By Zimbabwe is now known for acknowledging players in various fields such as music, sports, business etc. In music, to select winners, event organisers usually have voting campaigns availed to the public to use when choosing their favourite act. This is done to give power to the public.
Voting platforms which include Online, Facebook, SMS, Twitter, and WhatsApp messages are employed.Now imagine going through all that clutter trying to select notable votes amidst those spoiled votes where people diss the organisers and acts. It’s quite cumbersome and tedious.
But this local startup Shirishanu saw through this to develop a platform called Promoplus which sifts through that clutter to extract the notable required votes.The startup presented the Promoplus pitch at the Seedstars Harare 2017 competition last week.
Not only does this platform sieve these unwanted votes, it also does polling for these organisers and other corporate brands as well comparing one brand to the other. For example one might compare Jah Prayzah to Winky D, or One Money to Telecash or Ecocash, or One Fusion to Mega Chat Bundles
Shirishanu co-founder Tawedzerwa Chagwesha explained the platform saying it filters information provided when voting online. Promoplus is the first SMS and social media platform in Zimbabwe that is fully cloud-based. The system is cheaper and easy to set up.
“We have an SMS and Social media voting and public opinion platform. Basically, if you want to hear what people have to say, if you have a radio show that you want feedback live and direct organized, you know these radio shows they tell you vote on WhatsApp, vote on Facebook, tell me who’s going to count those votes?
“You also have graphical output showing you which are the hotspots which aren’t. You have all the visuals you need. So that’s basically our product in short,” he said.
He said this project was done after realising SMS polling and campaign systems in Zimbabwe are expensive, require extensive resources to install and are not remotely accessible.
“Well we had a client who wanted a custom solution and the thing about custom solutions you need to build them, you need weeks and they are going to cost a lot because they are custom. But this one is instant.
“Register just now and in an hours’ time you are running your contest. You are running your program,” said Tagwesha.
He also said when the public is voting or polling during the campaigns,one gets to see who is leading or trailing.
Integrating the platform with mobile networks appears sluggish to this startup making it the toughest part in ensuring Promoplus’ flawlessness.
“The hardest part is the mobile networks that process is sl…ow. But we what we have seen is that once the process is complete and we have integration with all mobile networks then it’s a onetime thing. It’s now a matter of paying a matter of paying a yearly subscription which is no big deal so we are ready for that struggle,” said Tagwesha.
Shirishanu said they needed $42 000 to get all the features incorporated into the system.
“We think with $42 000 we can have all the features we want implemented in the system, buy all the hardware we need, integrate with the mobile networks and the marketing and sakes that will take us to a profitable level,” noted Tagwesha.
Shirishanu offers services in Software Development, Web Design & Development as well as supply related ICT and Power hardware.
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