Happy 2014

Photo credit: blog.utest.com

So another year has come to an end and with that, another name change…yes, we are now 20somethings in 2014. (Is it just me, or does each year seem to go by faster?)

I spent much of 2013 building up this blog by writing numerous articles, as well as reaching out to fellow 20-somethings and asking them to share their experiences and opinions on beginning their careers in today’s economy.

I’m proud to say that my hard work has paid off. Around a month ago, this blog hit a major milestone: its 100th 20something profile. The blog now contains stories from over a hundred 20somethings in eleven different countries.

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100 profiles

Photo credit: bornoffside.net

On Wednesday, I posted the 100th 20something profile to be featured on my blog. When I started my blog in July of last year, I didn’t know how I was going to get ten people to contribute, let alone a hundred.

But almost a year-and-a-half later, this blog contains stories of 100 twenty-somethings in 11 countries (US, UK, Nicaragua, Australia, New Zealand, Kenya, Nigeria, India, Singapore, the Netherlands, and Canada).

I’ve had contributors in a variety of fields, including journalism, fashion, animation, film, theatre, radio, military, advertising, marketing, PR, education, finance, retail, graphic design, and nonprofit, among many others.

Very Inspiring Blogger Award

I’ve found out that Tiffany of One Girl’s Journey to 30 has nominated me for the Very Inspiring Blogger Award. The purpose of this blog is to inspire people in their twenties, so I’m really proud to be getting this recognition. Special thanks to Tiffany for nominating me, and I encourage you to check out her blog.

The rules for accepting this nomination are to list seven interesting facts about yourself and to nominate fifteen other blogs for the award. So I’ll begin with the seven facts:

Partnership with AOL Patch

Patch.com, a local news website owned by AOL, recently published an article that I wrote about 20somethings in 2013:

Twenty-somethings: A Personal Perspective (norwalk.patch.com)

The Patch sites for Norwalk, CT, and the surrounding areas will also be cross-publishing posts that were written for this blog.

Hopefully, this partnership will provide 20somethings in 2013 — and its stories of twenty-somethings in this economy — with greater exposure. I also hope it will also encourage more twenty-somethings to share their stories.

 

Versatile Blogger Award

Rebecca Fraser-Thill of the blog Career Avoidance 101 nominated 20somethings in 2013 for the Versatile Blogger Award. A special thanks to Rebecca for the nomination, and I hope you check out her blog for some great advice and perspectives on starting out in this economy.

The rules for accepting the award require me to nominate fifteen other blogs and write seven interesting facts about myself (I’ve already written eleven facts about myself for the Liebster Award, so hopefully I won’t run out of interesting stuff when I’m writing these).

So these are seven more facts about myself:

Liebster Award

Ally Denton, who wrote a profile of herself, has nominated 20somethings in 2013 for the Liebster Award. I’d like to thank Ally for the nomination, and I encourage you to check out her blog allydenton.com

To accept the nomination, I need to answer 11 questions that Ally has posed, and I also need to nominate 11 other blogs for the award and ask them 11 questions (edit: I neglected to mention this originally, but the blogs you nominate are supposed to have fewer than 200 followers).

Ally’s questions were to give 11 facts about yourself, so here they are:

My article for Under30Careers

Under30Careers, a career website for twenty-somethings, published an article that I wrote about 20somethings in 2013:

Optimizing Opportunity as a Recent College Graduate (under30careers.com)

In the article, I discuss my motivations for creating this blog, and I also explore some common themes I’ve noticed in the profiles that have been posted here. (I even reference a few profiles as examples.)

I’d like to thank Under30Careers for giving me the opportunity to write about 20somethings in 2013, and I encourage twenty-somethings to check out their informative website for career advice and job postings.

Getting the word out

I’ve been trying to spread the word about this blog so that it could reach as many twenty-somethings as possible. Methods of publicizing this blog that I thought of include:

• E-mailing career services centers in colleges and universities

• Tweeting celebrities in the hopes that they’ll share this blog with their legions of followers

• Developing relationships with blogs related to careers or twenty-somethings

• Going up to twenty-somethings on the street and begging them to check out my blog

As you can imagine, some of these methods seem more effective than others. But if you know of additional ways to help spread awareness for this blog, please feel free to comment below or e-mail me at twentiesblogger@gmail.com

And if you’re friends with Lady Gaga and could get her to tweet this blog to her 34 million followers, that would be fantastic as well.

We’re on Facebook and Twitter

I’ve been trying to expand this blog’s online presence, and one way I’ve been doing that is by creating profiles on Facebook and Twitter. So please Like 20somethings in 2013 on Facebook or Follow it (@twentiesblog) on Twitter:

www.facebook.com/twentiesblog

www.twitter.com/twentiesblog

I also became a contributing writer for Life Here At Twentysomething, which is managed by Jamie (who wrote a profile of herself). My first post discusses my motivations to become a filmmaker:

Why I’m a Filmmaker (lifehereattwentysomething.com)

When you encounter difficulties in reaching a goal (as I have for becoming a filmmaker), you sometimes lose sight of what made you set that goal in the first place. It’s your motivations that keep you on track when everything seems hopeless and you want to give up.

Name change

Provided that we survive the upcoming Mayan apocalypse, 20somethings in 2012 will be changing its name to — you guessed it — 20somethings in 2013.

I won’t change the name until this year ends, but in the meantime, I’ve changed the e-mail address and the web address:

My new e-mail address is twentiesblogger@gmail.com

I’ve set up this e-mail address to receive anything that’s sent to the old e-mail address (20somethingsin2012@gmail.com), so if you send an e-mail to the old address, I’ll be able to retrieve it and send a reply from the new address.

The blog’s new web address is twentiesblog.wordpress.com

The old web address (20somethingsin2012.wordpress.com) automatically redirects to the new web address, so all links to this blog should still be functional.

Thanks for your readership, and enjoy the new year or the end of the world…whichever comes first.