Monday 1 October 2012

STUDY CASE 1 - INTERACTIVE SESSION: ORGANIZATIONS

ROCKETTHEME : THRIVING ON THE WEB

 

              When it comes to doing global digital business, RocketTheme is a prime example. RocketTheme sells digital products in the form of templates, and extensions that are used with the open source content management system (CMS) Joomla. The Joomla CMS allows anyone with at least a limited knowledge  of Web site construction or internet technologies to start a Web site. Joomla essentially puts advanced web technology at the fingertips of "newbies." Current estimates suggest that Joomla is being used on 1.5 to 2 million Web sites globally.
         Andy Miller, a former member tthe core  developer group of the award-winning Joomla CMS,  started  the RocketTheme templates club with goal of making professional-looking Web sites  available  to the average internet user. Competition in the industry is fierce. However, RocketTheme Attempts to differentiate itself from other templates clubs through originality, a user-oriented focus, and flexibility of design. Currently, it is branching out into other different CMS markets, providing templates for other open source CMS solutions, such as Drupal, WordPress, and phpBB3.
        RocketTheme sells its products directly to its customers through a membership system.Growth of the club is mainly organic. For each type of membership, RocktTheme  charges a different fee. Members are defferentiated by the whether  they are light or heavy users (e.g., regular members vs developer members), which is visible through the pricing schedule. Marketing efforts ate targeted at the online community. to attract new customers, RocketTheme uses an affiliate system and makes use of Google ads.
        The RocketTheme templates club was launched in 2006 and has experienced exponential growth. According to Miller, " I started the rocketTheme Template club  with a whopping three templates in the inventory. Membership has a steadily grown since the time probably due to the increase in number of available templates. It's been a relatively consistent ride and i think a huge part of that is just due to how great Joomla is and how it's popularity has risen.Sure, some templates are more popular than others that is just the way these things work. I try to ensure that we provide a very well-rounded selection of designs, not just the same old "business" templates every month.
          How did the club get its start? Miller syas, " I have been involved in Web deveopment since my days in university, back in the early 90s, when hypertext was a new concept and gopher was the most common method of sharing information across networks. I was a computer enginerring major and quickly got caught up in the excitement around the internet. Anyway, long story short, I've been doing web development ever since ."
          RocketTheme is privately owned ; Miller is the sole partner of the RocketTheme Limited Liability Corporation (LCL). As such, he is also the day-to-day operational manager. Miller focuses on energizing his staff and creating a common goal for his employees- success of the RocketTheme template club. The organization can be  characterized as flat and non-bureaucratic. It has a full-time staff of 12 and has 14 support staff. The support staff consists mainly of subcontractors and several volunteers. New staff are attracted straight from the RocketTheme community or from online advertisement. Thus, the organization retain specialist from different parts of the world, highly skilled in their respective fields.
         RocketTheme Presently has a user base of well over 40,000 regiistered members, It stand out because of its international orientation  and collaboration. The team responsible for support and development of new templates and extensions is an international team, consisting of members from around the globe- the United States, England, Italy, Holland, Germany, India, Canada, Poland, Greece, and Japan - from different  background and different age groups. All communication and information exchange between the employess of RocketTheme and between RocketTheme and its customers is preformed using the electronic superhighway. RocketTheme attractsits customers from all over the globe; like its team, its customers come from different backgrounds, different age groups, and different countries. The target group of customers is, in essence, anyone who wishes to run a  web site using Joomla CMS.
        RocketTheme focuses mainly on development of templates for the different content management systems ti which it caters. Other services provided are mainly in the area of support. Customer support is provided through an online forum in which RocketTheme club members can post their template and extension-related questions and general problems with Joomla. The online community at RocketTheme.com and its collaborative atmosphere is representative of open source ideals. It is one of the pillars of RocketTheme's success.


CASE STUDY QUESTIONS :

1. What are RocketTheme's business processes, and what information systems can be used to support these processes ?

      RocketTheme provides digital products in the form of templates and extension that are used with the open source contain management system (CMS) Joomla. The CMS let anyone with at least a limited knowledge of Web Site construction or internet technologies to start a website. Competition in the digital products industry is fierce. However RocketTheme attempts to differentiate itself from other template clubs through originality, a user oriented focus, flexibility of design. In addition, they try to branching out to other CMS markets by providing templates for other open source CMS solutions such as Drupal, Wordpress, and phpBB3. These business processes can be support through Enterprise system, which are systems that expand functional area, focus on the executing business process across the business firm, and involve all levels of management.

2. How can these systems improve RocketTheme's business performance ?
     The enterprise system integrate  business  process in manufacturing and production, finance and accounting, sales and marketing, and human resources into single software system. The defragment information been stored in a single comprehensive data repository where  it can  be used  by many different part of the business.

3. What is RocketTheme's business-critical information system ?


     Communication and information exchange between the employees of RocketTheme, between RocketTheme and its customers which is by using electronic superhighway, and also the customer support area.

4. What information system could possibly improve rocketTheme's business performance ?

      Information system that could improve RocketTheme’s business performance is the intranet and extranets information system. Since there are using electronic superhighway to communicate and as information exchange, the intranet and extranet information becomes the suitable information system to boost their business performance. It is as the alternative tools for increasing and expediting the flow of information within the firms (intranets) and with customers and suppliers (extranets). Through extranets information system, customers support system  will be more systematic, fast and informative. The company can broadcast information related to their company, about their products, and as well about events that their organized. They also can post about video tutorial on how to use their product, latest product and customers can give their feedbacks and responses, which is crucial as the I.T. illiteracy becomes their major threat.




     


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