When it comes the time to decide your grown up life (i’m 36 years old), there are bunch of ideas, moments, fears, joys and uncertainty in our minds… But there is always a major goal to lead you to a final (but not unchangeable) decision. In my case, i had already decided to improve my life quality and my family time a couple of years ago, and become an independent entrepreneur (as my father did when he had like ten years more than I do now). In that pad, visiting new places every week was part of it, according to my “more family time, less work time” plan. The funny thing, I’ve always liked taking some pictures (moderated level) and leave my opinion (no matter of what), so I joined Google Local Guide project the first time some email or notification appeared to me (I really don’t remember)… But I don’t know how I became an 8 stars Local Guide!
Some “special” day I had a 6 star pin in my Google Maps app when I was reviewing a restaurant , and I realized what it really meant a few months later, when I updated a closed restaurante information and it got updated almost instantly (I think that was the “APPROVED” contribution in bottom of the list below).
Then I saw my pictures had A LOT of views (I still don’t believe about more than 1.2M views )
Later, I started to win batches, and my reviews where most of the time in first position, even when they were old… Everything was so cool! Then, I started to do my homework to “deserve” that position, and I realized I really liked it. So I started to get involve a lot more in local directories, social media, maps platforms, website development, SEO, SEM… And when the time comes last year, and I had to decide what to do as independent, I finally started my own Digital Platforms Management Agency for small business and NFP organizations. The truth is, and I have to be honest, it has not been easy, but my clients and my family always let me know I’ve taken the right decision . Finance balance should come later
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So… what can i say? THANK YOU Google Local Guides program for showing me the pad! And THANKS to every single person who saw, liked or post any of my pictures, reviews or recommendations.
That’s what Local Guides means to me!!!