{"id":50055,"date":"2026-03-25T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-25T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/?p=50055"},"modified":"2026-03-25T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T12:00:00","slug":"heropress-an-eighth-graders-dream-comes-true","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/?p=50055","title":{"rendered":"HeroPress: An Eighth Grader\u2019s Dream Comes True"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Pull Quote: The sense of community and belonging was strong.\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" height=\"512\" src=\"https:\/\/heropress.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/032426.webp\" width=\"1024\"><\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-audio\"><audio controls=\"controls\" src=\"https:\/\/heropress.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/ray_mitchell_heropress.mp3\" preload=\"none\"><\/audio><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Here is Ray reading his own essay aloud.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>When I was in eighth grade, I wanted to be a commercial artist. It wasn\u2019t common thinking at the time (and for some it still isn\u2019t) for art or design to be considered a practical career path. The thinking was, within art there was fine art for the people who could really paint or draw, and commercial art for people whose skills were passable; neither of which would lead to a comfortable lifestyle.<\/p>\n<p>I was just OK and never would be a fine painter, I was good enough at design for screen-printing and designing the posters and programs for the Jr. High fashion show or laying out the school newspaper. I liked it a lot, though I eventually pursued other career aspirations.<\/p>\n<p>I start the story this way because later in life, WordPress gave me the opportunity to have the career I wanted when I was 14.<\/p>\n<p>Today I run Made for You Media, a well-respected digital marketing agency specializing in WordPress for local businesses, but the path here took many turns and had many ups and downs.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How I Got Here<\/h2>\n<p>After attending college, the path I found myself on led me far from the world of art. I spent time working in a chemistry lab, in retail, then eventually to financial services. I spent almost twenty years working for the \u201cDon\u2019t leave home without it\u201d credit card company, serving international markets in Asia and Latin America. During a stint in Canada, my wife grew tired of being away from family. With news that we would soon have a grandchild on the way, we started the process to move back home.<\/p>\n<p>I knew that I wanted my own business. I planned to start a company to coach small business owners on how to build productive, high-functioning teams. Even though the dot.com bubble was long gone, I knew that even for a small, local company, I would need a good website.<\/p>\n<p>While closing out my days working in Canada, I would get home from the office around 7:30 in the evening, get something to eat, then from 9PM to about 1 or 2 in the morning, work on building, or trying to learn how to build, a business website. I repeated this routine for weeks until I had something professional looking.<\/p>\n<p>I hand-coded this first website in 2009 and it received lots of complements. However, as good as it looked on the outside, it seemed that things were always breaking under the hood. I had heard about \u201cthis WordPress thing\u201d and started looking into it. I recreated my HTML site using the \u201ctheme that cannot be mentioned\u2013but had great typography\u201d and haven\u2019t looked back.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Pivoting To WordPress<\/h2>\n<p>Ultimately, the coaching business I built that initial website for failed, but what I learned in building my first WordPress site enabled me to start building websites for other people. During the autumn of 2010, I built my first site for a paying client. It took me forever, but I got it launched. After building a few sites I needed to learn more than what I could on my own at the University of Google. I started attending WordCamps.<\/p>\n<p>WordCamp Raleigh was the first WordCamp I attended, and it was a great experience. In WordPress, we often talk about \u201cthe WordPress community\u201d and that\u2019s what it was. The same people whose blog posts I read were there in person. Experts, people who in my mind were the stars of the WordPress galaxy, were there, talking, teaching, and sharing with regular people like me. We ate barbecue, joked, and laughed together just like at a family or school reunion. The sense of community and belonging was strong, and something I still cherish.<\/p>\n<p>I got hooked on WordPress through <a href=\"https:\/\/profiles.wordpress.org\/chrisjean\/\">Chris Jean<\/a>\u2018s exuberant enthusiasm in talking about \u201cthe loop\u201d and his new plugin. I bought the plugin even though at the time I didn\u2019t understand what the loop was, I just knew from his excitement it had to be good. At another WordCamp <a href=\"https:\/\/profiles.wordpress.org\/sabreuse\/\">Amy Hendrix<\/a> talked about how important it was to contribute back to WordPress, and she sunk the hook deeper. Over time, I went from attending WordCamp, to folding up chairs at the end of the day, to filming other people\u2019s presentations, to delivering my own. I\u2019ve since had the opportunity to speak at several WordCamps including a couple of times at WCUS.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What We\u2019ve Become<\/h2>\n<p>Over the years my company has built many websites using WordPress, mainly supporting local businesses in the US, but also internationally. We\u2019ve been able to serve many non-profit organizations, allowing them to effectively and affordably serve their communities, leveraging the WordPress platform to attract volunteers and donations. I even had the opportunity to write my first book, Magical Websites for Coaches, an instructional text that showcases the power of WordPress.<\/p>\n<p>I point this out because WordPress and the WordPress community enable someone who\u2019s motivated to leverage their experience to start what can become a very profitable business at a very low cost. With the business lessons I\u2019d learned over the years, a domain name and an affordable shared hosting plan (thanks <a href=\"https:\/\/dreamhost.com\/\">Dreamhost<\/a>) and a few business cards, I was able to launch my business. In the process, I\u2019ve had the opportunity to make great friends and build lasting relationships, meet, and learn from some very smart and inspiring people, and after many years, have a successful career \u201cdoing commercial art\u201d full-time at my own company.<\/p>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/heropress.com\/essays\/an-eighth-graders-dream-comes-true\/\">An Eighth Grader\u2019s Dream Comes True<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/heropress.com\/\">HeroPress<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here is Ray reading his own essay aloud. When I was in eighth grade, I wanted to be a commercial artist. It wasn\u2019t common thinking at the time (and for some it still isn\u2019t) for art or design to be considered a practical career path. The thinking was, within art there was fine art for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50056,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50055","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=50055"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50055\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/50056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=50055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=50055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailysutoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=50055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}