Interview with Mike Hale

Mike Haletwitter dark blue jeans social media icons designed by icons.mysitemyway.com facebook dark blue jeans social media icons designed by icons.mysitemyway.com LinkedIn dark blue jeans social media icons designed by icons.mysitemyway.com Google+ dark blue jeans social media icons designed by icons.mysitemyway.com

Mike will be presenting Content Calendars for WordPress: Tips & Tools on Sunday in the General Interest track

Mike has over 15 years of experience building custom websites and applications for everything from solo entrepreneurs and startups to Fortune 100 companies.

He started working with WordPress in 2010 and specializes in customizing themes, building custom plugins and migrating existing sites to WordPress. Once built, Mike helps his clients market their sites by providing content marketing, SEO and social media management services.

Interview:

Why do you use WordPress?
I started using WordPress so that I didn’t have to build basic CMS functions for every website I built. I also like the availability of plugins to do most tasks. The amount of information shared by other developers also makes it easy to learn how to extend WordPress when you need additional functionality.

What would you say to convince someone to attend a WordCamp?
The sessions are very informative, and given by speakers that actually work in WordPress every day. The chance to meet and network with other WordPress enthusiasts, users, designers and developers all willing to share their thoughts and help each other is unlike anything else! And, of course, the after parties!

What is your favorite WordPress project you have worked on recently?
I recently published by first plugin to the WordPress Plugin. “Genesis Footer Links Nofollow” is a simple little plugin that marks links in the site footer as “nofollow” for Genesis Framework sites.

I know this isn’t something amazing, but after building a lot of client-specific plugins it was important for me to write something that could be used by anyone and learn more about the plugin creation & publishing process.

https://wordpress.org/plugins/genesis-footer-links-nofollow/

Do you have any advice for someone looking to start or grow a WordPress based business?
If you’re a designer, learn a bit more about development, and vice versa. Understanding how the code and design work together will help your clients in the long run. Also, try to pick a niche market to serve.

It’s hard to say no to projects in the beginning, but don’t short-change the value of your services too much. Building a portfolio is important, but you also have to pay the bills!

What is your favorite WordPress-related resource?
The Developer community, and the willingness of people to share information about how to do many different things with WordPress. There’s so many Podcasts, blogs and forums dedicated to WordPress it’s hard to pick any in particular.

Tell us something awesome about yourself that is not WordPress related
One of my hobbies is puppetry. I’ve made puppet parody videos that have gathered over 1.75 million views on YouTube. I’m toying with the idea of having a puppet-based web series depicting the life of a WordPress developer!