New year, new website, new focus

We’ve launched a new website and have some exciting plans for 2018 — including an upcoming printed directory, a new product for our members and new tools to help businesses in Zambia market themselves effectively

New year 🎉

2017 was a great year for thebestofzambia.com and now that 2018 is here and we’re recommitting to our three fold mission:

1. Empower Zambian businesses to market themselves effectively online2. Provide people with useful information about businesses in Zambia3. Share our beloved country and continent with the world

The new thebestofzambia.com

New site 💅

We’ve just launched a design refresh to thebestofzambia.com

Mobile-firstIn the past year mobile usage on thebestofzambia.com has crossed the 50% mark. That’s exciting but presents some design challenges: mobile users are generally on lower powered devices, slower internet connections, have less visual space and most importantly are very mindful of data consumption. The new site gives us a great foundation for our design focus for 2018: treat mobile users as first class citizens and shift our emphasis towards creating great mobile-first experiences that progressively enhance for tablet and desktop users.
Powerful instant searchAlso with the new site comes a new instant as-you-type search. It has a few features like spelling mistake tolerance and advanced filtering system that make it easier and faster for people to find the products and services they are looking for. Try it out on our homepage https://thebestofzambia.com.
HTTPSTaking advantage of https ensures our site is more secure, ranks better on search engines and has the added benefit of being slightly faster. It also paves the way for authentication based features we have planned such as reviews, ecommerce and messaging.

New platform ⚡️

A tightly coupled WordPress backend and frontend has served us well for the last 5 years but after re-evaluating our requirements and looking at the direction of the industry we decided a custom built Content Management System (CMS) for our backend and a React JS based frontend would better serve our needs and plans for the future.

That’s a lot of gobbledygook if you’re not technical, but it basically means that we can now produce more powerful, dynamic, app-like website experiences faster.

Below is our new tech stack if you’re interested:

Custom Headless CMSBuilt with React (Javascript library built by Facebook), Next.js (framework for server-rendered React apps) and hosted on Zeit’s Now.
Internal APIOur backend, frontend and database communicate with each other through a GraphQL (a query language built by Facebook) powered API hosted with Graphcool.
FrontendBuilt with React, Next.js, Algolia (search platform), Cloudinary (image CDN) and hosted on Zeit’s Now.

Renewed focus 🎯

We’ve renewed our focus to provide systems and tools that solve the specific marketing challenges faced by businesses in Zambia. We want to establish thebestofzambia.com as the most cost effective result driven platform to market a business in Zambia. We’re excited to announce some of the new features we have in store for 2018.

Printed directory 📚

We’re big proponents of the web so it might be surprising to see us move back to print. We believe online marketing is an affordable, scalable and far reaching solution but there is definitely still a place for print as a medium.

The 2018 edition of the business directory is scheduled for print and delivery in March 2018. The directory will showcase the business information and contact details of thebestofzambia.com Premium and Enterprise subscribers.

Advertise your business in thebestofzambia.com printed directoryIf you’re a business in Zambia and would like to feature in the first edition of our printed directory, you will need to subscribe by 1 Feb 2018 to secure your place. Learn more here: https://thebestofzambia.com/advertise

If you’re a paying member of thebestofzambia.com don’t worry, you’re already in!

Standalone websites 🖥

Do you have a website? Is it up to date? How easy is it to change its content? What did it cost? Does it show up in Google search? Is it responsive? If you don’t have a website, do you want one?

What if, by simply subscribing to a premium listing on thebestofzambia.com, we also created you a free standalone website on your own custom web domain.

A responsive website design branded for your business with SEO best practises applied so you rank well in Google search.
Your business information and contact details automatically kept in sync with your thebestofzambia.com listing so your critical information never gets out of date.

Sound good? Stay tuned for upcoming announcements of the new standalone website product. Our initial plan is to make this free for current subscribers and a low annual cost for new subscribers.

Marketing tools for businesses 🛠

Marketing can be a strain on business resources, you need time, staff with specific skills and more often than not, money.

In 2018 we will be providing helpful systems and tools to ease the marketing burden for businesses. These tools will make it simpler for businesses to produce higher quality content in less time.

Marketing resources and guides specific to the needs of businesses in emerging markets like Zambia
Free professional branded marketing material and templates ready for you to share on your own social media channels
PDF company profiles templates ready for you to print and share with your business contacts
Free Facebook profile picture and banner templates for your business
And much more

Market your Zambian business better today

If you’re a business in Zambia, we can help you market your business more effectively. We already have a strong platform with many useful features and in 2018 many new additions will be added to further establish thebestofzambia.com as the most cost effective result driven platform to market a business in Zambia.

Get started today by talking to us to see how we can help your business. Start a conversation with us here: https://thebestofzambia.com/advertise/

New year, new website, new focus