Our guest this week is Tomaz Zaman from Codeable and he joins us all the way from Slovenia. In this episode you will learn: how to write the perfect brief for a WordPress developer: why it’s important to have an opinion: and what to do with the money when you raise funding.
Tomaz has kindly sponsored a $200 voucher to get your WordPress work done at Codeable. Just tell us the number one request you get for a “tweak” from clients with existing websites.
"Congratulations Dee Harrison! Tomaz Zaman has chosen you as the lucky winner of the competition! Thanks for your contribution and keep elevating!" (October 2014).
Some of the highlights of this episode include:
Elevation Round Answers
Here are the answers to the questions in our Elevation round. Watch the interview to get the full scoop.
You can reach out and thank Tomaz Zaman on @tomazzaman and [email protected].
Tomaz suggested I interview Adii Pienaar ex-WooThemes and now Receiptful, Adii keep your eyes on your inbox.
Hint: to enter the competition, leave a comment below and tell us the number one most common request you get from clients with existing websites.
28 Responses
I really enjoyed this interview. Thank you both 🙂
I really enjoyed this interview. Thank you both 🙂
A great interview and a pleasure to meet Tomaz. I’m ashamed to say I hadn’t come across Codeable before but am very happy to have found them now. For owners of existing sites and their change requests I have two frequent requests 1. To make the site mobile friendly (for older sites built on non-responsive themes) and 2. To change up the layout of the home page to keep up with modern styling. And if Tomaz is ever in the UK he should get in touch and I will give him a flying lesson 🙂
I offer WordPress subscriptions using WP premium themes. Personally my biggest frustration is how theme developers and custom theme developers (still) don’t use the build in WP image functionality. Why is it still that so many theme still use TimThumbs while WP has a perfect working functionality for generating theme images? And the exaggerated use of javascript for unnecessary and distracting frills is beyond me: (WP) developers should know by now that Google punishes slow loading sites. That being said, I’m definitely also going to check Codeable!
Oh, and I guess our number 1 tweak is: Make the theme faster!
Really great interview. Yes brief writing is an art form and important. Tomaz was just a great guest and gave totally straight answers to Troy questions.100% WPElevation at it best.
Really great interview. Yes brief writing is an art form and important. Tomaz was just a great guest and gave totally straight answers to Troy questions.100% WPElevation at it best.
One of the most common things I get asked for after
completing a WordPress install is ‘Can you come and train us up on how to use
it?’.
This can often mean me travelling to their office or meeting
somewhere to present a slide-show of basic how-to’s.
But, just lately I have introduced a feature where they can
go to a page on their site which houses videos for them that are updated each
time WordPress gets updated so they are always up to speed with the technology.
The good thing is that I can remove any videos that I don’t
want them to see, like heavy admin stuff, for example.
Thank you for the latest podcast … top quality information,
as always.
I’m currently on the WP Elevation Masterclass where I keep getting
over excited about this business and having to calm myself down after each
video so that I can focus on the next one … at last, someone understand what we
Wordpress consultants are going through.
This is a top-notch course that I highly recommend to all those serious
about ‘Wordpress selling’ to invest in.
Dee, thanks for your suggestions about our landing page, I could not agree more and we’re already taking steps both to become mobile friendlier and to modernize it a bit.
Definitely going to take you up on your offer on the flying lesson 😀
Hey Martyn,
Thanks for the kind words about the WP Elevation Masterclass. I’m really glad you’re getting something out of it.
I’m curious is that the Video User Manauls plug-in you are using to train your clients?
Thanks for the kind words Jonathan.
Hey Tomaz, I think Dee was suggesting that the two most common requests she gets from clients with existing sites is to make them mobile friendly and change the layout of their homepage. If I’m not mistaken I think this is her entry into the competition 🙂
Ah lol of course 🙂
Well if I have identified our problems with her comment in an instant, I guess these issues are indeed very common these days 🙂
The plugin is called ‘Integrated Video Tutorials’ from http://www.wpmudev.org which I joined as they supply premium plugins and help with anything technical with WordPress. I got so frustrated when I kept getting stuck on technical issues and so these guys fix it in minutes after posting your issue.
I really need to learn more about the code that builds WordPress sites, yes, I can build them point n click but if I just learned a little coding, I’d be able to get around so many customer issues. Still, we can’t do everything, I suppose 🙂
Enjoying WPElevation podcasts on Stitcher. Thank you, Tomaz for being so honest and forthright. Thank you, Troy for not cutting his answers short. I really enjoyed this podcast and, sad to say, had not heard of Codeable, but it’s going to very helpful for this consultant.
The number one request I get is for explanations about SEO. I teach WordPress how-to classes and so most of the Dashboard questions go away, but SEO and all its nuances keeps us hopping. Thanks and Keep Elevating!
Enjoying WPElevation podcasts on Stitcher. Thank you, Tomaz for being so honest and forthright. Thank you, Troy for not cutting his answers short. I really enjoyed this podcast and, sad to say, had not heard of Codeable, but it’s going to very helpful for this consultant.
The number one request I get is for explanations about SEO. I teach WordPress how-to classes and so most of the Dashboard questions go away, but SEO and all its nuances keeps us hopping. Thanks and Keep Elevating!
You’re more than welcome, Val, thank you for taking your time to watch it! 🙂
Awesome show. Does codeable offer services to agencies or direct to the website owner only?
Really inciteful interview, thanks Tomaz for sharing. The most common request I get from existing clients is “Now can you show me how to get to No 1 on Google?”. I think, what they really mean, though, is, how to get more leads or business from the website. Of course, some do want to be no.1 on Google simply for vanity purposes!
I can’t help but like both Per and Tomaz. They’re both genuine, down to earth guys and I would go out of my way to buy them both a beer.
I appreciate the transparency in your interview Tomaz and love the transcripts, Troy.
Onwards and upwards – here’s to your continued success.
Thanks for the kind words Claff.
Oh yes – we know that plugin well. They copied it from our very own Video User Manuals (http://www.videousermanuals.com) 🙂
Hope to see you soon, mate!
Thanks Chris, we offer services to agencies too, in fact, we have quite a number of them using Codeable to extend their manpower when needed.
Thanks Alex – looking forward to that beer, I’m sure we’ll meet sometime in the future 🙂
Sounds great Tomaz. I will keep Codeable in mind
Tomaz and Troy, this was a great interview. I was pretty excited to hear Tomaz is Slovenian. As a 3rd generation Slovenian-American, it always gives me a great sense of pride to stumble across anything related to my family’s home country. On this note, might I suggest Tina Maze as your next guest? 🙂
Second, as a long-time user of oDesk, and always on the lookout for something better, I appreciate now having you on my radar and look forward to trying the service.
As for #1 requested client tweak (that is not related to SEO), without a doubt it’s tweaking contact forms. The most used plugins out there require various depths of CSS adjusting that clients just can’t handle on their own. Cheers!
Really great job on this interview Troy and Tomaž.
“First, Codeable is not a corporation. We’re not big. When we joke about
ourselves, we say we’re just a couple of humble guys from the mountains.
We behave person to person.”
So many really truthful comments in this interview. Totally right about that work/life balance too.. keep jumping out of planes Tomaž. Cheers – Raleigh