Hello, Local Guides,
15th January was a big day, do you know why the day of 15th of January is so important for the whole Local Guides community and the rest of the world?
If you are guessing my Birthday, so maybe you are right (even it was not a big day) 
, but yes I share my birthday with Something which changed billions of Lives 
Yes, itās the Birthday of the Local Guides Program ? which was born on 15th January 2015, when the Local Guides Program launched officially. Through which billions of people from all over the world are connected with each other today. The local guides program is not just a program but a movement, Which inspired millions of people around the world to volunteer and to help others with their contributions on Google Maps.
If you have the best companion, friend, and travel guide on any trip or travel today, it will be thatās just and not other than Google Maps.
So on the great day of the Local Guides programās Birthday, letās think of something that makes our beautiful world more informative, reachable, and Accessible to the people Who want to know more about this world.
As the whole world was suffering from the restrictions due to pandemics, traveling, meeting with each other, even wedding and religious gatherings were not allowed.
But now the majority of the world is vaccinated and the pressure of disease is now very low.
Now many parts of the world are gradually opening for tourists and visitors, and we hope soon everything will be normal and people will travel to other countries normally as before the pandemic period.
But within the pandemic period, in the country or local tourism of many countries boosted, for example in Pakistan, the record numbers of Pakistani tourists visited Northern areas of Pakistan during lockdown easiness and same in India and other countries.
In all these situations, I was thinking for a long time about presenting an idea of a Connect Post Challenge.
The basic idea was to show the beautiful and unique places of our countries which always make us proud to have them.
And Iām inviting all my friends from the community to share the best places of your country or any other country where you visited and fall in love with that specific place or tourist attraction.
Who can join the Challenge?
As I mentioned above, The soul of this writing challenge is to show the places to the world which make us proud to have them, along with especially Iām keen to see posts by the new friends of Connect who have any hesitation to write articles on Connect.
We will encourage and invite all the people who want to write anything about any place in their country.
And Especially for the authors of the posts, i will mention my friends to give them tips what they should do which can make their posts much better.
I started contributing on Connect Recently, how should I start writing a post on Connect?
Donāt worry if you are new on Connect, there are a lot of Local Guides and Connect Moderators who are pioneers of Connect, just start writing your post, publish on Connect, anyone of us will come and guide you with helpful tips and useful links which can make your next post much better than the first one.
But for the start, Iām sharing some tips and my own format of writing posts.
Choose Travel Section to start writing for the Gems of the world - A Local Guides Writing Challenge
Click on Start A Post:
Choose Travel Category at the upper side of the page:
Title :
Write down the title for the post
You can choose or write any title what do you want, it would be simple like
āKund Malir Beachā or it would be a little bit more attractive like āA Gem Of Balochistan - Kund Malir Beachā. I will go with the second one because it sounds much better.
Content:
Start writing your postā¦. but wait, I would love to add one more tip by my experience.
Usually, I write whole content at Google Docs for every post (as Iām writing right now) including adding Links in the post of Google maps and references of Other Connect Posts and than simply paste on Connectās post page. Itās much easier for me, because sometimes if your post is taking much time, and the page uploads automatically, sometimes you can find your content in drafts, but sometimes it vanishes and can give you disappointment. But writing first on Google docs can give you much time to think of some more creative ideas which you can express In your post.
For writing posts, I learned a lot from the tutorial post of my friend @AdrianLunsong "sHow to write a great post - Basic Tips #ConnectWritingChallenge
and
@TusharSuradkar 's brilliant post with full of informationMy Top 10 Tips for Travel Posts & Reviews - Empathy is Foremost
And I would like to refer to the above posts to everyone who wants to express his/her true feelings about their countryās amazing places on the wonderful forum of Local Guides Connect.
Photos :
Sharing photos of the places where you want to write an article always make your post attractive.
Following articles by Google Moderators will give you the best guidelines for Uploading photos on Connect
Uploading a photo on Connect? Read these guidelines first
How to tell a story through your photography
Use your own photos :
I canāt say more about tips regarding original photos on connecting than the post of my mentor @ErmesT 's articleA Reflection on āOriginal Contentā - What if this Photo ā¦ is Yours?
The above post will describe briefly the rules of Original photos on Connect.
Donāt Upload so many photos in a post:
Uploading too many photos in one post could sometimes make a nice post boring and without information, and on the other side you are going to touch the limit of 1000 photos on Connect so much quicker.
So instead of too many single photos, you can make a photo collage of some photos to share in your post.
Here I would like to refer again to my dear friend **Ermes Tounā**s post Tips and tricks to manage the photos in Connect
Uploading Photos by Mobile Phone:
If you are using Mobile Phone for publishing your article on Connect, you can make your photos larger and more visible by finding some helpful tips in this article How to Publish Photos in Full-Screen in PC using Mobile in Connect Postsby my friend @TravellerG Sahab.
Inserting Links :
Inserting Links in a Connect post is the important part of any post. Through your links, you can describe any place by the link of Google Maps.
For example, if Iām writing about Mukhi House Hyderabad, itās fine to simply write the name of the place, but you cannot get the Google Maps location by clicking on the name of the place. But how much better it would be if that happened that.
Your written word appears in the blue lines and if anyone clicks on it, it will go directly to the location by Google Maps. Like I wrote above the name of "Mukhi House Hyderabad, but if I add a link in it, it will appear like this ? Mukhi House Hyderabad
Now click on the blue line and reach directly to the place, check the direction, read reviews from other Local Guides and watch photos and videos of the place by the Google maps profile.
Once more, Iām referring to the post of Connect Moderator Ermes Toun 's Need Help? - Help Us to Help You - Add A Link
to let everyone understand how easy it is, to make our post attractive, informative, and useful by adding Google Maps links in our posts.
Some more small Tips for your #Gemsoftheworld post :
- Always add
Accessibility information in your connect post about any specific place you want to share with the world because your shared information will be helpful for those visitors too, the people who have different abilities and especially for the wheelchair users. - Write your post in any language In which you feel comfortable Because Connect has a very simple way that you can easily translate and read any post. So your post written in any language can be translated and read in English or any desired language.
- Add the links only from Google Maps or Connect, and avoid adding outsource websites links in your post.
- Add the link to your Google Maps review in your post, by this you can describe the place more conveniently. For example here is my Google Maps review of famous tourist attraction of Pakistan namely Pakistan Monument in Islamabad
So thatās the basic information to start writing your posts on Connect, but thatās not over. When you start writing, by that time, you will become an expert in it and overcome your shortcomings. But the whole point of this whole article is just to get you started writing no matter That you canāt write so skillfully in the beginning. You will see for yourself that after two or three posts on Connect you will become proficient in writing posts on Connect.
Just start writing today, and if you feel any difficulty, tag any Connect Moderator in your post, I believe you will not disappoint and you will surely get some great tips in comments under your posts as suggestions for your future posts. Donāt forget to tag me by typing @ before my username in your posts along with the tags #Gemsoftheworld and #ConnectTravelChallenge in your posts.
Here I m tagging some of my friends Local Guides and Connect Moderators to help me if I can add more information in my post āGems Of the World - A Connect Travel Post Challengeā because this is not only the project for me, but itās a mutual project from all Local Guides and especially Connect Moderators who love to guide others especially newComers.
@JaneBurunina @StephenAbraham @OmerAli @NareshDarji @Sagir @Tushar_Suradkar @AdrianLunsong @Muhammad_Usman
All the best 
.
