How to Be Successful Online, Part Two

This post is the follow-up to How to Be Successful Online. As you all know, the basis of the first post was my answer to the following question. I want to design WordPress themes, how can I become known?

4) Be innovative, and take chances
This is something that I cannot stress enough – I know from past experience just how powerful this tip can be. So many of us (myself included) have a tendancy to want to “mimic” those who are doing something successful. It’s admirable to want to be the next pro blogger like Darren Rowse, or to establish a technology blog like Michael Arrington. That will sometimes work, I suppose, but in my opinion it is far better to pioneer a concept, than to be a follower of one that already exists.

Back in August 2007, I was asked to design a custom WordPress theme for a real estate agent in Boston. After a few days, I finally came up with a design that I thought would have really worked for him – unfortunately, he had something else in mind. But that was okay, because we were able to work something out and I came up with a different design, and he was delighted with it. So what happened to that design that I was so proud of, that didn’t make the cutting room floor?

It started something new and exciting in the WordPress community. Something that I consider Revolutionary, in fact.

That’s right, you heard me correct. The very first Revolution theme was a reject. At first, I was totally bummed, because I thought that the theme I created pushed the limits a bit with WordPress, and took it to a level that it really hadn’t been taken to before.

But after days of moping over this, I woke up one morning and decided to lay it all out on the line, and wrote this post. Now I can’t say for sure if this was the first time a WordPress theme was called premium, but what I do know is at the time, premium WordPress themes as we know them now did not exist.

My point here is this. Be innovative and take chances – if I hadn’t, there would be a lot of WordPress sites that don’t look the way they do now.

5) Put customer service on the top of your priority list
I cannot stress this enough. Years ago I learned this lesson when I was the manager of a local convenient store – and that experience will be something I never forget. I used to see customers on a daily basis, and I made it a point to get to know them – to learn their names, to know what they did, and to do little things for them that mattered.

For as long as I am working in a business that deals with customers, I will do my best to put them first. I know that people want to be taken care of, and I’m very happy to do it. True, it gets to a point where it’s really difficult to answer every email or every post in a support forum – but I feel that it is my duty to make sure that people who spend money on Revolution are given the very best.

So my advice here is this – put customers first. Make sure that they are happy with the product, even if it means taking weeks to update an existing product, rather than continue to develop new ones. (i.e. My recent onslaught of Revolution 3.0 updates to existing customers.) In addition to that, it’s very important to set up an infrastructure for your business to accommodate your client base.

The best example I can give is my Revolution support forums. When I launched this on November 25, 2007, I figured that I’d get a few posts a day that I could easily handle and answer myself. It started out that way, but quickly this became a situation I needed to figure out – as the forum quickly grew into a community of Revolution users much larger than I had imagined. 34,000+ posts later…

I saw the amount of unanswered posts grow, I knew that I needed to address the problem, rather than ignore it.

So I decided to setup a team of moderator/designers who were willing to help out in return for referred customization work. And although Revolution users may not be responded to personally by me, their questions and the support they were hoping for when they first purchased a theme is stronger than ever.

The bottom line, as I see it, is this – happy customers can be a huge marketing tool. They spread the word about you and your services and they refer others to your site. In other words, they can really help build your business for you. As long as you are willing to put them first, and to make them feel special.

So that about does it – those are 5 things that I learned while establishing my business and things that really worked for me. Not all business models are the same, but I believe that these tips are ones that can apply to any business. I wish you the best of luck as you establish yourself, and remind you to keep these things in mind!

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* Now that all of the Revolution theme updates have been released, I have major plans moving forward. I will hopefully have some very exciting news to announce at the end of this week, and cannot wait to post about it. I normally don’t like prefacing my news in advance, but this is so big that I’m having a hard time holding it it. Stay tuned…

How to Be Successful Online

As a result of my recent site redesign, I’ve found myself in quite the contemplative mood of late – perhaps it’s also a result of the cooler weather that we’ve experience here in Chicago the past few days. I always seem to enter a mode of “thinking and writing” this time of year, so I figure it would be a great time to write more on my site.

There seems to be a redundancy in the questions that I am asked on a daily basis by people, so I’ve decided to start writing posts about the things I’m asked most often.

So here goes…

I want to design WordPress themes, how can I become known?

Instead of boring you with the details of my web existence (although remind me to tell you the story of how I bartered a guy in Washington state to get my domain name), I’ll list 5 things that were essential for me to establish myself and which led me to where I’m at now. (wherever that may be…)

1) Establish a game plan
This means setting up goals – tangible ones, and even general ideas and concepts of things you’d like to do. In a roundabout way, back in January of 2007, I admitted that working for myself and designing blogs was a dream of mine. Little did I know a year later, I would be taking the greatest leap of faith I have ever taken. Part of this step is identifying not only what your good at, but also what you enjoy doing. A lot of us are good at our jobs, but if enjoyment isn’t there, life can really be a drag.

An example of a tangible goal would have been my hope to one day reach the Technorati Top 100 blog list – something that felt ominous back when I was ranked number 8 million something. A year and a half later, I find myself ranked #6 – this in fact isn’t anything to be super proud of, just a fun thing that releasing themes has managed to get me. In all seriousness, it’s essential to map out the direction you want to head. You might stray from time to time, and that’s ok, but keeping your eyes on the prize can really take you there.

2) Get yourself on the map
When I first started to design WordPress themes, I knew that I really needed to find a way to stand out from those who were also doing it. A year and a half later, the competition for theme design is even tougher, so you need to get on this one. Take a chance, and email the owner of a site, and ask them if they need a redesign, or if you can offer your services at a discounted rate.

As I look back, there were two sites that I designed which, in my opinion, really helped me and my business take off. Mark Saunders, CEO of Splashpress Media, took a chance on me when he asked me to redesign the Blog Herald – that was my first “real big” site that I had done, and was truthfully scared that I’d be responsible for creating a theme for such a high profile site. Another site that I did early on was for my friend Daniel over at Daily Blog Tips, which in fact, turned out to be two consecutive site redesigns for him. Not to mention I made a really good friend as well!

3) Do favors for people
When you’re starting out an online business, it sounds counter-intuitive to do favors for people – whether it be to offer assistance at no charge, or simply do work for people at a discounted rate. Ask any aspiring actor or actress in Hollywood if they’d be willing to do a commercial or small role for free – they will say yes in a heartbeat, because when you’re starting out, any exposure is good exposure. I won’t go into the details, but what I can say is that I can recount at least two things I’ve done in the last year for people that have come back tenfold.

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* Because #’s 4 and 5 will be longer, more detailed answers, I’ll save them for the next post. Stay tuned, as I’ll write that post very soon…