Hello everyone, this is Jaber from Khulna, Bangladesh. I am a proud level 9 Local Guide who loves to roam around and share experiences in google maps. Local guide program means a lot to me. I take photography quite seriously, so when I realized I can help thousands even millions of people through my pictures it gave my photography a whole new meaning. I just love to take photo of the places and upload them in google maps. To a point I am kind of obsessed with it. So far, my images have gained more than 4.2 million view.
The thought that so many people saw my capture and somehow helped by it gives me the satisfaction of a whole another level. for the first time I came to know about google maps Local Guide program. I wasn’t much aware about it. but I uploaded some pictures anyway, and gave some review of the places I visited. After a couple of days, I received a mail saying this much people is being helped by your pictures and review. Then I finally realized I can contribute too.
It’s kind of in my daily schedule nowadays to provide some reviews and upload pictures of places I visited. Obviously, the reviews are a great way. But, in my opinion pictures says a lot more than written reviews. It gives a visual perspective and direction about a specific place so its easy for other users to understand the place, how it actually might be. Apart from that adding places on google maps is also fun. You get to add new places on maps that were not previously added, or places newly opened. The feelings and satisfaction that you added a place and people are going to be helped and benefitted by it means a lot.
For an example, this one time a travelled to another part of the country, where I found this small but very beautiful hotel which wasn’t on the google maps, so I asked the owner if I can add them on google maps, she said yes even though she knew very little about these. After 7-8 months I got a call and the person identified herself as the owner of that hotel. She was so happy and overjoyed to be able to find me. She thanked me and when I asked the reason she said, since I did that little trick, the number of customers have increased exponentially and the place is booked most of time. She didn’t know what was happening until one day a customer showed her that they found them through google maps. Then she found my number from the hotel registry and called for thanking me, also offered me discount coupon for the next visit. Though I said that’s not necessary as I don’t know whether or not um going there again of not but she insisted a lot.
So, these are the stories that mean more than anything to me, which is only possible for the local guides program. The whole google maps and local guide programs is about helping each other and building a sense of community that we live in a world with no boarders, and people from different parts of the world whom you don’t even know can help too. I for instance always takes the help of maps whenever I visit to a place even if its in my own city. I read the reviews and check the photos of that place just to make plans ahead.
It gives me a sense that someone unknown is helping me here, which creates a thought of accountability that I should help others in same way. Which local guide program enabled me to do so. Along with helping others, this program has its own perks and features. Such as reward points for every small contributions and categories makes this thing a lot more fun in so many ways. It’s like that little gifts for helping others you never knew you can actually earn. The way local guide programs created a community and trying to bring the world closer is amazing and I am so happy and proud to be a part of this.
