Zen Dog Web Services In Woodstock, GA Featuring Val Hudgins

Welcome to another installment featuring a small business owner who is passionate about what they do and the service they provide. This month, I would like to introduce you to Val Hudgins. She is the owner and mastermind behind Zen Dog Web Services. She is also a writing coach and loves dogs. You can often find her working in the conference room of the Copper Coin coffee shop in downtown Woodstock, which is where we made that above photograph.

Q: What do you love most about what you do?

Seeing clients grow their business and being told how much I helped…  AND I really enjoy a lot of the technical aspects “behind the scenes” in WordPress – the geeky stuff – learning it and teaching it.

Q: What steps led you to where you are now? 

Zen Dog Web Services is an amalgam of my past positions in corporate America in marketing and product management, my years working as a consultant with the Small Business Development Center and experience from a previous successful business I owned for seven years. After all that, I “retired” for a few years to take care of elder family and discovered I missed being a geek! At the same time, I was helping out friends and local businesses with their websites and fell in love with this new fangled thing called WordPress. So, I started another business of it and set out to enjoy working again – and I it worked!

Q:  What do you look forward to most each day? 

Meeting with clients – and not just because I love to go to lunch or coffee! Each client is different, of course, and their website is more than their online business card… it’s their portfolio, their first impression and way of interacting with customers. I love figuring out how we can make each site work to bring the client their idea of success.

Q: And what are you looking forward to most in the coming months? 

Several things: Anniversaries of client websites are always fun; we make those special! Our first contractor dinner is in the works, so all five of our contractor/employees can finally meet each other rather than via Skype or Google Hangouts. Very exciting is our first all-day “Intermediate WordPress Class” is September 16 in Woodstock with two speakers and lots of goodies.

Q: What do you find most rewarding about being an entrepreneur? 

Definitely the ability to work your own schedule… for the most part. I love to travel and so going to WordPress conventions and travel with my husband or sister is much easier when I can bring the laptop and set up as needed.

Q: Is there anything else you would like to share? 

I would love to share the lovely work you, Kelley, did on our first Client Photo Shoot Day. You made seven of my clients very happy that they finally got a beautiful digital headshot for their website. Thanks!

Thanks Val! I loved finding out more about what motivates + inspires you and am thrilled I was able to help out so many of your clients with updated headshots.

And for those of you in the metro Atlanta area who want to learn more about WordPress, SEO, and integrating multiple social media platforms simultaneously, Val is hosting this seminar on September 16th that you should attend!