Girls in ICT Livestreaming

Hello Alswell

Alswell is the latest search assistant from nCodedev Labs for GetFeatured.biz a classified which was released in 2011. It allows you to search for Jobs, Accommodations, Autos, Businesses, Deals and more directly from any of the available listings on GetFeatured.biz without opening the browser. It also comes with a MapMode feature which allows viewers to see listings on a Google map.  

Alswell is currently in Beta but can allow you to setup Alerts to be delivered via IM. SMS and Email alert setup will be added in the very near future, probably before it is fully launched. 

It is very easy to have Allswell send you a friend request, just visit Alswell’s registration page and click on the Register New Account tab. Enter your email address and Alswell will send you a friend request on gtalk within seconds, accept it and start searching GetFeatured’s awesome directory. 

To search for Jobs for instance, you have to use the following syntax without the quotes: “FIND JOBS, JOB TITLE HERE, LOCATION <OPTIONAL>”

Alswell wants to find and fix all her bugs so go ahead and send her a friend request on gtalk for an interesting classified search experience. Please make sure to hit the feedback button on GetFeatured.biz to send issues on Alswell.

Making money from your made in Africa Mobile Apps

One main challenge facing some of Africa’s mobile developers is how to make money from their solutions. Mobile Apps and solutions are quite new here (because smart phones until recently were not easy to come by) and there is no clear way of making monies from it yet.

You could try the following options to make some money from your mobile apps; 

1. Integrate Ads into your application
2. Partner or Sell the the app to a big company who needs it
3. Charge Premium SMS
4. Sell the App to users

I will briefly take each one after the other. 

Integrate Adverts into your mobile application. There are many mobile advertising platforms which works well with publishers to distribute their adverts. Some of these mobile advertising networks include but not limited to:

1. AdMob - By Google for most mobile platforms. iOS,Android, Mobile Web 

2. Airpush - For Android Publishers

3. smaato - For iOS, Android, Windows Phone 7, Symbian, Blackberry and Bada

The above mobile ad networks provide easy to follow instructions on how to create an account and publish their adverts on your apps. 

You can make some decent monies by integrating adverts into both native and mobile web application. To make money, your application has to be engaging to ensure users keep going back to using it. A less appealing and less useful app will be uninstalled or used less frequently meaning your will see less clicks on the ads you will be publishing. You can check out this article on how to create engaging mobile apps and solutions. 

Partner or Sell the app to a big company who needs it. So you have a very good app but stuck with how to monetize it, depending on the purpose of your application, you can sell it to a Mobile Content provider or directly to the telcos. This is not always a sure bet but if it is an app or solution which will make them stand out and provide very unique services to their customers they are likely to consider it. 

Some of the unique services which institutions have partnered or bought outright in the past include some of the following:

1. Chat messaging services similar to WhatsApp and GroupMe

2. Media Streaming and Content Stores

3. Text to Email services

4. A mobile application to read news from a news agency’s website

Charge Premium SMS. You can integrate premium SMS charges into your native mobile application. You can let users download the application for free and have the application send SMS to a short code which is at a tariff to unlock certain information or features in the app. 

You must however have a relationship or be in partnership with a telco to use this feature, meaning you will definitely have to split revenue made on the short code with the them. You can either be in partnership with the telco or a Mobile Content company like Mobile Content.Com if in Ghana :)

This model works very well if your application is region specific and has high traffic. The diagram below attempts to explain this model. 

The Ghanaian Tech Space in 2012: What I expect

1. I wish Ghana catches up with the rest of the tech world. It is currently steadily growing in the telecommunication space and I wish it gets better with more people taking interest in the space. The government will have to play a very vital role here to make things grow further. 
2. We will need easy access to the many innovative products produced by tech community. This will mean availability of hi speed internet, improved forms of ecommerce, APIs to the many mobile payment solutions by the telcos out there.
3. This one will definitely happen: Ghanaian startups with business cases as opposed to just an idea which birthes websites and mobile apps.  
4. Expect more moves on mobile web and native apps, especially on android. rLG Communications Ltd has started making android phones for the local market which gives local mobile developers the opportunity to have their apps pre-installed before they are sold to the market. This is very good because it becomes very relevant to encourage the Ghanaian developer to take on android. Who knows rLG will start assembling iPhones in Ghana soon. Good job!!!
5. More Election related websites and apps, we need them. Yes its 2012 and it’s the time to rehire or fire the country’s CEO. This is a very big opportunity for the tech community to start implementing all their ideas related to election monitoring.  I will use this opportunity to introduce to you the hashtag for the Ghana elections -> #Ghanadecides or #ghdecides on twitter and G+. Talking of great ideas for the election, there’s already an app out there called BallotBank, a mobile web app which works on the browser of the phone.
6. I see one or two more Tech Hubs / Spaces springing up before the year ends.  It will be great to have the tech community have a space(s) they can be comfortable to nurture their entrepreneurial skills. Once we have this in place, Africa should be ready for us.