Showing posts with label Events. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Events. Show all posts

Sunday, May 10, 2009

iBlog5 - Things Learned from the Blogging Summit in the Philippines

Going to iBlog5, Blogging Summit in the Philippines, was worth it. I was actually planning not to go to iBlog5, which was held at Malcolm Hall, College of Law, UP Diliman, last May 9, 2009. But I'm glad I did even though I was only able to attend the afternoon session. Learned a lot of things. Here are some, not in order.

The Blogging Scene in the Philippines
  • The tribe of bloggers in the Philippines is growing big.
  • Blogger Parties/Events are common nowadays in the Philippines. A blogger event is usually sponsored by one major advertiser with the hope of gaining goodwill and spreading word of "blog" about their company or products. Some companies such as Yehey are already providing Blogger Events Management service.
  • Bloggers will create campaign blogs or are being prepared for election in 2010 as citizen journalists. For those who are interested to blog for 2010 Election you can visit the Bloggers Election Handbook by Janette Toral

Evolution of Bloggers by Anton Diaz
  1. Artist - a blogger starts out by expressing himself, his story for the day, his rants and anything that he wants to blog about.
  2. Advocate - the blogger begins to talk on topics where he is passionate about. He no longer talks about just himself but rather transitions to creating content about his advocacies, latest updates on his industry, or anything related to his interests. I think I'm at this level.
  3. Entrepreneur - the blogger begins to make money through his blog. Anton cited that one needs to know about web business models and implement one, in order to evolve to this level. Some bloggers use the publisher model, where they earn through advertisements, just like offline magazines. I wonder what the rest of the business models are.
  4. Maven - the blogger rises up to be a thought leader, one who is considered an expert or guru, who people look up to for knowledge and ideas. I think Seth Godin is at this level.

Blogging Tips
  • Social Media Optimization not just Search Engine Optimization (SMO vs SEO) - heard the word SMO first from Fitz Villafuerte. He says that nowadays, we need to optimize and maximize our use of social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, etc. to drive visitors to our sites and not just focus on search engines rankings.
  • Content is King, Marketing is Queen. - Anton Diaz said that writing great content is not enough, marketing is as important. Some forms of marketing are social networking and joining online conversations.
  • Bloggers must learn to write good content now or else - Jayvee Fernandez predicted that in the near future, most non-blogger print magazine writers will transition to blogging online, so sooner or later they will outplay current bloggers in terms of producing quality content which attracts site traffic.


Links copied from Influential Blogger

Live stream feed last May 9
Video
Photos
Blog posts
#iblog5
Posted by Ronnie at 1:24 AM 1 comments
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Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Designing the Kingdom Business Conference Brochure



I was asked to design a brochure for a conference on December, the Kingdom Business Conference. By the way let me plug it in here: I'd like to invite you to this conference on December 11, 2008, 1pm to 6pm at the PICC Meeting Room 4. This year's theme is "Soaring in the Business World" and basically this is a conference for entrepreneurs and professionals, or anyone who desire to become positive influencers in the business arena. The conference will feature 3 speakers who will speak on both spiritual and practical advices on soaring in the business world as the theme suggests. The speakers are Leif Hetland, Dick Hochreiter, and Larry Ihle, all of which have spoken in business conferences and have Christian marketplace ministries in the United States. Session Topics are entitled: "Becoming an Eagle in the Business World", "Stop Struggling, Start Soaring", and "Tapping into the Supernatural". If these topics interests you, contact me and I'll send you the registration form. The registration fee is now P1,500 (P2000). For more info on the event, please visit this link: Kingdom Business Conference

I'd like to share here some thoughts that I had in the process of designing the brochure.

Elements Selection
Everything has to start with the theme. The brochure design must emerge from the theme. I used images associated with the words on the theme statement. The word Soaring are associated with birds, eagles, flight, sky, clouds. Business World connotes money, firms, industries, technology, buildings and cities. I chose bold techno and sans serif fonts because they best represent the modern world rather than Times New Roman and other serif fonts which tend to exude elegance and a feeling of conservative bureaucracy.

Front and Back Cover


Inner Spread


Concept and Conveyance
Words are not just the only things that speak in a design material. Every element speaks: The images, the fonts, the colors, the backdrop. But then there has to be a concept to unify them. The drama we chose for this brochure can be summarized in the subtext at the front page which says "In a time of uncertainty and economic upheaval, we need wisdom to rise strong above the storms...". This is the reason why the outer front and back cover page are dark because I thought of storms and turmoil. Then I thought of soaring, which gives an impression of enlightenment, encouragement resulting to inner pages with clouds, an eagle and a lighter color scheme. I usually design with one main color for a whole material, but this time I wanted it unique. I wanted to play with sharp contrasts. The impression I wanted to convey was that when the readers look at the outer cover they will feel the problem in the business world at hand, but when they open the brochure they will encounter a totally different and lighter page causing them to feel hope and encouragement. The dark cityscape represents the business world and the economic problem while the eagle and blue clouds represent the soaring part (by the way, the eagle is the only bird who can rise above the storms and soar). The yellow boxes were also intentional to further lighten the mood.

Positioning of Elements
I found out that the theme still dictate the positioning of elements. Notice the yellow bird shape at the front page. I tried placing it nearest the top-right part of the headline. Then I tried placing it at the top rightmost part of the brochure farthest the headline. The latter option was better since separating the bird from the headline helped amplify that sense of "Soaring". Notice also the eagle in the inner page. I first tried placing it below the Program Box. But then it made me feel that the eagle was struggling and not soaring. When I tried placing it on the upper portion, and the Program Box at the lower portion, it emphasized the soaring eagle and made it the focus of the page spread.

Actual Brochure Print




Screen and Print Output Differences
When the brochure came out from the printing press already mass-produced, I didn't like the output because the inner page was darker than I expected it to be. It was supposed to be bright. I guess next time, I should choose colors brighter than I wanted it to be. And next time I should also be present at the print shop when they release the test print. I was in Davao when they produced the test print. If I did, I would have had the chance to modify it before the final release.

Overall it has been a fruitful and fun design exercise for me. It is rewarding to engage with new design ideas in the mind.
Posted by Ronnie at 12:46 AM 5 comments
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Thursday, November 06, 2008

The DigitalFilipino.com Web Awards 2008







It's been encouraging to attend the DigitalFilipino.com Web Awards for 2008 at Taste Asia, Mall of Asia last November 5, 2008, 1pm to 5:30pm. I remembered last year how it felt to be a winner for our website Philrealty-showroom.com. Most of the winners this year must have been delighted and surprised to be selected as best websites in their respective categories.

Janette started the event discussing the criteria for judging of the entries. I understand that for some artists out there, some of the winners would not have passed their standards. That is because the awards is not about the best website visual design, but about the best website in all aspects and e-commerce practices. The entries were judged openly by the DigitalFilino Club members with regards to search engine readiness, good navigation, originality and freshness of content, layout, design, site speed performance, and interactivity.

Below is the list of winners per category this year:
  1. Apparel / Fashion Category - Tesoro's Philippine Handicrafts and Barongs
  2. Art Category - Hiraya
  3. Association / Organization Category - Information Technology Association of the Philippines
  4. Auction / Shopping Portal Category - KabayanCentral
  5. Automotive Category - AutoIndustriya
  6. Beauty Category - Godiva
  7. Blog - Corporate Category - The Belo Medical Group Blog
  8. Blog - Personal Category - The D Spot
  9. Blog - Professional Category - Tech at Hand
  10. Books Category - OMF Literature
  11. Community Category - TipidPC
  12. Computer / Consumer Electronics Category - Villman Computers Philippines
  13. Consumer Banking / Bills Payment Category - Philippine National Bank
  14. Corporate / Professional Category - Syntactics
  15. Events / Conferences Category - WordCamp Philippines
  16. Financial Services Category - Absolute Traders
  17. Food Category - Filipino Recipes
  18. Games Category - RF Online Philippines
  19. Gifts Category - Express Regalo
  20. Guides / Review Category - ClickTheCity.com
  21. Home Furnishings / Improvement Category - Philippine Interior Design & Feng Shui Tips
  22. Jobs / Employment Category - MyNimo
  23. Magazine Category - Candymag.com
  24. Music / Movie/ Film Category - TitikPilipino
  25. Newspaper Category - Inquirer.net
  26. Pharmaceuticals Category - GlaxoSmithKline Philippines
  27. Podcast Category - The Daily PCIJ
  28. Politics Category - Filipino Voices
  29. Real Estate Category - BF Homes Properties
  30. School / University Category - De La Salle University - Manila
  31. Services Category - Load.com.ph
  32. Social Networking Category - GreatPinoy!
  33. Tourism Category - Cebu CeBoom CeBlog
  34. Travel Category - Philippine Airlines

The winners representative were given a time to share their experiences and insights as they developed their sites. I enjoyed The D Spot talk as she shared how her son encouraged her to try blogging. I also liked The Daily PCIJ's talk as she passionately encouraged bloggers to join forces with journalists in informing the people especially for the 2010 Philippine Election. I find the talk of one of the sponsors, CashSense, enlightening. The CEO shared their story as they shifted being an online company to bricks and mortar then back to being an online company again. It made me realize that it really takes time, effort, strategy and commitment to customers needs and benefits, to win the market.

For more info and coverage on the DigitalFilipino.com Web Awards, visit digitalfilipinowebawards.blogspot.com
Posted by Ronnie at 11:39 PM 3 comments
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Tuesday, October 21, 2008

DigitalFilipino Club and Bloggers Networking Night in Davao



I just attended DigitalFilipino.com Club's Networking night in Davao last October 21. Met few new friends and was delighted to know that the blogging community in Davao is growing big. The event was sponsored by PAGCOR, newest corporate member of the club and was held at Pantawan Hall, Grand Regal Hotel, in Lanang, Davao City.

The night started with the introduction of all attendees. Janette Toral then introduced DigitalFilipino.com Club and its latest activities. Afterwards, she gave a report on the top 100 Filipino blogs in Ratified.org. I felt proud being a Dabawenyo when Janette told the audience that some of the blogs in that list were created by Dabawenyos like Pinoy Teens Online, Pinoy R.N. and Jehzlau Concepts.

At the event, PAGCOR showed a video about their history, achievements and the upcoming big project - the Tourism City in Manila Bay. This particular project is of interest to me since Manila Bay real estate is now booming partly because of this announcement.

Lastly, when the party and games started, I got my copy of Blogging from Home. Thank you Janette for the autograph. Lately I've been digging into visual thinking and I'm planning to put them into practice in my blogs. So here's my hand-sketched visual summary for the event:

Posted by Ronnie at 9:14 AM 6 comments
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Monday, July 28, 2008

3 reasons to join the 2nd Internet and Mobile Marketing Summit 2008

A few years from now the youth generation of today, who are exposed to the web and mobile technology, will be the future generation of the majority of decision makers in the land. A few years from now, the Internet and mobile phones will become the dominating marketing media and TV will not be as effective as it is today. I really don't know if that's gonna happen, hehe, but I guess that's pretty possible.

So that's why I'd be glad if I can join It's All Geek to Me! The 2nd Internet and Mobile Marketing Summit 2008. This event is organized by the Internet and Mobile Marketing Association of the Philippines (IMMAP) to be held at Hotel Intercontinental, Ayala Avenue, Makati City on August 13 to 15, 2008.

I find 3 main reasons why this summit would be a worthwhile exposure event for me.
  1. Learn the basics - August 15, 2008 will be dedicated to workshop sessions on the basics of both Internet Marketing and Mobile Marketing.
  2. Learn the trends - The summit will feature global trends in Internet and mobile marketing as well as what's happening here in the Philippines.
  3. Learn the best practices -There will be sessions on surveys of best practices on the International level and in the Philippine landscape. And there's the The Boomerang Awards 2008, a showcase of companies who implemented high impact and effective marketing campaigns using the Internet and mobile media alone.
Posted by Ronnie at 8:36 PM 0 comments
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