Caption: An image of a group of Local Guides reading and discussing
the Top 100 Photo Views Lists (Design & Art by @kasunaaa )
Introduction:
As keen photographers, Local Guides are proud when we see that our photos about a place, a meal or some other Point of Interest on Google Maps, are being viewed and helpful to someone. Every view counts even in the smallest way so we’d like more and more people around the world to see our great photos. A measure of how many people do see our photos is the photo views and thus we can think of this stat as a measure of performance on how many times we have helped someone using Google Maps. This post is about this. It’s about our contribution photos on Maps and their performance (number of views). More specifically, it includes a set of 10 leaderboards each with up to 100 participating Connect Local Guides, hence why for simplicity this post is called the Top 100 Photo Views Lists.
This is not the usual type of post you see here on Connect. So it’s not a post about a great photo I took, or great Food or Drink I made or tasted, or a great Travel story with amazing photos. It’s really quite different and interesting in different ways. However, because of this, there is a bit more information that you need to read and understand in order to get maximum value out of participating. I strongly recommend that you read it all and before jumping in, if you don’t understand something then ask your questions by way of a comment first. It all looks and sounds complicated but in reality it’s quite simple as the now nearly 100 Local Guides participating will all tell you.
Who can participate?
Do you have to be a “top gun” Level10 Local Guide with mega MILLION views to join in? No! In fact, the leaderboards have been specifically designed so that Local Guides at any level can join in, and you’ll see many do. So whether you are an entry level Local Guide or from a small town, or a top level Local Guide from New York or Paris or New Delhi, you can have a go. So if you want to brag about your photo views achievements then you’ve come to the right place. To find out more about this, read the Structure of the Top 100 Photo Views Leaderboards and the Snakes & Ladders sections.
Is this a competition to see who is the best?
As well as tapping into the element of gamification in the Local Guides program, with aims of showing the Local Guides having the top 100 photo views overall and at each Local Guide level, this post is educational and introduces a number of different ways of looking at the performance of your photos. This can help you learn how to improve the quality of your photo contributions. It also includes an element of fun and you can read more about this in the Sakes & Ladders section.
What do other Local Guides say about all this?
Yes that’s a fair question. To see what other Local Guides say about these Leaderboards click here.
I’m interested but I’ve got a question to ask.
Great but before you ask, because the Top 100 Photo Views Lists has been running since early November 2020, check out the FAQs section first and after that if you have any questions then ask by adding a message on this post.
All good, I’m ready to jump in!
Great. After reading and making sure you understand the important information in the immediately following comments, complete this simple entry form!
Conclusion:
The leaderboard posts are more than just seeing who has the best photos or the most photo views. Being able to look at our photo performance in different ways as well as in relative terms to that of other Local Guides and our peers in a fun and friendly way, I see posts like these as a way of showing us how we can improve our personal contributions, improve the quality of being a Local Guide, and thus leading to better information on Google Maps; it’s a win-win-win. If it were not for Connect it would be very difficult if not impossible to do this. Connect gives us the opportunity to connect and engage with each other on posts like this.
Adam