While we are all thinking about how internet has taken over and how we should adjust  to that, we forget about the traditional mediums, such as newspapers.

Thousands of people have gone over to the “e”-side for their daily news and it has become part of their daily routine. It’s just so much easier to turn on the computer, rather than going out to buy the newspaper.

For more on this topic, read What Does the Future Hold for Newspapers?

The movie The Cove has made waves as it reveals the slaughter of up to 20,000 dolphins per year in Japan. The meat sold, are sometimes labelled as whale meat. The purpose of the movie is to bring to light what has been in the dark for far too long.

The aftermath of the movie is even more shocking. I am sure that many have heard of the movie (like myself) and would like to partake in some way but does not know where to start or have the time to know where to begin.

The power of Twitter is amazing. I have Tweetdeck open on my desktop daily and the ‘pop-up’ updates are seen but hardly noticed. Going through the tweets of the last hour I saw that a DJ that I follow on Twitter was going on about the movie, he had also tweeted a site where one can go and sign the petition, online. That was amazing I thought. It takes minutes to do and you can send the link to friends that you know will feel the same and so the message is spread.

It is so amazing how one can now communicate about anything; you don’t even need to watch the movie to know that what is happening should be stopped. To do something about it or to put your name on the petition (click here)

If you’re reading this blog, you probably realise how important it is to use the internet as a way of marketing, advertising, communicating, etc.

It is even more important when trying to establish relationships between the organisation and its clients and customers. People talk, but more lately, they would rather express their thoughts and concerns on the internet, than personally. By doing this, they reach a much bigger audience and can thus make a bigger impact, leading to bigger problems for your company.

A Kenyan newspaper, The Standard, wrote:

“With growth of technology, referrals have gone a notch up. Consumers can access weblogs and online social networks to rant and rave about bad experiences with products or services.

Disgruntled employees can use Internet platform to take a shot at their employers without fear of reprisal, while critics are no longer worried about censorship, all of which should be of concern to any brand manager.”

Together with relationship management, the internet can also be used as a means of brand and reputation management. The Standard quotes Mr. Japie Swanepoel of Interactive Concepts in South Africa, saying:

"One dissatisfied customer can wreck havoc on a brand’s image when they talk of their frustrations with a product and other consumers read and comment on the negative remarks made.Online reputation management is key and marketers should be able to leverage on the positive comments made by consumers to counter negative remarks."

But there is light at the end of the tunnel! As Mr Tony Karanja, managing director of Infinitive Communications (Kenya) says, there are tools that can be used to manage bad publicity that may come from blogs and social networks, though Kenyan companies rarely use them.

The article continues saying that there are still space for growth, as there are 3.6 million Internet users in Kenya. This just shows that not all countries have gone over to the “e-side”.

The Apple brand, and no not the one that keeps the doctor away, is one if the ‘must-have’ items for a regular computer user.  These days anything that has an ‘i’ before its name is a must have for all, even those that are not even old enough to understand the concept.

One of the things on the lips of all the ‘geeks’  is the Ipad, set to be released internationally on the 3rd of April 2010 and it’s a rather anticipated release.  Pre-ordering can be done at Apple’s online store as of the 12 March 2010.

Though this is all fine and dandy, a few weeks ago Apple had announced that they have discovered that a few of their supplier factories have been using child labour in the production of the ipod, iphone and the mac’s, along with some other administrative  problems.

The PR in me says that it is a good move to have exposed the situation before the media made a huge story thing of it and it had a negative effect of the company.  It shows that people can trust the brand to keep them up to date and that they are transparent even with the bad stuff.

The sceptic in me however says that there is something not all that above board with the whole story.  Surely Apple had to have done their homework, I am sure that this is not the first time that the factory has done this.  Apple fans/supporters say that this is not at all the fault of Apple, this is the way that things are done in Asia and does not in anyway relate to the values of the company.  So okay, give the company its due, it did not know what was going on, but in the state that the economy was and is recovering from, saving a few thousand on production would make things a little easier. 

This really should have ones mind wonder with regards to the production of all the Apple products, including the soon to be released iPad.  Perhaps they are innocent in this whole ordeal but there is no real way of knowing for sure. We need to keep our eyes glued on Apple as what they are going to do now is not only important for their reputation but important for the problem as a whole

People in the country’s 60 largest cities spend 70% of their leisure time online.

Read the full article on McKinsey Quarterly.

The internet, as we all know, has a lot of advantages for any business. But let’s think about the internet as a human being; does it still have that many advantages?

• PRO 1: The internet discriminates against no one. If you want to comment on something and give your opinion, they do not ask you to give your age, gender, race, etc. so there can be no discrimination against you because of something you said.
• PRO 2: Because of the fact that there is no place for discrimination on the internet, stereotypes are also something not found often. For example, if you say something, no one can reply with a “you just say that because you are a guy”.
• PRO 3: The internet has personality. Whether you are a sophisticated professional, or a freelance “surfer dude”, there is a place for you on the internet. Blogs is a good example of this as you can find many styles of writing to fit your personality, thus improving the “conversation” between you and the article or blog on the internet.
• CON 1: Without a profile, you can become anyone. Many people find the need to reveal themselves for someone they are not, so that they can mislead people. For example, you can be an old man from the USA and create a profile on Facebook or any other internet platform as a 18 year old hunk from Hawaii. The sad thing is that people really do this with no consent.
• CON 2: The internet only answers questions that are there. Though the internet is a quick way of finding out things, it is not as quick at responding to your personal questions. For example, if you want to know a specific thing about a hotel, there is the option of sending an email to them. However, you don’t receive feedback on that email in an instant. Thus making the internet not as instant as it is portrayed to be.

Therefore it is clear that the internet is a lot more human than you might think…

Compared to countries such as Germany and America, we are rather ‘small’ on the e-commerce side.  Last year alone the e-commerce industry in Germany made 15.5 billion pound translating roughly to 158.72 billion rand (using the latest exchange rate).  Not a bad number I would say.

But all is not lost for our fair country, according to World Wide Worx the number of internet users has grown in 2009 to 5 million users taking the total of internet users to 10% of our population and according to Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx, this number may even increase to 6 million by the end of 2010, and with the number of internet banking customers increasing it is just a matter of time before they realise that there is so many other things that they can do on the internet.

Though the stats looks good, I had an interesting conversation with a colleague on the internet as a whole, and what he said made sense and is food for thought.  He said that in South Africa the biggest problem is that people find it hard to part with their credit card details and those that do not have are too afraid to get one, though if you look at the LSM’s in SA the number of homes that have the ‘extra’ bit to spend is rather in the minority

So, when you look at the situation from both sides, it looks rather bleak for SA and the e-commerce market unless, we able to win their trust but how we will do that, we leave for another blog.