Podcasts about heropress

In this episode, Nathan Wrigley and Rae Morey discuss key events in the WordPress community. Highlights include an automated plugin review system achieving zero backlog, the expansion of the Kim Parsell Memorial Scholarship to WordCamp Europe and Asia, and HeroPress' call for sponsorship. They address the ongoing conflict between Automattic and WP Engine, including legal disputes and community fallout, alongside the departure of WordPress Executive Director Josepha Haden Chomposy and Mary Hubbard's new leadership. Despite the drama, the episode offers insights into WordPress's design updates, featured events, and efforts to improve gender diversity. Check it out...

A quick online conversation about the 10-year anniversary of HeroPress led to a live interview and I am so thankful for my time with Topher. Part of what I love about Podcasting in a free-form way is not knowing where it will go. I had no idea that we would be able to have a conversation about Faith, Religion, WordPress and Diversity in one short chat. HeroPress is a cool project that cold use your attention if you aren't already plugged in. Join us and learn more. https://topher1kenobe.com https://heropress.com

In this episode of the Post Status Happiness Hour, host Michelle Frechette interviews Topher DeRosa, founder of Hero Press, about his journey and the platform's impact on the WordPress community. They discuss HeroPress's origins, challenges, and successes, highlighting its role in amplifying diverse voices through published essays. Topher shares inspiring stories from contributors worldwide and touches on fundraising efforts and the community's support. The episode underscores the importance of inclusivity and the transformative power of sharing personal experiences within the WordPress ecosystem. The conversation concludes with reflections on community events and the significance of connection and support.Top TakeawaysCommunity and Connection at Events: They discuss the importance of events like WordCamp as spaces for learning, networking, and finding belonging. Michelle emphasizes that these gatherings reinforce the idea that the WordPress community is friendly, welcoming, and eager to support each other.Language as a Tool for Inclusion: Topher talks about making HeroPress content available in multiple languages to cater to non-English speakers. He learned that people, even if fluent in English, often prefer reading in their native language, feeling a stronger connection to the content. His approach shows how inclusive language access can make individuals feel valued.Genuine Diversity Efforts: Topher initially counted contributors by gender to ensure balance, but he eventually stopped tracking as inclusivity became natural. This shift demonstrates that diversity efforts, when sustained, can evolve into an ingrained organizational culture.Personal Stories as Inspiration: Michelle highlighted how HeroPress stories provide valuable insights into people's journeys, which can be inspiring and informative for others, especially when considering hiring or collaborating. These stories create a sense of community by showcasing the resilience and achievements of individuals across different backgrounds.Mentioned Links:Topher DeRosaHero PressAndrey ShevchenkoWordCamp PuneSlackTwitterNexcessLiquidWebHuman MadeWP Coffee TalkAutomatticCollins AgbonghamaTijana AndrejicThabo TswanaRobert CheleukaWordPress.orgMorten Rand-HendriksenJosepha Haden ChomphosyWeglotYoastBlackPress

In this episode we have Topher DeRosia discussing HeroPress, a platform sharing inspiring stories within the WordPress community. Topher highlights HeroPress' mission to counteract negativity by showcasing WordPress's potential. He shares truly impactful stories, such as a child in a stock photo symbolising HeroPress's motivation to help, and individuals like Hari from India who found success through WordPress. Despite funding challenges, Topher remains committed to maintaining the core essays and possibly starting a storytelling podcast, urging support through recurring donations. Check out the episode today!

In this episode of the Post Status Happiness Hour, host Michelle Frechette interviews Marcus Burnette to dive into the many exciting features of WP World, a community platform designed for WordPress professionals. Marcus, the creator of WP World, walks listeners through its dynamic features, including customizable profile pins that reflect user specialties, a robust hosting review system, and privacy options for those who prefer not to share their location.Top TakeawaysUser-Friendly Features in WP World: Marcus Burnette highlighted various user-friendly features in WP World, such as the ability to customize profile pins based on user specialties and the option to hide locations for privacy reasons. This ensures the platform remains flexible and inclusive, especially for those who prioritize privacy or are digital nomads.Community-Driven Feedback and Development: Michelle Frechette shared how user feedback directly influenced the development of WP World. For example, her suggestion to add "accessibility specialist" as an option was quickly implemented. Marcus encouraged users to request features, showing that the platform is shaped by the needs of its community.WP World's Hosting Review Platform: Marcus introduced a comprehensive hosting review system where users can rate various aspects of hosting providers, such as performance and security. This community-sourced rating system provides valuable insights for people choosing WordPress hosts and ensures transparency by preventing paid listings.Playful and Engaging Design Aspects: Marcus, as a designer, has adding fun products like the "Capital P, dang it" mug. He also shared how events like WordCamps feature their own unique " u" mascots, contributing to the platform's lighthearted and engaging atmosphere.Collaborative Community Spirit: Both Marcus and Michelle emphasized their close collaboration and support within the WordPress community. Their plans to meet at WordCamp US to further discuss ideas highlight the strong, community-driven spirit behind WP World and its events. They also invited the audience to connect with them and grab stickers at the upcoming event, showcasing their approachability.Mentioned In The Show:WP WorldWP Coffee TalkWP SpeakersSeriously Bud? PodcastBud KrausChatGPTHeroPressJavi GuembeTopher DeRosiaElementorDo the Woo PodcastWP WonderWomenWP Career PagesWordPress.orgNexcessKaty BoykinKadence Amplify

Síguenos en: ¿Qué tal la semana? Semana esther Puesta al día post-navideña 3 retornos de clientes Semana Nahuai Follow up del caso raro en el que una actualización de TEC creaba un problema. Me encuentro el plugin actualizado y todo funcionando ok.

Apple Journals & Day One | Matt MullenwegImportant Takeaways:Apple announced its own Journal app at WWDC, which competes with Automattic's product, Day One.Day One has a few advantages over Apple's Journal app. One of them is the upcoming feature of Shared Journals, which allows fully end-to-end encrypted shared private journals with friends and family.Another advantage of Day One is its cross-platform availability. Unlike Apple's Journal app, which is limited to Apple devices, Day One works on all Apple devices, Android devices, and the web.Link: Original ArticleA Place of One's Own, in Noho – Automattic DesignImportant Takeaways:Automattic has a unique office space in Noho, New York, which is described as a “magic space” with unobstructed views of lower Manhattan.The office design is inspired by the aesthetics of jazz clubs and features collections of mid-century vintage furniture, art and design books, and original art pieces.The office is designed to be a practical and elastic canvas for diverse uses, and it reflects the rich aesthetics of Automattic's multiple creative tools.The office space is not just for work; it also serves as a socializing and connecting space for Automattic employees.Link: Original ArticleLinking to Supporting Orgs – Make WordPress.orgImportant Takeaways:The post discusses the need for a dedicated page on WordPress.org to link to independent organizations that support WordPress's mission of democratizing publishing.These organizations are not officially part of WordPress but offer valuable resources and opportunities to get involved.The proposed structure for such a page includes an introduction, organization categories, organization listings, updates and announcements, and contact information.The organizations should align with the mission of WordPress, adhere to a code of conduct, and actively contribute to the WordPress community or the broader mission of democratizing publishing.A vetting process is suggested for adding organizations to this page, including initial screening, detailed review, contacting the organization, decision to list, and periodic review.Link: Original ArticleWordPress Accessibility Day Gains Nonprofit Status Through Partnership with Knowbility – WordPress Accessibility DayImportant Takeaways:WordPress Accessibility Day, a virtual 24-hour conference focused on accessibility best practices for WordPress websites, has gained 501(c)(3) nonprofit status through a partnership with Knowbility.The event was initially started in 2020 by the WordPress core Accessibility Team and was revived in 2022 by Amber Hinds and Joe Dolson as an independent event.The 2022 event was a success, with 11 organizers, 1604 attendees, and 20 volunteers from 52 countries. After all event expenses were paid, WordPress Accessibility Day donated $2,000 to Knowbility.The partnership with Knowbility allows WordPress Accessibility Day to gain nonprofit status, making donations tax-deductible in the United States. It also provides access to Knowbility's accessible online event planning resources.The 2023 event will be held from 10:00 AM CDT (3:00 PM UTC) on Wednesday, September 27th, until 10:00 AM CDT (3:00 PM UTC) on Thursday, September 28th. The event will be live captioned and have sign language interpreters.Link: Original ArticleOne Equity Partners acquires cloud services provider Liquid Web and forms new holding company, CloudOne DigitalImportant Takeaways:One Equity Partners (OEP) has completed the acquisition of Liquid Web, a provider of managed cloud services, forming a new platform known as CloudOne Digital.The senior leadership team of Liquid Web will transition to expanded roles in the new, larger CloudOne platform with Jim Geiger as CEO, Carrie Wheeler as COO, and Joe Oesterling as CTO.Liquid Web, founded in 1997, operates 10 global data centers with more than 500,000 sites under management. With its brand acquisitions, CloudOne Digital will serve over 187,000 clients worldwide.CloudOne Digital will offer a broad portfolio of cloud products that meet the needs of web-dependent small and mid-sized businesses, cloud servers for developers and businesses with highly persistent, compute-intensive workloads, and managed private cloud for mid-market businesses that require enterprise-grade infrastructure and solutions.OEP plans an aggressive expansion strategy for CloudOne Digital, aiming to combine and integrate complementary businesses in the multi-cloud infrastructure segment.Link: Original ArticleWordCampers Demand Changes to Q&A Format – WP TavernImportant Takeaways:WordCamp attendees are calling for changes to the Q&A format at live events, citing issues with attendees abusing the format for self-promotion or not asking relevant questions.WordPress Core Committer Felix Arntz suggested that questions taking longer than a minute should be asked informally at a later opportunity.Arntz proposed several ideas to improve the Q&A format, including submitting questions to a central platform for upvoting, discarding lengthy questions, and providing mandatory training for emcees on handling problematic Q&A situations.He also suggested making Q&A optional, depending on the speaker's preference, to create a more inclusive environment for speakers.The feedback received on Arntz's Twitter thread was largely positive, with other attendees offering their own suggestions for improving the Q&A format.Link: Original ArticleNew Filter Controls: Discover “Commercial” and “Community” in the Theme and Plugin Directory – Make WordPress.orgImportant Takeaways:New categorizations were introduced in the Theme and Plugin Directory in late 2022 to enhance the browsing experience. These filters categorize plugins/themes as “Commercial” and “Community.”The “Commercial” filter allows users to discover themes and plugins developed by professional companies and individuals who offer their products for a fee. These premium options often come with dedicated support, advanced features, and customization options.The “Community” filter showcases themes and plugins created by the WordPress community. These products are often developed by passionate individuals who share their work for free or follow an open-source philosophy.The introduction of these filter controls is part of an ongoing effort to improve the browsing experience and refine the visual aspects of the Theme and Plugin Directory as part of the site redesign.Users are encouraged to provide feedback on these updates and try out the new filter controls.Link: Original ArticleThe Power of Community: A WordCamp Europe Sponsorship StoryImportant Takeaways:Barn2 Plugins sponsored WordCamp Europe (WCEU) for the first time in June 2023. The experience was described as a great opportunity for networking, brand exposure, and team bonding.The company spent a total of €13,256 on the event, including sponsorship costs, travel and accommodation, team t-shirts, WordCamp tickets, and other related expenses.The sponsorship booth was a key part of their presence at the event. They created a quiz for attendees, with winners receiving premium swag items. The quiz was a success, with 145 participants.The team also produced a video showcasing some of their most popular plugins, which was displayed at their booth.The author, Katie Keith, highlighted the difficulty in calculating the return on investment (ROI) for sponsoring a WordCamp. However, she emphasized the intangible benefits, such as increased brand awareness, networking opportunities, and team building.Link: Original ArticleSustainability Team • Supporting Organizations • Commercial & Community Themes & Plugins • Pattern Curation – Post StatusImportant Takeaways:The WordPress Sustainability Team has been established with the main objective of embedding sustainable practices into the WordPress community and its processes, focusing on ensuring longevity socially, economically, and environmentally.Several organizations exist to support the work of WordPress, such as The WP Community Collective and HeroPress. A proposal has been made to display such supporting organizations.Filters have been introduced for Themes and Plugins to distinguish between Commercial and Community efforts. The Patterns Directory is considering using filters for displaying all patterns associated with a theme.The post also includes a roundup of other WordPress news, including updates on WordPress 6.3 and 6.4, WP-CLI releases, community events, core updates, design updates, and more.Link: Original Article ★ Support this podcast ★

We have to start this week's news with coverage of WordPress' 20th birthday. Our beloved CMS officially reached the milestone on Saturday, May 27. Dozens of celebratory events were held around the world. You can even sign an online birthday card as part of the #WP20 From Blogs to Blocks campaign.Meanwhile, there is some special content worth checking out. First, WordPress co-founders Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little joined Drupal founder Dries Buytaert for a conversation on open source, AI, and the future of the web.And if you'd like to read about the last 10 years of WordPress history, take a look at Building Blocks: The Evolution of WordPress. The online book serves as the second volume in a series.Not surprisingly, the WordPress community also shared their thoughts via blog posts. That's how this whole thing got started, right?Among the highlights:WordPress Executive Director Josepha Haden Chomphosy shared an ode to the WordPress community's role in the project's success;Sarah Gooding of WP Tavern reflected on the impact of WordPress and outlines future challenges;HeroPress founder Topher DeRosia looked back at his start in blogging and what WordPress has meant to him;For more coverage of the big celebration, check out the #WP20 hashtag on Twitter.Links You Shouldn't MissWordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg wrote a short post regarding his creation's 20th anniversary. And he also announced the Audrey Scholars program. The aim is to provide 100% scholarships to selected members. There are currently 13 scholars in the program, which renews annually. All are encouraged to apply, although the focus will be on “children of parents or guardians who have contributed significantly to open source, or have been significant in our principal Matt Mullenweg's life.” Audrey Scholars is run by Audrey Capital, Mullenweg's angel investment and research company.Does Automattic have a top-secret AI plugin in the works? Author Seth Godin recently discussed such a tool on the Tim Ferris Podcast. The WP Minute's Matt Medeiros took a closer look at how important AI will be to WordPress. He even makes a guess at this new item Godin referred to as the “single best use I have seen of Chat GPT or whatever they're using.”European service provider group.one has acquired popular WordPress SEO plugin Rank Math. The free version of the plugin currently boasts over 2 million active installations. This a deeper dive into WordPress for group.one, as they also own web host one.com and the WP Rocket optimization plugin.A couple of well-known WordPress workflow solutions are teaming up. Sandbox site provider InstaWP has partnered with collaboration tool Atarim. There will be cross-product integration. Together, the aim is to make it easier to spin up test environments, collaborate, and track changes.From the Grab Bag Now it's time to take a look at some other interesting topics shared by our contributors.Automattic has pushed an automated update of the Jetpack plugin to patch a security hole. The vulnerability was found during an internal audit and would allow site authors to modify WordPress files. If you use Jetpack, make sure to update to the latest version immediately.There's been lots of talk regarding diversity and inclusion related to the upcoming WordCamp Europe. With that in mind, Michelle Frechette has shared some thoughts on moving forward as a community.WordPress developer and accessibility expert Joe Dolson has announced the closure of the Access Monitor and WP Tweets Pro plugins. Both plugins will be shuttered due to complications with their third-party tie ins.The results of the WordPress Individual Learner Survey are in. A total of 583 people participated. An analysis shows that 321 respondents described themselves as ‘somewhat knowledgeable' or ‘very knowledgeable' of WordPress, while nearly 32% had more than 10 years of experience.The WordPress Performance Team has conducted an analysis of version 6.2. The goal was to identify opportunities for future enhancements. Based on their findings, performance upgrades for classic theme templates, block widgets, and translation loading are among the identified targets.There's a new proposal to establish a WordPress Sustainability Team. The group would be responsible for promoting eco-friendly practices on the web and for in-person events. It would also include creating themes and plugins that serve this purpose.Developer Bill Erickson has released BE Starter, a hybrid starter theme. The package combines classic PHP templates with a theme.json file to control block styles.Thanks to all of the members who shared these links today: - Michelle Frechette- Mustaasam Saleem- Daniel SchutzsmithOutroThanks to you, dear listener, for tuning in to your favorite 5-minutes of WordPress news every Wednesday.You can support independent content like this by purchasing us a digital coffee at thewpminute.com/supportOr join the #linksquad membership for $79/year to support the show and become a producer of the WP Minute at thewpminute.com/supportThat's it for today's episode, if you enjoyed it, please share it wherever you do social media and jump on the mailing list at thewpminute.com. ★ Support this podcast ★

It's no secret that tools boasting Artificial Intelligence are popping up all over the place. That most certainly includes WordPress. And now Auttomattic's WordPress.com is running an experiment to see how the technology might benefit users.As reported by blogger JenT at WPcomMaven, the managed hosting service quietly added two AI-powered blocks to the Block Editor. The AI Image and AI Paragraph blocks are aimed at helping content creators.As the name suggests, the AI Image block allows users to generate an image that can be inserted into a post. And the AI Paragraph block will “read” your post's content and generate follow up text.Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg confirmed the new features on Twitter, but made no promises regarding how long they'll stick around.Meanwhile, Automattic engineer Artur Piszek published a brief post introducing the blocks and answering questions in the WordPress.com support forums. Based on the conversation, it looks as though this could be a commercial add-on in the future.The technology is being branded as “Jetpack AI”, and was built in conjunction with OpenAI.Links You Shouldn't MissThe first-ever WordCamp Asia is set to take place from February 17-19 in Bangkok, Thailand. If you're not able to attend in person, you can still watch a live stream of the event. Recordings of each session will also be posted on WordPress.tv at a later date.WordPress.org has kicked off a monthly feature called “What's new for developers?” Written by Justin Tadlock, February's post outlines several key changes that impact theme and plugin authors. You'll also find links to the site's latest educational materials. This resource looks like a win for the WordPress developer community.Cost cutting measures have continued to hit the tech industry hard. Domain registrar and hosting giant GoDaddy is among the latest to announce staff cuts. In a February 8 letter to employees, CEO Aman Bhutani said the company would cut approximately 8% of its workforce. The devastating earthquakes in Turkey and Syria have impacted millions - including members of the WordPress community. Developer Baris Ünver shared his story of survival on HeroPress and provided several ways to help those in need. The WP Minute would like to take this opportunity to share our support for everyone who has been affected.From the Grab BagNow it's time to take a look at some other interesting topics shared by our contributors.WordPress 6.2 Beta 2 has been released. This version includes 292 enhancements and 354 bug fixes.According to security firm Sucuri, nearly 11,000 WordPress websites have been infected by malware that redirects users to scam sites. At last report, no specific vulnerability had been found.The team behind popular plugin iThemes Security have announced that they're teaming up with security research firm Patchstack. The company will provide vulnerability details within the plugin's site scan feature.Matt Cromwell has announced that new episodes of the WP Product Talk podcast will be starting up again this week. Katie Keith of Barn2 Plugins will join on as a co-host.What would WordPress' 20th birthday celebration be without an appearance from Wapuu? A commemorative version of the virtual mascot is now available for download.The WordPress Design Team has released mockups for a planned redesign of the Block Pattern Library. It's the latest in a series of design revamps for the site.Internet Explorer is dead again, sort of. An update to Windows 10 will finally disable access to the since-retired browser. But not so fast - a few versions of the OS will still keep the app around for the time being.Video of the weekSubscribe at https://www.youtube.com/@wpminuteJoin The WP Minute as we take you on a tour of the new AI-powered Image and Paragraph blocks at WordPress.com.https://youtu.be/D9LYfjnHMdwThanks to all of the members who shared these links today: Matt CromwellBirgit Pauli-Haack ★ Support this podcast ★

In this episode Rob Cairns sits down with Topher and Cate DeRosia to talk about the HeroPress network. Show Highlights: What is HeroPress? How and why HeroPress was founded? The future of HeroPress. Why the WordPress community matters.

WP Builds is all about the WordPress community, but we're not alone in that. There are many places that you can hang out to find out what's going on, news updates, product launches and stories about members of the community. HeroPress is one such place, and it's been putting out great content about members of the community for years. Today on the podcast we have Cate and Topher DeRosia, the founders and curators of HeroPress as they talk about their plans to expand so that you can find all the WordPress content your heart desires in as few places as possible. It's a lovely episode with a couple of really excellent members of our community. Go have a listen...

WP Builds is all about the WordPress community, but we're not alone in that. There are many places that you can hang out to find out what's going on, news updates, product launches and stories about members of the community. HeroPress is one such place, and it's been putting out great content about members of the community for years. Today on the podcast we have Cate and Topher DeRosia, the founders and curators of HeroPress as they talk about their plans to expand so that you can find all the WordPress content your heart desires in as few places as possible. It's a lovely episode with a couple of really excellent members of our community. Go have a listen...

WP Builds is all about the WordPress community, but we're not alone in that. There are many places that you can hang out to find out what's going on, news updates, product launches and stories about members of the community. HeroPress is one such place, and it's been putting out great content about members of the community for years. Today on the podcast we have Cate and Topher DeRosia, the founders and curators of HeroPress as they talk about their plans to expand so that you can find all the WordPress content your heart desires in as few places as possible. It's a lovely episode with a couple of really excellent members of our community. Go have a listen...

In this nineteenth episode, WordPress’s Executive director, Josepha Haden Chomphosy, discusses and expresses gratitude for the inspiration behind the People of WordPress series, HeroPress. Have a question you’d like answered? You can submit them to wpbriefing@wordpress.org, either written or as a voice recording. Credits Editor: Dustin Hartzler Logo: Beatriz Fialho Production: Chloé Bringmann Song: Fearless First by Kevin […]

This week we'll be are talking about HeroPress and how they are building a repo of sorts called finditwp.com We'll be talking with Cate and Topher DeRosia about all that they are compiling for our WordPress community. Show Notes can be found here: https://www.wpwatercooler.com/video/ep403-a-new-wordpress-repo-compiling-the-community-wpwatercooler/ Panel Jason Tucker – jasontucker.blog Steve Zehngut – zeek.com Sé Reed – sereedmedia.com Jason Cosper – jasoncosper.com Cate DeRosia – hallwaychats.com Topher DeRosia – heropress.com Links HeroPress Network HeroPress Cate and Topher Life Hallway Chats WP Podcasts Find It WP Show Sponsors Desktop Server – ServerPress https://serverpress.com WPsitesync – https://www.wpsitesync.com Are You Looking For Brand Awareness? You could be a show sponsor. Let people know you're still in business and supporting your products. Supporting podcasts is a great way to repurpose your in-person conference budget. We have been sponsored by big brands such as Kinsta and Cloudways. Why not get your audience in front of the thousands of people who download this show every month? Yes, WPwatercooler has thousands of downloads every month. We're not just a YouTube Show. https://www.wpwatercooler.com/sponsor

This week's WordPress news for the week commencing Monday 4th October 2021

Tips this week include: • Recipe video SEO tutorials are underway • New Cloudflare tutorials for webmasters published • Celebrating a big milestone on Heartwood Art and new tutorials that will come of • New coalition of vendors happening • What's up with HeroPress expanding into the HeroPress Network • A summary of WordCamp US that happened last week • Genesis blocks now has new mobile options • How SiteGround centralizing their DNS might affect you • YouTube pays out the equivalent of 394,000 full-time jobs • The huge news with YouTube making transcripts searchable • How videos are replacing blog posts in search • Should you always own your own content platform?

This episode is sponsored by Ninja Forms About Cate DeRosia: Cate is a serial volunteer who has helped organize everything from her local meetup to WCUS 2021. Currently, she’s helping with marketing and communications for Big Orange Heart and WordFest Live and is leading the expansion of HeroPress and is the cohost of the Hallway […]

This week's WordPress news - Covering The Week Commencing 12th April 2021

The DeRosias are the founders and stewards of HeroPress. If you don't already know about it, HeroPress tells the stories of people who have leveraged WordPress and its community to change their lives and achieve their goals. Through these stories, global connections are made and conversations are had that build a stronger community, more employment, and educational opportunities, and easier access to resources. The post Episode 150 – Cate and Topher DeRosia appeared first on Hallway Chats.

This week's WordPress news - Covering The Week Commencing 15th March 2021

The first time I met Topher DeRosia was watching his talk at WCUS 2016. I was in awe of the ability of WordPress to connect so many people worldwide, and Topher's ability to use WordPress to tell their stories. HeroPress has helped inform how WPCoffeeTalk works. It's my pleasure to tell Topher's story here!

“Managed WordPress Hosting” is as commonly known now, thanks to Sally Strebel as Kleenex. Pagely continues to be a market leader in the hosting space. And they’re privately funded! Their business conference Pressnomics is also Sally’s brainchild and attended by a host of entrepreneurs. In this episode, Sally chats with Bridget and Jason about how our previous experiences can help us see a path forward. Follow Sally Strebel on Twitter @BizGirl “Last, being underestimated is a gift. They’ll never see you coming until they can’t help but notice. If you’re with the right people while that’s happening, there’s no better feeling.” Read her essay, “Marginalized” on HeroPress https://heropress.com/essays/marginalized/ Show Sponsors Desktop Server – ServerPress https://serverpress.com/ WPsitesync https://www.wpsitesync.com/ Become A Patron And Support Us On Patreon!

This weeks WordPress news - Covering The Week Commencing 22nd June 2020

With Blogger mucking around - and in my opinion totally messing up - with their interface, it looks as the days of fresh, written, content on my beloved, 14-year-old HEROPRESS blog are coming to an end. I took a look at Wordpress and very quickly came to the conclusion that maybe restarting my podcast would better scratch my blogging itch. Let's wait and see! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/tim-knight/message

This weeks WordPress news - Covering The Week Commencing 15th June 2020

Cate DeRosia has wandered around WordPress for the last five years speaking, organizing, and being an engaging human. Currently, she's building out a family business and investigating how to expand HeroPress into a new kind of membership site. The post Episode 131 – Cate DeRosia appeared first on Hallway Chats.

Topher DeRosia is the developer evangelist for BigCommerce and a frequent WordCamp speaker. He's worked with WordPress for a long time and is the man behind HeroPress, telling the stories of people whose lives have been transformed by WordPress. HeroPress is now syndicated on WordPress.org/news, bringing these inspirational stories to an even wider audience. At WordCamp Boston, Topher and Kathy talked about everything WordPress, from security to eCommerce, HeroPress, headless WordPress, headless eCommerce as well as how these new methods of distributing content and commerce will change publishing.

When selling online, many people get hung up on the platform (Shopify, Squarespace, WooCommerce) rather than making their decisions off of principle.   eCommerce is sales...sales is about people, communication, and serving each other in a way that benefits everyone, not just checking out digital shopping carts.   Topher goes deep into sales philosophy and despite his title being “WordPress Developer Evangelist for BigCommerce” he tells us a few things to consider before selecting an eComm platform.

This episode gives a very brief critique of the three main Conan titles being published by Marvel these days: Conan The Barbarian, Savage Sword Of Conan, and Age Of Conan, as well as mentioning Savage Avengers, which debuts today, that brings Robert E Howard's Cimmerian into the modern Marvel world! You can find articles - reviews & promos etc - I've published on this character, and related ones, under the Conan tag on HeroPress:  https://heropresstwo.blogspot.com/search/label/Conan You can find Marvel's own articles about their take on Conan here:  https://www.marvel.com/search?limit=20&query=Conan  --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/tim-knight/message

Mumbling first stab at recording an Anchor podcast. Is this the future? --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/tim-knight/message

Topher DeRosia is a Christian, husband, father, and WordPress developer in that order. By day, he runs iWitness Design with his business partner. Topher also curates HeroPress.com, a site that tells the stories of WordPress. The post Episode 30: Topher DeRosia appeared first on Hallway Chats.

In Episode 22, Topher and I discuss building HeroPress, sticking with a project when it’s important enough, and giving a voice to people in the community who don’t always feel like they have one. Show Notes Topher DeRosia HeroPress Kickstarter GoFundMe WordCamp London Sponsored by: Social Web Suite: Use the code BUILDSOMETHING at checkout! Hover.com: Get 10% […] The post Episode 22: Topher DeRosia and HeroPress appeared first on How I Built It.

I met Topher a few years back when we were plopped down near one another at a WordCamp after party. We never met, or crossed paths before. In fact, I think our beards dueled for a bit before we started chatting — or maybe it was the ice wine? To my delight, I enjoyed the conversation we had, inspired by the work my new friend was doing in and for WordPress. A few years passed and we kept in touch, even catching a Skype call here and there to discuss some of the new work he was challenged to embark on. HeroPress? Is this just another — dare I say — entrepreneurial spotlight shining on the well-known business builders of the WordPress community? No. No, it isn't. HeroPress embodies more than the shallow wins, even I'm guilty of showcasing on this show, to it's readers. Topher reaches out to all corners of the world, producing a healthy mix of diversity within the stories published on the blog. This is the real nitty-gritty of how people find their way in our community, be it for business or pleasure. Topher's an original, something you're sure to pick up on in his conversation today. I'm honored he graced our airwaves, and I hope you enjoy his story of diversity, challenges, and success with HeroPress. Who knows, maybe you'll publish your own essay on HeroPress someday? Matt Report - A WordPress podcast for digital business owners The impact of diversity, challenge, and success with HeroPress Play Episode Pause Episode Mute/Unmute Episode Rewind 10 Seconds 1x Fast Forward 30 seconds 00:00 / Subscribe Share RSS Feed Share Link Embed Download file | Play in new window The links Topher on Twitter HeroPress Like this content? Rate us on iTunes! ★ Support this podcast ★

I met Topher a few years back when we were plopped down near one another at a WordCamp after party. We never met, or crossed paths before. In fact, I think our beards dueled for a bit before we started chatting — or maybe it was the ice wine? (more…)

On this week’s episode, we’re joined by Tonya Mork of Know the Code. Tonya likes to rethink the way she does things to find a better path, one that is more efficient, effective, leads us forward, and is balanced with intent. She likes to share ideas, plant seeds, and inspire folks to consider a different approach. Her blog (Hello from Tonya) is all about the way she thinks. It’s meant to inspire you to stop, assess, and rethink the way you are doing things. In this 30-minute episode Brian Gardner, Lauren Mancke, and Tonya Mork discuss: Tonya’s 30-year career Not letting an ugly twist in life stop you Monetization strategies for an educational business Being an expert before you’re an educator Expanding beyond your current training areas Opportunities in the community for educators Listen to StudioPress FM below ... Download MP3Subscribe by RSSSubscribe in iTunes The Show Notes Follow Tonya on Twitter Follow Know the Code on Twitter Hello from Tonya Know The Code Visit Know The Code on Facebook Finding your Purpose in Life The Transcript How to Build an Online Education Business Jerod Morris: Hey, Jerod Morris here. If you know anything about Rainmaker Digital and Copyblogger, you may know that we produce incredible live events. Well, some would say that we produce incredible live events as an excuse to throw great parties, but that’s another story. We’ve got another one coming up this October in Denver. It’s called Digital Commerce Summit, and it is entirely focused on giving you the smartest ways to create and sell digital products and services. You can find out more at Rainmaker.FM/Summit. We’ll be talking about Digital Commerce Summit in more detail as it gets closer, but for now, I’d like to let a few attendees from our past events speak for us. Attendee 1: For me, it’s just hearing from the experts. This is my first industry event, so it’s awesome to learn new stuff and also get confirmation that we’re not doing it completely wrong where I work. Attendee 2: The best part of the conference for me is being able to mingle with people and realize that you have connections with everyone here. It feels like LinkedIn Live. I also love the parties after each day, being able to talk to the speakers, talk to other people who are here for the first time, people who have been here before. Attendee 3: I think the best part of the conference for me is understanding how I can service my customers a little more easily. Seeing all the different facets and components of various enterprises then helps me pick the best tools. Jerod Morris: Hey, we agree — one of the biggest reasons we host a conference every year is so that we can learn how to service our customers, people like you, more easily. Here are just a few more words from folks who have come to our past live events. Attendee 4: It’s really fun. I think it’s a great mix of beginner information and advanced information. I’m really learning a lot and having a lot of fun. Attendee 5: The conference is great, especially because it’s a single-track conference where you don’t get distracted by, “Which session should I go to?” and, “Am I missing something?” Attendee 6: The training and everything, the speakers have been awesome, but I think the coolest aspect for me has been connecting with both people who are putting it on and then other attendees. Jerod Morris: That’s it for now. There’s a lot more to come on Digital Commerce Summit, and I really hope to see you there in October. Again, to get all the details and the very best deal on tickets, head over to Rainmaker.FM/Summit. Voiceover: StudioPress FM is designed to help creative entrepreneurs build the foundation of a powerful digital business. Tune in weekly as StudioPress founder Brian Gardner and VP of StudioPress Lauren Mancke share their expertise on web design, strategy, and building an online platform. Lauren Mancke: On this week’s episode, Brian and I will discuss ways to build an educational Genesis business with Tonya Mork from Know the Code. Brian Gardner: Hey, everyone. Welcome back to StudioPress FM. I am your host, Brian Gardner, and I’m joined, as usual, with the vice president of StudioPress, Lauren Mancke. I’m very excited about today’s show because we’re continuing our series where we talk to members and experts, mind you, of the Genesis community. Today, we’re joined by Tonya Mork of Know the Code. Tonya likes to rethink the way she does things to find a better path, one that is more efficient, effective, leads us forward, and is balanced with intent. She likes to share her ideas, plant seeds, inspire folks to consider a different approach. Her blog, Hello from Tonya, is all about the way she thinks. It’s meant to inspire you to stop, assess, and rethink the way you are doing things. Tonya, it’s a huge pleasure to have you on StudioPress FM. Welcome to the show. Tonya Mork: Hi, Brian. Hi, Lauren. Hi, everybody. Glad to be here with you guys. Lauren Mancke: Yeah, we’re glad you’re on the show. Brian Gardner: Now is this the first time you guys have talked to each other, probably? Tonya Mork: Yeah, it is, actually. Lauren Mancke: In person, yeah. Brian Gardner: Cool. Yeah, Tonya and I have had a couple of good calls, which we’ll allude to throughout the course of the show. I’m going to just kick off and start a little bit personal. Tonya, on the home page of your personal blog, you have 16 circles of words that describe you. I’m going to make it fun, and I’m going to ask you to pick three of those that most personify who you are, and why do you think that those three would be the top three? Tonya Mork: Wow. Try to define a person in three different characteristics. That’s a tough thing. Brian Gardner: Well, 16 seems like a lot, so I figured if we narrowed them down to the best of the best, you could tell us in a nutshell who you are. The Three Characteristics That Define Tonya Tonya Mork: Okay. I think what defines me the most is that I unlock potential. I’ve been doing that my entire career — not only with people, but processes, with technology, and so on. The way that I do that is that I’m able to see what could be possible, what’s not there right now, and then I’m able to map out a way to move us to where we want to be. If I were to look on that page, I’d say, okay, potential unlocker is one, and then the visionary leader is another. It takes a lot of vision to not only educate people, but lead people, manage people. To build websites, too, it takes a lot of vision. The other thing to know about me is I’m a very happy person. Everything that I do, even back in engineering days when there was some tough problems, it didn’t matter. If I was in a boardroom or on the floor, I like to have fun. There’s a time for being serious, but you can still temper that with making sure that you’re having a good time and enjoying what you’re doing. Lauren Mancke: You mentioned you’ve been in engineering. We know that WordPress has been around for just over 10 years of that time, but you’ve got a career that lasts more than 30 years. Can you give us a little bit of background about what you were doing before WordPress? Tonya’s 30-Year Career Tonya Mork: Sure. I’ve been in engineering since the mid-1980s. I used to be in the high-tech world, so the automation world. This world, for folks who don’t know, if you can think about anything — your computer that you’re looking at, your phone, your car — all these things are mass-produced. To put those things together, it takes a lot of automated equipment, robotic, different cells, instrumentation, quality-type processes that go through and they assemble, test, make, those types of things. That’s the world that I used to belong to. I held many different roles in that. I started off as a tech, and then I moved into engineering. Then I went into some project management. I went into staff management, executive management, and so on. I had a whole path and trajectory that I went through long before I came to WordPress. Then life threw me a curve ball. There’s a chapter two that I know we’ll talk about. Then I found WordPress. This is how I ended up here, and we’ll talk about that here, I’m sure, as we move along in the interview. Brian Gardner: Yeah. There’s so many people in the WordPress community, many of which are really new, new to blogging, new to development or design, or any of that. One of the things I like most about you and I’m going to say this with no disrespect because you have a long career. We just mentioned you’ve been around for 30 years, which means you’re older than some people in our field. This comes out in your website and in the way you talk and in the way you explain things — you have a tremendous amount of knowledge for process, for analyzing things. There are not many people that I know of, if at all, who probably bring to the table what you do. To our community, I’m so thankful that you can bring that area of expertise because I think there’s probably holes and gaps here and there that exist. You certainly fill a big one. Thank you for that. Tonya Mork: Thank you. Gosh, that was very nice of you. I appreciate it. Brian Gardner: Okay. You alluded to a chapter two, and I hope that this is okay to ask. I read the very personal story you shared on HeroPress about finding your purpose in life. Clearly, you have a story to tell. You talked about it just a few minutes ago. In 2007, in your words, your life took an ugly twist. In whatever detail you feel comfortable, talk to us about that because I think that formulated kind of who you are now and where you’re at. Not Letting an Ugly Twist in Life Stop You Tonya Mork: Sure. It’s a big shift, and I wrote that article for a couple of purposes. One is to explain how can someone with the experience that I have, why aren’t I back in that market? Why am I here in WordPress, and why am I trying to help people? It needed to be told so that people wanting to know who I am and trust me as I’m trying to help folks and the reason, the impetus why. That’s why I wrote it. Then, two, I wrote it to kind of help inspire that sometimes life does just take an ugly twist. We all go through things. It can be anything from losing somebody to divorce, to losing your job, whatever. What happened to me in 2007, my engineering company was flourishing. We were doing really, really well, very profitable, and then I got ill. That’s one of those things you can’t predict. The kind of illness that I had, they basically went down a path and said, “You have something that’s extremely rare. I mean very rare, and there’s basically nothing we can do for you.” I had to lock myself away because everything in the world made me so ill that I wasn’t able to function. I basically became a prisoner in my own home. If you can imagine what that feels like to be so ill that lights, noise, a bird flying, being in a car watching things go by would send you into a seizure and then put me into the type of situation that was life-threatening, you can imagine how my life would be then. I was pretty much stuck here in this house except when it was time to go to a doctor or the hospital. That was it for many, many years. Going from being a type-A person who had a company, who had people, families that were counting on me, was very, very difficult. We lost everything. We watched them take everything from us. I lost friends. We lost our home. Everything that we had built throughout our career was all gone, all the savings, all gone, everything. The people that I employed were my friends. They were part of a family, and they lost everything, too. We’d built this together, and they had to go out and find different employment that didn’t have that same feel to it. It took them a while to get back on their feet again as well. It was a devastating loss for all of us. I was black for a while, just in a hole of darkness. Then somewhere along the way, I got sick of that. I got to get back to the essence of me, and that is I got to be happy again. I made a conscious choice that, “Okay, I’m locked in these walls. So what? I can extend out and do something in the world outside these walls, and I can do it virtually so that things outside, I could still control my environment so that I’m not ill, but I have a way of still being able to do something and have a purpose in the world.” That’s where I found WordPress. We were using it in my engineering company just for the blog, so I knew about it. Then I started a nonprofit to help people that were like me, and we spun up BuddyPress. I spun up the website for it. Then I started tinkering. And, “I really want to know this thing.” That engineer came out in me again, and then that educator came out. It was like I was looking at questions people were asking, and it’s like, “Wow, folks come from a different background than what I’m in. They don’t necessarily understand software principles and the fundamentals.” So I started answering questions. That led me on the path that I’m on now for helping people. Brian Gardner: Thank you, first of all, for sharing your story. I know it’s not easy. I’m a person who has had multiple chapters in my life as well, some online, some off. I think we have a tendency to glorify life online and being an Internet entrepreneur. Especially with social media, it’s so easy to portray just how good life is. Instagram, Facebook, all of that stuff, filters, all of that stuff. I’m a huge proponent of trying to keep it real. One person that comes to mind is Cory Miller, who speaks very much about mental health and trying to help those who are online doing things, entrepreneurs, that kind of thing. I hope to have him on the show in a future episode just to talk to that. I think there’s a reality that we all — whether we’re business owners, writers, bloggers, designers, or whatever — there is parts of our life that aren’t happy. It’s okay to go there and to figure that out so that you can become happy. For our listeners, those who are listening, understand that Tonya has a great story, and we’re just thankful for hearing that. Tonya Mork: Thank you. I’m thankful to the community because the community gave me purpose. If you go read my story, you’ll see that I found my purpose because of this community, you guys all welcomed me in, that I could then contribute. So many people contributed to the knowledge that I have in my brain. I just want to give that back to people. The end story of chapter two was that I got so ill, my body gave up, and I passed away. I got a miracle, and I came back. I said, “That’s it. I’m going to be a different person now, and I want to give back.” That’s what I’m trying to do now to help all of you guys to do more, make more money, be more efficient — obviously, I love Genesis — to help you to be able to know, to maximize what you can do for your clients with it. Brian Gardner: That’s a great segue. Lauren Mancke: I think there’s a lot of appeal with Genesis and in the WordPress community to have the flexibility, your schedule, and things that you can do that you might not be able to work in a traditional work environment. I think a lot of people can relate to that. When did Genesis become part of your picture? Why the Efficiency of Genesis First Attracted Tonya Tonya Mork: Let’s see, pretty much close to when Brian put it together. I forget the article that I saw, but something drew me to it. I started looking at it. I like to break things apart and just understand how they work. As it started progressing, it was like, “Hmm, I like the way this is put together.” It really feeds that developer sense that you can go in and do what you need to do. Out of the box, it comes up. You’re able to build a site immediately. Then just with a few tweaks here and there, you can get a custom experience. I like that versus just every time out of the box, you’ve got to go and write a totally different experience. That’s not highly effective to be able to do that, whereas Genesis allows you to be very effective and efficient. That’s what drew me to it. I would say it was pretty close to the beginning, not obviously right at the beginning, but pretty close to it. Brian Gardner: One of the things I like about the Genesis community, aside from the people that are in that, is the array of multiple opportunities that folks can … WordPress is kind of the same way. I always feel like Genesis is a smaller version of WordPress in that there’s just so many different ways to make money. You can design. You could develop. You can train. There’s just so many different opportunities there. One thing that, as I alluded to earlier, there’s gaps, or there were gaps, in the Genesis community, the educational side of Genesis and WordPress, coding, and developing, all in itself, that was sort of there. A lot of people take for granted, I do all the time, in my eyes, how easy it is to pick things up and to learn, and how to move things around. But I fail to understand or embrace, a lot of times, the reality that there’s hundreds and thousands of people who were once like me way back in the day — new to it all, don’t understand it, need a little handholding, and stuff like that. When I came across Know the Code, I was, first of all, instantly like, “Who is this person? What is she doing, and why is she doing it?” It just was an onslaught of this awesomeness. I was like, “I got to pay attention to this and put this on my radar.” I reached out to you shortly after it to just touch base and all of that. Obviously, Know the Code is a passion project of yours. You’re passionate about what you do. It’s something that I’ve seen you sort of, and we’ve talked about a little bit, very intentionally and smartly, might I add, monetizing because we all have to make money. Passion is great, but if you have the opportunity to make money from it, that’s also great because we need jobs, right? Tonya Mork: Right. Brian Gardner: What is the hope you have behind it? Obviously, you’re teaching and training people, and enabling them to pursue their version of a journey. From your perspective as an entrepreneur, but also from the perspective of the customer of yours, what is your hope there? Monetization Strategies for an Educational Business Tonya Mork: Just to be clear so that people understand what Know the Code is, yes, I teach Genesis, but I teach web development. I teach software principles, which feeds anybody from any stage in their career. It can start from a beginner through a seasoned pro like myself. It’s part of feeding that continuous learning process that we all have to do. It’s technology-based. It’s intentionally targeted at professional developers or people who want to be professional developers, who maybe along the way got into writing some code. They didn’t learn about things like solid principles and modular design, configuration designs, and how to troubleshoot and write code in such a way that it’s very efficient and reduces your cost. These are types of things that I teach. From an entrepreneurial standpoint, if you’re going after people who are going to make money off of what you’re teaching them, then it makes sense to monetize that. “I’m helping you to make more money, so okay, you should then pay something to me for my expertise as I’m enabling you to go off and make more money.” That’s why I put a monetizing paywall up in front of it. There’s a lot of free content, too, that people can then use as well. Again, that’s the educator in me. I’d love to be able to give everything away for free, but I got to eat, too. Brian Gardner: Yup. Tonya Mork: I have bills to pay, too. I’d like to live in my house in chapter three, you know? Brian Gardner: Although your advantage, though, is you live up in Wisconsin in Two Rivers, right? Tonya Mork: Yup, right. Brian Gardner: There’s a much lower cost of living there. At least you have that going for you, whereas I live in Chicago. Tonya Mork: Absolutely. Brian Gardner: I get hosed on my property taxes. There’s more pressure for me. Tonya Mork: I could imagine living where you’re at, yeah. We intentionally moved here. We used to live in downtown Milwaukee, so I know how expensive it can be. We moved here intentionally for the lower cost. From the perspective of my clients and customers who come to me, you’re the type of person who just wants to do more. You want to be more effective at what you do, you want to better serve your clients, and you want to make more money. You’re a professional, and that’s what I’m helping you to do. Lauren Mancke: What have been some of your challenges that you faced when you started Know the Code? Is there some unexpected things that you’ve had to deal with that you didn’t foresee? Challenges Tonya Faced When Starting Know the Code Tonya Mork: Everybody who ever starts a business always has some things that you learn, right? It’s one of those where I tell people, they want to know what entrepreneurship is like, well, you’re standing on an edge of a cliff, and it’s black out there. You have a vision in your mind, and you jump out. You start flying. Sometimes you’ll sink a bit. You’ve got to be innovative enough to be able to see that coming, then be able to adjust your path, so you can start to soar again. With Know the Code, some of the things are I produce a lot of content. Because of the format and how I do it, I’m able to just turn on the camera and just do a brain dump from me to you. It’s more like a cable, from my head to yours. That means I can produce a lot of content fast. One of the things I didn’t foresee was, “Wow, how am I going to organize all of this content, so you can quickly find it?” You can’t just dump it into a library. People aren’t going to be able to find that easily, so what I’m doing right now is going through a process of content discovery and working on the user experience, too, that you can, within a few clicks, find what you’re looking for. Brian Gardner: Sounds like a Dewey Decimal System, if we’re using the library analogy. Tonya Mork: Sure. Brian Gardner: I have a 30-second timeout because I want to ask you a fun question. Are you personally responsible for the designs both behind Hello from Tonya and also Know the Code? Tonya’s Hand in Designing Her Sites Tonya Mork: First one, yes. Second one, no. Yes, I did my personal site. It’s just something I’ve been playing with. I like playing in the sandbox, so you’ll come back it may be different. It’s just my expression of that designer that’s been unlocked in me. Know the Code, though, has a team behind it. We have a couple of professional developers who are designers who put that together. Brian Gardner: I kind of had a suspicion that you had your hands in at least one of the site designs. They’re both great. I love them both. I love the color schemes in them all. I can tell that you’re as meticulous with the design of your site as you are with the content on the site — so kudos to you. Tonya Mork: Thank you. Now, I did influence the color palette on Know the Code, because you’re going to notice I like green. That’s my favorite color, so yeah, I did influence that color there. I also like orange. There’s orange everywhere. Lauren Mancke: Speaking of Know the Code, do you have some sort of process in which you determine the types of things that you teach there? Do you have a way to determine what will resonate with your audience? Being an Expert Before You’re an Educator Tonya Mork: That’s a good question, Lauren. When I first started, I thought, “Well, who knows me the most? Where do I start?” Web development, software development is huge. Just the principles alone that you go through to learn how to sit down and write code from scratch. That’s what I’m trying to get folks to do, write it from scratch. There’s a lot to it. What I said was, “I’ve been in the Genesis community. The Genesis folks know me, so I’m going to start there.” I look at questions that people ask, and I say, “Hmm, okay, I can answer that question for you, and name that tune in X amount of notes.” That’s what I try to do — look at what questions people are asking, and then put that together. Then I kind of have a path for myself. I have a road map that I put together, and I’m taking you on a journey from where you’re at today. I looked at a big part of the market and where I believe the skillsets are at today and where I’m trying to drive you to, which is to be able to build anything and code from scratch if you want to. I’ve put together a trajectory for that. I’m sprinkling in some of the questions that you have to make sure it resonates with you because I’d really like to break it down into the basic elements so that it’s easy for you to adapt and take it away, not just one context, and trying to sprinkle in some of those questions with answers so that it clicks on the lightbulbs for you. Brian Gardner: That makes a lot of sense. I love that. I really do. On a recent call we had, you and I, we discussed the possibility of branching out with your business plan, right? Tonya Mork: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Expanding Beyond Your Current Training Areas Brian Gardner: We agreed that, as great as Genesis is, to the greater of the Internet, it’s just a very small sliver of audience and opportunity. I’m not territorial about that. I encourage anybody who’s building a Genesis-based business to think outside of the box, outside of the Genesis community, because there’s so much more opportunity to reach people on a broader level. The same can be said about WordPress to some degree because, even outside of WordPress, there’s still more space. We talked about broadening the training and the types of things you’d teach to cover ‘business people’ as opposed to ‘WordPress or Genesis people.’ Where are you at with that? I know it was only about a week or so ago we talked, but have you started thinking more about just things about general business? For example, I know we talked about things like legal types of things, such as trademarks, and all that kind of stuff. Tonya Mork: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Right. Know the Code itself is about writing software. It’s not just WordPress. I teach you PHP. I teach you jQuery, SQL, everything. That can allow you to build any kind of site that you want. If you think about it, as you just said, there’s this whole business side, even for developers. You’re stepping out, and you’re really good at code. Or you’re a designer and you’re really good at designing — but do you have that business ability as well? It takes a lot. There’s sales. There’s marketing. There’s all the legal stuff. There’s accounting. There’s a lot to running even your own little agency or freelance business. What Brian and I were talking about that I had mentioned was, after I did the Matt Report, some folks started asking me questions about, “Okay, well, how did you run businesses?” because I used to run a multimillion dollar businesses. “How did you do that?” What we’re doing to start with is I’m going to start writing just blog posts about business, just to share some ideas. That’s part of what my personal blog site is, just to get you to think about different ideas. I started a Little Green Book series. Some of those will be code. I just published a book, Refactoring Tweaks, which is on code to make your code better. The next one will probably be something in business. I can write these quick little ebooks that are less than 100 pages, or around 100 pages, to teach you something about technology or something about business, whether that’s marketing or whatever. Then that can then lead into something else that you and I talked about, too, which is then, “Okay, well, you’ve got a book. You’ve got written content.” Then we can move into something like maybe master programs where I can spin up a webinar or some sort of course and take you on a path. Brian Gardner: Now, Lauren is going to run the rest of the show while I go out and register KnowtheBusiness.io, because that’s how my brain thinks. Immediately, as you were talking, I’m like, “I’m going to recommend that you go off and think about what would be … ” If in fact you do get that response from people on your personal blog, people who are interested in starting a business and learning all of that stuff, what is the Know the Code version of what that website might look like? Tonya Mork: Oh sure, I’m on there right now registering it. Boom. Got it. Brian Gardner: I wouldn’t doubt it. Tonya Mork: Might as well while we’re talking, right? Brian Gardner: What’s $8? Tonya Mork: You inspired the idea. Lauren Mancke: Do you see any holes in the community as it stands now for different types of training, like on Know the Code? In other words, are there other opportunities that people can come in and offer something of value, that they can then make money at? Opportunities in the Community for Educators Tonya Mork: Oh absolutely. The whole thing, if you’re going to be an educator, you really need to know your stuff. You need to be able to do this. Let me take just a moment to teach you something, too, and then I’ll answer the question. You need to be able to start where that person’s at, and then map out a trajectory that moves them from where they’re at to where you’re trying to move them to. Then make it adaptable so that they can go off and make it their own, and not just teach one use case. Okay, I teach you how to build this one widget. “Well, great. I know how to build one widget. Whoopee.” No, it’s, “I know how to build a widget, which means I know how to write code. I know how to do this.” Okay. From an education standpoint, that’s what great educators do. They know how to get you to think and adapt the information that they’re giving you, and then that inspires you to go do other stuff. In the space, I’m here to help teach code, the proper way of building code to be efficient and make money at it, but there’s other things. Think about WordPress and what we’re doing. There’s content strategies, right? So you could be someone who needs to be out there teaching how to work with your clients to make the content first. Designs are great. We can put a pretty label on something and so on, but what’s going to keep people coming back to a website is that content. If the content isn’t right, then people are going to look at the pretty site, and they’re just not going to come back. Teaching strategies on content strategy itself, how to work with clients, that’s an area that could easily be done up. There’s things in SEO. There’s lots of different opportunities. You may think, “Well, that’s kind of saturated. Some folks are already doing that.” Find a way to do it differently. Find a way that’s uniquely your voice and that you have a true expertise in, and then you can go out and share that knowledge and educate others. Just remember, though, it’s about others. It’s not about you. It’s making sure that you’re truly delivering value to help other people do more things. Brian Gardner: I love what you said there. Last year at our Authority conference, Sally Hogshead was one of the main speakers. One thing she said, and you just basically said the same thing, was, “Different is better than better.” First of all, there’s a lot of people who claim to be knowledgeable in doing what they’re doing, not necessarily in the Genesis community, but there’s a lot of fluff out there where people are really good marketers, could design a good sales page, or something to that effect. One thing that I for sure know about you is that you completely back it up, almost more than you need to, not really, but a lot of people you can just tell, “Oh, this is a good sales page,” but there’s going to be not much to it after that. With you, it’s like you open the door, and there’s a mansion of knowledge. Development, for me, isn’t as interesting as design is. That’s just me personally, but there’s a ton of people out there in the WordPress space, in the Genesis space, and even outside of all that, just who are mega developers or people who want to just develop and don’t have the artistically creative side where design would appeal to them. For them, it’s all about code and knowing the code. I sincerely think you have an opportunity to do a lot more good work for the people everywhere. Tonya Mork: Thank you. Yeah, design is another area where folks could jump there’s a lot of elements to design that you could go in and start teaching with. Brian Gardner: Now you’re going to register KnowtheDesign.io. Tonya Mork: No, no. Brian Gardner: KnowtheEverything.io. Tonya Mork: Well, I’m not a designer. I will tell you right now, I am not a designer. I wouldn’t even want to try to teach that. There are great eyes out there, and mine aren’t it. If you want to know ones and zeroes, that’s me. Brian Gardner: Well, that’s the great thing about a good ecosystem — everybody knows their skills and their part, and they kind of just play and usually stay within that, which is good. Then it gives people a place, a good resource to go, to learn, and to do all of that stuff. Tonya Mork: Yeah. If you’re thinking about education and helping others, make sure that you really have an expertise in that. You’re right. I get a lot of emails where people say, “I could teach you how to blah, blah, blah.” My first question is, “Have you done it successfully? What’s your background?” That’s why I tried to push my background out there, so it didn’t just sound all fluffy and, “Well, okay, why is she teaching this? Does she really know her stuff?” I think you need to make sure you know your stuff and be able to back it up and prove that, yeah, you really do. Brian Gardner: Yup. Those are great words of wisdom. I want to do this with a number of the people that we have on the show because I feel like we could just keep going and talking and talking and talking. In the spirit of trying to keep this to a digestible level, I want to for sure have you back on the show, either in a follow-up fashion or to just pick your brain in another area that would be applicable to those who are listening. Where to Learn From Tonya Brian Gardner: I do want to ask our audience, as I always do at the end of the show, I have a question for you. Do you want to be a more awesome and in-demand professional developer? If you do, learn how to level up as a WordPress developer with Tonya at Know the Code, and get a hands-on, practical web development approach with screencasts which will help advance you to the next level in your career. For more info, visit her website, KnowtheCode.io. If you like what you heard on today’s show, you can find more episodes of StudioPress FM at, you guessed it, StudioPress.FM. You can also help us hit the main stage by subscribing to the show in iTunes. It’s a great way to never ever miss an episode. Thank you so much for listening, and we’ll see you next week. Tonya, it’s been a pleasure. Thank you for your time. Tonya Mork: Thank you, Brian. Thank you, Lauren. Lauren Mancke: Thank you.

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