Janette Toral
Digital Filipino

TODAY is the first day of the DigitalFilipino E-Commerce Summit. I must admit that I have a lot of fear with this event.

This includes whether all the members will be there to embrace the knowledge that their peers will be sharing.

What further scared me is whether my vision of transforming the DigitalFilipino community into a TED.com sort of group is possible or not. I guess, if you are going to dream of something, it might as well be big.

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This transition is guided by at least two main ideas.

The first one is to become the best. When there is a growing number of players trying to offer more than what you have, the best way to counter it is to take things to the next level by banking on your existing assets – which, in my case, is the quality of the membership roster.

I guess the idea there is that if people will decide in joining the community, I hope that in their search of the best, your brand will be the first to come in their mind and be endorsed by those who are in the know.

Offer an alternative and hope that what you have to offer will outweigh whatever your competition has to give.

Why is being the best important? Because in crises, when people are looking for solutions, they will not have time to scout around and get opinions but immediately want to get the best resource that is within their budget. I do hope that our solution will appeal to small and medium enterprises and become the kind of group that people will aspire to become part of and invest in for their personal development.

The second one is to develop a culture that people can identify with. Right from the start, I never used hype in promoting our community and neither promised riches nor greatness, as such is totally dependent on the person. In our transition, my focus is on the membership roster. Bring out the best in them by letting them share their experience and foster learning from one another.

In the process, I hope that the relationship among members will further strengthen and result in collaborative partnerships.

There are already documented relationships in the group, whether business or personal, that have prospered.

There are a lot more considerations in mind when planning this transition. I’m sure there will be a lot of failures but these will allow us to learn and further improve.

And so the journey begins.

(http://digitalfilipino.com)