Five Secrets to Becoming Self-Employed

I sat down to work on my running list I started yesterday, but it turned into something totally different. Thank goodness the other list is still running, though, because my poor knees are telling me “NO running.” Bill and I went out for our first walk yesterday, the first, we thought, of many. I told him to put his running shoes on early, because we were hitting the pavement at 6:45 sharp after the bus pulled away. Wouldn’t you know, my knees have revolted against living in a two-story house that sits on a basement, and they are telling me no running is allowed. Not even walking up and down the hills. So how am I supposed to stay in shape?

I’m not complaining about my house, though. I love my house. I love it almost as much as I love my free lifestyle of working for myself and having hubby at home to help me with work and help me with the house. I’ve heard the neighbors wonder out loud how we could live this way–home all the time. I sensed a little bit of jealousy from one who couldn’t quite figure out how neither of us ever seem to go to work. I’m still grinning pretty big about it, because it is quite the dream come true. I still don’t know how we managed to take the leap of faith required to get here, but we’re sure as heck enjoying it. Bill talks to friends “back home” occasionally who ask if he has found a job yet. A job? Who’s looking? He says. We jest, but he is full-time handyman right now. And part-time website updater and marketing assistant. We have our hands quite full of job and house. But there is still plenty of time for swinging a golf club in the backyard midday or galavanting around town together looking for kitchen cabinet stain or having lunch at Edgar’s bakery.

Did you know that there are places in the world you can actually EAT OUTSIDE?!? Birmingham is one of them. You can eat lunch in the middle of the day in September, and be completely comfortable with the temperature, and the wind does not blow your entire plate of food off the balcony. Unbelievable. That balcony we ate on is sitting above Main Street. Main Street, which I think is in Hoover? is this fantabulous little shopping area with restaurants and salons and boutiques, and a couple of open storefronts for lease that are just begging me to hang an awning with my logo on it. One day, I told Bill, we will make so much money, we will HAVE to open a storefront so we don’t have to give so much money to the gubmint. But, that’s probably a long time from now. For now, we’ll be happy to just pay the bills.

And, in case you’re wondering, (and I know there are lots of wondering minds who’d like to know), there are some secrets to being able to quit your full-time job and venture into the world of self-employment. I’m not getting too personal here, but I think there are some important factors that have helped us get to this point, and maybe they could be helpful to others. None of them are earth-shattering or new. The most important ones are age-old principles found in God’s word.

1.Live on less than you make. Proverbs tells us that the “borrower is slave to the lender.” So true, so true. He is also a slave to his employer. We admittedly still have ties to our mortgage lender, but other than that, we’re debt free. If you live on less than you make long enough, you’ll eventually have some extra cash laying around to be a safety net should you ever want to stop being a slave. But you don’t want to have to use that safety net.

2. So become an expert at what you love to do, and find a way to make money with it. I won’t claim to be an expert at everything related to building websites, but I have learned how to provide exactly what most small businesses desire when it comes to establishing or refining their online presence. I have spent several years perfecting my business model, and I’ve honed it to the point of being able to have confidence that there are enough businesses out there who need my services and will happily pay my fees to obtain them. Do what you love, then build your business skills until everyone else loves what you do.

3. Set goals and establish ways to measure them. Three years before we went job-free, I set some very specific and measurable goals and wrote them down on paper. Honestly? They were my six-month goals. After three years, I was halfway there. I wasn’t quite ready to leave the nest, but the Lord’s continuous prodding left me flapping my wings and learning to fly, despite what I thought my success indicators showed. If I had never set those goals, though, I wouldn’t have done what it took to reach them, and I wouldn’t have been ready when He said to “Fly.”

4. Don’t be afraid to do a 180 mid-stream. Owning your own business is a constant balancing act of managing supply and demand and figuring out what the market really wants from you. What I thought would work beautifully at first turned out not to be all that great. It worked okay, but I could feel the undertow pulling me in a different direction. I responded to that and changed things up to where they are today at SitesOnMain.com. And I’m still learning the balance. I changed things again after a year of doing business the new way, once I learned what worked and what needed tweaking. Understanding the customer’s needs and balancing that to my needs requires thought and attention. For right now, I think I’ve finally found my sweet spot. But in a few months, I may see that it needs more tweaking. I will do what works best for both me and my clients, in effort to bring the most amount of happiness to everyone in the equation.

5. The biggest thing required for making the leap is faith in God. Don’t be doing anything crazy if you’re not prepared and/or He hasn’t instructed you to in terms you feel very confident about. Bill and I prayed for many months, really years, for direction in our lives about our decision. We sought lots of wise counsel, we immersed ourselves daily in His word, we prayed and we prayed some more. We knew He was calling us to something different, even though He really didn’t share with us all of His details. (Not even some of the important ones.) When we couldn’t see His plan, we did what we knew we were given to do, and we built on the foundation of the business goals we had set years before. Years of daily, weekly, and monthly goal-setting and preparation, flexibility of adapting to market trends, and lots of head-banging hard work at the computer laid a firm foundation on which we laid our faith and prayers as God urged us to take the next step.

When I started making websites, it was merely experimental and driven by boredom. I had no idea God would use it to be the springboard that launched my entire family into a new phase of life in a state none of us has ever lived. There is no telling where God may lead my children because of our lives here, or even where He will lead me and Bill. Every day is up for grabs; we are totally dependent on what He has for us. If He turns the tide and tells us to do another 180, than that is what we will do. For now we are relishing in the peace and delight of the departure from the 9 to 5. Roll Tide.

Spring for a Fresh New Website

Hi there and hello from my home office! When I gaze outside at the red tips and see the crepe myrtles trying to sneak out some leaves, I’m reminded that despite the cold weather that has returned, spring is still here! Since it’s time for spring cleaning, spring planting, and all other things spring, I’d say it’s time to spring for a new website!

Recent Websites by Main Street Studio

The last few months have found me very busy here in the studio, and I’ve even trained my handsome husband on website setups to help me stay ahead of the game. If you check out my work website, SitesOnMain.com, you’ll find a series of posts that I’m rolling out over the next few days that show the websites we’ve launched over the past few months. I’m sorry to say that I seldom keep up with my work and personal blogging, but I am aiming to do a better job at that.

Main Street Studio

You will also find that I’ve changed the name of my company slightly. I have to be honest, though, and tell you that I’m not exactly sure if it’s going to stay that same name. We’re considering some lofty goals here in the studio, and we’re trying to determine the best name for the company that encompasses all that we want to do. “Main Street Studio” leaves the door open for more than just “web development”, but I just don’t know at this point.

I thought I’d share with you a few of the sites we’ve built lately, and then I want to tell you about our new line of websites we offer.

Perhaps the site I identify with the most is ReannaLily Designs. Jen Eskridge, a pattern and quilt designer (and now author!), hired us to give her tired site an overhaul. I didn’t take a “before” screenshot, but I think you’ll enjoy her new e-commerce site! I got a little carried away visiting her links and reading her blog, and the whole project resulted in a sewing spree of my own. And not only that, but her referral at a quilting forum brought in Dena Mehling of Trail Ridge Design, LLC, my very first out-of-state client who was a complete stranger. Dena and I are in the process of building out her e-commerce site. If you visit it now, you’ll see the before in action.

Some of our other projects:

Studio One Altus
AAA Portable Toilets of Altus
Underground Construction Equipment
Kincannon Funeral Home
Mark Me Paid
McMahan & Vernon Attorneys at Law
and some others we can’t officially tell you about.

Entrepreneur Websites

And then I have one other bit of news I mentioned earlier. We are now offering Entrepreneur Websites, specially designed to accommodate the needs of starter businesses that want an affordable website that packs a professional punch. Now, to be frank, I believe our Small Business Websites are still in the entrepreneur price range. But for those that need an even lower start-up cost, we’ve opened up a new option with the Entrepreneur Websites. With the basic entrepreneur template, we customize the background with a color or image and make the menu bar match. Then we can design a custom header or use one that you create.

As always, Main Street Studio is available to customize your website to the hilt. If you desire a fully custom built solution, we can do that for you. But in this economy, we’re finding that people would rather save their dollars where they can, and we are aiming to provide the same professional websites to those who want to maximize their advertising budgets.

WE Inspire Conference

On March 30th, Main Street Web Development attended the first annual Women Entrepreneurs Inspire Conference in Oklahoma City. With a goal of 400 attendees, the Oklahoma State University Riata Center for Entrepreneurship outdid themselves with an attendance of over 650 women entrepreneurs! Talk about exciting!! I’m here to tell you that the future of America was sitting all in one room that Tuesday. I’ve been to lots of conferences in my various fields of study, and I’ve never been to a more motivating venue.

The conference was not full of hype and marketing hogwash that fills the typical marketing conference, however. It was real women telling real stories of how they rose from average to extraordinary in their careers. It was real women sitting around me living the true American dream of creating their own jobs and jobs for other people out of their sheer determination and persistence.

Listen to this line up of some of the main speakers:

Shannon Carter, who launched Crayons to Computers, a free school supply store for teachers that is now found in 41 cities around the country
Cordia Harrington, “The Bun Lady”, founder, CEO, and president of the Tennessee Bun Company, who supplies buns to national chains such as McDonald’s, Chili’s, and Pepperidge Farm. She also founded several other hugely thriving companies.
Maxine Clark, founder of Build-A-Bear WorkshopÂ® and winner of many, many prestigious awards
Dian Stai, founder of Owen Healthcare, and perhaps my favorite speaker of all, for her bravery to take her company forward when all the odds were against her

Both of the breakout sessions I attended were led by Dr. Michael Morris, the N. Malone Mitchell Chair in Entrepreneurship at OSU and head of the new School of Entrepreneurship at OSU. Dr. Morris taught sessions on “Guerilla Marketing: Radical Thinking is the Key” and “Types of Ventures and Types of Entrepreneurs: Knowing Where You are Going”. Both of these sessions gave me valuable insight into my own goals and plans and how I can best go about accomplishing them.

Attending the WE Inspire conference gave me a new appreciation for networking. I’ve always believed in networking–establishing relationships with people outside of my usual circles for our mutual benefit and future potential. But I’ve never before realized so much potential in once place for women that I truly need to have in my life both now and in the future. I met people like Emily Ginn, a virtual assistant, who I might need to call on for administrative work in the future; Amy Morgan, a corporate training consultant and fellow web designer, with whom I am discussing business processes with; Jami Cervantes, a health insurance representative, who gave me some very valuable advice about health insurance for small business owners; Shea Alexander, an artist, designer, and crafter who is starting her own business sewing handmade items. And the list goes on. When I signed up for the conference, I thought I was signing up for good conference speakers and a chance to market my product. I had no idea I would walk away with relationships I intend to keep for the rest of my life.

My friends and fellow entrepreneurs Christa Murphy, Jenni McCadams, and Cara Perez joined me as I set up a table for the Networking Reception. I seriously could not have done this without them. We joked on the way there: “Main Street Web Development. Have awning, will travel.” Bill designed and built an awning frame for the event, and I designed a pattern and sewed the canopy for it. It was a marvelously fun project, and it really made the table look more look like a little storefront. MSWD is not located on Main Street, but the clients we are aiming to reach are those small businesses that are typically located on Main Street in any Smalltown, U.S.A. We want to give small businesses a chance to have great-looking websites in a price-range they can afford. But I digress. At our booth, we had the 24” iMac scrolling through our portfolio and theme gallery, and it garnered lots of attention from passersby, as did the FREE WEBSITE GIVEAWAY we offered for those who gave us their contact information. Very few people turned down the opportunity to win a free website. We even gave extra chances to win for those who did homework, like becoming a fan on Facebook, linking to our website, etc.

And that brings me to the original point of this article–the WINNER. Join me in congratulating Mary Jane Maness, a Broker with Heartland Realty & Consulting, LLC. Mary Jane is a delightful lady, and she does NOT have a website at all, so we are absolutely thrilled to give her the opportunity to get a free website for a whole year. What a great way to start the spring! Thank you to everyone who participated in the contest.

The WE Inspire Conference was a very profitable and enjoyable event, and we at Main Street Web Development look forward to next year’s event. If you live in Oklahoma and aspire to be an entrepreneur, you definitely won’t want to miss it.

In the News

Main Street Web Development was featured in the first edition of The Altus Aviator today. Here’s what The Aviator had to say:

McKelvey offers affordable websites

“The DigiFix Web Design Studio, the answer for Altus businesses seeking affordable internet presence, has just made personal web design even more inexpensive.

“Heather McKelvey, founder and executive director, says the web sites are easy to use and easy to find. She is announcing her latest endeavor, Main Street Web Development, where websites can be created for less than $30 a month.

“‘I basically offer a broad range of services, from affordable theme-based websites to high-end custom designed websites,’ said McKelvey.

“‘The websites have everything from e-commerce to real estate listings and everything in between,’ continued McKelvey.

“The Digifix offers an Identity and Branding package as well. With the package, the customer receives a logo and stationary visually consistent with the website. ‘Once the website is complete, we hand you your business cards, letterheads and envelopes right along with your website,’ McKelvey said.

“Some of the local websites McKelvey has designed include:

enchanteddoorgifts.com
altuschristian.org
gallagherorthopedics.com
fbcaltus.org
discoveraltus.com

“More information is available at sitesonmain.com, thedigifix.com or you can email info@sitesonmain.com or info@thedigifix.com or call 580-471-1745.”

Now how’s that for kicking off a new product launch?

Introducing Main Street Web Development

Cheap websites are a dime a dozen. There are plenty of places on the web you can go to get a website for just a few bucks a month. Problem is, they’re kind of ugly. And if, indeed, you do happen across one that really looks great, you have to do it yourself! Now for do-it-yourself kind of folks, this is a good proposition. But for those of you who don’t want any website DIY in your life, you’re kind of up a creek if you don’t want to make the initial investment a custom website requires.

With my home-based custom web business, The DigiFix Web Design Studio, I have realized this conundrum for quite some time, and I’ve been working on a solution that acts like a “crossover” website. With our new line of websites at Main Street Web Development, we are taking the affordable price of a DIY website, the fabulous creativity of a custom website, and DOING IT FOR YOU, to bridge that gap between what you want and what you can afford.

Getting a website has never been easier! First of all, we schedule a Setup Session with you. In this Setup Session, we meet you where you are to discuss all of the features you want in your website. If you don’t happen to live in the Southwest Oklahoma/North Texas area, we can even have our Setup Session by phone, email, or webmeeting. We help you select an available domain name, and we ask you the right questions to find out just what information you want to include. Then we help you choose a pre-designed theme that gives you just the look you want. And that’s all you have to do! Once we get back to the studio, we set up your website, professionally write your content, and give you a call when it’s ready to view.

For all of this personal, one-on-one service, you’d expect a high price tag. But our $99.95 setup fee is all you pay to have your own personal web consultant at your beckon call. We have month-to-month subscription plans, so you can choose the plan that works best for you and upgrade, downgrade, or cancel at any time. There is no commitment required. Prices this low make it affordable to have a website for yourself and your business.

And one more thing–we’re always glad to update your website for you. Our Upgrade Plan comes with three updates a month. But if you want to save some money and update it yourself, you’ll find the control panel extremely easy to use, and we’ll gladly show you how to use it up close and in person.

Help us spread the word about Main Street Web Development! Every business needs a website, and now it’s even easier than ever to get one.

Working from Home

Last night I let the kids stay up late coloring at the coffee table while I sat on the couch proofing my latest web project. Most of my work I do after they go to bed, but on this Christmas vacation schedule, we’re not so pressed to get them to bed at a reasonable hour. When they’re occupied every now and then, I’ll pick up the computer and do a little work.

After a few minutes of my chatting, working, coloring, working, watching a video online, then working some more, Will was curious about my work. “Mom,” he asked, “do you have to do that?”

“Well…no, I don’t have to. But I make money when I do,” I answered.

“How do you make money when nobody sees you do it?” he asked.

I could just see his little wheels turning, trying to process how Daddy has to leave the house to go to work, but Mommy can just sit around and “play” on the computer and still earn a paycheck. I explained to him that people could see the work that I do on their own computers. He totally got that, because he likes to play games online himself.

It is really, really cool to be able to work from home on a freelance schedule. I would imagine that there are lots of folks out there that would love to be able to earn income whenever they want to just by sitting down to the computer. It does have it’s cons, though. Not all of the work I do produces income, and none of it is steady. I can’t budget from my job or rely on it, because I maintain it at an arm’s length. I do that on purpose, because managing my household is my main priority, and I choose to spend my daylight hours with my children and other household duties rather than working. That means that any down time I have in the late evenings takes away from my work hours. That’s okay, though. I could change the way I work at any time, but I really like treating it as a bonus. It’s something that fills in the gaps of my schedule and allows me to earn extra income when I really need it, without causing me undue stress and grief in order to get everything done.

The pros of my job? I LOVE it. (Except for the mundane tasks, of which there are plenty.) I only do it when I want to. When the kids are out of school, I get to sleep late and stay home with them, and it doesn’t interfere with my work schedule. In fact, it helps it, since I can stay up later. I can do my work from anywhere, and I usually do a little while on vacation. (That’s a con too.) And most of all, the sky is the limit on what I could do with it. Given enough time, creativity, and elbow grease, I could earn a small fortune. I probably never will, at least not while the kids are little, but the potential is there. And that dream in itself is reason enough to keep me going.

The DigiFix Web Design Studio

I want to introduce you to my new company, The DigiFix Web Design Studio. I have been dreaming and planning for nearly two years about starting this company, and after much ado, the time has finally come to launch The DigiFix.

Over the past few years of designing websites freelance for various clients, I have come to realize the vast need for affordable, yet beautiful web solutions. So many small businesses and individuals truly desire to have a great-looking, easy-to-use websites, but they just can’t justify spending what it takes to get an elite design agency to do it for them. And let’s face it–those inexpensive build-it-yourself web companies can still be overwhelming, and finding one you can trust that has good-looking templates takes a whole lot of effort. There seems to be no middle ground.

My vision for The DigiFix is to provide an EASY way for people to get FABULOUS websites with personal, first class service, without spending their life’s savings. I’ve created a process that I believe can do just that. You can read more about it at www.thedigifix.com.

As many of you know, web and graphic design was not my major in college. It’s just something I have fallen in love with since moving out to the western plains of Oklahoma. I’ve always dreamed of turning my favorite hobby into my dream job, and it seems as though that is quite what is happening. I have felt God’s hand in this journey from the very beginning, over four years ago. On my first week of business, I started out meeting with two clients and getting the ball rolling for their websites. The business is really taking off fast, and I can’t wait to see where the Lord leads from here.

The Nightly Collapse

I did it again. I do it every night. And every night I try to talk myself out of it. In four brief seconds from the time I close the kids’ bedroom door to the time I round the corner and reach the guest bed, I manage an entire conversation with myself arguing for and against the urge to collapse on the bed.

The conversation goes something like this: “Do NOT lie down on the bed. You have WAY too much to do.” “But I have to. I’m SOOO tired. Who cares anyway? This is ridiculous. Nobody in their right mind would be working these kind of hours.” “You have to get to work. You’ve already outlined tonight’s work for Client X. If you don’t do it tonight, you’ll start out tomorrow behind.” “Client X doesn’t care anyway. What’s one more day?” “Fine, lie down then. Just do it. Then see how you feel.”

And I almost always feel worse. Then I lie there and continue the conversation with myself about which housekeeping chores can wait ‘til tomorrow and which ones I will hate myself for leaving undone. If I am really on top of things, I will have already picked up the living room disaster, cleaned the kitchen, and folded the laundry. But unfortunately, that day would be an exception to the rule.

At just 7:30pm, or sometimes as late as 8:30, I already feel as though I’ve been hit by a train. By the time I get the kids in the bed to stay, I’m too tired to think about anything, much less do anything. So when I see the big white bed calling, I just cannot resist the urge to lie down. It doesn’t help that it is two feet away from the computer desk. I almost always intend to sit down in the desk chair, but I seldom actually make it that far. Two feet is a lot to ask after all that I go through in a day’s time.

But on the average night, I talk myself into getting up, fixing a cup of hot chocolate or tea, and settling down to a nice evening of computer radiation. And I’m always glad I did. The late night work really keeps me going. And indeed the very occasion to choose whether or not I work is a blessing in and of itself. I mean, really. I don’t have to do any of this. My clients don’t mind waiting for me. (If they did, they wouldn’t hire me in the first place.) I could just sit and watch TV if I really wanted to. Or not.