endemol Asia, shared Chung's view that Korean content should meet the international needs. Endemol, an international production and distribution company based in the Netherlands, is well-known among industry insiders for selling its unique format to KBS 2 to produce the popular quiz show, "1 vs 100."

Mierlo was participating in the BCWW as both a buyer and a seller.

He said he was most interested in Korean dramas but also in the use of new technologies for mobile TV, Web TV and 3-D TV.

When it comes to 3-D TV, Mierlo said he saw a great potential in the 3-D TV market but that it will take some time for content providers to lower 3-D production cost and for consumers to purchase 3-D TV sets.

Chung shared the view.

"It's going to take a while for mainstream shows to start incorporating 3-D. But we're at the exploratory stages ? in time, audiences will get accustomed to 3-D technology," Chung said.

Japanese buyer, Contentbase general manager Sunny Kim, said she came to Seoul to buy Korean variety shows that feature K-pop stars, as Korean girl groups have gained huge popularity in Japan.

Kayo Fukuda, senior chief manager of international sales at NHK Enterprises, said the Japanese have set Korean dramas as their role model to penetrate the Asian market.

At the BCWW, KBS drama "Bread, Love and Dreams," which is hitting 40 percent viewer's rating in Korea, was sold to six countries in Asia.

MBC dramas including "Gloria" and SBS "I'm Legend" are also expected to sign a deal with overseas buyers during the event, officials said.

The Korea Creative Content Agency expects content contracts among the 50 participating countries at the BCWW to reach some 30 billion won (S$33.8 million).