First Professional Article Published: “FIND THAT SPECIAL CHRISTMAS GIFT”

Day 19 of the #NaNoPoblano2021 challenge, now a.k.a. “NaDePoblano” (heee….) . Major Theme: “A Few of My Earliest Things”. New sub-theme: “My Firsts”. Related post: My Evolution as a Writer.

Sorry it took me days to post again, but I only found my copies of our magazine. It was the publication that got me as its Editorial Assistant and in-house writer. My main position was the first for which I did various tasks that I don’t need to enumerate here. The second just came with the job description.

Below was my first-ever published article as a professional writer. It was actually a sidebar article, but it felt like a big one.  I wrote various stuff in this issue (like I always did in all the issues that were published during my time there). In fact, I copywrote the mag’s Christmas message on the left. (That wasn’t my first copywriting experience, though.)

The article on the right was special because it included my by-line. Yay! It’s a piece that wouldn’t win me anything but it still means something to me.

Why Visualize Data #THURSDAYTIPS #NanoPoblano2019

What is Data Visualization? It is the visual presentation of data to inform your target audience.

These data are meant to complement the relevant information you share. They serve as proof or factual evidence to support any claims you have and to help people understand the value of the data being presented.

Image from PCMag.com

The Evolution of Visual Presentations

In the old days, these visualization tools were simple graphs, charts, tables, timelines, and maps. They were materials you could physically touch. Over time, with the arrival of better technology, we learned to make more effective presentations. They were created using computer graphics and online spreadsheets.

In the Internet age, however, visualization tools have become much more sophisticated and interactive. Various software, widgets, Application Program Interface (API), and other programs are used to make them instead.

Today’s data visualization tools include the usual but more detailed charts (bar charts, pie charts), infographics, geographic online maps, and sparklines, which are small designs for numerical and statistical information. Heatmaps are included, too, as they are snapshots that indicate two things: what catches your website visitors’ attention, and where they stay the longest in your site.

The Advantage of Newer Technology

A visualization software helps give people a better idea of your data by showing the relationships between items and the patterns and trends. They can be more detailed, able to show information that would otherwise be missed. Unnoticed details could cause unexpected problems or misinterpretations.

Meanwhile, visuals attract more attention. They help the audience to understand data. People normally get bored with dull and cold presentations. With today’s technology, we are able to maximize a material’s potential while we improve how people interpret our data.

For instance:

With the Timeline JS widget, you can show stunning, interactive timelines to impress people. But it’s not just to impress, rather, to emphasize the significance of the presented data. The timelines can have slideshow and embedabble capabilities.

ZingChart is a feature-rich API and is very interactive. It allows animation to be used in its visuals. People are attracted to visuals and they love animation. ZingChart’s JavaScript library has hundreds of chart types to choose from, which also means hundreds of ways to let your audience digest information. 

TheTableau software updates information in real-time and is great for team collaboration. It allows you to create powerful, beautiful visuals and is very easy to use with its drag and drop ability.

Now MS Excel, Google Charts and Google Sheets maybe “old”, but they are still popular. In fact, they keep up with the modern times quite well—the better to stay competitive. Try out their library of data visualization tools and see that they are not at all behind when it comes to new technology.

The Importance of Data Visualization

The question is, why get these newer tools when you can use the old ones? The problem is, it is not really advisable, especially if information may be lost using the older technology.

You like to inform. You like to write. But how do you make sure your presentation sets you apart and shows you as an authority? Today, content is king. Part of that content are data that, as said earlier, should support any relevant information you share.

 

If you want to be seen as an authority in your field, show it. Make people know you are trustworthy, competent and knowledgeable. Use effective data visualization tools. Remember, though, that being resourceful is good, but it does not necessarily make you an authority. No matter how visually striking the look, if content is lacking, you will only be wasting both your and your audience’s time.

 

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NOTE: This was written in 2018 (never published, at least, not without my consent) so the visualization tools mentioned may not be that updated. Technology changes fast.

DISCLAIMER: I am not endorsing any product, tool, or company. Any mention was just for information purposes.

5 Ways to Drive High Quality Leads #ThursdayTips #NanoPoblano2019

Are you having trouble getting quality leads? Then, you are probably doing it wrong.

There are various ways to learn how to get those leads. They will not be easy and will require more time and effort to do.

5 Ways to Drive Great Leads

Below are five ways to do it, listed in random order. They may be things you already know, but they are there for emphasis.

1. Write unique and relevant articles. Make sure you do not simply copy off from other people’s works. Make sure your topic is related to what your business is offering.

If you do not create unique and relevant articles, you will end up listed far away from the first search engine results page. That is not going to help you drive high quality leads since searchers cannot find you. Content is considered king in the search engine optimization (SEO) industry.

2. Use Google AdWords. This can help you with great campaigns. You can create banner-type display ads and text ads. Maximize the use of their Keyword Planner Tool to include keywords in your ads. The tool will help identify keywords your site is ranking for and suggest some that you may try to rank for. Forget all the others that are not helping your site rank higher in search engines.

Understand how this powerful Google product works so you can use it well to boost your business standing. It is not an easy task and the service is not free. Still, work hard on your campaigns and check performance based on the results.

3. Use reputable analytical tools like Google Analytics. Google is emphasized because it is the most popular and trusted search engine. There are other analytical tools you can use; it depends on which search engines you trust. Bing has its own tools, for example, so use it, if that is your preference.

Analytics are important especially since they are oftentimes integrated with search engines: Google Analytics is with AdWords, Bing’s SEO Analyzer is with Bing Ads. Using them gives you a bigger picture of how your site is doing, why it’s not performing well, and what the possible problem(s) could be.

4. Do both on-page and off-page optimization. Optimize well, not just on-page but off-page. If content is king, optimization could be the queen—it can get you anywhere.

On-page SEO is done directly on the site. You can optimize titles, descriptions and links. It usually involves keyword search, allowing you to include keywords in creating descriptions, for instance. Meanwhile, off-page SEO is done outside the webpage. These are ways to promote your site through social media marketing, link building (e.g. online directory submissions), article submissions that link back to you, and others.

Hiring skilled SEO specialists is highly advised.

5. Learn online marketing strategies. You will need to learn new marketing strategies to get high-quality leads. Learn inbound marketing, inbound sales marketing, even email marketing. All can help you improve your business and get great leads.

Do not handle all the marketing, though. Make sure you have people to delegate tasks to. A marketing and a sales person/team will have separate tasks while still working together—Marketing will find possible leads (based on targeted “buyer personas”), Sales will work until the leads avail of your products or services. They must have the proper training on the new marketing strategies.

Marketing is very important. It is how you are going to introduce your business and let people know what you offer. The best strategies can boost business performance.

People’s attention span is too short, so you must keep their attention. They may visit your site, become leads and possibly convert into customers. Eventually, they may become what Inbound Marketing calls “evangelists”, the ones who will promote your business by word of mouth and increase your social media reach.

6 Reasons a Vlogger is Not Popular #ThursdayTips

So you’ve decided to join the club and vlog. But it’s been months–years even!–and you’re nowhere near the famous vloggers that inspired you. You’ve been posting daily and religiously ’cause that should make people remember you, right? Yet you’re not popular. What gives?

Let’s just take me, for example. Why is it that I might never be a popular vlogger? Well, I’ve watched enough YouTube vlogs to have observed certain truths. If these are your truths, well, sticks and stones, and no offense meant.

Why I’m not Popular

1.  I am not gorgeous.

2.  I’m not famous or going around with the “in” crowd.

3.  I don’t have the right or more proper equipment.

4.  I don’t have enough resources (physical and/or financial).

5.  I am not the gimmicky type of person.

6.  I’m too shy when I need to be bold.

I only emphasized my observations. It doesn’t mean that if one is this or not that, he/she should stay that way. It depends on what he/she wants to be or accomplish, what that person decides to do and thinks he/she can do.

I have suggested alternatives or simple solutions below.

How to Be a Popular Vlogger

1. Just be presentable.
2. Actively engage with your audience. Interact with people. Go out sometimes.
3. Make an effort to acquire better equipment for your purpose.
4. Be resourceful. Find ways!
5. Be creative. Make the effort.
6. Believe in yourself and be confident.

I have actually shared these whys and hows in my most current vlogpost.  There, I further explained a little bit more my bases and insights, own experiences, and conclusions. Excuse some of the mildly rough edited parts.

Perseverance pays off only when you do things right. It doesn’t matter how many times you post. If you ignore the importance of relevant content to people, then people will ignore you back.

How to Make a (Boxed) Ninja Turtle Costume #ThursdayTips

I’ve actually been putting off showing this. The reason was simple: I wanted to show it on my vlog then share here. But since I still have many backlogs there on YouTube, I thought, why the heck not share it now, right? So, a bit of a background…

Our cosplay theme for Christmas 2018 was ‘boxed anime/cartoon character’. I did some digging to make sure I understood what to do. Apparently, the box or cardboard idea has its own history and it has to do with this guy –>

This was Paul M. Palgen wearing his “epic fail” costume, now known as the Cardboard Box Gundam, back in 2003 at the Anime Central (ACEN) convention. As explained in KnowYourMeme.com (because indeed, it became a popular meme after):

“Paul’s costume of Zack from Final Fantasy VII had become unusable only days before the Rosemont convention…Not wanting to attend the convention without a costume, he asked his sister what he should do. She said, ‘Nobody’s going to care. Just wear a cardboard box and say you’re a Gundam.’ “

And the rest is meme-worthy history! Yes, it became a thing, spawning parodies and tributes. Who would’ve thought?

Okay, history lesson done. On to my real topic.

The instruction/requirement was to make sure to use a square box to cover the trunk of the wearer’s body. Then we were free to do whatever with the whole look. For some reason, the first thing that came to my mind was to make a ninja turtle costume for myself. It must have been because of the turtle shell that gave me an idea. Besides, it was a long-time coming. I had always wanted to make one. If you don’t know or haven’t read about it yet, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles hold a special place in my heart.

See my favorite Michelangelo? That’s me.

Michelangelo is my fave TMNT and I really wanted to create  nunchuks 😉

I know, I know, the colors were not all in the same shade (I had to make do with my resources), but I did my best. In fact, I think I did a good enough job, at least.

Now, how did I make my costume? My Internet search wasn’t such a big help — some were too simple that I didn’t like them; others were too elaborate and costly for me. I don’t think I saw a boxed ninja turtle even. Therefore, I thought of 95% of this costume myself.

Below is HOW TO MAKE A (BOXED) NINJA TURTLE COSTUME…Well, my way. I am sharing this “infographic” that I shared to my friends. If the words are too small, just do a right-click, click on “View Image”, and voila! Still too small? Press CTRL then the plus (+) sign several times until the desired size.

So how did you find it? Of course, again, these are just my own ideas. There are various ways to make a TMNT costume. But if you want to use my ideas, feel free to do so. Meanwhile, I will share the how-to video once I’m actually done with it.

COWABUNGA!!!

How to Rank Better with Search Algorithms #ThursdayTips

Why is your business not searchable on search engines? Focus on Search Algorithms!

But what are search algorithms? How do they work? What should you do? Let this short video introduce you to some Google search algorithms. Find out what they do and what you can do with them to rank better and get noticed.

Again, side note: I wrote and created this video for ConnieKnows.com. So they own the video.

Any thoughts? Share them in the comments!

Just no spam, please. No comments pretending not to be spam. Guys, I see through you.

Let Contents Do the Talking #atozchallenge2017

You are a wise person with a business to run. Naturally, you have done your research like a good businessman does. Based on findings, you realize that in order to expand the business, you’ll have to up the ante some more and level-up. Information technology is here to stay and you’ll do wisely not to be left behind, right? So you get a web developer and a web designer who create an attractive, fully functional and easily navigable website for you.

Website, check.

And then what to write? Since information is available right there at the office, content development is done in-house. Your people know the business, they have a clear understanding of what it is about. Who better to write about your business? Therefore, you delegate a content writer for the site right from your own team.

Contents, check. How hard can writing be?

Letting Your Home Grow

All those done, finally, you are ready to launch into cyberspace…Oops! Not so fast, hold your horses! While it seems you may have done things correctly, you just might want to backtrack a little bit and check if indeed, you’ve decided on everything wisely.

The most important parts of a website are not really the “physical” aspects, though they, too, are of great importance. After all, without them, how can searchers find you? Web developers and designers provide all the foundations and structures for your site.

As they say, however, a house is not a home. It’s what’s in it that makes it a home. An empty house is not a home; a cluttered house is, well, simply embarrassing, to say the least. For a website, it’s the contents that really breathe life into it. Just how much life depends largely on the quality of the contents. That is where you might want to focus your attention on.

Let your home grow. Feed it with the right nutrition, not junk. Knowing the details of your company and what it offers is just half of the requirements to ensure quality content. It takes more than knowing what to write, but how to write it.

A good, professional Web Content Writer knows that. She has been trained for it. It’s not just words and constructing sentences for her, but a lot of experience and know-how. Content writing takes more than typing. It involves research beyond existing resources, knowing more about how web development works. Also, a big factor in any business’ success today is good, clean SEO—this, she has learned and practices.

Getting Visitors to Stay

Competition in cyberspace is fierce. You want to be the business that captures searchers’ attention immediately and keep them glued to your site until they decide to avail of your offer. People’s attention span can only last a few seconds, that is the whole truth of it.

An attractive, fully functional and easily navigable website is practically useless if it sends searchers away with missing, low-quality or useless information. If they don’t find what they’re looking for or anything interesting, they either click the Back button or exit. Either way, they leave. You don’t want that. Don’t sweep the welcome rug off their feet.

How confident are you that you or your employees can write well enough to keep searchers glued to your site? Can your people get your business to the top of search engines’ first-page results? Do they have the proper skills that an actual content writer does? No?

You’ve already taken a risk, so risk more away! A web content writer is who you need, just like most businesses today. If you haven’t yet, this is the time to add one to your team. Remember, house walls can’t talk; it’s those inside the house who do.

 

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This is still the continuation of my A to Z Challenge. Last post, I was on the letter “M”. Why the jump to “W”? That’s because the pieces for the letters “N” to “V” have long been posted. The explanation is simple: When I was doing the challenge last year, I skipped letters. I did not finish the whole thing so I have decided to do it and not quit.

As for the writeup itself, just like some other stuff that I did for work, this was also a guest blogging venture. The deal was the article provider would get exposure but the publisher got exclusive rights to the unique article. No money involved. This one, the guest blogging services site owner reserved for her own site (I was actually thrilled!). There’s a story about this, but to make the story short, her site was down for years already and is now removed. I found her new site and could not find the article ANYWHERE. Now, Google found it on another site that isn’t supposed to have it and is not even mentioning me as the writer. Some guy is supposed to be the writer of this bogus page. The article is truncated, leaving a “Click here to read more” message, but the link just actually redirects to various suspicious sites that change every time you click on the same link!

Needless to say, it’s high-time we take back what is ours.

W is for “Web Content Writer”

This piece serves as my Letter W post for the A to Z Challenge 2017.

For my previous posts, kindly visit my A to Z Challenge 2017 page.

Why Do Content Marketing? #ThursdayTips

What is Content Marketing? How do you use it for business? Let me tell you in this video I wrote for and created. (Personally, I’m just happy to show my work to you, as I really enjoyed doing it and some other stuff. But don’t tell anybody that, har har har!!!)

It was an article that we also eventually made into a video for ConnieKnows.com.

 

Any thoughts? Share them in the comments! BTW, it is Thursday now here.

“Do I have to make every detail in fantasy fiction logical or acceptable?” #ThursdayTips

Well, I haven’t done this in a long time, so why not?This was where the excerpts came from: The Truth in Your Make-Believe.

Fellow fictionists, feel free to add in more tips!

 

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Sorry, I hadn’t been posting guys. There are just many things on my plate lately. But I promise to be a little more active again the next days…Toodles!

#AskGi No.1: “How do I tell my boyfriend I don’t find him attractive?…” #ThursdayTips

Welcome to my new…what do you call it…? Never mind. Welcome to Ask Gi!!! What is it? It’s stuff I get asked. Not personal, though maybe based on experience, but opinions and/or suggestions. Mainly, about LIFE!!! So I thought I’d share the more interesting or helpful ones to you. I’ve already created a page for #AskGi Column (check the menu).

I’ve been told several times I give good advice. So if you’re not shy about it, feel free to ask me something, too. Send your questions to j.gi.federizo@gmail.com, subject: “Ask Gi”. I will respect your privacy. Let me know if (1) you want things published or not, and if yes, (2) what real or code name we should call you by.

So here’s our first question. Comment below for your own reactions 🙂