Initiative aims to digitally transform SMEs

As the nation counts down the days to Alert Level 2, the need for small and medium businesses to be able to meet their customers online intensifies.

The required digital revolution is especially understood and promioted by SME ecommerce website agency Zeald, which has offered to build 500 free websites for Kiwi businesses that need help. The only cost to businesses in the first 12 months is a two percent success fee on website sales.

To-date, all 500 businesses have taken up the opportunity, but David Kelly (pictured), founder and chairman of Zeald, says this is only the start. “To put it simply, without digital transformation, many SME businesses have little chance of surviving the economic impacts of Covid-19.

“For many small businesses, this sort of change can be daunting. But business owners need to reimagine what their businesses could look like if they transformed digitally, and we want to support them through that transition,” he says. 

Kelly says the key to getting businesses operating in Alert Level 3, 2 and beyond, is to remove the barriers to embracing ecommerce.

“Every business that can be selling online, needs to be selling online. We need to de-risk the process of getting them there, by removing the financial hurdles. To get the ball rolling we announced an initiative to build an initial batch of 500 free websites, excluding transaction fees, for SMEs who wouldn’t otherwise have been able to afford the setup and hosting costs involved in the first 12 months.” 

The swift uptake of the 500 websites shows the intense need for digital transformation and support in the SME community. “However, this is just the beginning – tens of thousands of businesses need to get online if we are to achieve digital revolution,” says Kelly. 

“The enormity of the task ahead, for all of New Zealand, is not lost on us. Now is the time to act. Zeald encourages everyone who can be part of the digital revolution to help get the country moving again, to step up and contribute.”

For more information, visit – zeald.com/500-free-websites