The team at WeatherWatch.co.nz wraps up 2014 with record high ratings but it’s been a tough year to do business, but there are signs 2015 will be more positive…and in 2015 WeatherWatch turns ten years old!

OUR 2014 NUMBERS:
Ratings-wise WeatherWatch.co.nz has had over 4 million page views and 2 million sessions on our website this year.  Our website has well over half a million unique visitors.  Meanwhile, our free app, has had over 50,000 downloads since we launched it 18 months ago…and very few complaints about it! (still has 4 star ratings)

These are big numbers for our small company – and we are immensly proud of growing these numbers despite a tough year operating under exisiting New Zealand laws.

Despite a deregulated weather market the government now has two forecasters – these days both MetService and NIWA extend well beyond their core businesses to provide commercial services that strictly limit growth in the private weather market (like the 90s when Telecom had control of the phone networks despite competition being allowed).  

However both the public and private sectors continue to use WeatherWatch.co.nz – our numbers are actually up despite this pressure from government competitors directly to our clients to stop using us.

We’re now making positive inroads into changing the way the NZ Govt passes on weather data, with the help of ministers, corporations and the public who are now behind us.

OUR TEAM:
Our team has expanded this year, with Drew Chappell taking over as head of our news division. Drew has an extensive news background, reporting and managing the newsroom at CountryTV prior.   Drew has lifted our news content this year and as a result WeatherWatch.co.nz has a ‘stronger than ever’ focus on Pacific-wide stories and weather news from around Australia and New Zealand.

In 2015 Drew will work to grow more local news content in New Zealand too – as we know we’ve slipped a bit in this area over the past 12 months.

WeatherWatch.co.nz maintains two full time forecasters based in New Zealand, Aaron Wilkinson in the South Island and Philip Duncan in the North Island – the two cover all of the country with additional forecasting support/data from meteorologists in New Zealand at Weathermap and from Weatherzone in Sydney.

We’ve also hired help in the digital world – with weekly work now being undertaken to remove bugs, improve the speed of our site and apps and to be quicker at responding to faults on our website.   

This digital investment means we are now seen as the forecasting website that is less likely to fall over during a major storm…we are reliable.

We’ve also hired graphics design help, to improve how we commnuicate messages to the public.

None of this is cheap but we believe the investment is important if we are to continue in the market.

SUPPORT NETWORK:

We’re supported by both private and public businesses across New Zealand, Australia and the world – and we can’t thank them enough, because without their support we wouldn’t continue with this website. 

– Auckland Civil Defence, for the 5th year running, trust our advice alongside MetService during servere weather events.
– Fonterra, for the 5th year running, trust our week by week, region by region monthly rain reports.
– NZ Herald, for the 5th year running, use us for muitple weekly videos across the country.
– The Radio Network – for the 9th year running – uses WeatherWatch.co.nz for weather interviews and news updates across their nationwide network
– Webdrive – kindly host our website as they love what we do. 
– Weathermap – fantastic NZ weather website and they have backed us from day one by supplying us with raw data for markets we cannot afford to forecast for.  They also supply us with rain, wind, swell maps. A great team.
– Weatherzone – The more the NZ Govt forecasters push us away the more we’re doing business with international forecasters (who do an exceptional job).  Weatherzone in Sydney has a great team – and have extended a big hand of support to WeatherWatch this year.  We thank them and look forward to working closer in 2015 to improve weather services to the public here in New Zealand.

OUR WEBSITE LOSES MONEY – WE DO IT FOR LOVE:

We don’t claim to be the biggest and best – but we do proudly put New Zealanders first and profits second – it’s why we work so well with the public and private sectors.  Our website actually makes a small yearly loss – our profits are made outside of this site and we 100% offer this service because we think NZ lacks variety with weather information.

We couldn’t do ANY of this without the support of YOU – our readers/viewers who put faith and trust into our hard work – it’s your daily views that make our numbers high enough for us to show we’re credible – it’s really as simple as that.   

From all of us – thank you for supporting us all year round, so that we can support you when you need us most.

Have a wonderful, safe, fun, happy, exciting, summer!

– From all of us at WeatherWatch.co.nz