Mike Stopforth

Jeepers, things are cooking. We’ve had to really step up a gear in the last few months to respond to the demand for social and mobile media interventions from agencies and companies alike.
I’d like to brag about two projects in particular. Firstly we’re doing work with Internet Solutions in developing IS [...]

The big news in the South African social media scene today is the acquisition of a 40% stake in popular social media sharing site Zoopy by mobile operator Vodacom.

TECH4FRICA, a “web and emerging technology conference for Africa” being organised by Gareth Knight (of Kindo fame) has officially launched it’s website with info about the upcoming event.
It’s due to be held at The Forum in Bryanston over 3 and 4 October and already at this early stage has a very impressive speaker line up.
I [...]

For some reason I’ve been ignoring MyGenius.com - the Southern African social network for business people. I have been a member since late 2006 - MyGenius’s very early days - and never quite got in to it. I get the odd message from a MyGenius member wanting to connect but have spent little no time on updating my profile or adding content to the site.

Recently I decided to give MyGenius another go based on two realisations. Firstly, the value of social networking is undoubtedly found, or much easier mined, in niche communities. The quintessential example is Charl Norman’s Zooped Up community for owners of modified cars and suchlike - completely useless for me but absolutely invaluable and addictive to people entrenched in that community. MyGenius cannot be compared to MySpace, for example, because it’s not trying to be a globally dominant player. It’s simply trying to do what it does well.

Sachi and Lee LeFever of Common Craft fame occupy a very special, non-romantic place in my heart Back in the oooold days (about 3 years ago), when I was still quite unsure of the jargon and buzz behind Web 2.0 and social media, Lee was one of the few ‘A-listers’ who invested personal time and energy into answering my silly questions.

Today they’ve turned that gift for translation and a passion for all things social into a very cool business, producing informative, entertaining videos that quite simply, well, explain stuff. Whether they’re making videos for their ‘Plain English’ series of technology-related shows or for corporate clients, the LeFevers have fine-tuned the art of translation using the very tools they evangelise. Few businesses can boast that!

I call myself a Web 2.0 expert. I run a company, Cerebra, which exists to make money helping our clients understand and where necessary utilise Web 2.0 technologies and trends.

As niche as we are, we’re not alone. We have global and local competitors. In South Africa, we have two kinds of competitors - those that started as social media agencies or companies from day one (Younique, Longtail, would be examples) and then companies that have existed for some time in either the digital sphere or general marketing, advertising or branding spaces that have adapted their focus to align with the ever-increasing need for social media services and products (AtPlay, a division of Saatchi, is the quintessential example).

I attended the inaugural National Speakers Association of South Africa annual convention this past weekend.

It was well worth the investment, and even if watching a multitude of talented, professional overseas and local speakers didn’t result in any life-changing aha-moment (I don’t respond well to motivational talks), there was much self-learning to be done.

The most valuable lesson I’ll take from the weekend is not to underestimate the importance of building your personal brand. This is a difficult one for me, as I feel I need to strike a balance between building a personal brand, not being an egotistical prat and retaining some of what makes me, me.