Connected Women Global Meetup in Cagayan de Oro

The world just celebrated International Women’s Day last March 8 and the days leading to that… well, ramdam ko lang talaga pagiging babae ko, lol! The last week has been such a roller coaster of a ride for me that I think I need a break… a long one if possible! Unknowingly, I was about to have my period (mine is irregular so unless I take contraceptive pills which I stopped more than a year ago, I will never really know when my next period will come, hence, my emotions going haywire whenever it’s about to happen) so you can just imagine how every little thing ticked me off and every little thing blowing out of proportion from March 1-8, in my personal life at least. In terms of work, it amazes me how I can still function and do my best in serving my clients. Kudos, really, to women out there! Being a woman, a 41-year-old mother to a 3-year-old toddler at that, who also works full-time and provides for her family, is one tough job to beat! (Yes, I am patting my back and yours as well. It’s our month after all!)

Anyway, now that I have my period, I can relax, sort of, and just focus on what needs to be done and there are a lot. Aside from work and a ton of laundry (lol!), I want to update my blog and share with you an event I attended last February 27 here in Cagayan de Oro City, which, in my own small way, has been how I welcomed the upcoming International Women’s Month at that time. And yes, I watched Captain Marvel recently too. But that’s another story.

This year is truly becoming a year of firsts for me. I normally don’t go to events because of lack of time and energy. But in the pursuit of personal development, I want to start going out of my comfort zone again. Hence, my decision to attend a Connected Women Global Meetup.

Suffice it to say that I learned a lot. And in case you are a social marketer, or a digital nomad, or a digital entrepreneur like me, or are interested in becoming one, then read on. I will list down below the things I learned from this experience where you might learn something new too:

CONNECTED WOMEN OVERVIEW

First and foremost, here are some things you need to know about Connected Women.

MISSION:

Driving technology adoption by women-led businesses and startups.
Aims to train 1000 women in digital marketing at physical events in the Philippines.
Provide online training for 10,000 less advantaged women.
To impact 100,000 women through our content and online community.

Founder:

Gina Romero, CEO, and CoFounder
Gina is half-Filipino & half-British, daughter of an OFW.
Launched their first workshops in Singapore in 2013.
In 2014, launched the Connected Women Magazine.
In 2017, launched in the Philippines in partnership with Facebook’s #SheMeansBusiness

Vision:

“ We exist to empower women everywhere to use technology to share, connect, work, and learn.”

OPENING REMARKS

The Cagayan De Oro Connected Women Meetup was held at the DICT (Department of Information and Communications Technology) Tech4Ed Center and it was for free! Engr. Rolando Cabaluna gave an overview talk of what DICT is and what it does for us and because I rarely read the newspapers or watch the news, all this information was new to me:

DICT is under the executive branch of our government. It handles all the ICT branches and its mandate is to have efficient information and communications technology in the Philippines.
One of their projects in Cagayan de Oro is to eventually provide free public wifi areas including giving free wifi to public high schools.
One of its goals is to develop rural areas in the region by providing educational modules developed by U.P. graduates to students in rural areas. This is to answer the need to develop our countryside.
They also have a mandate to improve public access by connecting all government offices through fiber optic.
They aim to provide resource sharing and capacity building. In fact, with proper permission, anyone can use the DICT Tech4Ed center. It has computers people can use for free. Like if there are people out there who are delving into freelance work but can’t afford their own computer or laptop yet, they can go to the center and use the facilities for free until such time that they are already earning more than enough to be able to buy their own computer (maybe after 1-3 months). I was really amazed by this information! This would be a big help to moms out there who want to work-from-home but can’t afford it yet. Well now, they can.
They also provide Social Media Marketing Training. They can tap people from Connected Women (us!) for instance, to give free training to those in need so that these people can find related jobs more easily.
DICT also gives certification equivalent to Civil Service eligibility for a particular government ICT position. This will make it easier for these people in need to find eligible jobs in their field of expertise. I thank my mom who worked in COA all her adult life and urged me to get my Civil Service eligibility at a young age of 21 and I was even part of the Philippine’s Best and the Brightest Program at that time. For those who are having a hard time passing this eligibility exam in order to get a government job, DICT can help you.

So many good information, right? When the overview talk was done, the meetup proceeded with that evening’s agenda.

We had two speakers and I will just outline below the topics that were covered.

Topic 1: Top 5 Ways to Monetize Your Blog

Speaker: Ruby Caberte (President, CDO Bloggers; Owner/Blogger at Pinay Mommy Online and Rubzonline.com)

Paid posting companies
Direct advertisers
Brand Ambassadorship or product endorsement
Google Adsense
Affiliate Marketing

Minimum Requirements:

domain name and hosting
blog is 6 months old with 10 or more blog posts
blog has original content
indexed by Google
has social media presence

My thoughts about earning from your blog:

Though I’ve been blogging for almost 2 decades now (I started with Geocities back in 2000, then Friendster, then i.ph, then Blogspot, then WordPress), I haven’t really focused much on earning big time from my blog. And with Momtraneur, which I started in 2016 when I became a mother, it’s more of a passion project thing for me, like an online diary, more than anything else. It’s good to be reminded that I can do these things to my blog for extra income. So you might get to see ads, affiliate links and sponsored posts again sometime in the future. And if you’re like me, it’s never too late to start earning from your blog.

Topic 2: E-commerce and Dropshipping

Second Speaker: Karren-Kaye Tulang Mabuay (A digital marketing consultant specializing in e-commerce and dropshipping for small to medium-sized businesses)

E-commerce in the Philippines

Lazada:

not good for small businesses because of the many requirements
expensive

Shopee:

good for small business owners
once customer receives the ordered package, business owner receives money automatically

Shopify:

this is a storefront
this is for established businesses with their own fulfillment team

Dropshipping

Alieexpress.com: customers can buy retail, one piece at a time
Alibaba.com: for bulk orders

My thoughts about E-commerce and Dropshipping:

These are the two topics I am mostly interested in. Just the previous night, I was out with my sister who has been doing e-commerce and dropshipping for a while now. In just a matter of a few months, she said she has already earned P2Million. But like what the speaker said, it really takes time, effort and lots of money also. With FB ads alone, my sister spent about P1.5M. So it’s something to think about.

The meetup ended around 9:00 PM.

MY TAKEAWAY

If you are someone (either man or woman can actually attend this event according to Connected Women CDO Chapter President, Joan Sullano-Sheng) who wants to network with other like-minded people, then you might want to attend another Connected Women Global Meetup in your locality. They do so every 6 weeks, on a Wednesday evening and cover various topics. The next one here in Cagayan de Oro will be on April 10. Mahal will once again come with me as men are allowed as well. Check out connectedwomen.com / https://www.facebook.com/weareconnectedwomen/?ref=br_rs for updates.