In preparation for substance abuse week (which is this week) , Rlabs has teamed up with Mxit to bring drug advice and support to the tip of Mxit subscribers fingers. 28,000 plus subscribers added the Angel Information Service . On Monday the team had to be ready as  they did not know how many people would come online seeking advice and support with their substance abuse problems.  For the week  a 12 hour service session, the following statistics were achieved with a them of 10 counsellors:

• Number of Conversations: 1283
• Number of Messages: 7654
• Average Conversation per counsellor 44

The technology we are using to manage the conversations is JamiiX

With such a packed week ahead, the RLabs team is looking forward to new partnerships and exploring further how we will use innovation and technology to Reconstruct communities.

RLABS’ Social Media Factory is doing the Social Media Strategy for the movie: I Now Pronounce You Black and White. We had a competition running on Facebook to win two sets of tickets to the Cape Town Premiere of this movie. Today we did the draw and have two lucky winners.

The winners of the two sets of tickets are Lee Williams and Naasirah Dollie. Congratulations to you guys and we will be seeing you there tomorrow evening. The premiere will be hosted at Cinema Prive,Canal Walk. Viewers can expect to see the first screening of I Now Pronounce You Black and White at their local Nu Metro cinema from 14th of May 2010.

This gave birth to the world’s FIRST Social Media Factory, where trained community members who are unemployed are given opportunities to create extra income through being part of a team managing social media strategies for businesses, organisations, schools and public figures. This means that those who are in need of having their Social Media Strategy being managed or outsourced not only get access to these services at very good prices but also the teams implementing these strategies will consist of a mix of experts and community members. Exciting when a housewife who have no other form of income can use her Twitter skills and manage the Twitter stream for an organisation via her mobile phone. She would then be rewarded for each tweet thus being able to make a basic living via the Social Media Factory system.

The launch of Social Media Factory will be February 2010 and we hoping to see a global use of the Social Media Factory. We are excited to see how using Social Media, community members can be empowered and unemployment addressed to ensure our communities are reconstructed. Any organisations or businesses who would like to register for services with the Social Media Factory can contact us and we will send more details closer to the launch.

As most organisations have staff and clients making use of Social Media, adopting a strategy for engagement and marketing should be considered to maximise the use of these powerful tools. A few questions to ask before making use of Social Media in your organisations are:

- Where are your customers having their conversations? Are they online?
- Are you willing to manage and engage with your clients through Social Media tools?
- Are you ready to deal with critism?
- How do you integrate this in your organisation and make it part of daily activities?
- What are you willing to invest and what are you expecting in return?
- How will you measure results of Social Media strategy?
- What are your timelines for using Social Media in the organisation?
- How will Social Media be part of your current marketing and communication strategies?

If you have any questions or considerations to add please leave your comment.ia

Mobile Counselling training with the National AIDS Helpline (NAH) were concluded as the NAH became the world’s first organisation to live counselling over mobile phones. This initiave is one of the pioneering project part of the Reconstructed Living Labs (RLabs) where a number of service organisations are receiving training on the Mobile Counselling System, Advice Support Network. This collaboration is with Cell-Life and their partners and will ensure that the National AIDS Helpline have a Mobile presence over the next 12 months to support people in need.