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link8r

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I think that this will be really good for the Irish economy but especially for the Irish Web Design and Development community. The aim is to get some 40% of Irish businesses (25k) online in the next 12 months with their own website, adwords, domain and hosting...(well you've read the Press Releases by now hopefully!)

Given that setting up a website and turning it into business can be quite complicated, I think that as these companies begin to appreciate what goes into a site and change their mindset, they'll see the commercial value in approaching a professional web designer. Certainly not all will. But its taken 12+ years to get 60% online - getting the rest online in such a short space of time should really create a lot of demand.
 

Banta

New Member
I'm glad to see that someone has started a topic on this, and I want to +1 TwoHeadsWebDesign comment by saying hear hear link8r!

I also want to say kudos to Michele and the team at Blacknight. This is quite simply a brilliant idea, and I think you should be applauded for your part in this initiative.

As link8r said, I believe that companies will have a greater appreciation now for the web, and for people who design/create/implement websites, and will hopefully bring more business to the web community. In some ways as well, I think it will be a help to web designers as there will now be less calls from people on small budgets who just want a 1 page website. I now have a great place to point these people to where they can get what they're looking for now for free!

Regarding the comment on the link that it's bad for designers who target startup markets, I don't think it is. Most companies that sign up for this will have been in business for a few years to 30+ years I would say. They've had plenty of opportunity to get themselves a website, and they haven't. I don't think it's lost business, as I don't think it ever existed. I think that instead people who sign up to this down the line will probably look for those people/businesses that target the startup (in a starting to get a website sense) market and will say "Well I've had this site from the GIBO scheme and I'm looking to add some more information on it. Can you help?". If anything it should drive the industry, and I'll be saying as much as soon as I get my blog post together :p

We'll certainly be directing people who we believe can benefit from this to the GIBO website.

Again, kudos to you guys at Blacknight. This is brilliant in my opinion!
 

mneylon

Administrator
Staff member
Thanks for the positive feedback and please share the link to the blog post when you write it :)
 

Byron

New Member
Great job!

As some one who deals a lot with start ups I doubt my market will drop, those who want to spend will spend to avoid paperwork, no matter how light. And even the large number who will hopefully avail of this scheme will eventually need a point where professionals need to step in!
 

link8r

New Member
That's a really great result!

@BK - is there anything we can do to help more pro-actively? Please feel free to DM me or IM me or e-mail me :)
 

jmcc

Active Member
It is an interesting idea but I don't think that CSO's stats are correct (apparently just a survey of SMEs rather than any real web analysis) and I am somewhat cynical about Google's research. (I don't regard their people as being expert on ccTLD search because the core of their algorithm is based on crawling links and most new websites do not have inbound links.) The Irish webscape is somewhat healthier than others based on the research I've been doing over the past month or so. (Ran a websurvey on about 400K .co websites and 54% were parked with PPC advertising and approximately 15% were active/unclassified.)

The promotion will result in a lot more SMEs getting online and with the recession and people losing their jobs, it is well timed. Not all these new sites will convert to full e-commerce sites but some will and more than a few will evolve beyond cookiecutter websites. It might be the boost the Irish webscape needs.

Regards...jmcc
 

Byron

New Member
The promotion will result in a lot more SMEs getting online and with the recession and people losing their jobs, it is well timed. Not all these new sites will convert to full e-commerce sites but some will and more than a few will evolve beyond cookiecutter websites. It might be the boost the Irish webscape needs.

Totally agree with you on this, and I would imagine just like eircom.net webspace, people will eventually want to move forward.
 

mneylon

Administrator
Staff member
Totally agree with you on this, and I would imagine just like eircom.net webspace, people will eventually want to move forward.
Well it's going to be a lot easier to upgrade from the basic setup to a full solution ..
 

jmcc

Active Member
Totally agree with you on this, and I would imagine just like eircom.net webspace, people will eventually want to move forward.
The important thing will be to get them using their own domain branded mail on their sites. The use of ISP webspace has fallen dramatically in the last few years and apart from Digiweb, the ISPs really don't have much of a share in the Irish webhosting market. I think I saw a few redirects to Irish ISP account webspace in the May Irish website survey but they are rare.

Regards...jmcc
 

link8r

New Member
Just a thought I've been having - how many of these businesses that make up the 40% are active -v- say like IT Contractors (individuals on contract, typically high-end). I have about 20 friends who are all IT/Web contractors and none of them have a website (and could build their own). Just wondering what the mix is.
 

mneylon

Administrator
Staff member
Just a thought I've been having - how many of these businesses that make up the 40% are active -v- say like IT Contractors (individuals on contract, typically high-end). I have about 20 friends who are all IT/Web contractors and none of them have a website (and could build their own). Just wondering what the mix is.
I've never been 100% confident that the figures were that accurate, but they're the only ones we have ..
 

link8r

New Member
I've never been 100% confident that the figures were that accurate, but they're the only ones we have ..

There's definitely a lot H&S consultants without sites. I recently found a very high-end (read:cost) web design agency with no website (honestly)
 

mneylon

Administrator
Staff member
There's definitely a lot H&S consultants without sites. I recently found a very high-end (read:cost) web design agency with no website (honestly)
Well I wouldn't get too hung up on a specific sector ..
I know that a we (Blacknight) have multiple businesses registered, but I'm not sure if the CRO stats account for that ..
 
In a way Im not surprised % of agencies dont have sites. When I worked in one of Ireland largest advertising agencies (many many moons ago) they used a 3rd party marketing company to manage their brand image, marketing etc etc. The scenario of the proverbial builder who has to get a guy in to build his extension is common in the online advertising and marketing space it seems.
 

link8r

New Member
Certainly highlights an area that the Irish Government could look into - given our want-to-be-seen as the Internet Capital of Europe / Liffey Valley idea - to collect those stats
 

jmcc

Active Member
Well I wouldn't get too hung up on a specific sector ..
I know that a we (Blacknight) have multiple businesses registered, but I'm not sure if the CRO stats account for that ..
The details on what they did were fairly hazy. It seems to have been either a telephone survey of SMEs or a paper survey of SMEs and it may have completely ignored Sole Traders. The web is a great force multiplier for Sole Traders as they can compete with larger operations if they have some ability and expertise.

Regards...jmcc
 

jmcc

Active Member
Certainly highlights an area that the Irish Government could look into - given our want-to-be-seen as the Internet Capital of Europe / Liffey Valley idea - to collect those stats
Well this is what the Irish webscape looks like in May 2011.

Active/unclassified: 42.11%
Brand Protection Registrations: 2.22%
In Page Redirects: 1.84%
External TLD Redirects: 3.17%
Forbidden/Not Found: 1.14%
Government/Registry: 0.25%
Holding Pages: 11.81%
Internal Site Redirects: 3.61%
Exact Match Redirect to other TLD: 2.18%
Duplicate Content Networks: 0.56%
PPC Parking: 10.19%
Redirects (unclassified): 0.34%
For Sale: 0.00%
Site Unavailable: 0.22%
Problem sites: 0.01%
Redirect to other site in same TLD: 4.49%
No Website: 15.86%

Regards...jmcc
 

link8r

New Member
Thanks JMCC - beautiful stats to behild.

Can you tell me - are these total domains in Ireland, are these new domains registered, are these .IE or all?
 
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