Almost a month after the closure of news portal Woza, co-founder Kevin Davie says he still has confidence in the product.
His belief in Woza is justified by the most recent quarterly Audit Bureau of Internet Standards (Abis) figures, which show that Woza grew by 35% to 5.5 million impressions in the first quarter, just behind the Independent News and Media`s IOL site at 5.6 million page impressions.
Davie says this growth was achieved with a staff count of around 15 at the time of closure, which he notes is no mean feat when compared with organisations with many more resources.
Despite the portal`s popularity, Woza was forced to close down when the Bytes Technology Group (formerly Usko) withdrew its investor support a month ago. And although Davie is reluctant to write it off, he says the site "remains on ice". "We still have the equipment and the office space."
Davie says 12 possible investors have approached him, although most of these possibilities have already been exhausted and now only two remain.
"But I am still hopeful. It was always clear that there were going to be failures, but market sentiment remains very bad."
Commenting on details of the required investment, he says: "The figures are meaningless." What Woza requires, he says, is a lot less than what its competitors require.
While Woza remains on ice, its readership is still largely active through e-mail and the message board on the site. If Woza should resume tomorrow, it should not be too hard to regain its original readership, says Davie. He estimates that most readers would return within three to six months.
As to new ventures, Davie says he has been approached by a number of organisations but has not made any firm plans. But, says Davie, it would be much harder and more expensive to embark on a similar venture today. "The space is already colonised."
He notes that companies such as Woza and Moneyweb got in early and benefited from it. "We probably spent no more than R30 000 on advertising over the years. You couldn`t get away with that today," he says. "It is incredibly depressing."
Davie does believe there is a future for niche Web-publishing. "However, the consumer space is really hard." Woza generated a large portion of its revenue from advertising and Davie says this industry still has to mature. "Online advertising is still going to happen."
He says online advertising is too hard to monitor and doesn`t give agencies the returns they need. This will change, he says, with the growth in specialised agencies that monitor traffic and click-throughs.
Davie believes the state of online publishing is worse in SA than in countries such as the US. "We ape the Nasdaq, while in fact we are almost three years behind."
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