I’m a third-generation entrepreneur; it’s in my blood. I’ve always known that I wanted to work for myself, but the “what” didn’t become clear until sometime in the mid-90s…mainly because the technology hadn’t been invented yet! As the internet, the world wide web, and websites started becoming a part of our world, I found my “what”. I knew this was what I was meant to do. I saw this as an amazing way to level the playing field for small businesses against their larger competition…and it could be done at an affordable price! My mission was set and I moved forward.
Since there weren’t any classes or formal education on the subject at the time, I had to teach myself. I joined some listservs (email groups) of people just like me who were trying to learn from scratch. We would look at source code and help each other figure out how to code various things in HTML, which was all we had to work with at the time…yup…HTML and Microsoft WordPad! It was an exciting time in web development, as it seemed like something new was coming out every day…frames, tables, forms – and a bunch of nonsense like JavaScript code tricks, Java applets, autoplay MIDI files, animated GIFs, scrolling marquees, Flash, guestbooks before we finally got (angels singing) CSS!
I took on my first client in January of 2000 and have been growing in skill, size, and services ever since. My clients know that I’m not a flaky web designer who builds a site and they can never reach again for updates or maintenance; I actually clean up messes those guys leave behind! Some of my clients have been with me a dozen years or more and they can trust that I’m available by phone, email, text, or Facebook Messenger – AND, they never have to press “1” for English! I talk to them in terms that they can understand and often draw pictures to illustrate difficult concepts. I teach them as much as they want to learn about updating their websites, including blogging – and most importantly, I teach them how to market their company. After all, who knows their company better than the owner? I enable them with free and low-cost tools that are easy to use that help them to reach their target market without breaking the bank — and I teach them how to effectively USE those tools!