From freelancer to high-end web designer for builders: my entrepreneurial journey
Reflecting on the last year was hard enough, let alone looking back 4-5 years!
To be honest, I have a really hard time reflecting on how far I’ve come. I’m always pushing forward. On to the next goal, the next learning opportunity, the next growth step.
And I’ve noticed that when I do that, it’s really easy to get discouraged. I’m only looking at what’s in front of me and not the mountain I’ve already trekked that got me to where I am.
It’s so easy to do as a business owner — to only look ahead and not take the time to appreciate how far you’ve come.
This year I’m going into my 5th year of owning my website design business and I’m excited to say that the last four years has set me up to have a killer year in 2023.
No matter what industry you’re in, the first few years of owning your own business is rough. It’s going through the growing pains of figuring out how to best market yourself, putting together an efficient process for working with clients, hiring employees, figuring out what to invest in, learning how to work smarter by utilizing better systems…it’s a lot to juggle. Not to mention a huge learning curve.
My business coach encouraged me to reflect on my growth to really appreciate where I am today. So that’s what I’m going to do!
For anyone reading this, I hope my story of entrepreneurship might encourage you on your own path! Especially if you’re not happy with what you’re currently doing — it’s never too late to pivot or become an expert in the field you’re most interested in!
How I became a successful high-end website designer for builders and remodelers in less than 5 years
2011-2013 Did you know I was actually a music major?
I graduated high school in 2011 and ran off to the great white north. Fargo, North Dakota to be specific. (Crazy, right? And yes it was freezing cold. I honestly don’t know how I survived it.)
But I never had plans to go to school for computer science, business, or anything remotely related to web design and development.
My passion has always been music!
I had played violin all throughout middle school and high school, but I really loved singing. I was your typical choir geek. There was no doubt in my mind I wanted to go into a career in music. But I needed that career to have a good job outlook. Unfortunately, being a music teacher wasn’t the best route — just wouldn’t be enough jobs out of school.
I decided I wanted to go into the growing field of music therapy! I was doing what I loved and excited for the path I was on.
After a year in Fargo, I transferred to yet another frigid town and attended the University of Minnesota - Duluth. U of M had the music therapy program and I had more friends at that school (a nice perk.)
About halfway through my second year of college, I developed vocal nodules. Basically, those are calluses that form on the vocal chords and it affected my signing voice.
Because of this, I was unable to complete my vocal lessons and classes until they had healed.
I was put on vocal rest and sent to speech therapy.
But me, being a stupid 19 year old, didn’t want to give up screaming at football games, going out with my friends, or talking. (Anyone who knows me couldn’t imagine me shutting up for more than 10 minutes, let alone days at a time.)
2013 - Temporary leave from college
In 2013, I decided to take a year break from college in hopes that my voice would recover and I could go back into the music program.
I went to a 9-month Bible program in Cincinnati, OH and to my excitement, they had a choir.
I joined that choir (the very thing I wasn’t supposed to do if I wanted my voice to recover). But I couldn’t help it. I loved singing and again, I didn’t have the discipline to hold myself back and rest.
At the end of the 2013/14 school year, it was time to go back to college, but (surprise, surprise) my voice was not healed.
I had to pivot my career path and fast.
I’d been in school for 3 years at this point and now had to completely shift majors.
I went into a addiction counseling program. Not for me. Another year gone.
My student debt was piling up and I had to pick a course of action and follow through this time.
After a couple more changes to my major, I finally decided to get a Business degree. I knew I could apply that to just about anything I wanted to do in life, so it made sense to go that route. I decided to continue my college education online, since I was the type of person to move around a lot, and I didn’t want to lose any more credits in transfers.
2015 - Uprooted and moved across country to Washington state
In 2015, I met my husband, who had attended the same Bible program the year after me.
I was head over heels for him and when it was time for him to go back home at the end of the school year, I fit literally all of my belongings in my Chrysler LHS, and drove 2500 miles across the country to his home state of Washington.
There, I continued my online schooling and worked as a server and bartender to make some extra cash.
What I thought would be an easy transition turned out to be the hardest move of my life. I had always been very independent and used to moving around, but I’d never been airplane-ride distance away from my family and friends. I didn’t know anyone out here except my husband’s family.
So there I was, just shy of 23 years old in a completely different part of the country — no family, no friends, no job. I didn’t even have my degree yet. But I was with the man of my dreams and ready to tackle life one step at a time.
2016 - A wedding in Mexico and a “big girl” job
In the fall of 2016, Brandon and I got married in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. He had just taken a job as an electrical apprentice and I was working as a manager at Panera Bread, always on the hunt for a job that could become a career for me.
Shortly after we got married, I was hired to be an account manager for a startup marketing company in Vancouver, WA. I was ELATED!!!
This was my first “big girl” job. I made a salary (oooooh, ahhhh) of around $40,000 but I thought I had made it! I was excited to be doing something other than waitressing and I actually had a lot of fun working there. I was always challenged and learning new skills (like html coding, planning marketing campaigns, managing marketing budgets, and more). My boss was awesome and the environment was a lot of fun.
Things were looking good — Brandon moving up in his trade program and I had just landed a secure, salary job. It wasn’t long after we got married, Brandon and I decided to expand our family.
2017 - Here comes baby
At the end of 2017, I gave birth to our first son, Kai.
When we had our first baby, my boss allowed me to transition to working remotely part time. I loved having that extra time with my son but still getting to keep my career! it was the best of both worlds.
I continued to advance in the company and helped the startup company develop training programs and systems for hiring new employees in the future.
2018 - Here comes baby #2 (and another surprise I wasn’t ready for)
6 months after giving birth to Kai, I graduated from college with a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration and Marketing.
I got my college degree while working full time and in the midst of adapting to new motherhood. Talk about a crazy time…
Finally, after 6 long years, I had a degree and I could close that chapter in my life.
I continued to work semi-remotely for the marketing company and things were going really well for our little family.
I got baby fever not long after Kai was born, but knew unless I was able to be home full time, we couldn’t manage having another baby at that point. My mother-in-law was a saint for watching one child half the week — we weren’t about to throw another one at her.
If I could convince my boss to let me work from home full-time, though, that would be the key to baby #2.
Sure enough, my boss agreed and the baby-making began. (Sorry, TMI.)
Then everything changed.
The day after we got the positive pregnancy test with our second child, I got a call from the marketing company I was working for.
They were going out of business…immediately.
At that time, we needed both of our incomes.
I no longer had a job.
And we had baby #2 on the way…
I began scrambling to find another remote position but no one was hiring for remote work (this was pre-COVID, so not as many work-from-home positions were available as they are today).
In typical Katlyn fashion, I got my butt in gear and got to work. I found a local pizza shop hiring and it was back to waitressing until baby came.
2018 - What the heck, I’ll just start my own business
During that time, a mentor of mine, who owned his own consulting business reached out to me and told me he needed my help managing his social media and redesigning his website.
The social media I could do. But a website? I didn’t know anything about that.
He insisted. “You’re young. You’re smart. And I don’t have time for it. You’ll figure it out.” (In hindsight, he was probably just doing me a favor. But one I appreciated since money was so tight.)
I agreed and began doing some side jobs for him: Social media, redesigning his website, editing and proofreading documents, and other odd jobs he needed help with.
After a few months, and as the birth of our second child was getting closer, he encouraged me to just start my own business.
I’m pretty sure I laughed in his face.
Me? Yeah, I had a business degree but that doesn’t mean anything. My Bachelor’s program in business didn’t teach me how to start or run a business.
But it sounded fun, and really, I had nothing to lose.
I got my business license, put up a simple website with the little skill I had at that time, and marketed business services to small business owners.
Not long after launching my business, I realized something. I hated doing everything EXCEPT web design.
Here’s where the first real shift in my business happened. I stopped focusing on general business or virtual assistant services and threw myself fully into website design. I picked a skillset and ran with it, instead of trying to offer everything to everyone.
Reflection Time: This was the best thing I could’ve done for my business, especially in those early stages. Niching down is critical. You can’t be all things to all people. Pick what you’re really good at and what you really enjoy and become an expert in that thing.
It was in 2019 that I decided to become an actual web designer. I made my first big investment in a website design course. More specifically, a course that taught the skills necessary to run a website design business.
That $800 course (which at the time, was the biggest investment I’d made on anything), changed the direction of my business moving forward.
Not only was I learning how to build websites that actually worked, but I was learning the tools I needed to run my business.
2019 - It’s all or nothing
In July of 2019, my second son was born. It didn’t take long after having him to get right back to working on my business, though. It was something I was excited about and in what little spare time I had, I was burying myself in learning new things and adding to my skillset.
In the fall of 2019, I also signed up for an intense SEO program. A much bigger investment that I needed to convince the husband to let me purchase.
At that point, my business wasn’t bringing in hardly anything. Maybe $500/month from the guy I was doing social media for. It was the early stages and I was just learning as much as I could to build my foundations.
The SEO program was a scary big investment for us.
$6,000 was not money my business had. That was money I needed to come from our family savings. And that ALL that was in our savings…
Looking back, I don’t know how I convinced my husband that it would be worth it. He must have seen my drive, my passion, and that gut feeling that I would get my ROI quickly. Still, he’s not a risk taker and this was uncharted territory. We had two kids under the age of two. Taking that security net of cash and throwing it into my business was a scarier decision for us than deciding to have children!
I looked at Brandon and said “If we do this, we are in this for the long haul. I need you to give me 5 years of hard work, and it’ll be worth it.”
I was at a fork in the road. Either I quit my business or we took this leap and prayed for the best.
To this day I still can’t believe he believed in me so much! He gave me our savings and I ran with it. With that investment, I hit the ground running, soaking in every drop of knowledge I could get from web design and SEO industry professionals. I spent hours each night going through the lessons and learning a new skill set.
Not only was I learning how to design websites, but I was learning how to rank sites on Google to give my customers an even better experience and grow their own businesses online.
Needless to say, 2019 was the year that I invested in my business. We didn’t have much, but everything we had was put into it.
I was not going to let my family down.
2019/2020 - Freelancing and learning as I go
Ah, 2020. The Pandemic.
Thankfully, neither my business nor my husband’s took a hit during the pandemic. I was freelancing on Fiverr to build my portfolio and experience and a lot of people were starting businesses or focusing more on marketing during that time. As an electrician, my husband’s company was kept busy with commercial work and never really had a day off. It was a huge blessing to have our jobs.
In 2020, I was building websites for less than $500 to get experience and build confidence. I was experimenting with different platforms, finding out who I really enjoyed working with, and I built over 50 websites and felt ready to go out on my own.
But I was starting to get burnt out. After the 20% fee Fiverr took for letting me advertise for free on their platform, I wasn’t making much from web work. I was having to juggle multiple designs at one time to make any money. And just like in construction (or any other industry for that matter), when you’re working with people who don’t want to pay for much, they tend to be the most picky, demanding, and exhausting.
I hate to even complain about freelancing, though. I couldn’t just go out the gate charging whatever I wanted when I had ZERO experience. I was really grateful for Fiverr and Upwork to help me build upon my skillset and refine my processes. It taught me a lot about what I want for my business going forward, how I can give my clients a better experience, and overall it was right where I needed to be at that time.
But yeah, I was over it…
By the end of 2020, I went through several changes in my business:
I niched into building websites for the blue-collar and construction industries
I redesigned my website and branding to appeal to my ideal client
I invested in a professional logo and professional photography for my website
I was starting to look more legit and get clear on who I wanted to serve and why.
It was important for me to make web design, SEO, and marketing approachable for everyone. I didn’t want to be like others in the industry who were know-it-alls or made things difficult to understand. And that’s what my clients really appreciated about me…
Hence, the “yes I’m an expert in my field but we can chat about it in normal human terminology over a burger and a beer” photo vibes. ;)
2021 - From freelancer > agency
After over a year of freelancing for dirt cheap, I was ready to really expand my business.
At the time, most of my clients were actually month-to-month SEO clients. That SEO program I invested in paid itself off (and then some) in just a couple of months. I was making good money with my SEO contracts and helping my clients climb to page 1 of Google in their local area. It was a rewarding experience, for sure.
The work though? I hated it.
As a creative at heart, the mundane tasks that are involved in SEO was mind-numbing, super technical, and time-consuming work. It wasn’t work I really wanted to be doing.
After all, isn’t the whole point of starting a business to give yourself more freedom? For me it was…I wanted more time with my family, not less. And SEO for several clients was not allowing me to live my life the way I wanted to.
So in 2021, I decided I wanted to stop freelancing and build my web design agency in my local area. And as I got clients, I would slowly step away from the monthly SEO contracts.
I joined a local BNI chapter and began networking with other business owners in Vancouver. This was great for my business because it really got me connected into the community. It didn't take long to build rapport with other business owners and generate referrals from my networking partners, and those referrals turned into even more referrals!
I worked on SEO for my own site to get more visibility online and was starting to get inquiries from local search, as well. I was starting to see real, consistent inquiries and I was charging between $1,500 - $2,500 now for website designs. It was the first time my business actually felt like a business.
However, I was facing a challenge ahead of me this year.
My income potential was capped.
At this time, I was doing 2-week websites.
I had created a seamless website design experience for my clients that got them a beautiful new website in just 2 weeks. In order to keep that same great experience, I couldn’t be juggling multiples projects at the same time. Not to mention, I didn’t want to juggle multiple projects at once. I wanted a business that gave me the freedom to be with my family more.
Since I’m the only designer in my boutique agency, this meant working with just one client at a time. Which meant I did two, 2-week web designs per month at $1,800.
My income potential was capped at $3,600.
(And maybe a bit more if I still had an SEO client here or there.)
The only way I thought it would be possible to make more money in my business was to raise my rates (but I would still have an income cap each month) or to hire a team and scale that way.
But hiring a team scared the crap out of me.
Hiring a team meant interviews, training, and then managing that team. It meant overseeing projects to make sure the personalized experience people get when working with Katlyn, translates to the rest of the team. This wasn’t what I wanted for my business, personally. I liked being the one working with my clients. I’m a people person. I didn’t want to go from designer to manager. I wanted to remain the designer - an actual face to my business that people could rely on and personally get in touch with.
2022 - The missing link that led to my first six-figure year!!!
The solution to the “hiring a team” fear I had was solved for me in February 2022.
I attended a website designer summit that featured a dozen or so presenters — industry leaders in the graphic design and web design world. I went through the list of presentations and put a “star” next to the ones I was interested in.
One of the presentations stood out to me among the rest. It was titled “How to profitably scale your web design business with $10k websites.”
Okay, I’m listening.
My calendar was cleared out so I could attend that presentation. And I was hooked. Who wouldn’t be???
I was fascinated to learn about the differences between designers charging $2k for a website, and the ones charging $10k, $20k, $50k, even $100k+ for a website.
My understanding about website design to this point had much more to do with how it looked and felt (and yes, what you needed to do to get it to rank higher on search engines) and less to do about functionality or meeting business objectives.
I was introduced to the missing piece in my design process and the real value of effective website design — website strategy.
Designing a website to increase conversion rates and sales for our clients. This was a brand new concept to me and something I wanted to learn more about.
Would booking 10k websites be awesome? You’re damn right it would be.
But it’s not so much about the price point of the website as it was about the actual value I could bring into my clients’ business. That’s what I wanted to learn how to do!
Creating a sustainable business model can only be achieved when you continue to provide value to your clients. I needed this as much as my clients did — a mutually beneficial endeavor.
Immediately after the webinar, I reached out to the presenter and found that they had their own coaching program that taught website strategy to other designers and I pulled out my credit card.
Time to make another investment in my business.
And to date, this is the best business investment I have ever made, because it has allowed me to produce website designs that get my clients real results!
This was how I was going to scale my business. Not by hiring a team and taking on more projects. But by adding more value to the services I offer and helping one client at a time reach their own financial goals through strategic website design.
Now the work I do doesn’t just make my clients’ websites look good. But I get them actual results that bring in more profits. Their websites convert better and they make more money because of it! Because of the skills I learned and focusing on strategy to deep-dive into their business objectives, my clients are able to bring thousands more dollars into their business every month.
And in 2022, I was able to pass the six-figure benchmark I set for myself early in the year, all while working just 12-15 hours per week.
I am so incredibly passionate about the work I do today. And I’m thankful for the flexibility and freedom my business has given me. I can support my family while working part-time and have the work/life balance I crave.
And while most of you are working a manual labor, construction job, that doesn’t mean you can’t have this same freedom and flexibility.
The first few years of building your business is rough. There are a lot of things to think about, investments to make, processes to figure out, people to hire…And when you’re out on the job site every day and wearing all of those hats yourself, it can seem impossible.
I was there too. My job is different than yours but I was the only one marketing my business, doing client work, taking the courses and programs I invested in, finding the right team to help me, doing my bookkeeping, and figuring out what processes I needed to streamline my business.
It’s a LOT.
Nuggets of wisdom and lessons learned:
Keep investing in your business and never stop learning.
Lean on experts for the areas that aren’t your strong suit. Whether it’s marketing, sales, or the manual labor itself, you’ll see a much better ROI when you lean on people who have those strengths.
Find ways to streamline your processes and make your business run more efficiently. (Ex. Online scheduling and appointment booking software, CRMS or invoicing systems, automated reminders, a sales or admin team, etc.)
Don’t be afraid to niche down
And don’t be afraid to raise your prices!
Always, always, always be looking for new ways to offer value to your clients. This builds trust and sets you apart from your competition.
