Most of us understand that the Internet is a powerful tool
for businesses. An international study
across 12 countries found that businesses who use web technologies experienced
a revenue growth twice that of those who don’t(1). Yet, almost half of kiwi SMEs (47%) don’t
have any online presence(2).
The ‘average’ kiwi business is not making the most of the
Internet and it’s hurting our economy. Of the $2.8 billion that kiwis spent with retailers in the past year,
30% went to overseas companies(3). Research released this year by the Innovation
Partnership states that if
Kiwi businesses made better use of the Internet it could add $34 billion to the
our economy(4).
To help our
businesses make the most of this opportunity a not-for-profit organisation, The
Digital Office, has set up a Digital Growth Programme. This programme is designed to provide kiwi
companies with the skills to grow their business through the use of online
technologies.
One of the
key offerings of the Digital Growth Programme is Digital Journey, a free
interactive online assessment (www.digitaljourney.nz). Digital Journey identifies a business’
current use of online technology and provides a personalised action plan to
enable them to improve their use of the Internet and web technologies. To date,
over 1,000 organisations have been through Digital Journey.
The other
real plus about Digital Journey is that it assesses your digital maturity and
provides businesses with a view on how well they are using the Internet when
compared to others. This is a powerful dataset that can be used to measure how
well we use the Internet today and in the future. The figure today is 39.8%; that is our
digital maturity and the higher the percentage gets the more digitally aware
and embracing our businesses are.
Digital Office has also produced digital stats on which region has the
strongest digital maturity and which industry sector leads the way – check
out: http://www.digitaloffice.co.nz/#!Digital-Office-Digital-Maturity-Report/cibe/6CAB7F3D-C327-4307-AAE9-C45BDA7965B6 to see how your region or sector
shapes up.
More than
half a million households, businesses, schools and health centres are now able
to connect to the Government’s Ultra-Fast Broadband network, which continues to
rollout ahead of schedule. This is all
well and good but the key measure of the government’s success here is an
increase in digital maturity. We all are
on the same page here: being more
digitally aware is essential for our economy to grow and for our businesses to
compete on a world-stage.
We have a
Not for Profit taking on this challenge which we all need to support and be thankful
for, But what is needed is a concerted
effort to increase our digital maturity.
39.8% isn’t good enough.
Digital
Journey is available at www.digitaljourney.nz and it has been developed by the
Digital Office www.digitaloffice.co.nz
Stuart Dillon-Roberts
The Digital Office
[1] McKinsey
Global Institute (2011). Internet matters: The Net’s sweeping impact on growth,
jobs, and prosperity. Retrieved from
http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/high_tech_telecoms_internet/internet_matters
[2] MYOB (2014).
The state of the digital nation – An MYOB Business Monitor Special Report,
October 2014.
[3] BNZ (2014).
BNZ Online Retail Sales Report – Quarterly in-depth update and sales for
October 2014. Retrieved from
https://www.bnz.co.nz/static/www/docs/retail-sales-index/or2014-11.pdf
[4] Glass, H.,
Davies, P., Hefter, E. and Blick, G. (March 2014). The value of internet services to New Zealand
businesses. Retrieved from
http://www.innovationpartnership.co.nz/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Sapere-Google-INZ-The-value-of-internet-services-to-New-Zealand-Businesses_-_Report-31-March-2014.pdf
http://www.innovationpartnership.co.nz/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Sapere-Google-INZ-The-value-of-internet-services-to-New-Zealand-Businesses_-_Report-31-March-2014.pdf
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