Hello local guides, I am always watching my space and what is happening around me or in other countries on our official Local Guide platforms such as social media including YouTube and also our un-official social media pages or groups for local guides which is Facebook mostly.
I have seen multiple videos of local guides featured by our official Local Guide team on a video just to name a few such as How To Plan a Local Guides Meet-Up Like A Pro and Goa’s Beaches, Restaurants & Cathedrals - On My List, Ep. 7 what I wanted to know how does a local guide get featured, what are the requirements or how to get hold of the team? I might be missing something here which might be that, may be they have a list of places that they travel and list of local guides which they are interested on for them to communicate with them and produce a video.
For me I tried to ask some of those local guides who happened to be featured before and there was no potable information to reach to the team, others said they were chosen and got contacted then organised for that with then team, and some gave me a link to fill an online form which was provided years back and the link is no longer available which was shared for a certain country or city.
Can anyone please assist on how to be featured or get hold of the team, for me I see a need in my country, alone as a local guide is not easy to create awareness about the program locally and to encourage my fellow local guides to register or create account on Local Guide Connect so that they can be educated and receive official learning about the program on what we can not do and what we do, how to handle certain situations while guiding and how to avoid getting in trouble, how to respect business owners and the low, how to respect others rights when taking photos and many more. From what I have seen since I joined this official platform is that from the whole country South Africa I only seen less than 10 local guides here on connect and they are not active at all, those who are active are less than 5, except those who never mentioned where they come from or who never connect with other fellow local guides either here or on social media, to me this is a problem.
Being featured on a official video from the team can create a lot of opportunities like sharing the video locally and that gives proof that this program is legit not a money scam or any criminal activity, also this can help others to see a need for them to be part of.
Thank you for your help @SaifIS , I thought may be they get notified when ever a new post is created so that they look at it but from what I experienced here it does not look like that.
@ErmesT I am tagging you because I am looking for assistance based on my question above on my post. I have waited for some days and no one is responding except kudos given and the only suggestion from @SaifIS to tag a moderator for my question to be answered, can you please help me here or tag someone who can help, Thank you.
I personally believe that there are no procedure in place for being featured in an official Google Video.
The Italian Local Guides have been featured in the Local Heroes series for our activity in the earthquake area but, as far as I know, they have been contacted directly by Google.
What I believe is that what we have to do is to write interesting post about what we care, showing this to our community. This is what I did, (we did) for the Italian earthquake’s area, writing a lot about our activity, and the important role of the Local Guides in this subject
Thank you for getting in touch @ErmesT , I get the point but what I want to know is that without the Google team seeing a need them selves to create a video or feature local guides is not possible to ask from the team as a local guide if you feel there is a need some how to bridge a gap, unless the is a need that involves the whole world like the earthquake not only a specific country which is related to local guides as explained above which is to create awareness?
When you mentioned that we have to write interesting posts showing how we care as a local guides, what do you refer to, do you mean that we have to do that if there has been phenomenon locally, which resulted to the local guides being featured, if so, which platform did you use to write those interesting posts, was it when you updated the area affected by earthquake on Google Map which led to the Google team to notice you and contacted you?
Regarding your first question, Only a Googler can respond @Raphael-Mahumane
Referring to my personal experience, I shared everything here in Connect, starting from the very first day of the earthquake. I never used other social channels as a starting point of my thought, or of our activities in central Italy
Thank you for your honest response @ErmesT , can you please help me get the first question answered either by tagging a relevant person or Googler if possible, as this post have been here for a while now and it does not look like I will have a Googler to respond to this question any time soon. The link provided above which shows a list of Googlers it was not helpful to me, I could not manage to tag any of them that is why I ended up tagging you.
I will go trough all your posts you shared with me to learn about your posts and how you handled the earthquake.
I will be happy if you want to learn more about the Italian earthquake, I shared this story to help to understand how the Italian Local Guides (not me, I am not in the video, I reached them two days later)
Thank you a lot @ErmesT and @GeorgesHR for getting this questions answered, I hope others will be able to read the post and have their questions answered from this comments. I am glad there is a way to apply, @GeorgesHR I will be compiling all the relevant details required and submit my application soon.