I remember the day as if it were yesterday … Driving on the N6 towards East London, the conversation between my teacher-girlfriend and myself was around how we were able to get Grade 10 students to work on a Joomla website (www.geekleague.co.za), and how she went from knowing NOTHING about website building, to being able to manage, upgrade and work on the school’s Joomla website. (www.cathcarthigh.co.za)
A few days after that trip the 2009 Joomla Boot Camps were announced for Cathcart and Johannesburg. Our aim was to get every rookie that enrolled for the Boot Camp able to build their own website during the training, so it was theory with a lot of practical that delivered 14 Joomla websites in 14 days. Although the majority of the rookies only launched their websites a month or two after the Boot Camps, we succeeded in our goal and proved the fact that you don’t have to be a geek to be able to manage your own website.
Joomla is that easy to use!
Do you realize that people go to College for years to learn PHP, MySQL, CSS and HTML to be called web developers? You can FAST FORWARD that timeline and learn WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW in a few days at a Boot Camp, and then be able to save yourself or your business the costs of such web development services.
This year I find it difficult to fill up Joomla Boot Camps in the bigger cities. I ask myself what’s preventing people from falling over their feet to get an opportunity to learn a new skill, save themselves thousands, and also be able to EARN AN INCOME from what they learn in a week. Let me elaborate …
One of the 2009 Joomla Boot Camp rookies came into the course last year knowing almost nothing about PHP, Joomla and web development. He had a strong background in graphic design and knew his way around a keyboard and the Internet. After attending the Boot Camp my support to this person continued, as it would for any rookie who has the time to work on their website(s).
Soon after, the realization that what he knew about Joomla would enabled him to sell website design and development set in. After 6 months, this is his response:
“I have now written 170 k of business (Corporate Id and websites) for the past five months and since my website went live in Feb 2010. 80k was quoted in July so far and will still be billed this month. Joomla Rookie? I think I have graduated to an ‘ouman’
So, if you have the time available to learn something new, and the self discipline and determination to follow through, the above is the result of 5 days of training in a Joomla Boot Camp. 6 months later you will have a skill-set that’s worth a lot of money to people and businesses out there. This is not to mention that you will be able to work for yourself from the comfort of your home with only a computer and an Internet connection.
Still, I wonder why I do not have people signing up for Boot camps this year, after proving last year that Boot Camp is the most effective and affordable way of learning what you need to know in the shortest possible time. What you do with that knowledge is up to you! Don’t take it from, take it from the people who attended the Joomla Boot Camps in our first year last year.
As for the affordability of the Joomla Boot Camps, I am going to take the advice of seasoned and experienced professionals in the field of training, and up the enrollment fee to the standard fees charged, which, for 3-5 days, is more than double the enrollment fees for Durban and Port Elizabeth in 2010. I have proven the effectiveness of the course material and methods used and nowhere else in South Africa can you get what we offer you on a Joomla Boot Camp, where the outcome is GAURENTEED! You WILL walk away knowing AT LEAST how you have built your website and how to manage your own website from that point onwards.
Sadly, thanks to the lack of interest in Durban, we now have to cancel the Durban Joomla Boot Camp scheduled for August. On a more positive note, we will still be in Port Elizabeth at the end of July. Registrations close Friday 23 July, miss this, and you have missed the bus, the plot and a whole lot more!
