Category: Business

KCKCC offers new online social media in business certificate program

by Kelly Rogge

Have you thought about using social media to communicate market and serve your customers and clients more effectively?

The new online Social Media for Business Certificate Program at Kansas City Kansas Community College will introduce individuals to the growing and exciting opportunities that social media provide for businesses and organizations.

Students will discover new principles of communication that apply across all social networks including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and more. This includes learning how to develop two-way communication and marketing strategies and leaving the course with a concrete plan to help to begin using social networks immediately for marketing services and for communicating with clientele. Whether new to social networks or already involved, students will find practical value in this certificate program.

The certificate program consists of three one-month courses:
•         Introduction to Social Media
•         Marketing Using Social Media
•         Integrating Social Media in Your Organization.

Students may take the complete Certificate Program (three courses) for $495 or take any of the individual courses for $195 each.

For more information or to enroll, call KCKCC Continuing Education at 913-288-7170 or 913-288-7660.

AT&T to provide ultra-high-speed Internet here

AT&T is giving Google some competition for high-speed Internet in Kansas City.

AT&T announced today it would expand its U-verse GigaPower network to deliver data speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second to customers in 21 cities, including Kansas City, Kan.  Google introduced Internet speeds of up to 1 gigabit last year in Kansas City.

Kansas City, Kan., Leawood, Overland Park, Shawnee, and Independence, Mo., are included in the metropolitan area cities to be served here by AT&T’s ultra-high-speed fiber network.

AT&T also is taking its new ultra-high-speed service into the city where Google is headquartered, Mountain View, Calif.  It is one of the 21 metro areas nationwide that will receive AT&T’s new GigaPower network.

AT&T already offers the service in Austin. Besides Kansas City, AT&T will offer this ultra-high-speed service in Atlanta, August, Charlotte, Chicago, Fort Worth, Fort Lauderdale, Greensboro, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, Oakland, Orlando, San Antonio, San Diego, St. Louis, San Francisco and San Jose. Previously announced were Dallas, Raleigh-Durham and Winston-Salem.

“We’re delivering advanced services that offer consumers and small businesses the ability to do more, faster, help communities create a new wave of innovation, and encourage economic development,” said Lori Lee, senior executive vice president, AT&T Home Solutions. “We’re interested in working with communities that appreciate the value of the most advanced technologies and are willing to encourage investment by offering solid investment cases and policies.”

AT&T U-verse uses advanced IP technology and a network that includes fiber-optic technology.

The planned expanded availability of U-verse with GigaPower is part of AT&T’s Project Velocity IP investment plan to expand and enhance its wireless and wireline IP broadband networks to support growing customer demand for high-speed Internet access, advanced TV services, and new mobile and cloud services, a spokesman said. This expanded fiber build is not expected to affect AT&T’s capital investment plans for 2014. And AT&T continues to expect that its wired IP broadband network will reach 57 million customer locations in its 22-state wireline footprint by the end of 2015. If you are looking for reliable, ultra-fast broadband, you might want to check out something like Click Broadband for more information.

Besides ultra-high-speed Internet, the system will include TV services with the capability to record and watch multiple shows simultaneously; ability to scheduled DVR recordings and watch TV shows on 30 or more varieties of smart phones and tablets, along with personal computers; small business features such as sharing large data files and images quickly, backing up data remotely; and videoconferencing for business with partners and customers.

 

Luxury apartment complex in KCK succeeding

An open house and ribbon-cutting was held April 17 for the Village West Luxury Apartments at 11024 Delaware Parkway in the Village West area of Kansas City, Kan. The apartments are on 110th between State and Parallel, near The Legends Outlets. (Photo by Bridget Koan)

The first large luxury apartment complex in decades in Wyandotte County is doing well and poised to announce its second phase.

The Village West Luxury Apartments, 11024 Delaware Parkway in the Village West area of Kansas City, Kan., held a ribbon-cutting and grand opening last week.

Brent Miles, vice president of NorthPoint Development, the developer, said that two buildings in the first phase are complete and a third building is nearly complete. The three buildings have a total of 306 apartment units.

In phase two, another 300-plus units are planned, which will give the project around 616 total units, Miles said.

The second phase is scheduled to start this summer with a projected opening in the fall of 2015, he said. Each phase has a cost in the $30 million range, for a total project cost of $60 million.

“Wyandotte County hasn’t really seen a luxury apartment project for a number of years,” Miles said. “What we’ve built sets the bar at a new level.”

The luxury apartment complex has salt water pools, a concierge service, an on-site masseuse, and state-of-the-art fitness center. And it’s within walking distance of The Legends, other stores and attractions. The location near The Legends Outlets was the key, Miles said.

“We just wanted to build the highest level possible,” Miles said.

When it was first announced it was expected that some new employees at the nearby Cerner office complex may want to live there.  Some Cerner employees have decided to live there, but the complex also is seeing employees from the University of Kansas, the Army base at Ft. Leavenworth, the Unified Government, Board of Public Utilities and other places, he said.

Miles said the apartments have had a very good reception, with a large number of renters signing up.