... HOPE YOU LIKE IT! ...

WHoa I actually like this style. Its so different from the Springleap theme we are so used to. I reckon this is a positive step. Nice work Sebastian! shoutBack 7 hours, 38 minutes ago by

So you’ve registered, but you’re having trouble with something – ANYTHING?

This is the place to ask…

Do you want to know how to upload a design into the competition?

Or where to start a new blog post?

Or if anything isn’t working the way you think it should?

ASK

@Nicky01printo Unfortunately there isnt, you will need to re-register with the username you prefer. shoutBack 12 hours, 16 minutes ago by

Hey there, I would just like to find out if I can change my login name? I don’t want it to be Nicky01printo but if it can’t be changed then it’s 100%. Thanks :) shoutBack 1 day, 7 hours ago by

afrouladys please email Chloe at chloespringleap.com, she will get back to you with all the info shoutBack 3 days, 10 hours ago by

I’m still waiting for approval for an image and it has been a while when will I know if it got rejected and will I get a reason? shoutBack 3 days, 10 hours ago by

jameslindholmes - haven't received anything from you yet! pls email me on eranspringleap.com Tx shoutBack 3 days, 13 hours ago by

Never mind, found it shoutBack 6 days, 12 hours ago by

Where can I see what the theme is for the next competition. I see this month is Faces of Africa. shoutBack 6 days, 12 hours ago by

hello I’m not sure what size do you want the t-shirt pic in you said 600*600 but you also said I shouldn’t resize so now it’s at 1248*1100. So what size do you want it now? shoutBack 1 week, 2 days ago by

Yo Eran has NB eMail from me!!! James shoutBack 1 week, 5 days ago by

@Rowa Hi there Rowa Springleap us has been extended! we’ll keep you updated when it starts:):) shoutBack 2 weeks, 2 days ago by

There has been a LOT of chatter all over the South African Internet regarding First National Bank in discussions to bring PayPal back to South Africa.

WHAT??!! You don’t know what PayPal is? I don’t blame you, since the South African e-commerce environment has been hamstrung by not having this worldwide international standard stripped from us for so long.

PayPal is a USA-based wallet system for making and receiving payments safely over the Internet. PayPal protects you most of all as at no time do you need to divulge any of your financial information. FANTASTIC!

PayPal became especially famous on eBay and has now become *THE standard * in online payments.

Today PayPal has more than 153 million accounts worldwide across 190 markets and 24 currencies.

A few years ago due to some decisions made by the reserve bank as well as increased rate in fraud. But the genera consensus is that’s all a bit of “he said, she said”.

A bit of online digging revealed the following article on one of South Africa’s best known blogs, mybroadband – It’s a common consensus that something does stink to high heaven here.

Here is another article on MoneyWeb siting the exact legislation.

Here is a good podcast covering the issue with JP van der Spuy from Mytrade.co.za

Th two major considerations that have really held back e-commerce in South Africa are the South African Postal Service (So bad it sent the world’s largest shopping portal Amazon.com) running for the purple mountains) coupled with the lack of PayPal.

I know that the lift of this ridiculous restriction will completely change the way that companies like Springleap.com will do business not only in South Africa, but with the international Internet community that has become used to PayPal as their go-to payment method.

Despite what you may have heard to date the deal has not yet been sealed, but yesterday Virginia Magapatona – the head of corporate communications at FNB – confirmed that FNB is indeed in discussions with PayPal and the South African Reserve Bank – but that’s where the information and communication trail ends. That’s the FNB official story.

Te rest is hype and conjecture.

And hope.

There is an update on this matter available at the following link : Paypal and FNB press event on 25 March 2010 Nothing confirmed in terms of a commitment to launch – more a commitment to discuss with the press officially… but who know? Perhaps FNB and PayPal will surprise us after all with an actual launch date for this key service in South Africa. At least we will get a real official statement from both parties and be able to grill them like a cheese sandwich. Will this finally mean PayPal in South Africa? I FN-B hope so. shoutBack 15 hours, 46 minutes ago by

Hey @Jumper – I have created a new post on how a South African can open a fully functional PayPal account Hope this helps! shoutBack 1 week, 3 days ago by

Hey E, what if I can’t wait and I need PayPal right now in South Africa? Any pointers o suggestions? Do I need to go overseas an get a bank acc, to ope it from? shoutBack 1 week, 6 days ago by

UPDATE it seems that yesterday evening FNB Officially announced to their customers that they are in real talks with PayPal to bring the service to South Africa. Note that there is no guarantee, just an official statement on their site that they are in official talks with PayPal. shoutBack 2 weeks, 3 days ago by

UPDATE it seems that yesterday evening FNB Officially announced to their customers that they are in real talks with PayPal to bring the service to South Africa. Note that there is no guarantee, just an official statement on their site that they are in official talks with PayPal. shoutBack 2 weeks, 3 days ago by

Hey guys – any updates on the South African PayPal portal or ability to pay with PayPal? Really frustrating stuff, everytime I wanna buy anything and hit stupid barriers like this… I mean why are we so backward in SA? I know plenty of people who have online sites and stuff and would love to have PayPal.. I just hope it’s not astronomically expensive when it launches. That would suck. shoutBack 2 weeks, 6 days ago by

Hey guys – any updates on the South African PayPal portal or ability to pay with PayPal? Really frustrating stuff, everytime I wanna buy anything and hit stupid barriers like this… I mean why are we so backward in SA? I know plenty of people who have online sites and stuff and would love to have PayPal.. I just hope it’s not astronomically expensive when it launches. That would suck. shoutBack 2 weeks, 6 days ago by

via Thanks for the info shoutBack 3 weeks, 4 days ago by

The main PayPal alternatives for South African and African entrepreneurs I could find were the following : There is a credit card processor called 2Checkout which store owners can use to set up a merchant account. Low startup costs but they take a piece of every transaction. There’s also Moneybrookers which is quite similar to PayPal plus it allows customers to transfer their funds to any bank, anywhere or mail a check. Ther have 11.1 million account holders. Not too shabby. There’s also the UK-based NetTeller which is a direct competitor to PayPal. It’s an eWallet as well and offers payments to pretty much all countries across the world Ikobo offer a money transfer service as well with Inter-African fees at 6%, but that means it’s more expensive that PayPal technically. Do you know of any other alternatives to PayPal for us deprived South Africans? shoutBack 3 weeks, 4 days ago by

Hey Eran, what other alternatives are there to PayPal then? Getting pretty fustrated and don’t want to wait for thos greysuited crapmongers that keep holding my business back!!! shoutBack 3 weeks, 4 days ago by

Springleap.com brand ambassadors The Sick Leaves is hot hot hot right now! They are being featured in so many places’ it’s hard not to schedule everything.

Check out some updates below!

The Sick Leaves featured in JIP see full article here The Sick Leaves – wearing Springleap Stayin’ Alive or see below

The Citizen – The Sick Leaves was also featured in The Citizen, see Eksteen below wearing Springleap’s Momo by Ndikol

Read article here – The Sick Leaves wearing Springleap Momo t-shirt

Check out the review to The Sick-Leaves – The Last Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy album Springleap brand ambassadors

Make Some Noise

Check out Eksteen wearing My Face by TokoyoGoGo in an interview with Make Some Noise – Eksteen wearing Springleap My Face

Speakerbox

The Sick Leaves – Speakerbox Gallery

Interview on Speakerbox – The Sick Leaves

Fans can also download the first single ‘Coz you like it’ for FREE from Speakerbox

MNET- MK

Springleap brand ambassadors featured on MK

Mio.co.za

Check out the interview here – Springleap brand ambassadors

Just a few days ago The Sick Leaves performed at Ramfest Jo’burg, see picturestaken by Sean Brand below

“They looked great on stage! Eksteen’s bright yellow who is your daddy tee was very striking!” – Linda Thompson

VUZU

Springleap – The Sick Leaves on Vuzu or watch below

The Sick-Leaves online profiles:
MySpace Facebook
Twitter

More to follow soon!

Well done guys!

Springleap.com featured in the social media March issue of Entrepreneur Magazine’s Small Capital (A practical guide for business owners). The social media issue includes a case study of Springleap, co-founders and co-owners Eran Eyal and Eric Edelstein gives insight into building online communities, crowdsourcing, and social media.

The Springleap case study delves into past achievements as well as future plans the entrepreneurs have.

Read full Springleap case study below:

Small Capital
Issue fourteen March 2010

A practical guide for business owners – The Social Media Issue

CASE STUDY: Springleap

To Eran Eyal and his partner Eric Edelstein, the sole purpose of their Springleap.com website is to enable the crowd.

“Our core business and intellectual property is building online communities and harnessing their power. We are all about crowdsourcing; t-shirts are how we chose to express it.”

The t-shirt business

The t-shirt side of Springleap.com’s business is deceptively simple. Every two weeks the Springleap.com community votes for their favourite t-shirt designs, submitted by other members of the community. The creator of the winning design wins R7 482, 18- half in t-shirts baring the designer’s name. T-shirts with the winning designs are printed and sold via the Springleap.com website, the Springleap store in Sea Point, Cape Town, and via preferred reseller partners such as Big Blue, Rockabilly, Idols, SKA, Lover and others. The artist also earns royalties on every t-shirt sold.

Apart from voting, subscribers to the Springleap.com website can browse through previous designs and buy t-shirts8 whenever they like. 8Springleap t-shirts are manufactured from high-quality South African cotton and delivered to their fans’ doorsteps free of charge.

The real business
As Eran and Eric point out, Springleap.com’s purpose is to empower its community and to keep the members coming back for more.

On the one hand, it is hugely empowering environment for artists. “They submit their designs and receive feedback not only from so-called ordinary people, but also from other artists,” says Eran. “In the two years of the website’s existence, we have seen numerous instances of artists collaborating, mentoring each other and commenting on each other’s work.”

On the other hand, Springleap.com is a hive of activity for all members. They can blog, comment, converse with other Springleap.com users, submit creations, win all sorts of prizes, photograph people wearing Springleap clothing and submit those pictures – the list is virtually endless. The trick, as Eran points out, is to keep the community busy and give then new and interesting reasons to visit the site.

One of Springleap.com’s success stories is the daily special. Every day at 12:00 noon, they announce a special offer on a specific (t-shirt( on their Twitter account (@Springleaping). With discounts ranging from 5% to 70%, buyers have only 24 hours to submit their orders. It is not surprising that the daily special is the cornerstone of their marketing strategy. “That is where our marketing budget is. To date, we have not spent a cent on advertising.”

Understanding that community building, and not t-shirts, is the heart of their business, has allowed Eric and Eran to diversify.
Springleap.com now works its crowdsourcing magic for all kinds of design projects for corporate clients in a variety of industries. In fact, this is the real money-spinner for the business. In 2008, Springleap.com was named the second most innovative company in the retail sector in the world, and in 2009 won the Jump.co.za *e-commerce award for best online clothing and accessories store.

Eran explains: “In 2010 we will relaunch Springleap.com and introduce a few other new brands. Even more exciting is that w will launch the platform as SAAS (Software as a Service). This means that anyone will be able to have their own free ‘Springleap-like’ crowdsourcing e-commerce social media community site in a matter of minutes, by simply dragging and dropping the elements into place. We will also have more advanced features for purchase as well as full-blown corporate models.”

The secrets behind Springleap’s success

1. Time and effort. Social media, community building and crowdsourcing have been Eric and Eran’s way of life for a decade. “We understand the platforms and how traffic is generated, directed and converted.”

2. Perseverance and very hard work. From developing the website to coming to grips with textile production, postage and delivery, the birth of Springleap.com was anything but painless. “All I can say is that sharks patrol these waters!” comments Eran.

3. Business common sense. Eran believes that three things make a business work: always be nice, make calls and network, and deliver what you promise.

4. A sixth sense. “In this business, you need a feel for what will work, much like a surfer senses a good wave.”

The Springleap.com team would like to thank Small Capital

For more information on crowdsourcing watch videos below