Get a free delegate pass: Infosec Conference 2010

With Filipino's concern on Internet security still not subsiding and affecting the growth of e-commerce adoption in the country, DigitalFilipino Club and Posh Marketing Services is organizing Infosec Conference 2010 this August 25 at Hotel Intercontinental, Makati City.

We are giving away two (2) delegate passes to this event.

Should you like to participate and hope to get one of the passes, this is what you have to do:

1. Make a blog entry about the Infosec Conference 2010 and cite why you like to attend this event.
2. Your blog post must have a link to the following:
   link 1: Infosec Conference 2010 at http://www.infosecphilippines.com
   link 2: DigitalFilipino Club at http://www.e-commercephilippines.com
   link 3: Posh Marketing Services at http://www.poshmarketingservices.com/infosec-conference-2010-sharing-best-practices-in-it-security.html
3. Add a Facebook "like" button to your blog post to enable your readers to give a thumbs up.
4. Post a comment to this blog entry and give me the url link where your entry can be found. 

Deadline for submission of entries is on August 17, 2010.

Two winners will be chosen based on:

• First winner shall be based on most number of Facebook likes or thumbs up from readers.
• Second winner will be based on the blog post story - why do you want to attend the summit.

The 2 winners who will get one delegate pass each shall be posted here on or before August 20.
 
I hope you can join and see you at the Infosec Conference 2010.

May 19 to 23: Women Empowerment in the Age of ICT

I just partnered with the University Center for Women's Studies of UP (UCWS-UP) for the conduct of their training workshop on "Women Empowerment in the Age of ICT".

This is part of the UCWS-UP ICT project called "Women and Gender Advocacy, Training, Education, and research in the Age of ICT (WgATER-ICT). This is an action plan output of a trainer's training on ICT in 207 with APEC Digital Opportunity Center as lead sponsor.

As the coordination for the said training was quite tight, I've decided to tap into the existing women members in the DigitalFilipino.com Club to contribute their time and effort for this training. The program outline where the club members participated are as follows:

May 19 Monday

ICT for Business
Resource person, Gwen Nava

• Introduction to E-Commerce
• Internet Safety
• Introduction to E-Shopping and E-Transactions
• Hands-on
• Trial of e-commerce / e-government websites
• Comparison of e-commerce sites
• Case study: AbsoluteTraders.com

May 21

ICT for Data Management, Research, and Communication
Resource person: Aileen Apolo

• Introduction to search engines
• Introduction to keywords
• Tips on finding information you need onlnie
• How to promote your business through the Internet (e-mail and blog marketing)
• Search engine marketing
• Introduction to information research tracking (RSS and alerts)

May 22

ICT for Data Management, Research, and Communication
Resource person: Joan Pinon

• Information research result communication (online collaboration tools, wiki, blogs, podcast, vlogs)
• Using online collaboration tools and blogs (setting up and posting content)
• Hands-on workshop:
• Creating your own blog
• Using blogs for advocacy
• Case study: FilipinaImages.com
• Guest resource: Dine Racoma

May 23

ICT for Data Management, Research and E-Commerce
Resource persons:

• Katrina Inocencio, Kaban
• Reggie Bundang, RegaloService

Internet Payment

• Accepting online payment
• Case study: Kaban

E-Commerce for Women Entrepreneurs

• E-Commerce project planning
  
• Case Study: RegaloService
• Lessons learned
• Project Planning Workshop

Many thanks for this opportunity and we hope that more women will be empowered through ICT and e-commerce!

Reggie Bundang: Expanding RegaloService Offerings in 2008

RegaloService was probably the newest e-commerce player in late 2006. In less than a year, the site won two awards, the best gift site in the 1st DigitalFilipino.com Web Awards and winner in the ADOC ICT Awards.

Reggie Bundang's story in starting the site remains an inspiration for any woman who would like to achieve a balance, start their own business at home, pursuing one's dream, succeed, while taking care of family at the same time.

Her interest in shopping, reading, surfing, coupled with her background on online banking, business, and product development made her decide to pursue starting an online retailing business, RegaloService.

With minimal capital, she relied on her network of friends to get started. She also had to deal with challenges such as building credibility with her suppliers, finding the look and feel with her website that aptly represents what she wants, and getting a slice of the market. Help from partners, suppliers, and friends from all over were valuable along the way.

In the last W3O forum, I still remember what Reggie shared, knowing what you want, being professional and understanding in one's dealings, and building relationships were vital to success.

For 2008, Reggie plans to expand her service offerings in RegaloService.

Week 9: Filipina Writing Project

Here's the 9th week summary of entries for the Filipina Writing Project. If you haven't submitted an entry yet, head on to our writing project page on how to join.

This effort will not be possible without the support of the DigitalFilipino.com Club. This is a community of e-commerce enthusiasts and professionals. Benefits include access to research reports, e-books, networking events, tutorials, content development, advertisement placement, among others.

We received 1 entry this week. I encourage all our readers to link to:

• Long live Bb Filipinas

Overall
Combined with week 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9, we now have a total of 38 entries and writing project participants.

November 28 eyeball - I invite those who submitted an entry to the Filipina Writing Project to come and attend. We will be announcing the 10 winners on this day who will get US$100 each. Of course, those who can't make it are still part of the draw and can win.

Week 8: Filipina Writing Project

Here's the 8th week summary of entries for the Filipina Writing Project. If you haven't submitted an entry yet, head on to our writing project page on how to join.

This effort will not be possible without the support of the DigitalFilipino.com Club. This is a community of e-commerce enthusiasts and professionals. Benefits include access to research reports, e-books, networking events, tutorials, content development, advertisement placement, among others.

We received 2 entries this week. I encourage all our readers to link to:

• Biking Moves These Filipinas
  
• Filipinas: Tres Marias

Overall
Combined with week 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8, we now have a total of 37 entries and writing project participants.

November 28 eyeball - I invite those who submitted an entry to the Filipina Writing Project to come and attend. We will be announcing the 10 winners on this day who will get US$100 each. Of course, those who can't make it are still part of the draw and can win.

Week 7: Filipina Writing Project

Here's the 7th week summary of entries for the Filipina Writing Project. If you haven't submitted an entry yet, head on to our writing project page on how to join.

This effort will not be possible without the support of our sponsors. One of them is the DigitalFilipino.com Club. This is a community of e-commerce enthusiasts and professionals. Benefits include access to research reports, e-books, networking events, tutorials, content development, advertisement placement, among others.

We received 1 entry this week. I encourage all our readers to link to:

• Pinay Na, Nars Pa!

Overall
Combined with week 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, we now have a total of 35 entries and writing project participants.

November 28 eyeball - I invite those who submitted an entry to the Filipina Writing Project to come and attend. We will be announcing the 10 winners on this day who will get US$100 each. Of course, those who can't make it are still part of the draw and can win.

Week 6: Filipina Writing Project

Here's the 6th week summary of entries for the Filipina Writing Project. If you haven't submitted an entry yet, head on to our writing project page on how to join.

This effort will not be possible without the support of our sponsors. One of them is the DigitalFilipino.com Club. This is a community of e-commerce enthusiasts and professionals. Benefits include access to research reports, e-books, networking events, tutorials, content development, advertisement placement, among others.

We received 3 entries this week. I encourage all our readers to link to the following:

• Looking Beyond the Heart of a Filipina
  
• My Filipina Thoughts
  
• The Filipina Campaign

Overall
Combined with week 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, we now have a total of 34 entries and writing project participants.

November 28 eyeball - I invite those who submitted an entry to the Filipina Writing Project to come and attend. We will be announcing the 10 winners on this day who will get US$100 each. Of course, those who can't make it are still part of the draw and can win.

Barangay.ph launches global Filipino site

Yesterday, I witnessed the successful launch of Barangay.ph and wrote an article about the website. Nearly 100 guests attended this event at Grappa's Restaurant in Greenbelt 3 Makati City. Several DigitalFilipino.com Club members also attended as well.

I was able to get some congratulatory messages from three guests. They are Andre Kahn of J. Romero, Dr. Patricia Sison of Development Consultants, and Ella Reyes Choi of Clowning Around.

Congratulations to Jonno Alcaro and Nanette Alcaro for this successful event.

My First Steps in Developing MyLittleBaker.com

Acquiring http://www.mylittlebaker.com/ I realized was the easy part in e-commerce, creating the actual website was another story. It was both me and my husband’s decision to develop the website on our own. I know that the most logical thing to do was to hire someone else to make the website for us but because our background in programming (my husband Samuel is still a .NET programmer and I only make programs when the need arises) we decided to develop it on our own.

When choosing a web hosting provider there are certain thing one has to consider. First of course is the budget, how much could you afford for the packaged monthly hosting of your site? What platform will it be hosted on Linux or Windows? What are the hosting features and additional value added services does the package will have? Will it include free website templates, ready-made e-commerce templates and other website management systems? When we chose the advance hosting plan from philhosting.net they don’t have Windows platform plans yet then, but I really liked their hosting plans. So even though we don’t really make programs in PHP we still pushed through with the purchase and viewed developing it as a learning experience.

Our first step in developing the website was choosing the template for the site, since my package includes free template I first chose one and started filling in the information I want to place in the site. Once we started I realized that the template does not reflect the overall theme and look I want for the site, so we started looking for free templates in the Internet. Our first attempt in developing the site was filled with confusion, excitement and anxiety on my part and annoyance and pressure on the part of my husband because I can't seem to make up my mind on the final design. After all he bore the weight of developing the website, I was there to tell him what I want the site to look and we have a time frame of 24hrs for the site to be up.

To spare you all the gory details here are tips I want to share in designing your own website. You might decide to hire someone else to make them for you but you still have to design you site. And if you do it right you can have your site in a day or two, we made ours in 24 hours.

• Decide what is the overall theme/look your site would have. Will it be formal, light or refreshing to look at? It must reflect the image of the company you want to project
• Decide what you will put on your site. Audio, pictures texts, write up and images Prepare all pictures and other accents like icons you want to have. (You can also request your programmer to make icons for you) I realized when we were developing the website that I can’t just get pictures and icons from other sites, you must keep copyright in mind)
• Decide what are the sections your site will have and prepare the contents or text write up it will contain.Make information like about your company, products, your contact information and office location readily available
• Take special attention to your Product details provide images, description, pricing, specifications, weight and measurements
• Include shipping/delivery rates and details

One of the most important tip I can share that once you are already decided in venturing out in e-commerce is joining groups like Digitalfilipino.com Club and reading on the subject of e-commerce will help prepare you in this endeavour.

I hope my tips help you in your own journey in this crazy but exciting world of e-commerce. Remember it is only the beginning.

Owning a piece of the Web

I have finally taken the plunge! Accepted my commitment and finally bought my own domain, www.mylittlebaker.com.

As I receive the confirmation and the access details for my site I felt relief, excitement and uncertainty of what I did, after all it is my own money that I used in buying the domain and a one-year web hosting package. If I fail in this venture there is no one to blame but myself.

At long last I own something, a piece of "property" that is in my own name and is a part of something BIG. I now OWN a piece of the WEB, and as an owner I have a commitment to use it to share information and to enrich the content/information found in the World Wide Web.

I've been planning to put my hobby/home-based business online for a few years now, and last November 2006 I finally did it. I started planning all the details for my online business summer of 2006, looking for a name, deciding on what do I want to place on the website and looking for my options in payment and delivery of goods. There were several reasons why I decided in putting up an online business:

• To make it easy for my current customers and friends to view my products since most of them are online
• To reach out to new customers
• To make easy to market my products, I usually print brochures and give copies to prospective customers.

At first I planned to just get a free website or even use a blog to market my products online but when attended DigitalFilipino. com Club’s 23rd Networking Event last Oct 20, 2006 about Lessons Learned in Selling Products and Services Online: Featuring club members: YesPayments.com, Jovel Cipriano of PinoyDelikasi. com, Jay Frank De Jesus of TitikPilipino. com, Abby Ongyanco-Lim of Virramall.com, and Roy Platon wherein they shared their experiences in managing their online business. I realized that their “name” or “brand” is one of the key to their success. Like in any kind of business, you must create or have your own brand because it will be your representation to your market, and since having a website levels the field for businesses your name must stand out to get noticed.

It took me half the year to look for a name that best describes my products and to ensure that it is unique I checked the Department of Trade and Industry's Online Business Name Registration System and look if the domain name I want is still available. I panicked around October when I checked if littlebaker.com was available and to my surprised someone already owned it, I got sleepless nights after that because since August I've been planing to purchase the domain but I was still saving for it at that time. So finally by the last week of October I had enough money to buy my domain and webhosting, luckily mylittlebaker.com was still available and the name was much more appropriate because I named it after my son who is always present while I am baking.

Once I had decided on the name my next step was to look where I can register my domain and get web hosting. I used search engines, ask friends and acquaintances if they know a good web hosting provider and click domain registration ads. I finally found what I was looking for when a former student of mine working in a web service provider company(their hosting prices are expensive) gave suggestions on where to look for cheap web hosting solutions for beginners like me. There were so many packages available for web hosting, I based my package on the disk space allocation and the monthly data transfer allocation, this is crucial for me because my site is mostly made up of pictures of my products.

And after that the real work began in occupying my own piece of the web.

Joan Piñon joins W3O

I'm very glad to announce that DigitalFilipino.com Club Member and site owner of MyLittleBaker.com is now a contributor for W3O. She is Joan Piñon.

She'll be sharing her entrepreneurial, Internet, and e-commerce experience in W3O. We hope that you will be inspired by her story.

Welcome Joan!

Death of page view

I read an interesting piece in the Buzz Machine about the Death of the Page View. I have always believed in this since the creation of DigitalFilipino.com. It doesn't matter whether I belong to an elite list or not, What is important are the things that I can visibly measure. This includes my mailing list (digitalfilipino and ph-outsource), club membership base, and tangible research output or business success by site visitors where our events, articles, and reports have contributed to their success. Quality over quantity should indeed matter the most.

Kudos to Maoi Arroyo

First, belated Happy Birthday to Hybridigm Consulting's CEO, Miss Maoi Arroyo.

Second, congratulations to the successful 3rd Philippine Biotech Venture Summit that took place last January 10 to 12, 2007.

More power to you Maoi!