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Recorded On May 20, 2024 | Duration

Episode 22

StellarWP WP Constellations podcast Episode 22
WP Constellations
Episode 22
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In this episode, Michelle and Jon talk with Erin Lin of WPointer.com. Erin started providing WordPress tutorials in Taiwan (in Chinese), and from there grew a business, affiliate marketing sales, and a community of over 30,000 people.

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Episode Transcript

[00:00:02] Michelle: Welcome to WP Constellations, a podcast exploration of the WordPress universe brought to you by StellarWP.

Welcome to WP Constellations, where we here at StellarWP explore the WordPress universe. And today I am just so thrilled to have our guest, Erin Lin. Erin is the originator, basically everything, the teacher, the founder of WPointer. And you teach WordPress classes on your side of the world and you’re in Taiwan. I was just in Taiwan for Wordcamp Asia, as you were, and our paths didn’t cross as much as I had hoped. But it’s so good to have you here today. I am so excited to learn about how you teach. So tell us a little bit about yourself. Oh, let me not forget. I almost forgot to introduce my co-host. Sorry, Jon, I know you so well. I forget that you’re there. But today my co-host is Jon Clark. Jon, introduce yourself and then we’re going to dive into learning everything about Erin.

[00:01:10] Jon: Hi, my name is Jon Clark. I work automation and email for StellarWP and we try to do everything we can to keep up with current trends, certain things that are going on and remain humble in our strategies as the laws and everything else continue to change around us. But I am honored to be here. I appreciate being here and learning more about Erin and WPointer. So ready to go. Looking forward to a good podcast here.

[00:01:36] Michelle: Excellent. So yeah, Jon and I will be alternating asking you some questions and learning more about what you do. So tell us what it is that you do and a little bit about yourself, Erin.

[00:01:46] Erin: Okay. Thank you for having me here today. It was my pleasure. Okay, so I’m Erin Lin and I’m from Taiwan. My native language is Mandarin in speaking and traditional Chinese in writing. So I’m the founder of WPointer, a WordPress tutorial website aimed at beginners within the Chinese community.

And I actually earned my master’s degree in UI design in the US. So when I began using WordPress in 2011 and for the next six years I worked as a freelancer, designing hundreds of websites for clients until 2018. I launched this website as my own web blog, the WPointer, and started to promote WordPress and educate WordPress. And that’s pretty much it.

[00:02:44] Michelle: And you and I had a meeting a few weeks ago where I was just so impressed to learn about how you’ve created just this amazing WordPress world of education over there. So very excited for us to learn more today.

[00:03:00] Erin: Thank you. Yeah, I’m excited too.

[00:03:04] Jon: Erin, if I could ask, you just described WPointer really well. Could you tell us how you got started, what made you want to start?

[00:03:13] Erin: Yeah, sure.

So you know, as someone who is very into WordPress, I understand how WordPress is, how it’s flexibility and how I can use plugins to create various websites. So I’ve always had a dream in my mind I want to use WordPress to develop my own brand.

So I’m constantly looking for opportunities and later when I was still freelancing, I noticed my clients often asked the same questions and I found myself repeating the same answers all the time. So sometimes I gave them online tutorials. But I noticed those tutorials were too techy to understand because those were written by maybe developers. So I decided to write tutorials from a designer’s perspective.

And also from 2002 to 2011 I was studying and working in the US before returning to Taiwan. I remember WordPress was already very popular there. However, when I got back home I found not too many people in Taiwan know WordPress. And I found it was a really pity. I want to share these great tools to everybody. So gradually it became clear to me that it was a great opportunity for me, combining my expertise in UI design and my experience from freelancing and the situation of the Chinese market at that time. So I decided to start a WordPress tutorial site, especially for the Chinese community, for beginners who are not familiar with programming like me. That’s how the WPointer was born.

[00:05:06] Michelle: That is so cool, too. I think it takes somebody who’s got a really good vision to look at the community and see “how can I help and where’s a gap that I can fill?” And so for you to create these tutorials, there are so many in English, right? YouTube is full of English tutorials on how to start in WordPress, but for you to see the need in your local market is just inspired. So congratulations on that.

[00:05:38] Erin: Yeah, one of the things. I just feel I’m so lucky too. Yeah. At that time I found that I grabbed the opportunity. Yeah.

[00:05:49] Michelle: And that’s a good thing, right? I mean to be able to see it and really make a career and a life from it, that’s wonderful. But you offer your courses for free.

[00:06:00] Erin: Yeah.

[00:06:01] Michelle: So how are you monetizing that? I mean you can’t live for free. So how are you able to create revenue for yourself, to build a career for yourself?

[00:06:12] Erin: Okay. Yeah. Firstly, I want to say I’m very lucky that I have a husband supporting me at the beginning.

So I don’t make much money at the beginning. I remember maybe for the first half year I don’t have any income at all. I just keep writing.

And let’s say as I remember when I started blogging, I wrote basic tutorials like everybody does.

I wrote what WordPress is and what’s difference between .com and the org, what are the top plugins for certain areas, you know, like everybody does. But then very soon I got a very important feedback from my community.

Someone told me that he visited my website and he still didn’t know how to get started. It’s too overwhelming. He didn’t know what’s essential to look at and what they can keep or skip, you know. And that reminds me that I need to do something for to streamline my content.

Yeah. So I decided to narrow down my site’s focus as a solopreneur. I am the first to help visitors easily create their first WordPress site. Only I don’t do other goals at all. I just want them to be able to create their first website. So I decided to create this free course.

I gave it a name called Five Day Self Study Sprint because people can come and I tell them they only need to spend just 1 hour after work for five days. And with my videos they will be able to create their first WordPress website, whether it’s a blog, a portfolio site or a shop. And also at the beginning of the course I make it very clear to them the course value is very high, not free, because it was designed based on my years of experience in UI design.

But however, I don’t charge them.

Instead I recommend hosting services, themes and plugins that I find useful throughout the course. I earn commissions from those recommendations. I want to create a win/win/win situation for everybody involved. So I was very sincere and honest to them.

I didn’t know that it will make them accept this and feel comfortable and maybe that’s the reason this course gets very popular. And it turned out that the affiliate marketing income becomes my main source of income now. Does it make sense?

[00:09:24] Michelle: Yes. And I think a lot of people don’t understand how you can build your entire income off of affiliates. Do you also. And you are hosting some of your courses on YouTube, is that correct? Or Vimeo?

[00:09:41] Erin: I post videos on YouTube and then I embedded those videos to my web pages.

[00:09:47] Michelle: Yes. Are you also, does YouTube also bring you some revenue as well?

[00:09:54] Erin: A little bit.

[00:09:55] Michelle: Little.

[00:09:56] Erin: Yeah, yeah. As compared to affiliate marketing?

[00:09:59] Michelle: Yeah.

[00:09:59] Erin: That’s not that much.

[00:10:00] Michelle: Gotcha. Gotcha. As we would say, that’s the pizza money, right? That’s just the play money.

I am impressed for sure.

[00:10:11] Jon: Erin you have a lot, a lot of compliments. Students really love how you teach. They really love the fact that you are able to clearly help them get started. And like you said, it can be extremely overwhelming and you’ve been very helpful to them. But can you explain any challenges, or if you add any and all challenges that you went through when you first got started?

[00:10:38] Erin: Well, I think I have a big challenge, not just when I started. Throughout the time until now, the biggest challenge to me is the time management.

Because me, as a solopreneur, I’m the only person owning this brand. And I’m also a mom with two kids, age seven and ten. As I remember when I started WPPointer, my youngest one was only one year old. So I have to figure out how to balance my time. And, you know, I have, as a solopreneur, I need to create content, I need to post on social media and reply to lots, lots of questions on my Facebook group. Oh, I forgot to mention. During the free online course, I encourage my students to join my Facebook private group so they can keep communicating to each other and learning from each other. But sometimes when they are all beginners, they don’t, they are not able to answer questions. So I have to jump in to help them. So I spend lots of time on helping them on Facebook group, but not making money from there.

But still, that takes a lot of time. So just too many areas to take care. And sometimes when I take on too much, I have. I have. My husband will come to me and help me to slow down a little bit.

And also, you cannot believe I even volunteer as a storyteller at my children’s school. So I have to go there to tell stories. Tell stories three times a week. So I have lots to do. So learning how to work efficiently is the biggest challenge. But I want to say one thing, that I’m getting a little bit better now because I recently started to learn automation. I just heard Jon say, automation, it’s important. I finally know automation is helpful for me to solve this kind of situation.

[00:13:03] Michelle: Well, we’ll have to get you guys connected after the podcast.

[00:13:07] Erin: Yeah, I know.

[00:13:08] Michelle: He is the master at automation for sure. You mentioned your Facebook group and I don’t remember. I remember being impressed when we talked before. How many people are in your Facebook group?

[00:13:21] Erin: 30,000 people.

[00:13:23] Michelle: 30,000 people. That is an empire, ma’am. You have built an empire for yourself. And that’s. It’s amazing. And I think you made a good point when you talk about that. Balance of things and time management.

I think a lot of people get the idea that affiliate marketing, you don’t have to put time and energy into it, you just put links out there. But that is far from the truth.

[00:13:52] Erin: No, we call it double time.

[00:13:58] Michelle: People tend to call it passive income, but it’s not really all that passive. You, there’s a lot of work that you’ve done to build what you’ve built. Yeah, for sure.

[00:14:07] Erin: The only good thing is you have the time, the control for the time.

Sometimes you can take a short break, but at the same time when you are taking break, you know, next it will slow down the income. Yeah. So it’s not really passive at all.

[00:14:27] Michelle: Exactly.

But you must enjoy what you do. So let me ask you, what has brought you the greatest joy in what you do with teaching others how to build WordPress sites?

[00:14:39] Erin: Oh, okay.

Just like we just, just like the Facebook group we mentioned. Yeah.

You know, when the group has grown to about 30,000 people and I found myself enjoying managing the group a lot because when it’s about connecting with real people and seeing the cool stuff they do with the tutorial, my tutorials, and I really enjoy understanding their life or their work.

I even put together their work to showcase their work on a separate website. So every time when I check out their site, I feel the sense of accomplishment.

And the best thing of this is whenever I need help in my life, I can always find someone there to help me because they are coming from all kinds of industries. You know, everybody needs a website. So when I need a lawyer, a doctor or whatever, and they are always there, they volunteer. Yes, I can help you now. So that’s the part I enjoy the most. Yeah.

[00:16:02] Michelle: For you to be able to ask those kinds of questions and tap into that network speaks very well of you because you have built those relationships and I think that that’s, that’s really, that’s really commendable. Absolutely. I’m, I told you this before when we met. I’m very impressed with what you do and how you connect with community.

[00:16:24] Erin: Thank you so much.

[00:16:26] Michelle: Thank you.

[00:16:29] Jon: Do you have anything other, anything else that you would like to share with the broader community or anything that you may have coming up in the future that would be important to share?

[00:16:40] Erin: Sure.

One thing I think of is even though my tutorials and most of my Facebook group members are Chinese, but everyone is welcome to our world.

Whether you want to learn Chinese, see how Chinese people use WordPress or look for WordPress related business opportunities, feel free to join us and also, I’m recently working on WPointer Academy. As I told Michelle last time. And it will be a paid platform for WordPress learning. We plan to have meetups, webinars and sales courses there. And if anyone is interested in giving a short talk or demo in our events, please contact me. No problem.

[00:17:37] Michelle: That’s wonderful. I think that’s great to incorporate more people. I also love how the Internet allows us to bridge language barriers sometimes. So, like, I go to your website and Google says, would you like to see this in English? And I say, yes, thank you very much. And Facebook does the same thing. So if somebody posts in a group in a language that you don’t understand, you can click that translate button and then you can see, and then you can also respond. And you can respond in your own language and they will be able to translate and see your responses. So. Yes. So just because the Facebook group is in Chinese doesn’t mean that you can’t be helpful and participate as well.

[00:18:19] Erin: Right, right. You are totally right. Yeah, I think it’s very in these days and the high technology, we can use them much and help to solve the language barrier. It’s not a big problem at all anymore. So everybody, welcome to join us.

[00:18:39] Michelle: Thank you. When I came back from Taipei, I had picked up a little souvenir at the airport and I didn’t realize I had to assemble it myself. So there was folding, paper folding and all of this thing I had to do and all of the instructions were in Chinese, but I can use my phone to just take a picture and immediately translate to English. And I was able to do IT, yeah, so I just, I love technology. I’m such a nerd. I just love it so much.

[00:19:12] Erin: Yeah, I totally understand. We love to buy goods from Japan too, although I can understand English, but I don’t understand Japanese, so I can understand that.

[00:19:24] Michelle: I don’t understand Japanese either. So absolutely the tools that we have today, so much better than what we had ten years, 20 years ago. Yeah, it’s wonderful.

[00:19:35] Erin: So sorry, go ahead. No, I just think of WordCamp Asia. Remember during WordCamp Asia, I was very impressed how they incorporate immediate translation on the screen so everybody from different worlds can understand the English. And it was just amazing.

[00:19:59] Michelle: I love that somebody said to me once, if it’s in Asia, why are all of the talks in English? And I said, do you know how many languages there are in Asia?

[00:20:10] Erin: Yeah, but it’s unbelievable.

[00:20:14] Michelle: Yeah, but most people attending have learned some English and they also have the translation on screen, so. But, yeah, it would be very difficult to say. We’re having it in Asia. We need to speak “Asian.” There is no Asian language. No Asian. All of the languages. So many languages.

It’s wonderful. And it’s. It’s just so great to be able to meet people at WordCamps and get to know them in spite of sometimes language barriers, because we find ways in our community to overcome those, for sure.

[00:20:45] Erin: Yeah. And always when I meet people who know WordPress, no matter what countries you are from, I always feel like you are my family, you know?

[00:20:54] Michelle: Yeah.

[00:20:55] Erin: We know each other so long. And because we all love WordPress, that’s how. How much I love WordPress. And when I see Matt Mullenweg on that day, I was so happy.

Just, it’s like dream comes true.

I understand how passionate I am with WordPress and I show it to my audience and everybody feel that. And that’s how WPointer grew. Make WPointer grow.

[00:21:26] Michelle: Yeah. I love that. So if people are interested in learning more about WPointer, your Facebook group, and you, how do we find you online? Through all the social channels and your websites.

[00:21:40] Erin: Okay. So if anybody is interested, please simply visit WPointer.com. And at the bottom of my site, I have listed all the channels. You can find my Facebook group through my Facebook fan page as well. And if you would like to talk to me, you can send a message to my Facebook fan page and I will receive it.

[00:22:05] Michelle: Perfect, excellent. And I will get all of those links from you and from your website. We will put them in the show notes here, including a transcript of today’s episode, which then can be translated because it’s on the web for all of your Chinese followers as well.

[00:22:21] Erin: Thank you so much.

[00:22:23] Michelle: Absolutely.

[00:22:24] Erin: I really appreciate it.

[00:22:26] Michelle: It’s my pleasure. So anybody listening, go to StellarWP.com, find our podcast and Erin’s episode, and we will have all of the information there for you.

[00:22:36] Erin: Thank you.

[00:22:38] Michelle: Yeah. Thank you for being here, Jon.

[00:22:40] Erin: Thank you. Thank you.

[00:22:41] Michelle: Thank you. It’s so wonderful to have you here today. Thank you for taking the time to spend with us today. And thank you, Jon, for being the co-host with, you know, you’re so good at this. I’m just like, I’m always happy to have you on the screen with me. So thank you. Thank you both very much and for being here. We’ll see everybody on the next episode of WP Constellations.

WP Constellations is a production of StellarWP, home of The Events Calendar, LearnDash, GiveWP, Kadence, Iconic, SolidWP, Orderable, and Restrict Content Pro. Learn more about the StellarVerse at StellarWP.com.