Sander de Wijs - Wordpress Designer

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• Sander de Wijs
• Wordpress Designer 

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Sander de Wijs
Sander de Wijs is an expert in web design and
also experienced in psychology. What does
psychology have to do with being an IT freelancer
you might ask? Well, our freelancer of the week
explains it this way it really is all about
triggering the desired human behavior, no matter
if in psychotherapy, marketing or web design.
Want to hear how else he explains why it is a
perfect combination? Then read on...
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Sander de Wijs

• 1) First off, can you tell us a bit about
  yourself?
• My name is Sander de Wijs, _at_sanderdewijs on
  Twitter, and I live in Voorst in the beautiful
  countryside of the Netherlands. This is also the
  location of my office and provides a great amount
  of inspiration in my work. My main job is
  designing and developing great looking and
  functional websites. Besides this I also enjoy
  writing content and help clients to effectively
  market their website on Social Media. I started
  working as a freelancer in 2012.

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Sander de Wijs

• 2) If you would search for your profile on
  Google, which are the three keywords you would
  type in the search bar?
• If I had to describe myself in a few words it
  would be 'Creative, Hands-on, Full-Stack
  WordPress designer with a unique mix of several
  trades'.

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Sander de Wijs

• 3) What was your inspiration and when did you
  actually decide to become a freelancer?
• I thought about working freelance for a long
  time. The biggest inspiration in actually
  becoming a freelancer is my wife Daisha. She has
  been a freelancer her entire working-life and
  inspired me to take the final step.
• Even though my job as an IT problem solver for
  the Dutch government paid very well, it wasn't
  satisfying. At first I had the idea of helping
  people as a coach or therapist and took classes
  in psychology, human behavior and group dynamics
  for a few years. In 2008 I discovered that I had
  an eye for design and liked creating websites.

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Sander de Wijs

• 3) What was your inspiration and when did you
  actually decide to become a freelancer? (Contd)
• By the time I was ready to quit my job in 2012 I
  already had some experience in web design and CMS
  like Joomla, WordPress and Drupal. At that point
  I decided to make a living out of web design
  instead of psychology.
• After a while I found that web design and
  marketing is really all about triggering the
  desired human behavior. So I could put all that
  psychology to good use after all. Much later I
  read a quote by designer Joe Leech(_at_mrjoe) 'A
  designer who doesn't understand psychology is
  going to be no more successful than an architect
  who doesn't understand physics'. And he is
  absolutely right!

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Sander de Wijs

• 4) What kind of services have your clients asked
  you to provide?
• (Re)Design Most of my clients start out by not
  being satisfied with their website. This can be
  because the website looks outdated or there
  aren't enough conversions. They ask me to
  redesign their website and improve the overall
  performance. To achieve this I make technical
  improvements, create a great looking modern
  design that reflects the clients business and
  rewrite website content to make it more appealing
  to the visitors. And most important the designs
  are all mobile friendly.

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Sander de Wijs

• 4) What kind of services have your clients asked
  you to provide? (Contd)
• Custom WordPress Development Since 2012 I chose
  to specialize in WordPress for website
  development. My experience with WordPress is that
  it's very user friendly and the way it is built
  made sense to me. Because of this specialization
  I now develop custom WordPress themes, add
  functonality and customize plugins. There are
  quite a few clients who love their website
  design, but want to have it rebuilt as a
  responsive WordPress theme. Other clients want to
  have extra functionality built into their current
  WordPress theme.

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Sander de Wijs

• 4) What kind of services have your clients asked
  you to provide? (Contd)
• Content Creation Another service I get asked for
  by clients is content creation. New content is
  increasingly important for improving your
  business ranking in search engines. It's also a
  great way to keep your customers visiting your
  website because you offer them valuable
  information on a regular basis. Most
  entrepreneurs simply don't have the time to write
  new articles for their website so they contact
  me. We have a cup of coffee once a month, the
  client tells me what's going on in the business
  and I write a story about it. After it's finished
  I send it to the client for review and publish it
  on their website.

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Sander de Wijs

• 4) What kind of services have your clients asked
  you to provide? (Contd)
• Marketing and Crowdfunding Last year I received
  a lot of demand to help clients promote their
  websites and services on Social Media. This is a
  similar approach as the content creation. I take
  care of the technical/marketing aspects of the
  Social Media campaigns. I target the best
  audiences, write appealing headlines and publish
  at the best possible times. The client can then
  focus on having the conversation with his/her
  clients on Social Media. This year I took care of
  the Social Media marketing for a Crowdfunding
  campaign that helped raise more than twice the
  goal amount.

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Sander de Wijs

• 5) Do you use other freelancers or companies to
  provide skills that you dont possess?
• I enjoy working with other freelancers, but don't
  do so very often. I have all the skills needed to
  fulfill the demand of my clients. In some cases,
  for example when I wanted to create background
  movie like in PayPal.com for a client, I reach
  out to other freelancers in my network.

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Sander de Wijs

• 6) What about freelancermap.com? Can you tell us
  a little bit about your experience with our
  IT-network?
• Last year I tried several websites to find work
  for remote clients. I like freelancermap because
  it's easy to navigate and search for projects.
  The thing I appreciate most about freelancermap
  is that they're very easy to contact. If I have a
  question I reach out and get a personal reply
  within a day or so. Other remote job websites are
  mostly anonymous and impersonal. At
  freelancermap.com I felt right at home and I'm
  confident it will bring new business.

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Sander de Wijs

• 7) How do you set yourself apart from your
  competitors? What makes you special?
• I have a unique mix of several trades which cover
  both technical and social/psychological aspects
  of design. Web design for WordPress is my
  speciality, using HTML, CSS and Javascript with
  modern tools and standards. I also have a good
  understanding of PHP, writing content and
  understanding human behavior which is essential
  for creating a good User Experience. Last but not
  least I ask the right questions to my clients,
  helping them to determine what is most essential
  for their business and use that in my designs.

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Sander de Wijs

• 8) What are the top three books, blogs or
  magazines you read to stay up to date in the
  IT-market?
• My favorite website for keeping my skills
  up-to-date is www.teamtreehouse.com. They also
  have a great blog.
• For future trends in web design, coding and IT I
  check www.readwrite.com a few times a week.
• My favorite book is 'You're my favorite client'
  by Mike Monteiro. This is a must for freelancers
  working with clients directly (and it's a fun
  read). Mike also gave a brillant talk '13 Ways
  Designers Screw Up Client Presentations' on
  Generate NYC in New York.

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Sander de Wijs

• 9) Freestyle! Is there anything you would like to
  tell our readers?
• The most important skill I learned while
  freelancing is selling something without trying
  to sell it. I focus on learning about the
  clients problem that needs to be solved, and
  showing how I can help. It makes them feel at
  ease and establishes a base of trust. And if a
  client doesn't need my help at that time, he/she
  will remember the nice conversation. Making it
  easier to them contact me in the future. And they
  do so regularly.

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Sander de Wijs

• 9) Freestyle! Is there anything you would like to
  tell our readers? (Contd)
• The other thing I learned while freelancing is to
  never compete on my fee. There's always somebody
  out there who will work for less money. If you
  have a profession you have invested a lot of time
  and money to get where you are now. So let your
  fee reflect all that invested money, time and
  experience. And use that to convince the client
  that they will be better off with you in the long
  term. This way you will still love your job ten
  years from now.

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