Sensis Jettisons Trading Post.
Posted on June 18th, 2007 by Simon ChenIt’s a pity that Sensis have put The Trading Post on the block.
Distribution is down by an alleged 25% from last year and revenues have fallen 7% in the 6 months to December.
Reports are saying that the A$636 million they paid for it wont be exceeded when a buyer is ultimately found for the asset. There’s good coverage here and here.
It’s a pity. Sensis is getting out of the wrong business. They’ve got the skills and resource (or at least did) to make a go of The Trading Post.
What they don’t have are the skills and talent to be in the search space. They need to accept that fact. And fast.
More importantly, what worries me most is the talent that continues to jump off the Sensis ship. John King, the most senior executive at The Trading Post, recently cleared out his desk.
I for one, would love to know why.
Subscribe to more posts like this
Related Posts:
Add to 
| 
| 
| 
View blog reactions
This entry was posted
on Monday, June 18th, 2007 at 6:02 pm and is filed under Sensis.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
June 19th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
The turnover at Sensis is high, particularly in the online media departments, because online media is ultimately not valued by the business, the people management is appalling, elitism and favouritism is rife, decision-makers are clueless with disastrous results (see: the Citysearch redesign), layers of beaurocracy stunt innovation, and poor imitation garners ‘talent’ promotion. At least, that’s why I left.
June 19th, 2007 at 9:19 pm
Katie, thanks for the comment. Takes courage to be honest. To me, Sensis is one of those businesses with huge potential, has (or had) the ability to attract good talent and more importantly, had the potential to leverage the 440,000 odd SME customers that is has had a stronghold over for years but failed to execute on many fronts. As an outsider looking in - the empire building, the tall poppy syndrome (which is really one of the Australian workplaces worst traits) and the lack of leadership is one of the reasons that it is dumping The Trading Post. There will be more to come. And the bragging rights to revenue increases for the business as a whole will soon come under enormous pressure.
July 10th, 2007 at 9:53 pm
This story is actually not true and originated from The Age. Fairfax was supposedly one of potential buyers of trading post and this was the same case when Lonely Planet was on the ‘chopping block’ two months ago.
Sensis have investing heavily in integrating the trading post business and transforming the online business.
July 10th, 2007 at 10:01 pm
Bill, welcome to the conversation. For some strange reason, a lot of people are asking me about Sensis at the moment. I can only assume by your comment that you work for Sensis. Good for you. But my curiosity is still there and the questions remains - Is the Trading Post for sale or not? Is revenue down (or not)? Is distribution down (or not)?