October 20, 2017 — Getting off on the right foot with a new WordPress site is easy when you plan ahead. Most people want to start with choosing a theme, however in this session we will start by understanding how information flows in WordPress. We will explore how to successfully build a roadmap for your site, using Categories and Tags, building menus and how to leverage pages and posts. We also talk about keeping your site focused on your sites visitor and resources to help flesh out your site.

Presentation Slides »

October 19, 2017 — WordPress Marketing Strategies for Business

October 19, 2017 — It is the American Dream – quit your 9-5 job and build your own business. Is that your dream as well? Are you thinking about taking the plunge and giving notice to your boss in order to embrace your entrepreneurial spirit?

This engaging discussion will present a foundation on things you need to think about when starting your own WordPress business – either Full-Time or even Part-Time. Topics include (but of course, are not limited to):
* How to get started
* What to charge
* Where to find clients
* Services to provide
* How to protect yourself
* Insurance (what? you need that?)
* Pitfalls to avoid
* Proposals, Agreements, and Contracts
* and more!

October 14, 2017 — Many starting WordPress business owners underestimate how long it takes to build a strong foundation for their business. Often, out of desperation, they will take on any job, at any price, no questions asked. Ending up financially and emotionally drained. This is probably a reason why so many businesses close down in their first two years.
Having experienced this myself the hard way, I discovered the power of the tiny word “No!”, the most powerful key we hold to end this rat race.

Saying “No!” is counterintuitive. And it is certainly is not an easy thing to do. But practicing to say “No!” can keep you from disliking your business and the people you do business with. The moment you stop saying ‘Yes” to every opportunity that arises, your WordPress business can grow bigger than you could have imagined.

The “No!” strategy is all about doing the work you are passionate about and are good at, and with the right clients. It really boils down to doing less of the work you dislike, isn’t profitable or does not fit your beliefs.

Learn to say “No!”
I feel the time is right to share some insights about why and how I learned to say no to certain work and clients. I will share my six-step process that helped me grow my WordPress business over the years …

And remember:
“If it’s not a hell yeah, it’s a no.”

October 13, 2017 — Many of us build website for clients – most of us even get paid for it…

There is a lot of money in freelancing. There is also a lot of pain and frustration.

Ever wish you could just ask someone how they did it? You can! Our panel has been there, done that, has the t-shirt, scars, and lessons learned to share with you.

With any luck you can learn from their mistakes and avoid making a few of them yourself!

October 10, 2017 — The idea of building a business on open source software may be old hat for most technologists, but for many people in more traditional industries, the concepts around using and contributing to WordPress may seem quite strange. Can a program you get for free be any good? How does the licensing work and what the heck is a GPL? Who do we call if it breaks? Who’s in charge of this thing? Sharing technology with everyone, is that safe? Wait, you wrote some code for us, and now you want to publish it for anyone to use, for free? We’ll answer these questions and more in a discussion of how to get OSS buy-in from the whole newsroom — lawyers, executives, and IT departments included. Along the way, you’ll get a refresher on making the most of the open WordPress ecosystem, whether you’ve been a part of this community for 13 years or 13 hours.

October 8, 2017 — I started my business in 2010 as a way to make money part-time while being a stay-at-home mom to my 1 year old daughter. Now, two kids and 7 years later, I’m running an agency full-time with my husband and trying to have some semblance of work/life balance in a business that never stops and a house with 3 kids.

This talk will be about my own personal experience – struggles and triumphs – over the past 7 years going from part-time freelancer to full-time owner of a business that supports my entire family. We’ll talk about finding purpose and striving for business success, and what that means when you’re a parent of young children.

In addition to sharing my own experience, I will be reaching out to other WP business owner parents and be interviewing them to see how they manage work/life balance, and incorporating their advice and experiences into the talk. These interviews will be recorded so that audience member can watch them after the fact.

October 8, 2017 — Branding your business lies in large part on how well you’re able to convey why you do what you do, and to put it into a narrative that your perfect customer understands. This is a simple framework based on the Hollywood blockbuster model.

October 4, 2017 — Marija will talk about her process of the creation of small business websites in WordPress from the moment she get the project from the clients to her process of listen, discover, concept with an emphasis of the designing in the browser and testing to the creation of the WordPress files for the website….

Presentation Slides »

October 3, 2017 — Table ronde autour des bon usages de votre site WordPress dans le cadre du business.