{"id":2356,"date":"2016-03-28T10:18:50","date_gmt":"2016-03-28T04:48:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.plugmatter.com\/?p=2356"},"modified":"2016-03-28T10:18:50","modified_gmt":"2016-03-28T04:48:50","slug":"peter-suhm-wp-pusher-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/plugmatter.com\/spark\/peter-suhm-wp-pusher-story\/","title":{"rendered":"Peter Suhm, Founder of WP Pusher, Shares His Lessons Learnt as a WordPress Entrepreneur"},"content":{"rendered":"

Peter Suhm<\/a>, founder of WP Pusher<\/a>, is a well-known guy.<\/p>\n

Passionate about building websites, helping clients, Peter started his journey as a website developer.<\/p>\n

When he got started with using WordPress for his clients, he realized there had to be a simpler system to deploy smaller patches on the websites.<\/p>\n

And that was the inception of WP Pusher.<\/p>\n

WP Pusher has since then helped hundreds of WordPress developers maintain thousands of websites across the world.<\/p>\n

\"Peter<\/p>\n

In this interview, Peter shares why his plugin was removed from the .org website, how he built WP Pusher to solve his own WordPress problems, how he took it to the next level, and a lot more.<\/p>\n

1. How did you start with WordPress? How did you get the idea for WP Pusher?<\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been using WordPress for a long time, probably since around 2006-2007. I was still in high school at the time and around that time I started building small websites for clients. I was already doing PHP at the time, but WordPress was the first CMS \/ framework I started using.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0In 2011, I took a break from University (I was studying business administration and IT at Copenhagen Business School at the moment) and started working on larger PHP applications – mainly for 1 startup I worked with here in Denmark. Later on I got a full time job as a Ruby on Rails developer. During those years, I barely touched WordPress – except when some of my old clients wanted me to do small fixes on the sites I built for them years back.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Every time I had to pull out one of those old projects, it made me sad. In the meantime I had become a heavy Git user and none of that stuff seemed to work with WordPress. So that was basically when I got the idea. There must be an easy way to just do a small patch, push it to GitHub and have it deployed on those client sites\u2026 So yes, I guess I was scratching my own itch!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

2. What challenges did you face while developing the plugin? What do you think are some of the common problems of plugin development?<\/h3>\n

\u00a0Basically all the things that WordPress is missing that almost all other serious PHP projects have adopted at this point. All the things that makes PHP developers from other communities scream when they see WordPress. Danny van Kooten pretty much has it covered in this tweet<\/span>.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Danny<\/a><\/p>\n

3. How did you decide on content marketing as a primary marketing medium for your plugin? How’s the progress been so far, \u00a0and what have you learned\u00a0from the experience?<\/h3>\n

Well, it\u2019s been more than a year since I said that and it\u2019s worked great so far. See, WP Pusher is not allowed in the WordPress.org directory, because they see it as a competing product. That\u2019s where most plugins get their traffic from, so I had to do something else.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The content I\u2019ve put up on the <\/span>WP Pusher blog<\/a> has been picked up many different places, such as the WP Tavern – and you guys. It has given me some great guest posting opportunities.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I think I\u2019ve been pretty successful with my email marketing as well. I\u2019ve launched various free email and video based courses that have proved to be a great way to reach a lot of WordPress developers. More than a thousand WordPress developers signed up for the <\/span>Git video course<\/a> I launched a few months back.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

My main take away has been that:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The more (quality) content you put out there, the easier it is for people to firstly, find you, and secondly, talk about you.<\/div>
<\/div><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

4. What other marketing alternatives do you think are viable? What’re your thoughts on affiliate marketing?<\/h3>\n

I think the best marketing you can get is when people recommend your product to others. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I love when people post something nice about WP Pusher on Twitter or Facebook. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I haven\u2019t had the chance to experiment with affiliate marketing yet, but I think it can work great if you have the right affiliates.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

5.\u00a0Can you quickly sum up the transition of your business model from a SaaS to a freemium model, and finally to a premium-only model?<\/h3>\n

Yes, throughout the short life of WP Pusher, I\u2019ve had a few different business models. The first version was a SaaS model, but I quickly decided that it wasn\u2019t necessary to offer it as a hosted service and shifted to a plugin model.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I launched a free version for WordPress.org and a paid version, so basically the good old freemium model. As WP Pusher was no longer allowed in the official repository, the freemium model made less sense. Now there\u2019s a free version of WP Pusher if your code is open sourced. If you use WP Pusher for private \/ commercial purposes, you have to purchase a license.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

6. Why did you decide not to go with the SaaS model? Was it due to the users or the technical challenges that it accompanies?<\/h3>\n

At the time several people advised me that I would never get WordPress users to sign up for a service like that and charge a monthly fee for it. After a year of getting to know my customers, I\u2019m not sure if it\u2019s necessarily true, though.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

In the end I think I realised that the product was simple enough that it could be offered as a plugin. I still think about offering a hosted service, since some things are really hard to implement in the WordPress dashboard – such as <\/span>integrations with services like GitHub and Bitbucket<\/a>.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/h3>\n

7. What\u2019s your take on WordPress.org directory especially after they have removed your plugin from their repository for non-compliance?<\/h3>\n

I would love WP Pusher to be available from WordPress.org, since it would make the distribution much easier. However, I respect their decision. It\u2019s their platform and they are free to host what they want!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

8. How has the feedback of your\u00a0free version users shaped up the plugin? Any specific examples?<\/h3>\n

The first version of WP Pusher was very basic and only supported GitHub. I didn\u2019t even include a way to delete or edit plugins. I\u2019d say that 80% of what\u2019s currently included in WP Pusher is based on user feedback. I have some very invested users that use WP Pusher every day to manage a lot of client websites. It\u2019s only natural that they have a lot of feedback and I always try to listen as much as possible.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The free version is great because it adds to the volume of users, which means I get even more feedback.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

9. What are the biggest challenges running a plugin startup?<\/h3>\n

Don\u2019t get me started! There are so many unsolved problems for WordPress plugin and theme shops. I still haven\u2019t find a great solution for checkout, license management etc. It\u2019s really just a big mess to set up, no matter what tool you use.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve tried it many times that updates to services I used would break their functionality, causing my site to be down and so on.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

My biggest challenge so far was probably when the service I used to provide updates for WP Pusher crashed. I used WP Updates<\/a> to upload new versions of WP Pusher that would then be sent out to all my users. One day the site was down and it hasn\u2019t worked since. I was left without a way to send out the next version, without asking my users to do a manual update and then build my own system to handle it. That\u2019s actually why I\u2019m working on a new service now, <\/span>WP Shipper<\/a>.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

10. How are you managing support? How are you trying to optimize it?<\/h3>\n

So far, support hasn\u2019t been a big issue for me. Most of my users are freelancers or agencies and in general very professional. WP Pusher mostly attracts developers with a certain level of experience, since it\u2019s only interesting if you are already using tools such as Git and GitHub.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

11. How do you think WordPress startups are different from startups in the SaaS space and others. What advantages and disadvantages do the WP startups have over the others.<\/h3>\n

I think WordPress startups built on the freemium model have a lower barrier of entry.
\n<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

You can start with something small and if it\u2019s being picked up by the community, you can build a business around it. The WordPress ecosystem is huge and there are endless business opportunities. It\u2019s very low risk.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

When your plugin is not in the official directory, you don\u2019t have that advantage.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

And I don\u2019t think it\u2019s much different from any other startups.<\/span><\/span>
\n<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

12. Why do you think plugin developers should consider their plugins as startups and not just plugins?<\/h3>\n

As I said in <\/span>that article<\/a>, thinking about your WordPress plugin as a startup might switch the way you think about it and make you more ambitious.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

WordPress is 25% of the Internet, so there\u2019s no reason a service offered as a WordPress plugin can\u2019t be as big as any other software product.<\/div>
<\/div><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

When I started working on WP Pusher, it was supposed to be a SaaS. Changing the business model and building it as a plugin initially made me think of it as something smaller – even though it didn\u2019t have to be. SaaS or plugin is basically just an implementation detail. It was still the same product offering.<\/span><\/span>
\n<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

13.\u00a0What is\u00a0the best advice you’ve received, and from whom?<\/h3>\n
\"Bryce<\/a>

Bryce Adam<\/p><\/div>\n

My friend Bryce Adam<\/a> has been extremely helpful, especially when I was just getting started with WP Pusher. He was the one suggesting launching WP Pusher as a plugin and use the freemium model. He has also been pushing me to adapt the extension model, which is something I’m still considering.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Danny<\/a>

Danny van Kooten<\/p><\/div>\n

Danny van Kooten, creator of MailChimp for WordPress, runs a very successful WordPress plugin business. He\u2019s pretty much the first person I go to whenever I need advice! You should follow him <\/span>on Twitter<\/a> to learn from someone who\u2019s killing it with the freemium model<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Peter Suhm, founder of WP Pusher, is a well-known guy. Passionate about building websites, helping clients, Peter started his journey as a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":2953,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,6,11,17],"tags":[44,53,74],"yoast_head":"\nPeter Suhm, Founder of WP Pusher, Shares His Lessons Learnt as a WordPress Entrepreneur - Plugmatter Spark<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"WP Pusher since then has helped hundreds of WordPress developers across the globe. 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