Gold Medal Winners of the 2020 Web Design and Development Competition Announced
webprofessionalsglobal.org is pleased to announce the Gold medal winners of the 2020 “Virtual” Web Design Challenge
This year’s innovative and totally online event invited and challenged
Challengers documented their progress as they demonstrated their skills in Web Programming (HTML, XHTML and CSS), Web graphics, Web site design, Web accessibility and usability, Web site management, project management, Web multimedia and equally important, professionalism.
A panel of experts from the Web professional community based their winning selection on the following criteria developed by webprofessionalsglobal.org:
• Design and Layout: Navigation • Programming: Compatibility • Programming Code Structure & Design • Scaffolding of Process – Diagram/Flowchart • Video production and presentation • Professionalism
Winners at the Secondary/High School: Gold:
• Kevin Downing, Whitinsville, MA • Daniel Cardone, Blackstone, MA
Winners at the College/Postsecondary Gold:
• Matthew Connors, Massachusetts • Joey Higuera, Massachusetts
“On behalf of the webprofessionalsglobal.org organization, the Technical Committee and challenge judges, I want to say thanks to all the teams for putting forward all the great efforts. So much in the world has changed since last year in Louisville. But one thing has not changed, and it is the quality of our Web Design challenge participants. In chatting with the judges, each team excelled in different areas, and they enjoyed seeing all the creativity in all the submissions. If these winners stay on this trajectory, keep practicing, growing their career portfolios, and adding international industry-recognized certifications to their resumes, I have no doubt they will get snatched up by industry when they start looking for that first career move. I am proud to say this is my seventh year as part of the webprofessionalsglobal.org Web Design challenge support team, and even though I didn’t get to see everybody in Louisville, I had a terrific time.”Lead Judge – Steve Waddell Founder CTeLearning.com
The Web Design Contest provides quality education experiences for students in leadership, teamwork, citizenship and character development. It builds and reinforces self-confidence, work attitudes and communications skills. It emphasizes total quality at work, high ethical standards, superior work skills, life-long education and pride in the dignity of work. For additional information visit www.webdesigncontest.org
SkillsUSA is a United States career and technical student organization serving more than 395,000 high school, college and middle school students and professional members enrolled in training programs in trade, technical and skilled service occupations, including health occupations. For additional information visit www.skillsusa.org
Tami didn’t know what to do after getting hurt on the job. As a wife and mom—with another one on the way—she knew she needed help getting to that next paying career. Fortunately, she contacted her local workforce development board and job center where she found a team that helped her see all her possibilities and how to take the next step. Tami explained that she had some basic needs for her new career. As a mom with a husband who is a critical worker, she wanted a career that would enable her to stay home and work remotely if her family had to move due to her husband’s work. She wanted a career that would be more satisfying and give her the chance to be creative and help others.
The workforce consultants at the career center showed Tami the choices in education they could provide to help her move forward with a new career. They all agreed that web design was a terrific career path and a good fit for Tami. Tami did not have any previous training in web design, but her counselors told her that would not be a problem. Some of the options were classroom-based courses that would require her to wait for the next semester to begin. These courses offered her a course completion certificate, not an industry certification. However, they also offered Tami an option that had rolling enrollment, meaning she could start immediately. The course and instructors were all online and only required her to have internet and either a PC, Mac or Chromebook. All the coding and development tools were all included and cloud-based. And the feature that got Tami most excited was that the course prepared her to receive a full International Industry-Recognized Certification from the Web Professionals Organization. This was not merely a course completion certificate, but an industry certification from the professional association of web designers, developers and app creators. Tami filled out paperwork and was meeting her instructors within days. She was very thankful for the workforce development board job center team who made this all happen.
With COVID-19 affecting how we work and live, many people like Tami are seeking new career paths that will allow them to work with more flexibility and freedom. Let’s hear from Tami and her instructor.
Tami enrolled in the Web Design and Development course through California State University San Marcos. She had worked on early social media sites years ago and remembers that was the first time she got excited about the potential of the internet. However, before starting the course she didn’t have any actual training in design or development. The course taught her everything she needed to know from the ground up and developed her into a skilled and knowledgeable web professional, all as a remote learner.
In the months that Tami was working through the course, she faced several events in her personal life, including a pregnancy, that required her to pause her learning for a time. Because the course is self-guided, she could easily take a break and resume when she felt ready. Tami praised how helpful Cal State San Marcos was throughout her journey, saying “I reached out to them a lot when going through things and having to say, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t get school done this week or this month. So, can I do an extension?’ They were always sweet and encouraging about it. They said, ‘Oh, no problem. We can extend it for you.’” And Steve Waddell—co-developer of the course, instructor, and curriculum development partner of webprofessionalsglobal.org— was always available to answer questions Tami had along the way. This unique model allows the student to work at their own pace as a virtual learner, without the pressure of a traditional classroom setting in which all students are expected to keep the same pace no matter what life circumstances happen in the process.
webprofessionalsglobal.org Certifications
One of the key features of the Web Design and Development course is the optional webprofessionalsglobal.org exam, which enables the learner to earn a certification administered by the Web Professionals Organization, the premier industry association for web designers and developers. Tami commented on how well the course prepared her for taking the certification exam at the end of the course: “I’ve taken tests before that seemed to include nothing that I had learned. In the Web Design and Development course, every quiz prepared me for the final certification exam. I have test anxiety and was worried I was going to fail, but Steve talked me through the process and said I would do well. And he was right—I finished in 30 minutes, and it was easy.”
Having an industry certification and project portfolio sets Tami apart from other professionals that companies may be considering hiring, which allows her to hit the ground running in getting clients and starting work on projects. Equipped with new skills, knowledge, a portfolio and certification, Tami can work directly with clients to solve problems and meet needs. The experience of taking the course and working with Cal State San Marcos made her a fan of the university and how willing it is to help adult learners like herself.
To others who may be thinking about a new path but don’t know how to switch careers, Tami says “I would tell anyone else that they can do it. And I know people say that, but seriously, I am the worst with school sometimes. I have struggled with self-esteem issues, but doing this course gave me so much. It gave me more than just the education—it gave me the knowledge, strength, ability and confidence to do it. It taught me that there’s way more to web design than I realized—there are so many different types of jobs out there that I can do now because of this course and certification.”
Helping Adult Learners Switch Careers and Develop New Skills
Steve Waddell commented, “I get to have a unique perspective as a teacher. Since I am one of the co-authors (I also need to shout out Daniel, the other head co-author and the other 24 team members who helped build this course) I know why we designed the course as we did. This course has over 170 tutorial and industry subject matter videos. We created a terrific ‘play with the code’ live sandboxing feel to help the students learn to create web pages and sites. And I can be proud of all the ‘techy’ stuff we did as instructional designers. However, it is when I am facilitating, supporting and helping the students that I really understand their learning needs. The experience allows me to be a better course developer and I enjoy the teaching.
It is so much fun seeing students reinvent themselves through online education. I am Tami’s ‘teacher’, but the course is really self-directed, self-paced education. My job boils down to coaching and supporting when the adult learner struggles. I struggled when I was first learning how to create web pages and sites and it really is fun to relive some of those early struggles and help guide students over the humps, just like the people who helped me out years ago.
Tami is the example of what is great about adult education—especially online education. Watching her reinvent herself and switch careers from a more physical type job to a creative tech field was actually quite fun for me. This is what adult education is about. Anyone can reinvent themselves. Web design is about helping individuals, groups and businesses bring their stories and products to market. Tami loves helping people, and when she was struggling with things in life that so many adult learners must deal with as they reconstruct themselves into a new career—including jobs, family, illness, and pandemic—it was her passion to help others that kept her moving forward. I am so proud of how she stuck to it, and a shout out to CSUSM for all their support.”
Start Your New Career Path Today
Maybe you are similar to how Tami approached her career shift and are thinking about how to find an exciting and in-demand career path, even in the age of COVID-19. The time is now to learn at your own pace and begin your career start, all from the comfort of your couch or kitchen table. If you’re not sure where to start, webprofessionalsglobal.org is fortunate to work with many workforce development organizations, public and private universities and colleges in the US. Our workforce, university and post-secondary partners offer a variety of course options from multi-year programs, semester-long, and 90-day career certification sprints. If you want to find a school to work with, shoot us an email at steve@webprofessionalsglobal.org, and we can point you in the right direction.
We also see the need to help with over-aged and under-credited youth, and we always welcome the opportunity to partner with organizations in helping to re-engage these youth in education and a brighter future.
Do you work at a University, College or Workforce Center?
If you are an organization that wants to use media-rich and highly interactive international industry-recognized certification courses in your career programs, then contact us today. We are ready to help.
First in Nation to Earn STEM/STEAM Stackable International Industry-Recognized Certificationsdeveloped by webprofessionalsglobal.org
Haven, Kansas May 6, 2019 – Three Haven High School Students are the first in the U.S. to earn Associate Level Web Developer webprofessionalsglobal.org stacking certifications from two separate courses at Haven High School. Additionally, nine more students earned Web and Mobile Application Industry Certifications also offered by webprofessionalsglobal.org and three others earned Web Designer certification.
Graduating with webprofessionalsglobal.org Certifications
All of these students will be graduating high school with industry-recognized webprofessionalsglobal.org certifications, which is quite an accomplishment.
Haven High School is in its fifth year teaching these courses and providing students the opportunity to earn credentials. This continued success is led by the Haven Business Education Department, and the business educator responsible for this program is Jessica Wilson.
Steve Waddell—founder of CTeLearning and webprofessionalsglobal.org curriculum development partner—was asked to visit Haven HS and present a banner on behalf of the webprofessionalsglobal.org to recognize it as the most credentialed school in KS. Haven students have earned more industry-recognized certifications than any other school in Kansas.
Haven High School currently runs both the Web and Mobile Application Development and Web Development for Business courses by CTeLearning.com. These courses are stackable and enable students to earn a webprofessionalsglobal.org International Industry-Recognized Certification (IIRC). These exams are proctored at the school site to maintain exam integrity and ensure each participant has met all of the minimal requirements to sit for the credential.
Power of Rural STEM and Business Education
Steve Waddell said, “Never underestimate education in the rural parts of the U.S. or the dedicated educators, administrators and students who thrive there. These students here today are gaining world-class credentials from an international professionals association like the WebProfessioanals.org. This is not just another test delivered by a testing company. These students have received an international industry-recognized certification. This shows that high tech, high-demand career education can happen and should happen everywhere. We love being a part of rural STEAM/STEM and business education.”
“Wherever a student calls home should not restrict their opportunity to discover their passions and talents for these high-demand STEM careers. Only a few short years ago the wisdom of the day was that to work in these types of technology careers you had to leave the rural community and move to suburban or urban spaces. Times have changed, those days are gone, and Jessica’s students are proving that.”
The Path to webprofessionalsglobal.org Certifications
In addition to the Web Development for Business and the Web and Mobile Application Development courses, Ms. Wilson teaches other career and technical education courses, including Business Entrepreneurship and Coding and 3D Video Game Design. This recent success is demonstrating that Haven High is a regional STEM/STEAM/CTE powerhouse.
In these courses, students learned web and app coding, created sites and apps, and built a future-ready portfolio with real-world projects. As of today, they get to add industry credentials they can show college recruiters or future employers.
“As educators we thrive in reaching for what seems to be impossible, especially when it comes to doing what is best for our students and helping them be successful. It is always appreciated to have an administration that helps to support you in these kinds of endeavors. I am very lucky here at Haven and I just want to extend a thank you to Principal Travis Moore, Curriculum Director Marty Niensteadt and our Superintendent Clark Wedel for their ongoing support of this fantastic opportunity. It is with their help and the determination and hard work of my students that we are able to continue the tradition of excellence here at Haven High. As much as I appreciate the recognition, as their teacher none of this would be possible without the work my students put into their learning and their support of one another,” said Jessica Wilson.
The certification earned by the Haven HS students is delivered by webprofessionalsglobal.org, Executive Director Mark DuBois and educational team were key in creating and maintaining the international industry-recognized certifications.
“Many students take the course only for high school credit. Those who want to gain the coveted webprofessionalsglobal.org industry-recognized credential must receive a minimum course grade, meet all project performance requirements, exhibit professionalism in all class activities and receive a recommendation to sit for the exam by their course instructor. Ms. Wilson’s students took the proctored exam at Haven High” said Steve Waddell.
“We welcome the Haven students to the exciting world of web technologies. We are very proud of Ms. Wilson’s students. Haven has an incredibly strong program and we continue to see students succeeding at Haven and earning industry certifications year after year. All of us here at webprofessionalsglobal.org love seeing students take these first important steps towards high-demand STEAM/STEM careers in web and app development,” said Mark DuBois, Executive Director of the WebPrfessionals.org
Courtesy of Haven High School Yearbook
Congratulations for Earning Stackable webprofessionalsglobal.org Certifications
The three Haven High School Students who are the first in the nation to earn their Associate Level Web Developer by stacking certifications from two separate CTeLearning.com courses at Haven HS are:
Kelton DeBord: Junior
Caleb Fredrickson : Senior
Ronnie Voss: Sophomore
The nine newly minted Mobile Application Industry Certification recipients are:
Joshua Clodfeldter: Freshman
Ethan Earls: Freshman
Dakota Fox: Sophomore
Z’Hakari Huffman: Sophomore
Maverick Lane: Freshman
Cole Long: Freshman
Nathan Schmidt: Sophomore
Holden Schneider: Freshman
Cole Zongker: Freshman
Congratulations to Jessica Wilson’s 2019 class of industry-recognized certification recipients. We can’t wait to see the class of 2020.
Today I read about another major auto manufacturer laying off employees. My heart goes out to the employees who have spent years working for companies that shut down on just a moment’s notice. At one time, working in auto production was a reliable means to provide for a family. It was a sustainable career with the opportunity to be a part of something big—the biggest industry in our country.
This article is for all the American manufacturers and production workers who are wondering: what is next?
They say that when one door closes, another opens. That may be little comfort, but I want you to know there is a door that is wide open to you. Keep reading and please give me the time to let me make my point.
With traditional auto manufacturers undergoing serious restructuring in recent years, a long career at Ford or General Motors isn’t guaranteed as it was in years past. A worker in the past might have stayed with an auto employer for his or her entire career—but with today’s changing economy, many of those employees have been laid off and forced to pursue a career change outside of the industry. The world of work keeps changing, and it is hard to know which way to go.
The Good News
The good news is that auto production workers have built-in skills that translate well to other industries. The years of training and hard work to build some of the most high-tech and complex machines on the planet has given you wisdom, experience and skills that companies look for.
If you’re thinking that your experience in the auto industry doesn’t translate well to web design and development, read on.
How Does Production Experience Relate to a Career in Web Design and Development?
Someone with auto production experience is a natural fit to dive into the world of web design and development. An auto production worker must have excellent attention to detail and focus on completing tasks correctly, skills that are required of designers and developers. A production worker must also be able to think critically and troubleshoot problems that arise on projects. Guess what web designers and developers do every day? Web developers solve problems and build web sites that are far less complex than any car I have ever driven.
One of the biggest complaints I hear all the time from friends who own tech companies is the issue of work ethic and dependability. Being dependable, a good team player and able to communicate well is critical to project success in both industries. Also, demonstrating a willingness and ability to be cross-trained in different job tasks at your company is an enormous asset in the web industry. And perhaps most importantly, both auto production and web design and development require a technical aptitude. Technology isn’t going anywhere, and as new technologies replace old ones, employees who learn the emerging ones will be extremely valuable to their companies and the web industry.
As you think about “re-careering,” don’t discount the other skills you bring to the table, including pride in work, product knowledge, integrity, dependability, initiative, persistence, leadership, adaptability, empathy and self-discipline. These are the attitudes that companies look for when hiring designers and developers to help them succeed on the web. Put simply, a career transition from manufacturing and production to web design and development is a natural one.
A Career in Web Design and Development
Broadly speaking, web designers and developers work with clients to market products and services online. Designers utilize text, images and video to create websites and reach intended audiences, and developers write the code that provides the technical foundation of these websites, It is a fast-growing STEM career path that offers a median salary of $73K and up to $150K per year, offering flexible and fun careers to those who don’t want to report to an office every day. Many designers and developers enjoy being independent and contracting their services to small and large companies while working remotely. Others are employed full time and use their skills to help their company grow and succeed. Most designers and developers have both design and coding skills, allowing them to better help their clients succeed and meet business goals.
A Flexible Career
Web design and development is one of the growing STEM careers that offers unparalleled flexibility and opportunities to work on impactful projects, and many designers and developers aren’t required to commute to an office each day. According to research, 30 percent of the U.S. working population currently freelances in some capacity, and that will grow to 51 percent by 2020. Web designers and developers often can have just as much of an impact working remotely as from an office. Additionally, web design and development serve as the foundation of many of the technologies we rely on today. It is a stable career that isn’t going to disappear overnight, which makes it a safe bet for those seeking to get started in a brand new career.
The First Step to Getting Started
To get started in the industry, you will need to gain design and development skills. The good news is that you do not need a traditional college degree to enter the field. Employers value candidates who have industry certifications and a project portfolio—so it is important to find courseware that will prepare you in both of these areas. I am partial to online courses that allow you to play around and “sandbox” your practice work, as I believe they are a great way for learning at your own speed. For tools, all you need is a browser and text editor. Avoid courses that teach specific applications like Adobe Dreamweaver and WordPress—in my experience, companies want people who don’t rely on a specific tool. Learn the basics first.
In the course style I am suggesting, you will learn by building real projects and creating a digital resume that will showcase your skills to potential employers. This is important to demonstrate your technical aptitude and ability to successfully develop and guide a project from beginning to end. You can also gain in-demand industry certifications to prove to companies you have a comprehensive skill set and are ready to produce for them on day one. Side note: it’s wise to avoid industry certifications from testing companies and instead seek a less biased source, like professional associations, as they are more interested in measuring technical aptitude and proficiency. It just makes sense that companies will place a higher value on more meaningful certifications backed by a professional organization, like webprofessionalsglobal.org, than from another testing company. Always consider the source of the certification—your next employer certainly will.
To be completely transparent, I am not a professional career coach or workforce counselor. However, I am an employer who has worked with people who came to me after working in other industries. These employees have transferable skills and successfully transitioned to the world of web design and development. Recently, we had 26 people working on a project, and most of the members of the web team had spent time in other industries before switching to web development. I have also had the pleasure of witnessing adults retraining from the inside in my duties as an adjunct instructor for adult education design and development courses.
A Career in Web Design and Development is Possible
Be proud of what you have done and learned in manufacturing: through valuable experience, you have gained many valuable and transferable skills. You learned how to take responsibility, solve problems, work in teams, develop technical aptitude, cross-train in other disciplines and more. You can take this experience and build on it to enter the exciting and rapidly expanding world of web design and development. Contact webprofessionalsglobal.org today for more information on how to begin your path to an exciting new career.
How and where we work is changing. The nature of modern businesses and lifestyles means working from home is more popular than ever. Going to the same office eight hours a day, five days a week is no longer the norm.
While working from home can sound like a dream, anyone who’s actually done knows how unproductive or unsociable it can make you feel. If you frequently work from home here are some ways to make it a happier and more productive environment.
Make sure you can work when you want
A home workspace needs to be somewhere you can actually complete tasks. Whether you’re an early riser or a night owl, you need to make sure your workspace is suitable for the hours you’re most productive in. If you want to work remotely make sure your home doesn’t have partners, roommates or children roaming around distracting you. The more you can keep your focus on your work the better it will be. Work when they’re out of the house or make it clear when you need some time alone.
Make sure you aren’t confined to a bedroom either. Muddling the wires in your brain with what room is for sleeping and what room is for working will only make it harder to keep a good life schedule. Designate one room for working from home and design it around your habits and needs.
Tech out your work station
A difference you’ll likely notice working from home in comparison to an office is the drop off in quality of equipment. It’s unlikely your home office has a workstation as well designed as the one at your desk at work.
StarTech’s guide to the perfect docking station highlights how we now find ourselves moving around and jumping between tasks more than ever, even at home. Having technology that allows you to do that is just as essential at home as in the office or on the move.
If you do your best work with two monitors and a particular desk size then try and replicate that feeling when working from home. For a lot of people working from home is about comfort, but trying to do a full day of work with your laptop on your lap isn’t ideal.
Have an office structure
If you’re new to working from home it can be tempting to be a bit liberal with your work schedule. With no one watching over your shoulder and the lack of a productive office atmosphere it’s a lot easier to take an extra break to stare at your phone for half an hour. To make sure your productivity levels stay high and your guilt levels low you should try and stick to the same schedule that made you a success in the office.
Limit the number of breaks you take and don’t be tempted to elongate your lunch with an extra episode of something on Netflix. Mindset is a big part of what makes working from home successful. If you can carry over the same schedule you kept in the office it’ll be a more seamless transition.
Stay connected
Working from home can be lonely. You need people out of the house to keep yourself focused, but you miss out on the buzz of an office environment. There’s no need to feel disconnected though. There are a number of tools for staying in touch with your team remotely without having to spend all day on the phone. You can also keep an eye on what people are doing so you don’t lose step with the rest of the team and get a bigger picture of the business operation.
If you frequently speak to clients make a point of scheduling regular meetings with them over phone or video chat. This can help break up your day and act as a replacement for the contact you’d usually get from colleagues. Suddenly previously boring client meetings become a highlight of the day.
Treat your space like an office
A happy workspace is a productive workspace. When working from home keep the house as if all your colleagues were there too. Don’t just keep your workspace clean, make sure the house is somewhere you enjoy being and has an ambiance you enjoy. Businesses have noticed the benefits in recent years in having lots of plants, plenty of natural light and pleasant scents. Modern workplaces are often a nice place to be, so replicate that in your home.
Maybe work in your PJ’s if it makes you feel more at ease, but try and avoid sitting around in your underwear. Working as if someone else is in the room with you is about keeping yourself productive and retaining a professional state of mind for the full workday.
Keep to-do lists
Everyone working from home has the same thoughts. Maybe I should just clean those dishes quickly. The house could probably use a vacuum. Chores have never been as appealing as they are when you’re working from home, but you need to resist the urge and stay on track. Making a daily to-do list before you go to bed every night is a great way to achieve this. It leaves you with no illusion about what needs to get done that day and gives you direction, which is what remote workers need more than anything.
Conclusion
Working from home is both a blessing and a curse. It can be relaxing to skip the commute and have an extra half hour in bed, but home can become somewhere you become stressed and unproductive. Follow these tips to keep your performance levels up wherever you work.
Editor’s Note: This article was contributed by Rodney Laws. Here is additional information he provided about himself.
Rodney Laws is an eCommerce platform specialist and online business consultant. He’s worked in the eCommerce industry for nearly two decades, helping brands big and small to achieve their business goals. You can get his advice for free by visiting EcommercePlatforms.io and reading his detailed reviews. For more tips and advice, reach out to Rodney on Twitter @EcomPlatformsio.
More likely than not, the first thing that people come across when conducting a simple search over search engines for you are your social media profiles – your twitter feed, your Facebook pages, and your LinkedIn profile.
With more and more recruiters leveraging search engines in their background check, it is more important than ever to take ownership of your personal brand.
What is a personal brand and why does it matter?
Your personal brand is your online persona. It is how the world sees you and people perceive you. It is the unique combination of your skills, personality, and experience that comes together to form your online persona and sets you apart from your peers and competitors.
Let’s get real though. Coding is where your passion lies.
Marketing yourself online and honing your virtual image is probably something you are least interested in. You would much rather immerse yourself in the code.
“Good people put their heads down and get caught up in their job and forget they have a whole career to manage.” – Pamela Rucker, chairwoman of CIO executive council’s executive women in IT.
While marketing may not be the thing you have a natural affinity for, it is definitely something you should work on to differentiate yourself in the ultra-competitive tech world and open up a myriad of opportunities as well.
As a web developer, you cannot underestimate the importance of having a strong online presence.
Jeff Atwood, the co-founder of Stack Overflow and Discourse said in his blog post, “Mere competence in a technical discipline is not enough. That’s the minimum required to keep your head above water.”
A strong online presence and a distinguishable personal brand is a tool that every developer needs in his/her arsenal that can open up a box full of possibilities.
Getting on the recruiters’ radars and getting job offers is just the tip of the iceberg of opportunities. When done right, personal branding has reportedly led developers to land lucrative jobs with developer salaries towards the developer salaries towards the higher end of the spectrum, just based on their online presence.
It has even helped developers establish themselves as entrepreneurs through their personal brand. Most importantly, it has empowered web designers and developers with control over their own online reputation.
How to create a compelling personal brand?
A large number of software developers have taken to personal branding in one form or the other. Everybody left, right and center is busy making a blog, tweeting about it on Twitter, posting on LinkedIn and sharing across Facebook.
How do you make your voice heard over the din?
Here’s the strategy you need to follow to make sure that your personal brand sends out from the rest, builds your reputation and ensures that you land in a goldmine of opportunities.
1. Find your brand before you start building it
What value can you add to the existing ton of information already out there?
It is easy to feel overwhelmed looking at the knowledgeable resources being published every day. The imposter syndrome is very real and figuring out your unique selling point (USP) is important for you to be able to overcome it.
You don’t have to be a subject matter expert to share something value-adding. Even if the knowledge you share is not something you, your unique angle or perspective has the potential to make it useful for someone reading it.
The personal brand you aim to build should reflect that. It is supposed to be “personal”. This doesn’t mean that you talk about your vacation plans or food preferences.
Have a passion project? Talk about it.
Learning a new language? Share your experience
Your personal brand needs to reflect who you are, what challenges you face and the steps you take to finally overcome them.
2. Focus on creating content and taking a strategic approach
How wonderful it would be if you only had to hit the publish button and readers would come pouring in. The reality, however, is that unless you take a strategic approach, the content you create is never going to see the light of the day, despite being amazing in quality.
Even publishing content on Medium doesn’t guarantee you traffic (even though it is the primary reason why developers blog on Medium). Social media is tricky unless you already have garnered a significant following.
Step 1: Build your own website
As a web developer, you can choose to code from scratch and your website can also double up as a project within your portfolio. If coding your website isn’t something you fancy or don’t have time for, a simple WordPress hosted website will also do.
Your website doesn’t have to be fancy, it just needs to have a decent UI/UX and feel professional.
Step 2: Make the website discoverable
The key to ensuring that people organically discover your personal brand lies in formulating an effective content strategy.
While you might not be a marketing pro, understanding the basics of search engine optimization (SEO) and how the search algorithms work is critical to ensuring that the content you create reaches its full potential.
Step 3: Target the right audience
The homepage of your website should communicate exactly what is it that you specialize in. For example, if you are a Python developer, when a recruiter is searching for the same, your website should turn up in the search results.
How do you do that?
Identify the bottom of the funnel keywords. These are the phrases that people looking to hire someone with a skill you possess are actively searching the internet for. When you are writing blog posts, make sure those address the how-to queries regarding the area of your specialization.
Step 4: Build your blog’s authority
If you have just started your website, the domain authority is likely going to be low. Backlinks from high authority publications pass on the link equity to your website which is important for getting your content to rank.
There are several developer-focused publications you can write for. This way you can share your knowledge, contribute to the developer community and build backlinks to your own website at the same time.
If readers find your content valuable, they will likely follow the trail of links back to your own blog resulting in referral traffic at the same time.
3. Make sure your content doesn’t sit idle on your website
Blogging about something and then forgetting all about it is something that happens all too often. Don’t let the content you publish collect dust on your website.
Keep updating your content
The thing about technology as an industry is that it is highly dynamic. It is constantly changing and the stuff that is valid and relevant right now would likely become outdated or obsolete.
Keep going through the older posts, add or remove relevant data to keep your blog up-to-date.
Once your website grows, conducting periodic content audits can be a good idea as well. This removes the stuff that isn’t relevant anymore and also gives a boost to your SEO rankings.
Share it across the social channels
If you want to take full ownership of your personal brand, you have to make sure that your content reaches far and wide. This is where the power of social media comes into play. You don’t have to be an expert at social media to promote your content on it.
Choose your channel and interact with people there. The philosophy behind this should be value addition rather than self-promotion. Social media can be a great avenue for fostering relationships and engaging with the developer community at large.
Certain platforms such as Reddit have highly engaged communities where you can contribute and grow at the same time. Github and Stack overflow are also excellent avenues for engaging with the developer community and if you aren’t utilizing these channels already, you definitely should.
Repurpose your content to drive more value out of it
The value of the content you produce doesn’t end once you click on the publish button. The time is ripe to be experimenting with different formats. Video content is all the rage right now. Podcasts are also hugely popular among the developer community.
So the tutorial you just published on your blog can be converted into a YouTube video or a podcast and shared. It makes you accessible to your peers who may prefer watching or listening over reading about something.
4. Patience and consistency is the key to success
All good things take time, so don’t jump into establishing your personal brand expecting overnight miracles. Be consistent in your strategy and have the patience for the results to show and if the strategy is right, rewards would definitely flow through.
The quest to build your personal brand needs to continue right alongside your journey as a software developer. It might be a lot of effort in the initial stages but once you get started, the results will only get compounded over time.
Whether it is being recognized within the developer community, showcasing your skills, building your reputation or getting lucrative job offers, personal branding can help you accomplish all this and more.
Remember, achieving a balance between working and simultaneously talking about it is the true hustle. So, be a hustler!
Whether you run a small business, a personal brand, or a multinational agency, search engine optimization can help you take your business performance to the next level.
Here’s a couple of interesting facts. Google receives over 74,000 searches every second; 67% of the clicks go to the top five results. There’s one conclusion that we can draw: if you want to create a consistent source of organic traffic, your website’s content needs to rank high.
SEO is a process, not a result. It requires planning, maintenance, consistent testing, and optimization. It is similar to any website optimization – you keep improving it over and over again and you don’t stop.
I’m going to share three critical steps that will help you optimize your website for the search engines. Pay attention, take notes, and apply them!
Keyword Research
Search engine optimization is highly related to keywords. Let me give you an example. If you type into Google the phrase “how to optimize website”, you’ll get different results compared to an extremely similar search term (“how to optimize a website”). Even though there’s a very small difference, it still matters.
Therefore, keyword research process is the first step in your SEO methodology. You must know your target audience and predict their intentions in order to offer them relevant content.
Start by identifying relevant keywords through brainstorming. Go to Google and type in those keywords and key phrases and look for suggested searches. Add the suggested terms to your list. Check out different industry forums to detect any possible search terms and add them to your list.
Once you have a decent list of keywords, you’re ready to continue the process. Take advantage of the following tools:
Keywordtool.io (helps you discover more keywords)
Google Keyword Planner (keyword analysis)
SEMRush (keyword analysis)
Before you start focusing on keywords that you’ve brainstormed yourself, you need to validate those keywords. Use Google Keyword Planner and SEMRush to figure out the difficulty, the competition, and the potential of those keywords.
As you validate keywords, add them to a new list of “confirmed keywords” and start planning your future content around those keywords.
Continuous Testing and Measuring
Test, test, test. That’s the number one advice that you’ll receive from most SEO professionals. You need to analyze your search engine rankings and your incoming traffic in order to figure out the effectiveness of your keywords and strategies. You can use a free rank tracker tool to simplify the process. Ensure that you’re measuring your results properly and keep track of the changes. You need to create connections. Figure out what changes produced the best results and try to replicate that in your future attempts. Check the screenshot below:
You must also pay attention to your link building strategies. The quality of your outbound and inbound links is directly proportional to your ranking performance. There are plenty of tools that can help you track and measure your backlinks portfolio, so make sure you use them.
Maintenance is key. You should consistently add and modify keywords according to your results. As I’ve mentioned above, SEO is a journey, not a result!
Speed Up Your Pages
Speed matters. If your webpages load slowly, you’ll offer a bad user experience, and users will immediately bounce off your website. When that happens, Google will immediately take notice and start decreasing your rankings.
To improve your website’s loading speed, take advantage of the following tactics:
Minimize HTTP requests
Minify and combine your files (images, videos, etc.)
Defer JavaScript Loading
Reduce server response time
Buy a better hosting plan
Run compression audits
Enable browser caching
Reduce the size of your images
Reduce the plugins
Reduce redirects
If some of these tips sound complicated, make sure you explore them using this useful post. Improving your website’s loading speed is critical since Google’s officials have specifically declared that speed is an important SEO factor.
Takeaways
Investing in SEO is one of the best ways to capture highly targeted traffic that are ready to interact with your brand. I believe that SEO is both an art and a skill. If you think about it, every skill needs to be practiced over and over again until one achieves mastery.
Of course, it’s going to be difficult at first, especially because SEO results don’t show up overnight. However, as you focus on your webpage optimization on a consistent basis, you’ll slowly gain a stable source of passive traffic that will significantly boost your marketing and sales performance!
About the author: Kate Peterson is a digital marketer, graphic designer, and content developer. She’s currently developing a beginners’ digital marketing course that aims to provide a comprehensive online marketing methodology. In her free time, she is contributing to various social causes through various non-profit movements.
An industry that has experienced the biggest transformation in recent years, mainly because of the use of the Internet, is trade. Either numerous companies are switching entirely to eCommerce, or it makes up an enormous part of their business.
As we all know, eCommerce is a very competitive and challenging field. It’s getting harder to attract users to visit your website in the ocean of the same or similar offers and to buy products from you rather than someone else. This means that website owners and digital marketers have to work assiduously and think of different strategies to achieve desired results, i.e., drive traffic to their eCommerce website (and ultimately sell their products or services).
There are two well known options: Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), and Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Which is more critical for your eCommerce business – traffic to your website or conversions? These two strategies shouldn’t be mutually exclusive; the best way to have a successful eCommerce business is to combine these. Before going deeper, let’s review some basics.
What Is eCommerce?
For anyone just getting started in this field, eCommerce refers to acts of buying and selling products online. Some advantages of this approach include: lower costs, less physical limitations (such as floor space for customers), and increased visibility. In fact, to be successful today, a business is almost required to have a website and eCommerce capabilities.
eCommerce Strategies
CRO and SEO are separate eCommerce marketing strategies, but they are closely connected and necessary for a successful eCommerce business. If you are just getting started (and located in the UK), you might want to investigate some of these providers.
SEO – Search Engine Optimization is the strategy to increase website visibility and, subsequently, traffic by posting engaging content. CRO – Conversion Rate Optimization — a system designed to increase the number of people who will not only visit the website, but become customers. Neither of these two strategies, if used alone, is enough to get the results that you want. You need SEO for eCommerce website to attract people and draw attention to your eCommerce business. CRO eCommerce is necessary because, without it, you just have people who are looking at your products but not buying them.
How They Overlap
Some people believe that SEO and CRO are like cheese (SEO) and a mouse trap (CRO). Both of these strategies focus on users and must provide quality content. The work of web developers in building site architecture, and developing a framework for web content creation, affect both aspects equally. Here is how you can combine them to increase your sales and make your business stand out as a leader in this field.
Create an attractive design. Nothing makes a stronger first impression than website design. People often decide about purchasing your products based on what they learn from your content. However, an inaccessible messy design with poor navigation will turn them away. How does a customer feel while browsing through the pages of your eCommerce business. Important aspects to consider are brand awareness, impact on bounce rate, and website security.
Always provide interesting content. If you want to draw visitors (potential customers) to your website, you need to ensure to provide the best possible content. Here are some tips to remember. Use proper keywords associated with your products or services. Use a Call to Action where appropriate. Invite your readers to do something to get a product or get more information so they can decide to purchase what you are selling. Examples of such sentences are: Call Us Today to Have Your Product Delivered Tomorrow; Want to Know More About This Fantastic Appliance? Contact Us Now!
Create pages on social networks and integrate them into your website. It is well known that social media and eCommerce businesses work well together. The more you are advertising your product on Facebook, Instagram, and other social media, the greater your chances of making a profit. There are many approaches you can choose to increase your visibility and sales using social media. Some of them are homepage social feeds, product pages, and hashtags.
Final Take
It is no secret that eCommerce is a rapidly expanding field with a lot of competitors. This also means that both SEO and CRO are getting more complicated. Successful business requires the use of both strategies. However, finding the right way how to implement them simultaneously isn’t always straightforward.
We would like to hear from you if you are using these strategies for your eCommerce business! What are your experiences with SEO and CRO? We would also like to know your opinions, comments, or ideas if you are thinking about starting your own business.
About the author. Thomas Glare is a marketing specialist and a communication manager of various eCommerce portals. You can often see Thomas at marketing conferences. He likes to spend his free time watching British crime mystery web series.
Did you know that while you browse your favorite sites across the internet, your internet provider secretly sits on the other end of your screen watching your every move? Scary? While just makes for a funny scary story, the reality isn’t much different from this scenario.
Although there’s no one looking out for the sites you visit, there are people who can do so if they wish. Also, some internet companies record user browsing data and internet behavior to bag revenue from advertisement companies.
What’s more? In 2017, some members of the U.S. Senate voted in favor of selling internet browsing data recording from millions of people like yourself. If you are uncomfortable with this, you may want to do something. The solution? Get a VPN for yourself!
What Is a VPN?
VPN is an abbreviation for Virtual Private Network. As the name suggests, it’s a private network that overrides your original internet connection and directs you towards, safe, protected servers.
This means the VPNs route your data through encrypted servers that work to hide your online browsing details. Consequently, the private network saves you from all kinds of dangers lurking online such as hackers, identity theft, and commercial data selling.
We know what you’re thinking, you don’t really care who knows what you’re up to right? Here’s a secret, VPN can help you get into content and restricted web searches that you can’t access through your local network.
How? Well, you must’ve noticed how your local internet provider directly takes you to the regional page of websites like Amazon and eBay. Meaning, they know where you’re logging in from. Your VPN gives you a whole new identity online, which means you can access online material that’s not available in your regions, such as movies and educational resources as well.
Nowadays, VPNs are being used everywhere from corporate offices to top-secret government agencies. They are essential to organizations that need remote access to their networks on a regular basis. Also, it’s a valuable solution for people who value their privacy and get the protection they need from virtual threats.
Why Do You Need a VPN?
To make the reason as clear as possible, a VPN simply creates a direct, secure passage connecting one computer to another. If you’re not convinced yet and need specific reasons to use get a VPN for yourself, here are some situations where a VPN can mean a lot to you.
Be Safe On Public WiFi
It’s commonplace for us to inquire about the free WiFi services before choosing a restaurant to dine in. Believe it or not, connecting your device to one of these WiFi connections without a VPN can be the biggest risk to take. That’s because, these networks are open to anyone, and can provide a straight passage for malware from other devices to invade yours.
Similarly, the WiFi can also be a trap to get you into phishing scams raging through the internet these days. A VPN connection helps ensure you don’t fall prey to any of these situations.
Get Through Streaming Restrictions
Are you tired of Netflix blocking certain content because of your geographical location? The same dilemmas can get you on BBCi and even YouTube and Instagram. While browser proxies can get you through these restrictions, they slow down the streaming speed making for an unpleasant viewing experience. To get through these restrictions, a VPN is the best option.
Avoid Censorship Regulations
Some oppressive governments impose restrictions on their citizens regarding what they view and visit. These regulations are also virtually reinforced to combat any intrusion, so if you try to get into any prohibited online pages, they’ll know.
That’s where a VPN comes in. As mentioned before, it encrypts your data and conceals your identity completely. This way, you can get through the oppressive regulations and censors without exposing yourself in any way.
Encrypt Your Online Data
When you’re using a VPN, the network creates a secure passage for you to send your data through. So any activity you conduct with the VPN app running will be private and encrypted. Every VPN connection offers an app that you can use to activate and deactivate the connection on your device according to your needs.
How To Choose Your VPN?
Convinced? Then you’ve probably started conducting your search for the perfect VPN for yourself. Attributing to the high consumer demand, there are a plethora of companies providing VPN services. If you choose the wrong one, you’ll end up exposing your data to yet another unreliable third party, which can be hazardous to your privacy. Here’s how to choose an ideal VPN network.
Price And Security
Most of the time, the level of security you’ll get with a VPN is directly proportional to the price. For normal users, mainstream VPN providers costing under $5 will work well. To choose the best one, you should go through the user reviews to get a clear evaluation of the service you’re about to purchase. Also, go with well-known and reputable companies to avoid getting into a scam.
User Data Logs
If security is your main concern when getting a VPN connection as compared to unlimited access to content, you should check whether or not the company keeps logs of their user data. These logs can be used to track you or your online activity. For extra security, you should choose one that doesn’t save your online browsing details.
Network Servers
What could be worse than paying for a VPN service that slows down your device and makes streaming almost impossible? To avoid this situation, you should do your research about the number of servers a VPN network has. This way, you won’t put yourself at risk of overcrowded servers and slow connections.
Multiple Device Compatibility And Clear User Interface
Many VPN networks allow you to sign in with your account on multiple devices. If you can get this service at an affordable price range, you should definitely go for it as it keeps you from getting restricted to one device.
Most importantly, check the interface of the app you’re purchasing. The most clutter-free and clear the interface is, the easier it’ll be to use.
Conclusion
We hope you found this guide for VPNs useful. It’s a great personalized tool for people in favor of internet freedom and browsing privacy. Select the ideal VPN service for yourself today and go incognito for all your online operations.
Everyone who runs a website has heard of DDoS attacks and hopes never to see one at their doorstep. But, what do you really know about these attacks? Our perception can be muddied by several myths and misconceptions. Also, to efficiently protect one’s website from such attacks one needs to understand what they are. Let’s review the fundamentals.
Understanding DDoS attacks
A DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack takes place when a hacker sends a lot of traffic to a particular website, essentially overwhelming it. The website server gets overloaded with these malicious requests and can’t function properly so it becomes inaccessible to visitors.
Perhaps you have seen situations when a website of some company can’t be accessed at the time of an important event or release connected to it (maybe it has even happened to you – and hey, there’s no shame in it; it has also happened even to Amazon). It occurs when the traffic is too high and the company’s servers can’t handle it.
A DDoS attack seeks to emulate such a situation, only without the pleasant (save for the headache that is fixing it!) feeling that you managed to draw so many people to your website.
In a sense, this type of attacks is somewhat similar to spam: flooding some resource with tons of undesired information and making it hard to find legitimate emails. Or, in this case, just crashing the website.
In a DDoS attack, the perpetrator gains access to computers or other devices that are connected to the Internet and uses their bandwidth to perform the attack. It is most often done with the users whose devices are being used for this purpose are not even aware. Usually, to hijack the device, the hacker needs to inject it with malware but it isn’t always so.
Sometimes, one can find themselves as a
part of a DDoS attack because of some seemingly safe activity they did online.
One example of that is the 2015 attack on 8chan. To gather their army of invading devices, the hacker bought bandwidth of the users of a popular VPN/proxy address provider through its sister company. Then, people who simply wanted to hide their IPs basically had them borrowed to commit a crime. While the use of that bandwidth to perform an assault on any website is illegal, buying and selling IPs is not. Those users should have read the terms of service which allowed it.
Since malicious traffic is coming from so many sources at once, it is nearly impossible to stop it and block all of it.
Why are such attacks carried out? The primary reason is money, as it’s possible to extort some from the unfortunate victim to stop the attack. On the other hand, sometimes DDoS attacks are performed just out of spite and to sow discord.
But why are DDoS attacks particularly
dangerous today, you might ask? The answer is simple. Just like with any
technology, modern Internet of Things devices that we all love so much can and
are used by bad actors for their purposes which often involve conducting
denial-of-service attacks on websites.
And the scariest thing here is the number of IoT devices. As of 2019, there are almost 27 billion of them worldwide. Moreover, the security of such devices is often lacking as their developers tend to focus more on functionality and, pardon the slang, oomph of their tools than on the questions of cybersecurity that are generally rather boring to the public and can’t be used in advertising as effectively. These two factors put together make our IoT environment something of a time bomb waiting to go off at some hacker’s prompt. The most famous example of an IoT-powered DDoS attack is, perhaps, the Mirai botnet one that happened in 2016.
How can DDoS attacks be prevented?
Most of the ways to protect one’s network or website from DDoS attacks rely on rapid detection. Speed is very important here because the faster the attack is blocked, the less damage it can do.
Detecting a DDoS attack can’t be reliably
done by a human specialist due to how much data they would need to sift through
and how rapidly. Therefore, technical methods have to be used. Of course, since
they are not operated by humans, they must be given some criteria to work with
and understand what qualifies as abnormal activity. Such criteria may include
certain IP addresses and IP ranges that are to be blacklisted, variations of
HTTP cookies, etc.
Once a likely attack is detected, it needs to be quarantined. Today, it is done via a cloud-based solution most of the time because hardware solutions are often too limited in their scope and don’t have enough capacity to deal with all malicious traffic coming with a DDoS attack.
There are various means of getting your
website rid of this undesirable traffic. Black-hole routing, for example,
routes it to a dead address that no host machine is assigned to, causing DDoS
traffic to be “dropped” there harmlessly.
“Scrubbing” data centers are another way of traffic filtering. All traffic coming to your website is transferred to such a data center where it is determined if it’s legitimate or not.
Another undoubtedly cool way to protect
your website from DDoS attacks is a very futuristic one. However, today, we
have technologies that weren’t imaginable just a few decades ago as something
that will be actually available to the mortals.
I’m talking, of course, of artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI and ML).
The main benefit of machine learning is that
it’s not simply a set of filters that legacy protection measures often provide.
It can, indeed, learn to see patterns that are common to something. What
interests us the most is that AI can be taught what a particular website’s
traffic normally looks like and notice any irregularities faster and more
efficiently than any human can.
However, unlike simple filtering
mechanisms, AI is not limited in it. It doesn’t need a strict set of filters to
determine if an attack is happening because just like a human being (at least,
in theory), it can recognize something it has never seen before (and hasn’t
been told by a human that this is a malicious attempt) as a threat.
All in all, there are many methods of
protection against DDoS attacks. Most of them come in the form of a service
that can be acquired from a security firm. And indeed, such protection is not
cheap. It is a difficult question if your website needs it and there is no
universal answer. Some sites are more likely to get attacked than others. Some
can afford to go down for a couple of hours while others can’t.
The choice is yours. But I hope that now you know a bit more about DDoS attacks and approaches to defend against them.
[Editor’s note: this is a contributed article. Information about the author is found below.]
Sam Chester is a co-founder of Cooltechzone.com, a website dedicated to online privacy and cybersecurity. His area of expertise includes data security and analytics, software, and Internet censorship. He is a staunch supporter of limiting the role of government agencies in the lives of the citizens.
