Digital Planet launched its site in August 1999, when its focus was on providing industry news and information, online shopping and on developing various functionalities for the growing user community.
But like most Internet start-ups, Digital Planet`s core business focus gradually changed. As Neil Watson, Digital Planet Director explains, previous to the redesign, the site was changed only once in the last two years.
"We had so much more content and information, and also, I guess so much more experience in what good Web sites have to offer, and don`t, that we decided to just do a major overhaul. So, the whole business has changed dramatically over the last four years. The idea started out to be a portal to the IT community to find news, information and content and auctions and shopping, and our slogan was, and still is, SA`s IT home online."
The idea was to attract anyone with an interest in the IT industry, with information relating to jobs, training, shopping, and other services. The strategy involved partnerships with various content providers, and the provision of discussion boards, a classifieds section and other community platforms to encourage active participation on the site on the side of the users.
Major changes, consolidated refocusing
"We`ve dropped a lot of it - our discussion boards, our classifieds section, and our partnership with EarthWeb in the States. All of that was good content, but the interest just wasn`t there for the content.
"What we`d rather do is focus on what we`re really good at. But the idea was to consolidate, and build a shopping experience that we hope is better for our users.
"What we`ve found over time is that we`re very good at some parts, and not so great at others; news is a great example. We can`t compete with ITWeb for news, and we don`t want to - it`s not our business. We`ve learnt where we can do well, and in SA today our niche and our competitive advantage is in our shop."
We`ve got it all
Digital Planet`s key differentiator and key to success in a closely competitive market is its breadth of product offering, says Watson.
"There isn`t anyone else in our space. There are lots of places where you can buy online - a printer here and a scanner there - but if you want to buy a range, there isn`t anything even close. We have 51 000 products online. With the redesign, we really wanted to focus on the shopping aspect and on allowing users to find what they were looking for a lot quicker than they could before."
Another critical aspect is the value that Digital Planet provides to its advertisers and sponsors. "Previously, the site had a list of about 21 shops, and the guys at the bottom were not getting fair value for what they were paying."
Now, the site features a bank of vendor logos, the positioning of which rotates every 12 hours. Watson says vendor response has been phenomenal.
"They love it - which is just as important as your members loving it."
There are about 22 000 registered members, a significant portion of which take an active interest in the site, it would seem.
"We`ve been running polls on the site, and we get tons of feedback. As soon as the new site went live, we had hundreds of e-mails. But we haven`t had any negative response to the changes."
Digital Planet`s relationship with US company EarthWeb (now known as Dice) was one of those dropped in the restructuring - a matter that did not have a major impact on the company, says Watson.
"We never got to the stage where it became strategic to either of us - we were getting some nice content, they were getting some good PR, and that`s really all it was at the time.
"We have some opportunities [for international partnership], and where it will add value to our membership base, we will definitely consider it. But we`re getting good at our shopping, and we`d rather put our resources into focusing on better deliveries, and logistics, operations, and workflow processes."
SA`s e-tail challenges
"We`ve all got to get much better at understanding what the Web can allow you to do [in interacting with the customer] - it`s taken us four years to understand the power of this medium."
One of the new strategic initiatives is the call centre and customer relationship methodology that Digital Planet has set up. Watson notes: "The click or call model is working all over the world. Calls account for a lot of transactions noted as e-commerce. People love people, and relationships are what sales is about."
E-tailers really have to give people a reason to buy online, says Watson, and there`s only a handful of South African Web sites that do that. "From our number of repeat customers, I can see we`re one of them."
Share
Editorial contacts