Customer Spotlight: Charlie Pryor

In today's Customer Spotlight Series we are excited to introduce you to Charlie Pryor with Pryor Media. Charlie has been a valued customer and contributor to the Themeco community for some time. Providing many different types of media services, Charlie even put his voice over skills to use in the following interview. Enjoy!

Q: Hi Charlie! Can you tell us a little about yourself and how you got started in WordPress?

My name is Charlie Pryor, I'm a 27 year old media producer from the small town in Michigan. WordPress wasn't something I ever really even knew about until I developed my writing skills, and my desire for writing become too much to ignore, around 2009. I wanted to create a website where I could express myself, share my opinions online, and best of all, be in complete control of the experience people had while seeing what I had to share. I didn't know any code at all at the time, so writing my own website was out of the question, and given that I was a college student primarily living off of student loans and pizza, paying for it to be done for me wasn't an option either.

I've always been a person willing to learn new things, and when something grabs my attention I latch onto it until I've got it. WordPress was the CMS I first tried for my website, hottipscentral.com, a technology blog that taught people how to work with modern consumer cell phones and computers. My own blog at CharliePryor.net came very quickly after that, since I found myself wanting to talk about other random things that had nothing to do with technology.

Fast-forward to 2012, when I really started to get into new media. I had a B.S. in Film and Video Production, and I loved helping people express themselves through video. Yet no matter what sort of video I produced, things always seemed to end up in one place consistently: videos go on the internet. The web was the final destination for media. I had already been using WordPress for a few years at that point, and knew that if I was going to do this career right, I had to tackle not only the medium of the art, but the venue as well. Thus, Pryor Media was really born.

It was only natural then that, once I really got ahold of what works and what doesn't on the internet, I offer services pertaining to it.

Q: What has X done for you and your business?

X has had an incredible impact on my business. I doubt I would have gotten off the ground so quickly without it. X was released late January, which just happened to be about the time I was getting serious about giving PryorMedia.net it's own website. I had owned the domain for over 2 years, but since I was making stuff for other people so much I didn't have the time to do anything for myself. Late January was an incredibly slow business time for me, and when I saw X I was so impressed I had to make a YouTube video review of it.

To this point, I was no stranger to YouTube, but I hadn't ever thought of making videos on WordPress themes – the entire concept just seemed boring to me. So many other people were doing it boring, I guess I really never gave it any thought until X.

What X has done, at it's most fundamental level for me, is get me excited about web design, and it has done the same for my clients. The business people, the lawyers, the restaurant owners, the artists, and all sorts of other people like them can all benefit from something as dynamic as this, because they know they're getting a theme that can go almost anywhere, and if they want to change a direction – they can do that too. It changed everything, and you can tell by the sheer number of themes that were released shortly after X, coming with several different demos with a ton of variety in their layout. Is X the “best” WordPress theme out there? That's really subjective – but it certainly appears to me to be the one that stepped up design quality for everyone else.

Q: You've made some popular videos about X. Is YouTube one of your favorite traffic generators? Are there others?

YouTube has been an excellent lead generator. About half the business I get today comes from somebody saying they saw a video of mine on YouTube and they wanted to talk to me about having a site with X. 90% of the time they're so into it that they've already purchased the theme before even talking to me. They just knew it was what they wanted, and with my skills and expertise with using it all this time, I'm able to help them faster than most web designers out there can.

My entire goal with my company, is to create sites that clients can get excited about, and learn to manage themselves. I combine my video education and experience with my web services, offering in-depth tutorial videos to clients that want them so that they can learn how to edit and maintain their own website with X, and many other themes. The way X is put together is very powerful, and while it does have a learning curve, it's become easy to train people to use it like pros. Because of that, a large portion of my business also comes from happy clients, because happy people talk, and as you can tell by how long my responses are, I like talking.

Q: How do you go about finding clients?

To be honest I've been busy enough over the last few months that I don't even look for clients anymore. They find me. Part of it is YouTube videos like I said, and a lot of it is because of past clients. There are of course people who also find me on Google or Bing search, and I'm happy to have answers for them when they contact me, even if they don't necessarily hire me in the end.

Q: I see you do voiceovers. Can you make one like those guys who do previews for a movie describing X in an overly dramatic way?

Haha! You got it!

Q: What do you feel is the most important characteristic to client satisfaction in the media business?

Clients only care about a result., and the cost to get there. They don't care how you do it, what tools you use, or have much of a preference even of who is doing it, so long as the result they original dreamed of comes out of it, for a price they are willing to pay. Part of the trend I see most, and I completely base my business around it now, is that people don't care about “originality” much anymore. It doesn't matter if somebody else is also using that theme for their site. They just want it looking great. I've had clients straight up tell me they wanted my site. They actually asked me to copy mine, and give it to them! Of course, that's not really something I'll do, but I always recommend using premium developed themes from trustworthy people that support it, rather than having some guy on the internet custom code them a site.

Because with a custom coded site, you'll get the end result, but it'll cost you far more (double or triple) and almost certainly lack the support element of it. Likewise, you can underpay for things too, and then you'll get your price, but you'll still miss out on the ultimate goal, which is far worse.

Using X allows me to give my clients an amazing looking website that's diverse and ready for their customizations, while also giving them a way to seek great support – and being able to train them through video is a bonus as well. How many custom-coding developers are going to train their clients to edit it themselves, or are even capable of it? Old designers are into trapping clients into paying them for updates. I'm into liberating people to work with something new that excites them, and since it's exciting for them, they'll take care of it and will be more successful as a result.

Q: Is there anything else you'd like to share?

Well I won't do any self-promotions or anything, but I will say that it's important that you are doing what you love, and that you're also doing business with people who love what they do as well. When people love what they do, they are constantly learning more and improving themselves. It's that level of care and commitment that will lead to mutual success. I'm really happy to love what I do, and X has become an unforeseen contributor to that. Thanks!

Thank-you Charlie for contributing to our Customer Spotlight Series and, of course, for the voiceover! Charlie provides a full range of media services that you can read about at his site http://pryormedia.net which is proudly powered by X. Charlie's not just a fan of using X for his clients, he uses it on his own site as well. If you are a customer of ours who is interested in being featured in a future Spotlight, we'd love to hear from you