Turn Your Love of WordPress Into a Great Business

I don’t need to convince you that WordPress is awesome. Thats why you’re here reading this post. The plugin repository full of amazing free plugins to help you extend the functionality of WordPress, free and super cheap themes all over the internet to help your websites look amazing, and a fabulous community of WordPress users attending WordCamps all over the world to support you. There really is lots to love about WordPress.

So why not turn your passion for WordPress into a consulting business? I’ve been a WordPress consultant for 10 years now and it’s given me an incredible lifestyle. I’ve worked from beaches in South East Asia, hotel rooms across Europe and even the United Nations building in New York City where I was a guest speaker at a conference.

At the time of writing this post, WordPress powers 28% of the internet, so it really is a great time to get into the business of helping clients launch their website on WordPress. If you’ve ever entertained the idea, let me give you a head start. I’ve made a lot of mistakes and learned a lot of lessons, so feel free to take my methods, tweak them and make them your own.

Qualify Your Leads

The most important factor in the ongoing success of your business, is the happiness of your clients. And the easiest way to delight your customers is to make sure they are a good fit for you and that you can actually help them.

When anyone requests your help with their website, send them to a project enquiry form on your website and ask them a short series of questions to establish what their expectations are and how motivated they are to complete this project with you.

Heres an example of my project application form to get you started.

Page Builders Make Great Prototypes

Trying to communicate  what your client’s new website will look like and how it will function in written words is very difficult. Your explanation of a membership site and their interpretation of a membership site are two different things. This is where page builders are your best friend.

Use a page builder like Beaver Builder, along with a plain theme with minimal styling, like the default Twenty Seventeen theme for example, to produce a quick prototype to actually show your client how their website is going to function in the browser and across multiple devices.

Once you and your client have agreed on the functionality, then you can flex your CSS skills and move onto design and development.

A Web Project Is More Than A Website

Of course, a successful website project is more than just a website. “If you build it, they will come” is a great quote from the cheesy 1989 film Field of Dreams starring Kevin Costner, but unfortunately building a website does not guarantee visitors.

Use your skills around blogging, content marketing, social media, SEO and lead capture to help your clients get a return on their investment and they’ll be singing your praises to all of their friends and colleagues.

I can’t stress this enough. Go above and beyond what you think is required and delight your clients with your expertise, helpfulness and service. It’s the best way to make sure they refer more clients you can send to your project application form and start the entire process again.

I hope you’ve found this post helpful and I’d love to hear your thoughts or answer any questions you may have in the comments. Seriously, feel free to ask me anything.