Many people have probably seen a flyer as the one below or visited the AfroDigital site but most don’t really understand how they can benefit from attending a Google Digital Skills Training.

In this post, I will share with you the lessons I learned from the training and how I benefitted from it.

Being a student in IT made me skeptical about the whole program when I heard about it 2 months ago. The single thought drove that skepticism was “Well I am already a coder and a student so what could I get from digital skills”. I felt like I was above the program already because I’m a web developer but something kept nagging me, if I didn’t at least go and find out what it was all about, could I be potentially losing out?

It turned out I would have been at a great loss.

Lessons learned

Online presence

You are a brand. I existed online sure, however, my online presence could be done better with a good strategy.

I’ve seen a trend among my peers who think linkedin doesn’t matter, they are wrong. More importantly they don’t realise that what actually shows up when you google their name is what matters more importantly.

The first thing a potential employer or business partner will do before you get considered for the job is to google you and this will be very true in the near future across all Zimbabwean companies. Now if you don’t even show up for what you say you do/want to do, why should you even be considered?

Opportunities in the Digital World

It’s not all about code. You don’t need to learn/know how to code to get a job online.

During your school break, what are you doing? Partying? Chilling? Whatever it is, add researching and working towards some opportunities you’d like to pursue in the digital world.

For example, within just a week, you can become Google Adwords certfied and be eligible to work as an Adwords manager - Adwords is Google platform that allows companies to advertise online.

This is just one thing you can do and there are many more espcially if you learn a technical skill like coding.

Online opportunity

Sell. Here is where i learnt how to create a good strategy to market myself in the digital world.

Traditional marketing principles don’t work effectively in the digital world. Knowing what works will place you at an advantage for when it comes to marketing your new startup or yourself as a professional.

Conclusion

Here’s a look at my website before and after I attended the training:

Before:

After:

Clearly something changed. It’s not just the design that changed, my whole online strategy did to apply the lessons I learned.

The Google Digital Skills Training program will teach you what you may not need to do now as a student but what you will eventually need to know and implement if you’re to succeed in the digital world.

Don’t just snapchat your lunch, use it to build yourself a better future.