GDGPH: Apps Promotion and Monetization Meetup

In the Philippines, hackathons are happening left and right. Filipino developers have produced a good number of application for both web and mobile across the different platforms available. However, the biggest concern is that most of these developers don't get the traffic that they serve and don't earn from the application they have work so hard to develop.

With this concern in mind, +GDG Philippines and +GBG Makati organized the Apps Promotion and Monetization Meetup last night (July 25, 2013) at +Commune in Makati City. Out of the 44 developers that have signed up, we have confirmed only 20. These 20 developers were picked because they either have an app idea or they already have an app out there.

After serving dinner to the participants (talk about the really delicious Chicken adobo!), the meetup started with +Rosario Juan, a social media expert, owner of +Commune, and Community Manager of +GBG Makati, discussed about tips & tricks on how the developers could promote their application. Ros' presentation is available through this link.

Ros Juan of GBG Makati and Commune

These was followed by a talk by Howard Dy Go of Mochibits, a game development company. Howard shared with the participants the realities of apps monetization and how monetization should rule their development. His slides are available here.

Howard Dy Go of Mochibits

There was also an open forum after Howard's presentation when developers asked their questions to the speakers and when the other participants shared their thoughts, as well.

+Anne Michelle Santos of +Globe Labs shared on how people monetize from web applications and said the closing remarks for the meetup.

Thank you +Commune and +Globe Labs for making this event possible. Thank you so much to Ros and Howard for sharing your time, knowledge, and experience to the community. Lastly, thank you to all the developers who made time for the meetup and we hope that you got a better idea on how you could promote and monetize your apps.

Thank you to all those who attended the meetup!

Photos are taken from +Reymart Canuel.

GDGPH: GBG-GDG Philippine Transit App Challenge Bootcamp

Last July 13, four bootcamp for the Philippine Transit App Challenge were organized by the different Google Developer Group and Google Business Group across the Philippines. There was a bootcamp in Cagayan de Oro City (organized by +GDG Cagayan de Oro and +GBG Cagayan de Oro), Cebu City (organized by +GDG Cebu) and Bacolod City (organized by +GDG Bacolod and +GBG Bacolod).

In Manila, +GDG Philippines together with +GBG Quezon City, +GBG Makati, +GBG San Juan and +GBG Pasig organized the GBG-GDG Philippine Transit App Challenge Bootcamp in the Orange and Bronze Software Labs, Inc. office in Makati City. There were 30 attendees to the event with one team sure of joining the PTAC already.

The event started at around 10:00 AM with Ms. Patricia Mariano from Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC) discussing the objective of the challenge as well as the available public data from DOTC. Her presentation is available through this link.

Ms. Patricia Mariano of DOTC

After the session of Ms. Mariano, +Pol Faustino from Orange and Bronze discussed about code management using Git. The users learned the basic of Git as well as the best practices on how to better manage their codes during the contest period. His presentation is available through this link.

Pol Faustino from Orange and Bronze

This was followed by a session by Camille Zapata, a freelance user interface and user experience expert, on quality user interfaces. One of the evaluation criteria of the challenge was quality interface, thus the attendees of the bootcamp learned what it means to have a quality UI. Her presentation is available through this link.

Camille Zapata a freelance UI expert

During lunch, the participants used the time to ask their questions to the speakers.

+Pol Faustino personally teaching the attendee on how to use Git during lunch

After lunch, +Edge Dalmacio, co-founder of Haybol.ph, discussed and demonstrated the power of Google App Engine. He showed how to deploy applications in GAE and discussed the pricing model.

Edge Dalmacio of Haybol.ph

The next topic is Google Maps with +Lorenzo Dee as speaker. Enzo is the co-founder of Haybol.ph together with Edge. He showed the different html and Javascript code necessary to show direction from Point A to Point B and shared their application Haybol.ph which uses both GAE and Google Maps. His presentation is available through this link.

Lorenzo Dee of Haybol.ph

The last topic for the day is about tips and tricks on how one could promote their application. One of the evaluation criteria for the app challenge is public voting, thus, we invited social media guru and GBG Makati Community Manager +Rosario Juan to discuss with the developers the different ways they could promote their app.

Ros Juan of GBG Makati

The video recording of the bootcamp is available in the YouTube Playlist below:
Note: we're still trying to upload the rest of the bootcamp.

Thank you everyone who attended!

Thank you so much to all the participants who joined us in the boot camp and hopefully you create applications that would help solve the transit problem of the government. Thank you so much to all our speakers for sharing your time and knowledge in making this event possible. Lastly, Thank you +Orange & Bronze Software Labs for supporting our event in such short notice.

After the 13th of July, the bootcamp was also organized in other key cities across the country: Zamboanga City (by +GDG Zamboanga), Baguio City (by +GDG Baguio and +GBG Baguio), Ilo-Ilo City (by +GBG Iloilo with +GDG Bacolod), Zamboanga City (by +GDG Zamboanga), Davao City (by +GDG Davao and +GBG Davao), General Santos City (by +GBG General Santos), and Bontoc, Mountain Province (by +GDG Halsema). With these series of bootcamp, the Google communities hope to inspire, motivate, and equip the participants with the right tools and ideas in helping address the transit problems of the Philippines.

The New Google Maps Meet-up

Last July 12, 2013, Google Developer Group - Philippines with SmartDevNet organized the New Google Maps Meet-up in Smart Jump Experience Center.

The meet-up started with GDG Community Manager +Jomar Tigcal  giving an overview about what the community is, what GDG does, and what are the past and upcoming events of +GDG Philippines. Most of the 40 participants were students and it was their first time to attend a community organized event.

The attendees during the meet-up

This overview was followed by GDG Community Manager and Geo-Advocate +Wayne Manuel. He discussed the New Google Maps. Wayne was using the huge touch screen television/monitor in Smart Jump Experience Center to show the participants the new Google Maps. He also shared the different ways the Maps API can be used depending on the need of the app or site.

Wayne Manuel

Also, during the meet-up, +Carlson Orozco presented his application called bandarito.ph which uses Google Maps and Google Maps API. The app is a Philippine location-based classified ads.

Carlson Orozco presenting his app called bandarito.ph

Group Picture with all the attendees

Thank you so much SmartDevNet for hosting us and the support to GDG. Thank you to all those who attended the event and see you on our next meet-up!

GDG Philippines July Events

July will be a busy month for GDG Philippines. We have three events this month: a Maps meet up, a bootcamp for the Philippine Transit App Challenge, and an Apps Monetization meetup.

Google Maps Meetup

Have you seen the new Google Maps which was anounced in Google I/O 2013? We're having a meet up about it and the Maps APIs on July 12 (07:00 PM to 09:00 PM) at Smart Jump Experience Center, Megamall. This event is sponsored by Smart DevNet. For more details about the meet up, check out the Google+ events page.

GDG-GBG Philippine Transit App Challenge Bootcamp

Joining the Philippine Transit App Challenge? GDG Philippines, GBG Quezon City, GBG Makati, GBG Mandaluyong and GBG San Juan brings you the GBG-GDG Bootcamp. We have arrange the topics that will help you get ready for the challenge. This event will be on July 13 from 09:00 AM to 03:00 PM at Orange and Bronze Software Labs, Inc. (3rd Floor, CJV Building, 108 Aguirre Street, Legaspi Village, Makati City) For more details about the bootcamp, check out the Google+ Events page.

Apps Monetization Meetup

In collaboration with GBG Makati and Globe Labs, we will have an apps monetization meetup on the last week of the month. In this meetup, we'll have talks about various ways on how you can monetize your apps. We're still finalizing details about it as of now. We'll be updating this post as soon as we we have the details.

To be more updated about GDGPH events, check our website, add our Google+ Page in your circles, follow us on Twitter or like our Facebook Page.