Today, I dove into the financial literacy part of techie youth. Stocks and investments are some things I always wanted to get into, so I figured why not try to learn about them. Stocks are a share of a company, a percentage of a company. If an Apple share is $100 and Apple is worth $1000 and you own one share, you own 10% of Apple. There are different types of shares, some paying guaranteed dividends which makes for a steady income, while others follow the market hard. If the stock crashes you lose a lot, and if it rises you will gain. These investments are much more risky. Understand the market and all the given terms and companies are challenging. As an inspiring investor you must be willing to only put in what you are willing to lose because chances are that you’re first investment will not return much.
This is for Monday, August august 15th’s post. I focused on learning the fundamentals of google sheets, docs, and slides. These are all applications in which you can utilize almost form of work. In docs, you can store templates and information, slides are especially good for presentations, and sheets represent any statistical information or data. Moving on, it is crucial to keep up with your email and to organize it. Replying to multiple clients at once can be stressful, so you need to plan out when you will respond to each one. The labeling feature provided by gmail makes sure you’re able to organize it however you want.
Today, I dove into the basics and advanced usages of Garageband. The tutorials provided on the site were enough to get me started but I had to do some extra research to see exactly how to get the pieces of music I wanted in my piece. For the piece, I chose to keep the energy throughout the 1 minute and 8 seconds to show that at Techie youth there are exciting new opportunities waiting to be taken advantage of, hence the electric, high energy piece. I went with a synth as my main sounds, and drums to compliment it. I felt that vocals would not add to the piece, so it is strictly an instrumental.
I spent less than an hour on the site today because I had to focus on moving forward with my mobile app and website creation. I am in the process of using Swift to build my app, and will continue website work tomorrow.
Today I dove into the music production basics. To be a successful artist or independent in the music industry you have to make sure your chord progressions and keys appeal to your audience. There are popular keys that the trending songs use and it is best to use them. Tomorrow, I will dive further into music production and begin to make my track as well as catch up with my other assignments. Today, I submitted my blog post for the writing unit. My mobile app is almost ready to submit to the app store and I will work on developing my website tomorrow.
This is for Friday, August 5th. Yesterday I dived into sales funnels and the fundamentals of it. In short a sales funnel is the process of a purchase and what attracts the customer. Awareness draws opinion, which draws consideration, which draws preference, which ultimately draws purchase. Getting an intended audience’s attention and making them feel a call to action about a product is crucial. You want them to feel like they need your product. Sales funnels exist in every aspect of business. From retail stores, to local shops, technology websites and clothing stores.
Today, I dove into how Instagram filters can make users money. Similar to the Snapchat and Facebook filters, if you create a filter and it gets approved you make a commission based on how many users are using your filters. Besides this there are many other ways to make money on Instagram. Besides this I continued to work on my mobile app and I had to go back to the mini unit to brush up on some coding.
Today was another short day. I read articles and no videos because I was not on my computer. I am also still in the process of developing my mobile app. However, I learned about Snapchat AR filters. To keep it short, you use software t create your own augmented reality filter and upload it to Snapchat. If it is approved, users can then use your filter, and you get paid based on how many people use it. A simple way to make a quick income.
Today, I spent only 3 hours on the site diving into themes and templates. I spent a short amount of time because I am working on my mobile app project which is going to take quite a while. The gist is that creating Wordpress themes are extremely simple. Once you have created a template you can then place it for sale on one of the many marketplaces the internet has to offer.
Today, I focused on the blueprint for my app. I worked on my macbook and incorporated the code I learned from the mobile apps mini unit. My idea was to create an app that shows the fruits of the jet setter lifestyle and with each picture is a link to techie youth. It is still in the early stages and I will be looking to revise it more. Other than that, I continued with the digital assets unit and progressed to video game assets. Video games are extremely popular among teenagers such as myself. We tend to buy free games that incentivize purchases for cool cosmetics, and that is one way these developers and companies make money. Assets include characters, UI, HUDs and Icons, sound tracks, etc. Any major component of a video game can be sold, and there are marketplaces where you can put your software up for sale such as TurboSquid & Unity Asset Store. It is important that you master the creation of digital assets before trying to sell your assets. Remember that companies want the best possible asset and they are choosing from endless amounts. Tomorrow, I will continue video game assets.
This is Thursday July 28th’s post. Today I finished up mobile apps and monetization and completed the quiz. To keep it simple, when monetizing an app you have to know how to capture an audience (specifically who do you want to use your app) and after capturing, maintaining and continuing to grow. There are tons of ways to capture an audience, and you should spend as much time promoting your app as much as it took you to make it. I dove into video games and learned that there is much more to the developing side of video games than I had initially thought. I am excited to dove into the video games mini unit and submit my mobile app as the assignment next week.
This is my recap of Wednesday, July 27th. I finished up the app development videos and articles and dove into learning how to monetize and advertisement your app once it is out there. Although lots of companies do not have the budget for large scale advertisement, there are still tons of free ways to get your app out there. You do not need money to spread the word between friends and family, which continues to spread as well as post on social media. When advertising something to the mass public you have to capture their attention. Understanding psychological patterns are a huge factor in this. You need to know what you need to show about your app to capture your intended audience.
Today, I continued my studies of mobile apps and dived into creating android apps and cross platform apps. (native) While apple devices are common, especially in my generation, every other phone is android compatible. Android apps can also be written with much more codes, Java and Kotlin being the most common. Since android is more widespread, there are more tutorials and guides for app creation supported by their devices. Firewall UI and WearOS are essentials to know how to program for android devices. Similar to apple, you can still test your apps if you do not own an android device, through the Android emulator. After your app is crash and bug-free, you will need to publish it to the Google play store. I had more time after finishing android apps, so I begun cross platform apps. I am in the middle of a 2 hour video, but the from the articles given, through programs like Microsoft Xamarin, Appcelerator Titanium, & Adobe PhoneGap you are able to use coding languages to program your apps.
Today I dove into the Mobile app creation unit. I spent the day on IOS app development. I learned what code you need for IOS apps, what you need to publish and test your apps, how to sign up for a developer account with apple, etc. To start off, SwiftUI is the most common code to create an app with on IOS. Apple has a tutorial for the program on their website. Going into this, I thought the content would be a lot to digest, however apple and the videos provided did a great job of explaining it making the content easier. Moving on, there are ways to develop and test apps even without an apple device as they can be pretty pricey. Moving on, to publish an app you need to make sure there are not any bugs and that the app does not crash. When programming an app you can easily run into problems due to incorrect codes, or codes that are not detailed enough. So, before publishing an app you need to make sure that your code makes your app run as smoothly as possible. Finally, once your app is published, you will regularly need to perform app maintenance and push updates out.
Today, I only spent about 2 hours on the site to finish up my 25 hours for the week. However, within the digital assets unit, I started the mobile app development mini unit. I will eventually have to make an app, but from today I learned that making a mobile app may not be as hard as it seems. While you have to learn a coding language, it can be easier to make an app rather than make a website. The average salary for a app developer is also good, almost an average of 80k. As an app developer, you need to know multiple languages, and know how to maintain users' info as they are subject to being leaked if the app is not water tight.
Today, I only spent 2 hours on Techie Youth, however I chose to spend it learning how to begin selling stock photos. I could not get too in depth however, once you have good enough equipment or find good enough photos online, you build a portfolio of photos. It is better to follow a theme within your photos because it will draw an audience to buy your photos. Once you’ve finished the portfolio you sell it online with a third party website.
Today I continued my study of digital assets. I learned about podcasts and online courses through numerous videos and articles. Online course creating targets consumers that want to develop a skill. The skills that consumers want to learn vary. These skills can be copywriting, photoshop, online marketing, real estate, etc. A target audience is step one when creating a paid course. Next, is to figure out how you will structure your course. What do these students need to know and have, and what don't they need to know and have before purchasing your course. There are also tons of websites that can help you publish your course. Moving on, I also learned about podcasts. Podcasts have become extremely popular and are seemingly everywhere. Podcasts can also be held on Youtube, Spotify, ITunes, etc. When first airing a podcast, it is crucial that you are covering a specific genre or piece of content. Internet drama, fitness & health, sports, etc. There needs to be a specific focus of your podcast to draw in an audience and keep their attention, which provides you with a community that will tune in whenever you are live. Like course creation, there are many sites that will allow you to publish your podcast.
Today, I had to make up past assignments. For example, I revisited some of the social themes such as snapchat and I dived further into digital assets. After placing my picture on the marketplace, I realized how difficult it is to develop a following for stock photos. My photo for sale is not necessarily horrible, however the time and effort that other sellers put into their digital assets must be tremendous. Continuing, I learned about webinars and their purpose. Online calls with customers with varying purposes. A webinar can be held to promote new products, or interview individuals, or present new ideas for companies. Webinars should be organized, well-informing and give whoever it is being presented to a call to action.
I chose to finish off the writing unit by reviewing Magazines and journaling. Magazine writers make tons. Taking interesting angles on topic you are interested or passionate about are the first steps to begin magazine writing. Extensive knowledge of a topic and correct information are essential to include in a magazine article. Like any other writing piece it is important to capture your audience at the start of the piece of writing to ensure their attention throughout the rest of the article. On the other hand, there are journalists who write about key points that they want to bring up about a certain topic. Whereas Magazines are generally broader, journalists tend to zoom in more. These pieces of writing resemble essays in the sense that they are organized to introduce, present, and conclude an argument. Journalists also have to be aware of the other literature in their fields.
Today my shift was shorter than usual because I only needed 3 hours to fulfill my 25 hour mark for the week. However, I chose to dive into the basics of digital marketing. Digital marketing is an online form of marketing delivered through the internet to catch the eye of customers browsing online, on search engines, apps, through video ads, etc. To put digital marketing into perspective about 77% of customers research brands before purchasing products from said brand. Digital marketing is not the hardest to get into and start making money. This form of marketing is also essential to insight on consumer engagement. Next week, I want to dive deeper into the many ways to start digital marketing.
Today, I wanted to dive further into the other fields of writing. I enjoyed learning about copywriting but I wanted to check out a few others before I decided which field I would study much more. Specifically I spent lots of time on Customer service and correspondence. Starting off, when helping a customer exchanges are supposed to be both formal and casual. Keeping sentences short, concise, and polite guarantees a good experience with a customer and it shows that you are displaying respect. Each exchange should also focus on one solution to a problem. To do this, break down the issue the customer has, and dissect the problem step by step. Ask questions that are easy to respond to and only give your customer one task at a time to see if you are able to provide a solution. Using the customer's name is also crucial because it helps to show that even though you are assisting the customer, that you are also human. It allows for a normal conversation. These same points apply for an email. Although when sending an email, make sure to break down the problem as you would in a customer support chat. Give your customer easy to follow steps to ensure that they receive the help that is needed. For the remote job aspect of customer support, there are sites that are always hiring for customer service reps. As long as you familiarize yourself with policies are able to assist customers, jobs should come. These jobs span internationally as well! Fluency in other languages can help as well. Customers can have questions from all around the world and can speak different languages. The more languages you speak, the more valuable of a rep you are.
Today, I decided to focus on the fundamentals of copywriting and what it is. To start off, "copy" is a form of writing that allows you to appeal to a consumer and make them feel a call to action. While Call to Actions are necessary in a "copy" piece of text, it is also important to only have one. Anyone can copywrite and you do not need to have the most extravagant vocabulary. Copywrites should be short and concise, but urgent. Copywrites are marketers and salesmen first, writers second. It is crucial to understand the industry that you are writing for and appealing to that audience as best as you can. The job pays decently well as well. Ranges for the first year of copywriting range from 28k-46k and rises to about 80k after a few years of experience. Freelance writers however, who decide who they copy for and have no set schedule can easily make 6 figures as long as they have clients and companies who hire them. For this it is necessary to build a network of companies and connections so that you will always have an available client. The remote component is similar to yesterday's lesson. You have to manage your time extremely well, since you do not have a set 9-5. It is up to you to decide when to work, and when to tend to your other life needs. To finish up, you need to have a certain persuasiveness in your writing. You need to sway consumers to buy whatever is being sold. Raising a need for a before unnecessary item.
Today was my first day at Techie Youth. To sum up the first few videos, it was a guide to how life is when you can work remotely. Like anything else, there are pros and cons to working remotely. Some of the pros include no need for a morning commute (especially in NYC), and working from wherever you are, including on vacation. However, some of the cons include a lack of focus and quality time away from co-workers. When finding something that you are passionate about, you have to find a way to take it online and appeal to many others to grow your brand. I learned that through our everyday social media apps, there are pages and users that constantly make money. Most do not even have to make original content. For instance, someone can have a theme page about traveling and repost many pictures from different influencers as long as they credit the user. This positively influences both the page and the original poster as publicity is given to both. Tiktok, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, and Pinterest are among many apps that give the way for creators all around the world to make money and work remotely. Social Influencers that we watch on an everyday or weekly basis utilize ads and sponsorships to capture the attention of us, the audience, and to grow their brand, which leads to more revenue. The fields that you can get into are also endless. Travel, food, sports, fitness, wildlife, photography, there are endless amounts of themes that anyone can build a following around. As long as you enjoy making content around a certain theme, working remotely will work.