Monthly Archives: November 2022

All Travelled By Claire?

PEER REVIEW THREE: reviewing marketability. featuring: all travelled by claire.

A screenshot of Claire's home screen of the website. — A screenshot of Claire’s home screen on the website.

For the third peer review activity, I got the opportunity to browse and look at Claire’s website: All Travelled By Claire

At first glance, the home page is well-organized and aesthetic to look at. The picture featured on the homepage immediately caught my attention because it is from Greece. From a fellow traveller’s perspective, I was immediately interested.

The title and home screen of Claire’s website clearly state the website is for travel photography and travel resources. From a SEO standpoint, I think it is good marketing as it highlights keywords for the search engine to curate and find (Hollingsworth, 2021). The page captivates audiences who love to travel.

I really like the home page; it is very clean and organized. The simplicity and natural colours add calmness to the webpages setting.

Before I began interacting with Claire’s webpage, I thought about my own digital relationship with travel. I thought about the different photos I would take compared to those of others. Therefore, I was interested in seeing what Claire decided to take photos of and decided to upload (“Digital Breadcrumbs: The data trail we leave behind us”, 2023).

When I clicked on the travel photo option button, it took me to a page labelled “an interactive photo diary”. The page featured two pictures of a similar beautiful sunset overlooking the water. From the photos, I could see the captivated beauty. Overall, I really enjoyed the colour scheme from the sunset. Based on the photos, I assumed the location of travel was possibly Greece, or somewhere warm.

Although the photos were beautiful, I was missing some information. Unfortunately, there was no story or information regarding the photo’s location and or meaning. I loved the idea of the photo diary, but it seems like photos are missing as there are only two pictures available to see. I think there is a lot of potential for this page despite the missing information.

Next, I explored the about page. When I went to the about page on the webpage, I found a lot more information.

I really appreciated the about page as it outlined some information on Claire. I was able to understand Claire’s vision for the website. From my perspective, the website was focused on Claire’s passion for travelling and was intended to be demonstrated through the cultivation of travel photos and fun tips (Basu, 2020). I felt that the about page provided a lot of personality into who Claire is.

A big thing I would personally focus on is adding some public content that includes travel tips and photos with information.

Overall, I really liked the intended look of the website. I think the intentions of the audience are clear and precise. The website includes good key search words and is headed in the right direction. I think the website has good potential.

Thank you for sharing Claire!

References

Basu, T. (2020, September 3). Digital Gardens let you cultivate your own little bit of the internet. MIT Technology Review. https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/09/03/1007716/digital-gardens-let-you-cultivate-your-own-little-bit-of-the-internet/

Digital Breadcrumbs: The data trail we leave behind us. (2016, May 23). Pod Academy. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from http://podacademy.org/podcasts/digital-breadcrumbs-our-data-trail/

Hollingsworth, S. (2021, August 6). 15 reasons why your business absolutely needs seo. Search Engine Journal. https://www.searchenginejournal.com/why-seo-is-important-for-business/248101/#close

(Process Post #10): Data Insights and SEO

This week (Nov. 13–Nov. 19) was the busiest week of the term so far, with essays, midterms, and plenty of assignments in the lineup. Finally, I got through the rough patch, and now my only focus is doing well in the finals. So good luck to me!

Now, looking over the content for this course, I will be going over the Google Analytics data for my website and the importance of SEO.

Google Analytics

Most of my website’s reach is coming from direct channels, which is understood at this moment due to peers looking at each other’s websites, grading, etc. However, access through social media is at 16.7% and organic search is at just 8.3%. To reach a larger audience, I would need to improve my organic search results.As said by Hollingsworth (2021), organic search is usually the primary source of website traffic, which is clearly not the case on my website because of poor SEO at the moment. Hence, I would have to tag the posts and make proper use of keywords in order to perform better on the search engines.

Looking at reach by devices, 75% of the reach came from desktops and 25% from mobile phones. Currently, as a student, I mostly use desktop all the time, so I’m only focusing on the desktop website; however, now that I’ve realised that the majority of my audience will most likely carry phones wherever they go, it’ll be critical to polish my mobile website to make it accessible and finished.The data from data.ai (2022) also suggests this trend: more people are spending their daily time using phones. Hence, this is what I should start working on as soon as possible.

Lastly, it is important for a website to be fast and reliable in order to improve the user experience. It turned out that my website was poor in terms of quick response; it took 3.8 seconds for a page to load, and that’s a lot! I would have to probably add a plugin or reduce the picture size for content to appear quickly and reliably.

Search Engine optimization

…

References

Data.ai. 2022. State of Mobile 2022. http://posiel.com/outline/full-semester-outline/dataai__state_of_mobile_2022__en/

The post (Process Post #10): Data Insights and SEO first appeared on Self Therapy.

Sofia’s Life For The Day

This week, I explored Sofia’s blog, Day in Sofia’s Life. First Impressions The first thing I notice upon arriving at her site is the appealing colour scheme and simplistic design that she has chosen. The white, black, and red all contrast with each other nicely, and gives the site a crisp feel. I also liked...

Week 11: Process Post

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Peer Review #3: Knitting After Hours

Knitting After Hours is a fantastic blog by Lily that is centered around the creator’s interests such as cooking and knitting. The About Me page eloquently captures the tone and subject matter of the titular blog. However, one aspect I would like to pay great attention to is the personal anecdotes Lily articulates. These personal details are a great touch that effectively conveys the personality behind the Knitting After Hours blog to the audience. Additionally, this personal approach lends credence to the assertions of Tom Critchlow in regard to digital gardening. For example, as cited in our Tanya Basu course reading: “with blogging, you’re talking to a large audience,” he says. “With digital gardening, you’re talking to yourself. You focus on what you want to cultivate over time” (Basu, 2020). Knitting After Hours captures the sense of a digital garden that Lily is fostering for both them and their larger audience. This is exemplified on the About Me page when Lily outlines how cooking and knitting helps them stay focused when conducting their academic responsibilities. It can be inferred that Lily wants to strive to achieve a better schoolwork ethic since it is mentioned on their About Me page that they “put off” assignments and readings. Thus cooking and knitting are great outlets to promote a better work ethic. This instance showcases how these interests help instill balance in their life. Therefore, Knitting After Hours serves as a digital garden that Lily can use to help cultivate better improvements in their life.

Basu, T. (2020). Digital gardens let you cultivate your own little bit of the internet. MIT Technology Review. Retrieved from https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/09/03/1007716/digital-gardens-let-you-cultivate-your-own-little-bit-of-the-internet/

Figuring Out SEO.

Before this week, I honestly had no idea what SEO was or how it even worked. I had no idea of its importance or any idea of how it influenced the internet.

The biggest and most important step in understanding SEO was knowing that it was an acronym. SEO is for search engine optimization (Hollingsworth, 2021). Before I went on to the readings, I wanted to understand each component of that.

I know it sounds silly to not understand the components of SEO, but honestly, I had to break it down. So, I took each word in the acronym and broke it down.

My definitions: S.E.O

Search: to look for something or someone. It’s the process of looking.

Engine: something that is a moving part. Meaning, it facilitates something.

Optimization: something that provides the best or most effective possible outcome.

After I was able to create my definitions and break down the word slowly, I was able to read and understand the articles.

Essentially SEO helps facilitate, promote, and benefit the growth of a company/brand (Hollingsworth, 2021). Hollingsworth (2021) outlines 15 reasons why SEO is important to a company/brand by reasoning it promotes growth and awareness.

I found the process of understanding SEO interesting because I was able to break down the whole wording into my own definition and apply it to the readings.

I find that if I ever am confused or stuck on the wording of something, I find I just have to break it down. I don’t know why, but I sometimes have a short mental block when I come across wording that is unfamiliar to me. Therefore, I have to take a step back and look at it in small doses to easily break it down. Once I do that, I have no problem understanding it.

After reading Hollingsworth’s (2021) article and sitting in a lecture, I can understand the importance of SEO. I find I was able to understand how it impacts a user’s experience with the content online.

References

Hollingsworth, S. (2021, August 6). 15 reasons why your business absolutely needs seo. Search Engine Journal. https://www.searchenginejournal.com/why-seo-is-important-for-business/248101/#close

Peer Review #3: Moda Web Design & Fashion Blog

Website link: https://brendanmckay.com/101blog/blog.html

Brendan’s website, Moda Web, is a blog about fashion and the fashion industry. The chosen audience is very specific and the website seems to be doing a great job catering to people who care about what is happening in the fashion and design world. Brendan’s blog contains posts about runway fashion shows, the creative minds behind haute couture, as well as new products in the fashion industry. They seem to have an eye for fashion and creativity because their blog has a very minimalistic look, but still somehow looks super neat and modern. The black and white look gives the website a contrasting but welcoming feel that I as the viewer very much like.

Brendan’s posts revolve around the world of fashion is very lucky for those certain people looking to keep up to date with all that is happening in the fashion industry. Since the blog is all about the fashion world, it would only make sense that Brendan’s targeted audience is people wanting to keep up with everything in fashion or people that are generally interested in fashion.

The website definitely caters to its chosen and very specific demographic especially since in one of the posts it mentions the use of Google Analytics (which by the way is a great way to figure out who your audience is and how to engage more with them). If I were someone who wants to keep up with the world of the fashion industry and see what is happening around the world, Brendan’s website is definitely the place where I would look and depend upon to keep me up to date.

While going through the website and getting lost in all the posts about the fashion world, I found some ways that the website could be improved. Well, to begin with, it would be nice to have an accessibility feature so that everyone and anyone interested in fashion can access Brendan’s blog without difficulty or inconvenience. Another thing that would be nice to see would be a little bit more about the author in the “About” section of the blog because as of right now it only tells the audience about the website (which is absolutely fabulous), but it would be great to get to know a bit more about the genius behind the blog.

Besides my minor suggestions, Moda Web is an absolutely amazing and fabulous place to visit and keep in mind if you want to stay up to date with the world of the fashion industry and everything fashionable.

Nothing

No time

No value

No memories

Nothing

Nothing remains and you have

You have nothing to give, hold, or cherish

Nothing to love or hate

And you can’t but help wonder why

When nothing is going right

But nothing is going wrong

And you just sitting in the void

Wondering why

Locked doors and closed windows

Just silence

With nothing left

No point in going forward if there is only silence

What can you do with nothing

You can do nothing

Just sit

Sit in silence

Week 10: Rabbit Holes

Rabbit holes, after rabbit holes, after rabbit holes, so many rabbit holes that I have no idea where I should begin. Everyone falls down a rabbit hole once or twice… or thrice (for some of us that is a daily occurrence). Rabbit holes sometimes seem like never-ending spirals that we sometimes fall down because we were looking for something specific and like five hours later, we realize we have no idea what we are doing and how we ended up in that position.

Rabbit holes are a blessing and a curse. Rabbit holes are a great way to keep up with modern trends, and get your name and online persona out into the world of the internet, also you can get inspiration for crafts and your own posts from the deepest parts of the internet. However, it is essential to not forget the best part of getting lost in rabbit holes which is that IT IS SO MUCH FUN!

Getting lost in rabbit holes is an absolute blast because, in the beginning, you are looking for a recipe on how to perfectly cook scrambled eggs and the next thing you know, you are trying to figure out why elephants are grey. I honestly love escaping into the depths of rabbit holes because it is so easy to get lost and learn new things, and my personal favourite reason would be that you get to kill some free time that you did not know what to spend doing.

However, every coin has two sides and the other side of rabbit holes is an absolute curse. I know I mentioned that I love wasting my time surfing the web for random nonsense as well as random knowledge, but that is also the disadvantage of rabbit holes. Rabbit holes are never ending spirals of articles after articles after articles. Most of the time I will have stuff to do and tasks to make off my checklist, but instead, I end up sitting on the couch and surfing the web for no reason and getting sucked into a rabbit hole that I would rather not escape.

No matter what you think of rabbit holes, they are a part of many peoples’ everyday lives and there is not much we can do. Sure we can limit our internet usage, but I would rather figure out the answers to random questions than get boring chores done. I guess that’s just my opinion!

(Peer Review #3) Reviewing SarahJoyElawa

Introduction

This is the third peer review of PUB101. In this peer review, I will be looking over the audience and marketability dimensions of one of my PUB101 peers, Sarah Elawa.

Sarah’s website: https://sarahjoyelawa.com

Sarah’s website is focused on self-care, and it is a challenge that she has given herself to track healthier habits in her life. Likewise, the content of my website also has somewhat similar content, which falls under the more general term “self-help.”

This review can act as a guide for both of us, as it will set the tone for things that I can get inspired by from Sarah’s website and some things that she can take away from this review.

Audience Reach

Sarah’s website is about her healthy life experiences and can be called a lifestyle blog. Lifestyle blogs are really fun to follow, in my opinion, and have a diverse audience that shows interest in such a genre. As we have talked about in lectures, people scan through the website to decide whether they want to stay connected and keep following for more. I get the same positive aura right from the home page, which makes me keep coming back for more. I would like to make a suggestion following that: as it is a lifestyle blog and all about Sarah, it would be quite interesting to see a challenge or task that audience members should perform every week to keep them engaged. Keep a water journal, for example, and record how much water you drank this week, and then comment down below.

In terms of targeting the audience, this website delivers what the audience likes and prefers. The audience likes to see health and fitness content, and popularity among the audience is increasing year after year (data.ai, 2022). Sarah’s website has a lot of potential to create an audience base targeting all the age groups. Older audiences prefer fitness-related content, while Gen Z prefers meditation, so the cherry on top is that Sarah covers both. Great job there!

Marketability

One aspect of marketing we have talked about in class is that in order to reach a large audience, it is important to be present everywhere—on social media, YouTube, your website, etc. As Steve (2022) says, success in content is given if you can reach the largest audience possible. One suggestion I can make to Sarah is that in order to reach the largest audience, social integration would help her a lot. Especially if she is comfortable using YouTube, she can make a lifestyle vlog, and I would be more than happy to subscribe. The type of content Sarah is making would be much more interesting if it were delivered in video format, as visual data encourages engagement.

She can begin monetizing and creating branded content once she has a sizable tribe of die-hard fans or followers. For instance, paid product reviews; creating her own merchandise, like a vitamin tracking chart; water bottles; etc. Because she is a publishing major, I would insist on keeping this website and expanding it over time.

Conclusion

Overall, I really enjoyed reviewing Sarah’s website. It was aesthetically pleasing, and the content was fruitful. It was so good to see how like-minded creators are doing, and it inspires me even further to keep posting helpful content out to my audience. As said, there is still some room for improvement in areas like social integration, some further tips to engage the audience, and marketing aspects. However, this website is just a few months old, and there is a long way to go. Hopefully, if you will be keeping the website, it will be pleasant to see how it turns out.

References

data.ai. 2022. State of Mobile 2022. http://posiel.com/outline/full-semester-outline/dataai__state_of_mobile_2022__en/

Pratt, S. 2022. Week10: Revisiting Analytics, SEO, and Audience (Nov 15). The Creativity Business. https://creativitybusiness.substack.com/p/embracing-the-power-of-niches?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

The post (Peer Review #3) Reviewing SarahJoyElawa first appeared on Self Therapy.

Narrowing into a Niche

A few days ago I started an Instagram account connecting with this website. It’s worked quite well to bring more readers to the website, especially if I mention a new blog post in a caption. About 37% of the traffic from the last 28 days has come from Instagram, and I saw a spike after a social media post on Nov 13 when 15 users visited the site. I’ve had 63 users for the past month, which might not seem like many, but it’s a 54% increase since last month.

Overall I’ve had 99 users in total with a bounce rate around 47%. The bounce rate has been fairly steadily decreasing since early October, which hopefully means my posts are not terribly boring.

I’ve been trying to refine my targeted audience, because I think choosing a niche will help me reach more people. I’d like to do something around the history of knitting, like knitting superstitions, using vintage patterns, and how knitting has changed over the years. I follow a lot of content creators who focus on historical dress, and I really enjoy learning about how crafts and art used to be done. I don’t want to narrow down my focus too much, and I still want to keep the recipe section and be able to write odd posts that align with my interests at a particular point in time, but I’m excited to learn more about knitting through history and maybe make that my focus.

The semester only has a few weeks left, which is both exciting, because I’m looking forward to winter break, but also blows my mind, because I can’t believe how fast time is going. It’s true that once you get older, time goes by much quicker. In December I’ll have more time overall for knitting, so I’d like to prepare by learning a bit more about knitting as a historical craft over the next few weeks.

PROJECT: Offline — Amena

It Starts With Hello

Taylen’s point of view on how she met this person.

Out of the many places to meet someone, who would have thought you could meet someone in the women’s bathroom. For context, it was the first week of university and upon checking out the campus, there were rumor’s that there is a couch in one of the women’s bathrooms. When entering the bathroom, I stumbled upon Amena heading in the other direction and though we saw each other around in the same cohort earlier in the day, we introduce ourselves right then and there surprisingly. As Amena and I are both science majors, we shared some classes together in our starting years of school and hung out together within the circle of friend groups. In our later years of school, we had the opportunity to do some group projects together and found ourselves growing our friendship through the projects we made together. I’m super excited of what else we can accomplish before we graduate and when we do, we will finally be certified as #WomenInSTEM.

This or That

You can only choose one…

Salty or Sweet
Winter or Summer
Air Guitar or Air Drums
Coffee or Tea
Dogs or Cats
Sleeping or Eating

Five Facts of Fun

What are 5 facts about yourself?

I used to have a pet goat for a summer and then I ended up eating it without my knowledge. *Laughs and Taylen is in shock*. So background, this is in Pakistan and for Eid, we sacrifice goats. I was just attached. I didn’t realize what was going to happen. It was delicious so there’s that… it was a good sacrifice.
I can speak 5 languages. I speak English, French, conversational Korean, Urdu and Hindi (we are pretending that they are not the same language, even though they kind of are, but the writing system is different, so I can’t read or write).
I really like poetry and I write poetry on my free time. I need my sad times.
I love to sing, but I’m tone deaf. But it’s like “ayo, catch me at 9pm at night just screaming ballad songs”, but it sounds like someone is dying.
I was in a sewing competition. I came second out of two people, so I don’t know what that says about my skill but I did come second. But yeah, there’s such things as sewing competition.

Drop a Bop

Pick a song that is the theme song to your life and discuss why.

So there’s Comeback by Carly Rae Jepsen and Bleachers. I think the lyrics are kind of a vibe right now. It goes, *sings* “I’ve been thinking about making a comeback, back to me”. So it’s like about coming back to yourself, I really like that one. And then also, I would say BTBT by B.I, Soulja Boy and DeVita. It’s like a KPop artist that I really like. That’s just been a song I listen too to hype myself up. So Comeback is more of a deep song, BTBT is the vibes. And then The Curse of the Blackened Eye by Orville Peck when I’m really sad. It’s about range *laughs*.

Debate Time

What is your perspective on the following question: Is the Jungle a salad?

Well your not eating the jungle. How does it make it a salad? What’s the debate in this? Who is out here being like, walking through the Amazon forest going *makes munching sounds*. Yeah. That’s it. If you’re forging, yeah I get it. There’s items from the jungle that you can make salad with, but like it’s not a salad cause you can’t eat everything in the jungle.

Some Deeper Small Talk

Chosen from a group of questions, the person answered the following question: What’s the most exciting improvement that I’ve been seeing in myself recently?

I think there’s been 3 that I can think of. One has been, even today actually; so I’ve been working in the service design sector for a little bit now cause of IAT 333 [a SFU course about service design] and then my job right now is service design and I didn’t realize how much I enjoyed it. One of the projects that I’m working on is teaching and building design capacity in other services. And so I’ve been teaching people design. I was looking at service design and I stumbled across the winner of the student category of the service design awards, and I was listening to her give her project and explain it. And it was just so exciting listening to her and what she was talking about and all the things she want to do. I just was like really excited. I feel that unsurety that everyone has growing up of “what am I going to do with my life” and I don’t know if I want to do service design for the rest of my life, but this is definitely something that I want to pursue and I’m super excited about. So that’s one improvement.

Another thing that I’ve been proud of myself for self-improvement, quoting Taylor Swift and Phoebe Bridger’s in Nothing New (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault), [a lyric from the song] “How can someone know everything at 18, but nothing at 22”, that’s been something that I’ve been dealing with. I was fairly head strong, and I always have been head strong; so I’ve been very self-assured and know what I’m doing. Even when I don’t really know what I’m doing, I’m okay. But I lost that and I didn’t realize that I lost that sense of, I guess security in self; just that self-assurance that everything is going to be okay and I have everything planned out. But yeah, you’re hitting 22 and like everything is falling apart. And it’s really, insanely scary. What’s comforting is that I’ve gotten okay with the knowing nothingness part of it. I’m a total control freak over the littlest things in my life. And just being okay with knowing that I’m still learning and I don’t really know anything is an exciting improvement.

My last one is definitely going to travel. I’ve always wanted to solo travel, do things on my own and be on my own; and I finally have the opportunity too. I’m excited to see who I’ll become and that improvement when I do it, obviously I don’t have it right now, but I think there’s a sense of independency that’s already growing and that improvement is really exciting to me.

The Final Spotlight

If you had the final opportunity to say anything to the world, what would you say?

Climate change is real, can we please do something about it cause I want to live past 2030. If I could shout that off the roof tops I would. Please, COP 27 is happening right now and it just feels like false promises again and I just wanna have a future. Not to end it on a sad note, but that’s what I would scream to everyone and like, bang into everyone’s head, cause please climate change is so, so real. We are feeling the affects of it now everywhere around the world. So, can we please do something about it?!

Goal 6 – Do yoga for at least 10 mins every day (Nov 14 – 20)

Doing Yoga for at Least 10 mins Every Day

November 14 - November 20

Introduction

This week I challenged myself to do yoga for 10 minutes daily consistently. I have been doing yoga since around 2019, and I am fairly consistent when life is not too busy. However, whenever I am really busy with work and school, I tend to neglect it. I have taken a few in-person classes, but for the most part, I follow videos on Youtube just because they are free and allow me to do a session whenever I want. I also recently read the book Inner Engineering: A Yogi’s Guide to Joy by Sadhguru which outlines the more spiritual origins of Yoga which often gets ignored in modern-day western yoga classes.

However, before I dive into my experience, I want to highlight some of the perceived benefits of meditation, according to Healthline.com.

Some of the Benefits of Yoga

Yoga improves flexibility
Yoga helps with stress relief
Yoga improves mental health
Yoga may reduce inflammation
Yoga will likely increase your strength
Yoga may reduce anxiety
Yoga may improve quality of life
Yoga may boost immunity
Yoga can improve balance
Yoga may improve cardiovascular functioning
Yoga may help improve sleep
Yoga may improve self-esteem
Yoga may improve bone health
14. Yoga can promote better posture and body awareness
Yoga can improve brain functioning
Yoga can help with burnout

Experience & Effects

I am happy to say I successfully completed this challenge this week. I found that the best time to do a yoga session was a few minutes after I woke up. I often wake up feeling a lot of muscle tension, and practising yoga in the morning helped me feel a lot less tense and better physically. It also ironically helped me feel more awake. It also helped me feel a lot more relaxed and happy while getting ready for work or school.

Here is One of My Favourite Yoga Video for Beginners

Here is a Video on the Origins of Yoga

References

Ezrin, S. (2021, December 14). 16 Benefits of Yoga That Are Supported by Science. Healthline. https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/13-benefits-of-yoga#TOC_TITLE_HDR_2

Are Advertisements Annoying? Maybe.

In my last process post, I accidentally skipped the readings for Week 9 and reflected on Week 10 instead. Therefore, in this post, I will refer to Week 9. Can you tell my brain stopped working at this point in the semester? I am mentally still in September and not November. For this week, I decided to add a new section for non-fiction book reviews on my website. This entire semester, I was only focusing on fiction books, which I don’t necessarily think is bad. However, I realized that providing both would expand my audience because of the variety. Also, some people only like to read non-fiction and are looking for recommendations. Therefore, I am excited to write my public post on my first non-fiction book review! I am also looking forward to receiving my second review feedback soon. I can confidently say that I am satisfied with all my writing, editorial, and design elements at this point in the semester. However, I am always open to receiving feedback and improving. After reading Bleymaier’s article, “On Advertising — Maria Popvova” I thought it was interesting how he mentions the concept of ad-free sites. Bleymaier mentions how Popova “claims her affiliate advertising links are not ads” (Bleymaier, 2013, p. 1). Here, Popova implies that her including links in her post is not to sell anything and that they are or will be featured on the website already. This point is interesting because it made me reflect on my website and how having an ad-free site is beneficial. From a user’s perspective, no one enjoys clicking on a website and having ads all over the place. However, in terms of collecting data, this could be useful for me. In other words, seeing what my audience is interested in engaging with. Advertisements are something to consider, but I am unsure where to start. Tutorial, here I come.

References

Bleymaier, T. (2013, February 13). On advertising. Tumblr. Retrieved November 20, 2022, from https://on-advertising.tumblr.com/post/42994492644/donation-pitch-included-at-the-end-of-each-brain

Vancouver Gem #4: Cream Pony

Looking for something to do in North Vancouver? North Vancouver’s handmade donuts and southern fried chicken shop at Cream Pony ’round back in lolo lane is a place to stop by. The Cream Pony Dream “a place for our neighbours and friends of all cultures, ages, and abilities to feel at home — and, of course, to eat the best darn fried chicken and donuts North Vancouver has ever seen!”

The interior design of Cream Pony is subtle and quaint. The colour theme is pastel all over with classy paintings. I remember the music playing was soft to the ear or “family-friendly” playing “Build Me Up Buttercup”. Though the interior is smaller than I expected for a fried chicken and donut shop, the business seems to optimize its space and operate fine.

For a donut and chicken shop, it sure is pricy. I put emphasis on pricing compared to my previous reviews as this gem I particularly found this more expensive for what they serve. Then again, it is North Vancouver. Half a dozen for $17 before tax and tip?? No thanks, I would rather spend my money on donuts at Duffins or Krispy Kreme! Oh well, I would not tip. Besides, this is in North Vancouver, they most likely don’t need the tip.

I ordered the Cinny Sugar and Raspberry Chocolate for $3.15 before tax each at opening hours. I am disappointed that there was not much variety. I could have walked over to Tim Hortons for more variety at a cheaper price. I also ordered two pieces of Cajun Spice Chicken. They told me I had to wait 15 minutes… for two pieces of fried chicken. Though, the Cream Pony donuts I ordered were good. They are definitely worth trying if you are in the Lonsdale Quay area.

Behold! The two pieces of Cajun Spice Chicken for sadly $9. But let me talk about my experience with the 15-minute waiting period. The ambience of this place is indescribable. Not the workers, but the customers. If you want to be surrounded by lululemon middle-aged kombucha pilates moms at 10 am, then this is your place to be. I suggest checking Cream Pony at a later time to avoid this.

The two pieces of chicken were amazing. The crunchiness, the warmth of the freshly fried chicken. My only problem was the Cajun Spice was hardly there. I’d say instant noodle spice packets are more generous than Cream Pony. All it tasted was I imagine original chicken would taste with a side of light spice. This is the spice catered for those who cannot do spicy but want to claim they can eat spicy.

Overall, the place is small, the place is cute. Rate: 5/10. Cream Pony is a place to stop by when you are in the area, not a place worth driving for. The food is not bad or terrible at all, but it’s not anything special.

Cream Pony is located at around BACK in Lolo Lane, 111 1st St E, North Vancouver. Operating hours are Wednesday-Sunday, 10AM-8PM. Monday and Tuesday CLOSED.

Verity by Colleen Hoover

Rating: ★★★★/5

Happy Friday, Bookworms! I am currently at Starbucks enjoying my Chestnut Praline Latte while attempting to be a productive university student. Want to know what has been distracting me from studying for my exams? Colleen Hoover’s Verity. Reading with Rachel finally got her hands on Hoover’s #booktok trending thriller novel. Verity immediately grabs your attention and holds it for the entire book. I had to continue reading even after the first chapter. In other words, putting the book down was impossible. The mystery behind the main character, Verity Crawford’s autobiography, kept me on my toes. I assumed that the book was going to be a murder mystery novel. Things start to go downhill when Lowen, the main character, is unable to put down Verity’s manuscript, as her past is revealed in disturbing ways through her relationship with her husband, Jeremy, and three children, Harper, Chastin, and Crew. Since Lowen is the only one to witness Verity’s injuries, which don’t appear to be as severe, the plot quickly becomes unsettling. I do not know how to explain it other than that without spoiling or giving anything away. Hoover does an incredible job of evoking emotions of fearfulness and panic without giving away too much information throughout the entire novel. The plot twist is well-written and shocking until you realize how clueless it makes you feel as the reader. I was unsatisfied with the ending because of all my unanswered questions and the unsettling feeling that not everything is always what it seems. Verity is incredibly terrifying, and Hoover’s portrayal of her character is astonishing because of how scary she makes you feel as a fictional character. Besides Verity, I had mixed feelings about Lowen because of her selfish and questionable decisions. It was hard for me to sympathize with her. However, I was constantly worried about whether she was going to be able to survive. Every moment she spent in the Crawford home made me anxious for her. I want to point out that this book contains explicit language related to sex and discusses the topic of child abuse. Therefore, please keep this in mind if you are interested in reading Hoover’s Verity. Overall, I recommend reading Colleen Hoover’s Verity if you enjoy suspense and want a book you can quickly finish in a few hours.

Book Club Food for Thoughts

What do you think happened at the end of the novel? Do you believe Verity’s truth?
What are your thoughts on Lowen’s character? Did you like her? Why or why not?
What are your thoughts on Verity’s character? Did you like her? Why or why not?
What did you think about Verity’s manuscripts? Are they believable?
Do you think Verity is a strong writer/author? Why or why not?
Did anything about Jeremy surprise you? Why or why not?

Book Summary

“Lowen Ashleigh is a struggling writer on the brink of financial ruin when she accepts the job offer of a lifetime. Jeremy Crawford, husband of bestselling author Verity Crawford, has hired Lowen to complete the remaining books in a successful series his injured wife is unable to finish. Lowen arrives at the Crawford home, ready to sort through years of Verity’s notes and outlines, hoping to find enough material to get her started. What Lowen doesn’t expect to uncover in the chaotic office is an unfinished autobiography Verity never intended for anyone to read. Page after page of bone-chilling admissions, including Verity’s recollection of what really happened the day her daughter died. Lowen decides to keep the manuscript hidden from Jeremy, knowing its contents would devastate the already grieving father. But as Lowen’s feelings for Jeremy begin to intensify, she recognizes all the ways she could benefit if he were to read his wife’s words. After all, no matter how devoted Jeremy is to his injured wife, a truth this horrifying would make it impossible for him to continue to love her.”

Exciting News…

While this announcement is not related to Colleen Hoover or her novel Verity, I wanted to announce a week in advance that Reading with Rachel will be doing her first non-fiction book review next week! While I have only done fiction book reviews, I decided to pick up a secret non-fiction book this week. As always, I am looking forward to sharing my thoughts with all of my fellow Bookworms. Weekly book club meeting locations will also be coming your way soon. Besides that, please remember to take care of yourselves and have a good rest of your week.

Social Media Detox? UnderRated.

Technology is addicting, especially when it comes to social media. It is hard to go a day without logging in or checking in on various websites and platforms.

An interesting feature on my cell phone and laptop is screen time. My cell phone and laptop notify me of how much time I spend on my screen and the time allocated to each application

When I think about my screen time, I find it almost alarming. I find in the summer and on vacation, my screen time is so minimal. However, I find in my day-to-day busy life, I am on my screen for significantly more time. When I feel stressed or overwhelmed, I find I gravitate to surfing the web and scrolling on social media as a distracting tactic, allowing me to procrastinate my time.

As I was thinking about my screen time in more depth, it brought me back to a time when I had no wireless internet on my phone. Back then, I was not ever able to check social media platforms unless I was at home or a place with wireless internet. I did not get internet on my cell phone till my second year of university when I needed the internet for work.

After considering my current screen time, I decided I was going to do a social media detox.

I have done a detox unintentionally before or have done one when I was away on vacation. I have done several days without my cell phone and connection to the “real world” as I love backpacking and hiking trips, where for obvious reasons, there is no cell service. However, I have never done a detox with social media and technology while in town.

Before completely going cold turkey on all social media, I had to think of a plan. I knew before I started, I needed to do this within reason. For instance, I knew I needed access to my email and phone calls for work purposes.

However, everything else I decided I was going to cut back.

For my cell phone, I decided to temporarily delete all social media applications, such as Facebook Messenger, Instagram, Snap Chat, Visco, and YouTube. For my computer, I decided to limit my access to only my work email and SFU’s canvas page.

I decided to pre-emptively let some people know that I was planning on disconnecting my phone and computer usage so that they knew the best way to get a hold of me was through calling. From there, I just went for it.

Originally, I wanted to try a week or 5 days, however, based on my decided timing, I could only really allow for 3 days. So, I decided to try it on the weekend.

It was quite weird. I found I would look at my phone as if something exciting was going to happen. I slowly realized, without social media platforms I did not need my phone throughout the day, except for school and work.

The first day was okay. I didn’t feel like I was not missing anything. On the second day, I was quite curious to know what was happening with everyone. By the third day, I had gotten semi-used to it but was still wanting to scroll when I was supposed to be doing my email for the day. I felt like I was able to see how much I typically gravitate to looking and scrolling on my phone.

It was an interesting experience. I found I stayed busy with my day-to-day chores and activities. I found myself checking my phone less and less as I got used to having no social media access on my phone. I found I was able to get my work done a lot faster and concentrate my time more effectively. I enjoyed that aspect as I was able to have more free time.

Moving forward, I decided to limit my social media time on my phone and laptop. I have set up a setting that only allows for half an hour each day of social media time. That way, when I am scrolling or looking at social media it hopefully makes my time on it more intentional rather than just passively scrolling.

A cell phone screen showing the different options to limit and track the type of screen-time on a cell phone. — A cell phone shows 3 screen options to limit and track the type of screen time on a cell phone.

Overall, it was a nice break from social media, even if it was just a couple of days. I found it was harder to be cut off when I was in town compared to when I have done it in the past on vacation. However, I feel like it was a good time to reconsider how much time I wanted to spend on social media.

Personally, a social media detox allowed me to reflect on my time spent on social media. I was able to re-evaluate how much time I spend on it and how I want to change it. I think was a great experience. I found it not as intimidating as I thought.

Disconnect, try it out!

Social Media Detox? UnderRated.

Reviewing Mikaela’s Website

Mikaela’s Website: http://mikaelaswrld.com/

Mikaela’s website is bright and colourful, as the first element I noticed as the user was the red and white background and the bulky pink letters for the title “Mikaela’s Wrld.” As someone who does not often use bright and flashy colours, this element is different and stood out to me. From a user’s perspective, I recommend Mikaela to focus on the unity of her website’s design. Here, I am referring to the consistency of the colours she utilizes. The colours are distracting and overwhelming because pink and red clash together. An element I appreciated was how Mikaela included accessibility tools on the left side of the screen. According to Professor Norman, using “open source/access tools and apps as well as built-in accessibility checkers, plugins and other software tools make it easy” (Norman, 2022, p. 10). Professor Norman implies how important it is for your website to be accessible for anyone to use. In other words, Mikaela’s accessibility tools on her website provide a wide range of people to use, such as people with disabilities (Norman, 2022, p. 10). Moreover, the calendar on the left side could be a helpful feature on a website because it allows the user to see when and how often Mikaela posts content.

After browsing through Mikaela’s website, I want to make a few suggestions for helping her website improve in terms of using formal and plain language. As a user, I found it challenging to read Mikaela’s content, as there are many grammar mistakes and hard-to-read sentences. For example, she is missing punctuation and misspelling words, hindering the flow of her content. In her post, titled “Clocks,” she discusses how “growing up I thought it was mandatory for everyone to know how to read analog clocks.” Here, she is missing a comma between the word “up” and “I.” I highly recommend Mikaela read over her posts and double-check for grammatical errors.

Mikaela’s post continues to highlight how “the skills needed 20 years ago and skills needed now are waaaaaaaay different. Some teachers made it seem like if I can’t read an analog clock, I wouldn’t be able to graduate and/or have a secure future.” Here, the wording and language in her post could be more concise. In other words, if Mikaela simplifies, the content will be more accessible.

I recommend Mikaela to add pictures on her website as well. As someone who is a visual learner, I think adding photos will enhance the website and make it more engaging for users. Lastly, creating categories for Mikaela’s public posts will make it easier for the user to find what they are looking for.

References

Norman, S. (2022). Lecture 5: Editing & Genres + Accessible Websites [PowerPoint slides]. Simon Fraser University. https://posiel.com/outline/full-semester-outline/

A Guide for Useful Resources for Genshin Impact

Introduction

This guide will be different from my usual Guides. As Genshin Impact is a game with a large fanbase there exist multiple sites like my own that try to help guide players to accomplish things in this game. However, as there is a lot that doesn’t mean that they are all the best. This is why for this week’s post I want to take the time and share some of my favorite websites and YouTube channels I like to see when I need help.

Channels

There are three Genshin Impact content creators on Youtube that I particularly like watching:

They all provide build guides similar to how I talk about character builds on my blog. However, in a more in-depth manner. Each of these channels has its own respective unique content that they also do aside from the character builds. One of which I like seeing is the DPS showdown videos of certain characters by IWinToLose Gaming. It is interesting to see what character is stronger than others and how they build the parties to deal with such high DPS.

Websites

The websites I access have their respective purposes. The Genshin Impact Interactive World Map is a useful resource that allows users to find materials, chests, puzzles, etc. This map is very useful when I need to collect materials to ascend my characters. By using this map I will know where to find the materials I need without any hassle. The other site I like to use is Paimon.moe. This site is a database that shows content from upcoming events to materials that are farmable today. Furthermore, it also has character guides similar to my content on this blog. It also includes a neat feature the “Wish Counter” that allows you to import your data on the character/weapon wishes you have done on your account. It will use this data and will give you information on how lucky you may have been with your wishes. Or even how often you reach the 5 – star pity.

Search Engine Optimization

In this week’s lecture, we’ve learned about search engine optimization and how it can help bring audiences to your website. Although talking about this concept this week, utilizing SEO to attract an audience had been always around to configure on Word Press. Moreover, utilizing the tags option to allow my website to show up at the top of Google searches is now one of my key goals in order to expand my website to a larger audience.

Before this week’s lecture, I didn’t realize the importance of using tags. I only added a few tags just for completion as I thought it was a requirement for the class. However, this is not true and can help my website to further grow.

As Genshin Impact is a popular game, I do not see that any of my posts show up in the search results. For example, if I try to search for a build for the character “Raiden Shogun” you will see multiple websites that are not mine but all with similar content. In fact, it does not show up even if I type “raiden shogun abysmal guide”. When searching for my website it only shows up at the bottom on the second search page. Discouraging, but this means that my website has a lot of room for improvement to reach out to a bigger audience.

An interesting result I got from one of my searches was when I searched for “absymal guides raiden” on Google. Instead of seeing my website show up in the search result, I found that the Posiel site was in the result.

search result on google of "absymal guides raiden"

This search result makes me wonder why my website does not show up first before Posiel. However, I will work towards changing this result so that I can have my website show up before Posiel.

With all things considered, having my website show up as one of the top search results on Google is something I’d want to achieve. However, considering the popularity of the game, I do understand that there will be a challenge. Nonetheless, it will not prevent me from working towards this goal.

Peer Review # 3

For the last peer review, I had the opportunity to review Kobe Sam’s website. At first glance, I really like the website. Simple, yet informative to a degree where you understand what the website is trying to achieve. Even before reading the “About Me” page, the theme of the website is easy to understand that it’s about Kobe’s lifestyle and personal blog.

I assume that rather than having an audience to speak to for the website’s content, I see it more as a personal blog where the content is for Kobe to reflect on his journey through school and the skills he has obtained. In other words, rather than writing content for a set audience, he is writing the content for himself. Where people can learn from Kobe’s own life experiences. One thing that I have noticed is that the amount of content uploaded for lifestyle and entrepreneurship is rather low. For a website on a personal blog, I expect that I’d find more content related to those topics rather than it all on academics. To improve user interactions and have more users looking at your website, I’d recommend trying to post more content related to those categories. Since your life experiences are unique it can potentially pull the attention of a niche user group to expand your audience.

Something I have noticed on your website is that it was hard to navigate. Since your content is grouped by: “Entrepreneurship”, “Lifestyle”, “Academia”, and “About Me”. When I try to go look for a set of content like the mini-assignments, it is rather hard to find all the mini-assignments. Therefore, I do recommend creating sub-categories under your current ones so that it allows your users to easily navigate through your website. Furthermore, I have noticed that some of the titles on your blog are bolded while some are not. To keep it consistent, I recommend sticking to one style. Whether you decide to keep the title of your posts bolded or not making sure what you post is consistent is important for your website. Also, I do see that some posts still have the “Uncategorized” category set on the post. I believe this is by mistake, but make sure to confirm everything is correct before you make the post public.

Everything considered I find that Kobe’s website is really good. There are a few minor flaws but they are all easy to fix. As I believe the content for Kobe’s website is a personal blog based on self-improvement I do not find the means to push Kobe to write content based on what the audience likes. However, if attracting an audience is the goal, using tools such as Google Analytics will help to understand your audience better and to know what content they enjoy seeing. As writing a blog about your own experiences is unique and something someone else cannot write, I believe that Kobe’s website has a lot of potential for growth and to further expand his content to a wider audience.