Getintheloop Marketing Ltd. recently launched their membership platform, Getintheloop.ca. The new website offers an exclusive members area for access to discounts in the South Okanagan on premium restaurants, golf courses, spas, resorts and wineries.

Based out of Kelowna, Get in the Loop was launched in 2011, experiencing early traction with their exclusive golf discounts. Since then, the company has experienced rapid growth and is expanding into other industries and regions. Founder, Matt Crowell said, “After year two, I knew there was a big opportunity outside of just offering great discounts on golf. This year, we are excited to be launching the new members site in the Okanagan, providing an array of discounting opportunities to our members.”

I had a chance to ask Matt some questions about Get in the Loop, it sounds like there will be even more exclusive deals around the corner!

BP: How long have you personally resided in Kelowna? What brought you to Kelowna in the first place?

Matt: I have lived in Kelowna for the past 18 years. My family moved here from Alberta, chasing the sunshine like everyone else.

BP: There are no shortage of group discount websites and coupon websites out there - what makes Get In The Loop different? What's in it for the businesses who offer discounts through your platform?

Matt: For our members the discount users – We offer exclusive discounts to premium businesses in categories they are interested in. We are the first company to offer discounts at locations like Sparkling hill, The Harvest, Moxie’s and Beyond Wrapture on a regular basis. We don’t offer a one-time coupon, we have created a Loop community that regularly gets privileged offers and entrance into exclusive events. The last big difference is our soon to come application, currently a mobile site, all the deals are delivered and used via your Smartphone. 

For Loop Partners, the businesses - we built Get in the Loop on a business first approach. In saying that, we give the business the ability to control when, where and how to best discount their product to our Members. We offer the business a unique channel to communicate with our local Loop Community. We are interested in a long term relationship with our Partners, that is why we have selected to work with only the Premium businesses and why we keep their discount information for members eyes only.

BP: How many members are currently In the Loop? What are your goals for 2013?

Matt: From year 1 to year 2 our membership tripled leaving us with over 600 members last year. With the launch of our new Loops (Staycation and Restaurant) addition of upcoming apps and extremely upgraded technical abilities we expect to cap our membership at 5000 members within 12 months.

BP: What has been your most successful offer to date?

Matt: In the past 2 years everyone has really loved our Harvest 2 for 1 offer that all Golf Loop Members receive when they purchase the membership. Last week Moxie’s promoted 2 for 1 Bellinis and a Free Basket of wings both of which seen some great success.

BP: You currently have Golf, Restaurant and Staycation loops - any new loops in the works?

Matt: We have ideas for our 4th and 5th Loop But we would love the readers of Castanet and our Members to give us feedback on what they would like to see for the next Loop. Team@Getintheloop.ca

BP: Kelowna is your focus at the moment, but do you have plans to expand into new cities anytime soon?

Matt: This is actually a pretty cool story. While completing my Masters this year in Belgium I set up all of the Partnerships to launch a Belgian Loop focusing on high end European saunas, star restaurants and golf. We have a team member on the ground in Belgium, we are in the middle of translating the website for launch. Locally we are currently working to expand our membership into Kamloops, having already secured a few business Partners there, hoping to launch the membership sometime in early June.

About the author: Brad Parsons is the owner of Sticky Consulting, an Internet marketing & web consulting company based in Kelowna.

As the gun control debate rages on in America a new technology is starting to hit the mainstream that could make obtaining a gun virtually as easy as downloading a file. That technology is 3D printing.

Likely the biggest public advocate of 3D printed guns is 24-year-old Cody Wilson who owns Defense Distributed.

Cody’s company has created a website called DEFCAD which contains different files that 3D printers can use to print different components of a gun.

A popular 3D printer manufacturer, MakerBot, once housed many of these same files on their website at Thingiverse.

When MakerBot removed all gun-related files from Thingiverse, Cody jumped into action in order to defend the freedom of information, a controversial move.

One day 3D printers will be as common as inkjet printers, and that day may not be very far away.

3D printers are already dropping in price substantially; in fact you can purchase the MakerBot Replicator 2 for $2,199 USD (http://store.makerbot.com/replicator2.html).

So as governments spend time and money trying to develop laws and regulations that keep traditional guns out of the hands of dangerous people, technology is leapfrogging their efforts and opening a whole new world of potential turmoil.

But any profound innovation comes with a dark side - the day we can purchase a 3D printer, and then print a second 3D printer for our friends with the original printer.

Oh wait, it looks like that day has already arrived!

After launching earlier this month, Reddit's original web video series dubbed "Explain Like I'm Five" has already started to generate some attention.

Based on Reddit's popular sub-reddit of the same name, the first three videos released in the series cover the following topics:

• Existentialism and Friederich Nietzsche
• The Crisis in Syria
• The Volatility of the Stock Market

Of course simplifying any complex topic comes with risk, some of the viewers commenting on the videos aren't satisfied with the content. But is the YouTube audience ever satisfied? Not a chance. Even if these short video clips don't deal with all the subtle details of a complex topic, if it leads a few more people to investigate further I believe they're working.

Meet the DoorBot, a fresh approach to a very common, yet antiquated technology. DoorBot was recently funded on the crowdfunding website Christie Street, raising over $250,000 towards the first manufacturing run of the product.

After being installed where a traditional doorbell would normally be, DoorBot accesses a wifi network to stream video from the front door to a mobile phone or tablet. When someone 'rings the doorbell' the mobile device alerts the home owner, who can then view and talk with the person standing at their front door through their mobile device. The DoorBot can also be upgraded with a Lockitron, which allows the home owner to unlock the door remotely. With funding successful, inventing company Edison Junior will start shipping DoorBot soon, with the base model priced at $189.

About the author: Brad Parsons is the owner of Sticky Consulting, an Internet marketing & web consulting company based in Kelowna.