Quirk Education’s new digital marketing course, Applying Social Media to Business Challenges, kicks off on 28 June.

The content for the 5-week online course is largely drawn from Quirk’s own recent case studies, including campaigns that Quirk eMarketing has run for brands such as Mweb, Sun International, SA Tourism and Neotel.

Amongst other things, the course will look at:

• the challenges and opportunities in the social media landscape
• using platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and blogs
• building communities around brands or topics
• how businesses can take a strategic approach to social media
• how to run integrated campaigns using both online and offline elements
• best practice for social media campaigns

This is not a basic introductory course, but rather an in-depth look at practical application.

“In the past year we’ve had amazing success with Social Media implementation for some of our big clients and they’ve reaped huge rewards as a result,” says Lyndi Lawson, Minister of Education at Quirk Education. “It’s on this experience that we’ve based the content for the course.”

Places are limited, and registrations close on 25 June. The cost of the course is R5,900 (including VAT), and there is a 10% discount on group registrations of three or more, and a 20% discount for OPA members.

Visit the Quirk Education site to register.

Greg Montjoie, General Manager of Hosting Solutions at internet service provider Internet Solutions suggests that companies are not yet grasping the full benefits offered by cloud computing. Despite the fact that there has been a definite shift towards conducting business in the cloud, he feels that most businesses do not understand the true benefits of cloud computing, and are instead just “computing in the cloud”.

Montjoie makes the distinction between accessing specific applications via the internet to perform computing tasks (computing in the cloud), and a setup that allows for seamless maintenance, migration and optimisation of hardware, regardless of geographic location (true cloud computing).

True cloud computing allows companies to make the best use of their infrastructure at all times, and to ensure that resources are allocated to business priorities. Such a system also has built-in redundancy – if a specific server is down or not running at optimal efficiency, processes can be diverted to another server without the user even noticing. Other key benefits mentioned by Montjoie include agility, reliability, performance and interoperability.

He cites the example of companies using cloud computing to ensure more efficient utilisation of their hardware and networks across different timezones. “So when it’s daytime in London, for example, those servers are running at near full capacity, while those in Tokyo are running only the basics.” Likewise when it is evening in London, capacity there will be cut to a minimum while Tokyo’s servers are allowed to run at full steam. “The beauty of cloud computing in this instance is that it is a seamless, automated process that the user is completely unaware of.”

“As with any technology, companies really need to look at the full spectrum of features to ensure they maximise the benefits they derive from changing the way in which they operate,” Montjoie concludes.

FEMTECH is a six-month business support programme aimed at women who own and run technology-enabled businesses.

Participants will

• learn how to determine whether their concept is feasible
• learn how to develop a plan to take their new product or service to market
• get help and support from a business coach
• become part of a peer network of women facing similar challenges and opportunities

The course includes workshops, ongoing personal mentorship and coaching and women-centered peer networking.

To be eligible for the programme, you must be a female business owner with demonstrated entrepreneurial skills, who is currently running a business, preferably one that is technology-enabled. Alternatively, you must have plans to introduce an innovative product or service into an existing business, or to spin out a business from a corporate environment.

You also need to be within travelling distance of Pretoria, and must be able to attend training and mentoring sessions at least once a month between July and October.

Applications close on 31 May 2010. Twenty applicants will be chosen to complete the programme. Visit the FEMTECH website for details of how to apply.

If you missed Net Prophet on 13 May, you can now see all the videos of the day’s sessions on the Net Prophet blog.

1. Vinny Lingham – Building a global business – lessons learnt
   
2. Stefan Magdalinski – Observations from building a technology business in Africa
   
3. Adriaan Pienaar – The WooThemes story
   
4. Stuart Ntlathi – The next generation
   
5. Richard Mulholland – The side-effects of social media
   
6. Patrick Kayton – Shaping the future of internet publishing by shrugging off the past
   
7. Arthur Goldstuck – The Sophisticat, the Elephant, and the Secret of the Digital Native
   

Local ISP RSAWEB today launched True Cloud Servers, a cloud hosting platform that allows users to deploy and provision fully operational servers in just minutes. The first of its kind in South Africa, RSAWEB’s True Cloud Servers offer benefits previously unavailable to businesses hosting locally.

The two main differences between True Cloud Servers and any similar products that are currently available are the speed at which servers can be deployed and provisioned, and the flexibility and scalability of the offering.

These are some of the key benefits of True Cloud Servers:

• The user has complete control, with full administrator access to their server, allowing them to select their choice of operating system, applications and configuration
• Resources can be controlled on a day-to-day basis, as the demands placed on the server change
• New server resources can be allocated on demand to cater for resource-hungry applications or sudden website traffic spikes
• Users pay for only the resources they need – in other words, the resources that are actually provisioned
• Servers can be set up and fully operational within minutes

Flexibility and control
The technology behind True Cloud Servers allows flexible control of server resources through the use of Cloud Nodes. Users can maintain optimal server conditions by adding resources from the Cloud Nodes whenever they lack CPU, memory or other resources. Mark Slingsby, Technical Director of RSAWEB, says, “With the dynamic provisioning of resources, RSAWEB True Cloud Server users never have to worry about scalability in the case of increased traffic demands or traffic spikes. Hosting with True Cloud Servers allows users to instantly react to high demands by adding required resources at the click of a mouse.”

Viability of local cloud hosting
Hosting locally allows users to avoid the data transfer latency that is inevitable when hosting with an internationally based ISP. The recent increase in available bandwidth, the sharp decrease in bandwidth costs and the introduction of affordable uncapped ADSL in particular make local cloud hosting an attractive option for South African businesses.

Available configurations
True Cloud Servers are available in the following configurations, all of which include free setup:
Server 256 (R256 per month, 256MB RAM, 1 vCPU, 10GB Storage)
Server 512 (R395 per month, 512MB RAM, 1 vCPU, 10GB Storage)
Server 1G (R695 per month, 1024MB RAM, 1 vCPU, 20GB Storage)
Server 2G (R995 per month, 2048MB RAM, 2 vCPU, 50GB Storage)
Server 4G (R1495 per month, 4096MB RAM, 4 vCPU, 80GB Storage)

RSAWEB guarantees 99.99% uptime on True Cloud Servers, and will refund users for any downtime experienced.

Free trial
RSAWEB is offering a free trial to anyone who’d like to experiment with True Cloud Servers. This trial is available immediately, and will expire on 30 May 2010. To sign up for the free trial, visit RSAWEB’s website.

The NetWeb business community is hosting a networking event this evening (28 April 2010) at the Southern Sun Hotel in Main Road, Newlands. There will be an hour of presentations on issues facing entrepreneurs, followed by an hour of networking.

Bruce Wade of The Entrepreneur Incubator will talk about becoming a “20-tweener” in order to understand the new rules of business engagement, while Peter Greenwall of Logical Stupidity will present on “Pulling Ideas From Your Aspirations For Financial Gain”. The cost to attend is R70 per person, and snacks will be provided. The event runs from 18h30 until 20h30.

Find out more about the event on the NetWeb site, and book your spot by emailing Pamela Tosh at pamela@pamelatosh.co.za.

We heard about this event via the Cape Town Startup Digest. Join the Startup Digest mailing list to make sure that you don’t miss out on any startup and tech-related events taking place in Cape Town.

Facebook has begun expanding the reach of its “Like” feature a little more, by sending out customised printed “Like” stickers to a certain number of businesses who have existing fan pages on the social network.

These window decals give the company’s Facebook fan page URL, as well as instructions for “liking” the business instantly via SMS. Included with the customised sticker is a letter offering a few tips for having a successful Facebook fan page, as well as a coupon code good for $25 worth of Facebook advertising.

This is a pretty smart and inexpensive way for Facebook to – amongst other things – grow their user base even further by getting other businesses to do their advertising for them, ensure that businesses use Facebook consistently to communicate with their customers, and introduce small businesses to the Facebook advertising platform.

BetTech Gaming, a South Africa-based developer of gaming and betting software, recently secured a multi-million rand investment from 4Di Capital. The first product that BetTech plans to launch to the South African market is their Sports Book package, a fully integrated software platform that includes functionality such as risk management and reporting, event management and marketing, and an affiliate and white label system.

“In my opinion, most of the gaming related software platforms available in South Africa are faced with legacy type issues. They are outdated and are having to regularly redevelop and re-engineer to ensure that they keep abreast of market demand,” says BetTech director Jesse Hemson-Struthers.

BetTech intends to work with its development partners to produce cost-effective and future-proof products that offer flexible and modular betting channels, including web, mobile and call centre. The company’s aim is to use the South African setup as a springboard to expand into other rapidly developing sports betting markets such as India, South America and Asia.

BetTech director Mark Bosman says, “We are delighted to have 4Di Capital on board as our long term partner in this project – not only for their ability to provide a capital investment for our software development plans and operational setup but also because they are able to leverage off of their global network to assist in introducing BetTech Gaming and its products to the broader market. We feel that this is where the real long-term value will be added.”