New Zealand Online Trends

New Zealand Online Trends

E-government initiatives begin to make an impression

Despite facing an independent technical review after delays to its implementation, the Public Access to Legislation (PAL) project, which aims to put all acts of parliament, regulations and bills online, is proceeding apace. An interim site carrying unofficial versions of New Zealand Acts and Statutory Regulations ( http://www.legislation.govt.nz/) has been moving up the Hitwise rankings in recent weeks, rising almost 1,000 places in the overall rankings over the past fortnight.

Also climbing in the Hitwise rankings is the NZ E-government Programme website ( http://www.e-government.govt.nz/ ), which has risen 2,584 places in the overall rankings during the past two weeks. The site provides information on e-government initiatives, including the development of the new govt.nz portal, launched in November 2002, and which was a milestone for the Government's e-government programme. The site also provides details of GoProcure, the proposed whole-of government online requisitioning system, which commenced development in December 2002.

The govt.nz portal ( http://www.govt.nz/ ) was the seventh ranked National government website in May, down one place on the previous two months, demonstrating that it is used as a convenient entry point to New Zealand government services online. The top ranking site in the Government - National category during May was Te Kete Ipurangi - The Online Learning Centre ( http://www.tki.org.nz/ ), the bilingual portal-plus web community from the Ministry of Education that provides material for the education community. The Te Kete Ipurangi site overtook the Inland Revenue ( http://www.ird.govt.nz/ ) and the Immigration Service ( http://www.immigration.govt.nz/), each of which had occupied that top spot in April and March respectively.

Fast mover

This month's report is based on Hitwise data for the week ending 14 June, 2003.

New Zealand National Agricultural Fieldays http://www.fieldays.co.nz/ www.fieldays.co.nz Position last month - 1,601 Position this month - 745 Positions jumped - 856

With the 2003 Fieldays exhibition held at Mystery Creek during 11-14 June, the event's website experienced a huge influx of traffic, proving that the agricultural industry has a significant online presence. Driving this home, the Premier Feature for Fieldays 2003 was "e-farming@fieldays - A Platform for Success", which was designed to demonstrate the advancement of online technology in the primary sector. Furthermore, the top downstream website from http://www.fieldays.co.nz/ is NZ Ecommerce ( http://www.nzecommerce.co.nz/ ), which features a special section on e-farming.

News in brief

News in brief provides a monthly insight into the latest developments in the New Zealand online marketplace.

Real Groovy rankings for retailer

The website of music store Real Groovy ( http://www.realgroovy.co.nz/ ), which operates stores in Queen St, Auckland, and Cuba St, Wellington, closed in on its highest ever ranking last week after two weeks of significant rises. The site reached its highest ever weekly ranking of 73rd amongst all NZ sites in April this year, and for the week ending 14 June it almost reached that high water mark, getting as high as 76th. The store could be attracting online customers thanks to high profile new releases from Radiohead and Led Zeppelin, or it could be due to a promotion offering a free CD with the purchase of any pair of Levi's jeans from the store's clothing section.

Competition heats up amongst snow sites

With winter now officially upon us, the race for top spot in the Sports - Snow Sports category has become heated. Taking over from the previous front-runner, the official Mt Ruapehu website ( http://www.mtruapehu.com/ ), in the latest weekly rankings is Snow.co.nz (www.snow.co.nz http://www.snow.co.nz / ).

The Mt Ruapehu site has also been making significant progress up the rankings, jumping 48 places overall to reach 103rd amongst all NZ sites for the week ending 14 June, and it wrested back first position in the Snow Sports category in the daily rankings for 14 and 15 June. The slightly slower start this year for Mt Ruapehu can be attributed to the late arrival of the ski season in the North Island. Currently, Turoa ski area is expected to open on 20 June, with Whakapapa and Happy Valley following a week later. The Mt Ruapehu site also received a spike in traffic at the end of April, with cheap prices for season passes available for purchase on the website at that time.

Netball NZ scores with England series

The official website of Netball New Zealand ( http://www.netballnz.co.nz/ ) saw an influx of traffic as the Silver Ferns took on the third ranked England team in a three test series between 9 and 13 June. The site rocketed up the rankings, reaching its highest ever ranking of 191st amongst all NZ sites for the week ending 14 June, up 244 places. The site received the bulk of its upstream traffic (almost 50%) from the nzoom (www.nzoom.com http://www.nzoom.com/ ) and nzoom ONE Sport http://www.onesport.nzoom.com/ websites, which both feature a link for match reports on the 3 test series.

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