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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