Hi again,
This task is still open for a task owner. The job of the task owner is to form a team of volunteers ( or snatch them from another village) and together work on this task. The task owner is responsible to communicate the project with the team and our LR in Zambia.
If this sounds OK with you, please contact me directly.
Cheers:
T.J.

This is an outline of the plan for an Internet cafe

Mulenga, it would be great if you could provide us with a bit of an overview on what the market is like in Garden? I have written down some questions which can help us build up a picture and inform our ideas around marketing'

Are there any other internet café's in Garden?
Where is the nearest internet café?
What are other internet cafes like in Lusaka?
What is the intended opening hours of Garden's café?
Is there anything that is "special" or different about the new café? Is there anything that differentiates us from our competition?
Are the fees competitive?
How do other café's market their services? Have you seen any evidence of marketing?
Who are your potential customers? Can you please list them?
How do people in Garden like to receive their information? Are they likely to read an advertisement in a newspaper OR look at a poster in a Tavern or shop? Do people receive pamphlets in their mail boxes?

Any additional info would be great!
Carolyn

Hi Carolyn,

Thank you very much for the questions you have raised.
I will be answering them this Friday when I compile more elaborate answers so that the neighbours can get a clear picture.

Mulenga

Hi Everyone,

Below are the answers to the questions raised by Carolyn.

1]No we do not have any internet cafes.
2]The nearest cafe is about 15 to 20minutes walk from our place though the speed is not so good and it is quite expensive.
3]Internet cafes here in lusaka offer most services done in business centres,such as secretarial,photocopy,scanning etc.
4]The intended openning hours for our cafe is from 10:00hours to 20:00hours.
5]Yes the prices are very competitive.Our location,the speed of our wireless internet and the long openning hours will give us an edge over our competitors.
6]As regards to marketing of the services most of the depends on word of month by a satisified customer and the putting up of posters.Our potential customers are a group of regular internet users I meet with at the various distant cafes and also the few businesses we have here in Garden.With time our greatest customers will be the youths in our community.
7] Posters will be the most effective way by which people here can receive information.
I hope my responses have given us an insight of our community here in Garden.
Please feel free to seek answers to any questions you may have as these will give all us a very good feedback on which to build on.
a lovely weekend to all of you. :-P
Mulenga

Mulenga, now that the launch of the cafe is not far away at all I was wondering how you were going to start marketing the cafe? It would be a good idea to start letting people know when it will open and what services will be available at the start. You said in your previous post that Posters would work the best for your community. Can we help you with this in anyway? Do you need help in drafting one one etc? There seem to be a number of Neighbours on Nabuur who have publishing skills. Let us know!
Carolyn

Carolyn

You are right! Marketing of services is an important aspect of any service. Silvio (2001) defines marketing as, “the design, implementation, and control of programmes calculated to influence the acceptability of ideas and involving consideration of product planning, pricing, communication, distribution, and market research”. The questionnaire that we drafted will show you (Mulenga) what people consider as important and it is good to offer them what they consider important and not what you consider important. Also look at who are your competitors and try to improve on what they are doing.
Remember the 4 Ps of marketing, PRODUCT, PRICE, PROMOTION and PLACE.

According to Kinnell, (1994:27) marketing is a set of activities aimed at facilitating effective exchanges between the organization and its customers whether the organisation is producing goods or services. In library terms, the product is the services that the library provides. In determining the value (price) of our library services and how well they are likely to satisfy user requirements, it is necessary to consider the degree to which accessing those services for users is both convenient, pleasurable and satisfying. 'Place' is concerned with various methods of transporting and storing goods, and then making them available for the customer. Getting the right product to the right place at the right time involves the distribution system. It includes a range of issues from the languages in which signs are presented, through the level of reading ability necessary to understand library guides and literature, to furnishings and fittings and comfort level.

Promotion is the most easily and quickly recognised and understood aspect of marketing but probably in fact the least important. Some librarians believe that if they are promoting, they are marketing yet this is not the case (Hawcroft, 2006). Krieg-Sigman (1995:419)defines promotion as, ‘communication with an attitude’ and recommends the judicious use of promotion, and reminds the reader that there are also times when not to promote is best option.’

David

Thank Carolyn and David,
I enjoyed reading your two postings.Help in making posters will be greatly
appreciated and if there is any neighbour ready to help us,please just let
me the type information is needed.As for the services since we are yet to
know if we will be assisted with any equipment such as photo-copier we will
start with the internet,secretarial,card making and selling of mobile phone
talk-time.

Regards,

Mulenga

Hi Mulenga,
I can try to see if a Neighbour on another village I work on can put something together for us.
A few questions though which require some information from you.
Opening times: 10.00-20.00
Address?? where is the cafe located exactly?
Are you prepared to put down fees or would you prefer this poster simply to be about the opening of the cafe?
Name of the Cafe?? any ideas yet?
Is there an other info you would like to include?

Would it be easier for you to print off a black and white poster or do you have access to colour printing? This will guide the person who develops this poster. Will A4 size be OK or do you want it to be bigger?

Thanks!
Carolyn

Hi Carolyn,

Yes the opening hours will be from 10:00hrs to 20:00 Monday to Friday and 08:30 to 19:30 Saturday and Sunday:
As for the location it is near REDCROSS Skills Centre and Mugi Car Park in Garden @ House no.90/09
The cost will be K120 per minute.
We have had a heated debate on the name of the cafe and in the end 'PA MULENGA'Internet & Business Centre was agreed on.
As for the printer,we have managed to purchase a small colour printer and A4 paper is just fine.

All the best this weekend,

Mulenga

Terrific! I hope we'll get an interested neighbour to develop this poster this week! Stay tuned.

Hello Mulenga and Garden neighbors,

Carolyn has explained your requirements for the poster to me. She has also mentioned the time constrains, so I will finish it quickly for you. She has also connected us through email, so I will ask if I have any questions, but I think it will be rather simple.

I hope the Internet Cafe will be a great success!

Regards,

Mika Ortiz

Hi,

Something else to grow the cyber visitors number is a loyalty program, created and frequent visitors are awarded with free half an hour browsing after every two weeks of 20 hours. This means that each of the frequent browser is provided with a logging booklet at a price of course and every time they browse the time is entered and there are free minutes when one reach a certain amount. This will encourage repeated customers. Booklets are better as they are cheaper to make, electronic cards are expensive. Just a thought.

Hi- I like that idea! It could work. I guess Mulenga would have to see how the business is comming along and how affordable offerring "free minutes" to repeat customers would be- but- essentially- I think it's an idea that could entice people back to the cafe. Thanks so much for you post!!

Hi everyone,

Thank Ndasika and Carolyn. The Loyalty idea is great. As soon as we are done with our payment for the cost of installed equipment the loyalty and subscription account will be introduced. The only thing at the moment it seems the secretarial part of the centre is doing far much better than the Internet.

I have also been approached by a number of people who want to be trained.However, at the moment I can only manager to train only not more than two people because of the volume of work.I am very sure in the coming months when we are able to employ at least a full time employee thing will be better.

Mulenga