Sheryle Gillihan
Keynote Speaker (Saturday)
After spending time in the military, as a stay-at-home mother, and in corporate America, Sheryle has learned to seek purpose in her work. She joined CauseLabs in 2010 and currently serves as the company’s CEO. She serves on three advisory boards in the DFW area and is also the co-founder and purpose ambassador of PurposeWP, a WordPress-based company that helps non-profits with their online presence.
Carrie Dils
Keynote Speaker (Sunday)
Carrie is a podcaster, speaker, writer, and teacher. She took on her first freelance web development client in 1997 and has been actively involved with the WordPress community since 2012. These days she’s teaching front-end web development at Lynda.com and helping digital freelancers grow their businesses via the OfficeHours.FM podcast and carriedils.com.
Laura Dapkus
Topic: WordPress for Non-Profit Organizations
Laura owns a boutique agency in Van Alstyne, Texas, and built her first website in 1996. It was HTML and it was dial-up, because she wanted to share photos of her Pit Bull, Lucy. Lucy sent her down a path of advocacy and volunteering that informs her work today. Her ideal project is one that helps people engage with local services or motivates them to give to a cause that lifts up our community. Her passion is education. She supports our public schools and serves on the board of a foundation that provides community college scholarships. Her other job is as a shepherd of actual sheep.
Lori Calcott
Topic: You Built It… Now What?
Lori Calcott is a co-founder and partner of webShine. Originally from Pittsburgh, Lori has been working in the search space since 2001. As a paid search guru, Lori has transitioned with her clients through the various platforms starting with Overture, and currently in Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook Ads. As a published author of The Definitive Guide to Google AdWords, Lori is a leader in the paid search field. When not at work, Lori spends time with her family and can often be found hiking and skiing.
Ani King
Topic: Herding Cats: How Project Management can Help Build Your Best Customer Experience (and then Make it Better)
Ani is the Managed WordPress Project Director and Team Builder at Liquid Web, with ten years of experience in hosting and customer support. As a STE(A)M enthusiast, she works to spread a love of technology among school-aged girls, with a focus on WordPress and project management skills as a way to advance learning.
Her other great passion is for literature, which she cultivates in others through syntaxandsalt.com, a WordPress-driven magazine that publishes speculative fiction by new and established authors.
Ani is based in Lansing, Michigan, where she resides with her husband, two children, and a mouthy tuxedo cat.
Chris Lema
Topic: Bringing a WordPress Product into the Market
Chris Lema has been building online web applications since 1995. He started working with WordPress in 2005, and today he’s the VP of Products & Innovation at Liquid Web, a 100M hosting company. He’s known in the WordPress community as a blogger, public speaker, and the creator of CaboPress, the best business conference for WordPress in Cabo.
Brennen Bliss
Topic: Starting Your Digital Agency With WordPress
Brennen is the CEO and founder of the leading North Texas digital marketing agency, PixelCutLabs. At 18 years old, he is a member of the American Marketing Association and an expert on the subject. His marketing agency provides services to local and multinational companies, with clients including The College Football Playoffs, Retreat Central, and MyClouset.com. Brennen is recognized for crafting results-oriented strategies to brand high-profile businesses, helping them stand out among established competition. With Brennen you get the best of both worlds, a young man able to keep up with the fast changing times of the digital marketing world, and an experienced professional with the track record and acclaim to take your brand and digital reputation to the next level. Every venture Brennen partakes in serves as a conversation starter, as he makes an effort to disassociate himself with the status quo.
Erin Flynn
Topic: How to raise your web design rates
Erin has been making websites since 1999, and started her own web design and development company in 2012. After a few years creating websites for clients, Erin shifted her business. Now, her primary business is helping other designers and developers navigate the difficult waters of entrepreneurship by providing courses and guides to teach everything from how to start a web design business to how to deal with nightmare clients.
When she’s not teaching designers or working with her own design/development clients, Erin can be found exploring the mountains near her home in Aspen, Colorado. Find out more at erinflynn.com.
Scott Kingsley Clark
Topic: If you think it, you can build it
Scott is a Senior Product Developer at Modern Tribe, lead developer of the Pods Framework, and one of the driving forces behind the Fields API proposal for WordPress core. He spends his days thinking about and solving complicated data architecture problems.
Adam W. Warner
Topic: 360 Degrees of Security – Setting Standards for Your Websites and Yourself
Adam W. Warner first discovered WordPress in 2005 and has since founded several WordPress-focused businesses that provide education, plugins and consulting services for online business owners. In 2016 he brought his passion for WordPress to SiteLock as a Product Evangelist. Adam has since delivered his zeal for WordPress by speaking at several WordCamps and other events. In addition to WordPress, Adam is passionate about his family, robots and of course, life, the universe, and everything.
Alex & Marie Juchniewicz
Topic: How Losing My Son Gave Birth to So Many Blessings
Originally from California, Alex now lives in Houston with his beautiful wife Marie and their cat Zeke. Having worked with WordPress since 2010, he got his real start by working as an Internet Marketer at a digital agency building WordPress sites for local SEO clients. Since then Alex has had the opportunity to work for some of the best WordPress companies in the community such as Pagely, Pantheon, and Valet (formerly WP Valet) where he had the opportunity to grow personally and professionally dealing with support, processes, partnerships, and site development.
Currently he works at cPanel, Inc. as a Scrum Master (Agile Coach) for an internet development team. He also leads efforts in Business Development over at Jilt.com, part of the SkyVerge family, in helping merchant store owners recover lost revenue due to abandoned cart orders. Growing up he has always had a passion for other people, whether be just talking to someone he just met or serving others by loving on them. The WordPress community has provided many opportunities to meet so many people and build relationships.
If you see him walking around please do not hesitate to come up and say hello!
Tom McCracken
Topic: Getting to ROI – The Shift to Results Oriented Google Analytics
Tom McCracken is a 20+ year web industry veteran. He has a blended background ranging across web development, UX, marketing, content strategy, data analysis, and agile project management. His passion is helping organizations leverage technology to drive measurable business impact.
Tom has consulted on over 100 interactive projects for organizations such as AT&T, U.S. Bank Corp, Simon & Schuster, IBM, Miami Dolphins, NEC, McDonald’s, SMU, Abbott Labs, Pratt & Whitney, ADP, E*TRADE, Nationwide Insurance, and Tektronics.
An avid open source contributor, he has built more than two dozen Drupal modules and WordPress plugins. Today, his core focus is developing results-oriented, data-driven tools to enable teams to deliver decisively better web experiences and ROI.
Aaron D. Campbell
Topic: The Future: Why Open Matters
Aaron is the WordPress Security Team lead, has been a regular contributor to WordPress for more than ten years, and is currently funded by GoDaddy to work full time on the WordPress open source project. He has over seventeen years of web development experience and worked with clients ranging from small local businesses to Google, Yahoo, Disney, and Harvard. He’s been called both a coffee snob and a beer snob, but considers both to be compliments. When not buried in code, he enjoys spending time with his wife and son, riding his motorcycle, and reading sci-fi/fantasy books.
Susan Ramsey
Topic: Customizing a Theme in the Browser
Susan is the owner of One Happy Studio, where she creates and customize themes, and develops custom websites using the Genesis Framework.
Creating the website is just part of the story for Susan – she is somewhat obsessed with the process, and loves to help others by answering support questions for a number of theme developers including Pretty Darn Cute Design, and on the StudioPress community forums.
Susan is honored to be a StudioPress recommended developer.
Tanner Moushey
Topic: Javascript – Beyond jQuery
Tanner is a web developer and entrepreneur located in the small town of Granite Falls, Wa. He’s passionate about using technology to promote community. When he’s not tracking down new leads or coding, he loves playing music and spending time with his wife and 5 kids.
Kevin Fontenot
Topic: Chatbots: Why Your Business Must Adopt Conversation Based Marketing
Kevin Fontenot is the Director of Marketing at TrainedUp.Church. He also likes to refer to himself as a professional interneter. In the past, he was worked on all kinds of WordPress projects including building (and selling) a marketplace built using EDD. Kevin is passionate about helping organizations reach people with marketing that is actually engaging. He lives in Carrollton, Texas, with his wife Brooke and their two dogs.
Sara Graybill
Topic: Creating A Digital Marketing Strategy That Works
Sara is the owner of Graybill Creative, a web design and digital marketing agency. She has been helping business owners and non-profits with their digital marketing since 2009. She does that through website design and development, technical services, and online marketing consulting.
Lindsay Halsey
Topic: SEO in an Hour for WordPress
Lindsay Halsey is a co-founder and partner of webShine, a search engine marketing agency in Basalt, Colorado. She is also co-founder and partner in WP SEO Hub with a scheduled launch in late October. She graduated from Dartmouth College with a degree in Economics and spent several years as a mountain guide and ski patroller. In 2008 Lindsay made the leap into search engine marketing. Her primary interest is search engine optimization for WordPress websites.
John Peterson
Topic: Optimize Your WordPress Website
John Peterson’s first taste of the power of the web came during college. He wrote an innovative grade distribution search engine that peaked at around 21,000 hits a day. Innovation earned John a scary call from the Dean, and later a Distinguished Student Award and a Services in Engineering Award. Don’t ever underestimate the power of crude Perl scripts and HTML!
Today, John is the President at Develare and manages a team of five. John and his team love making the web work for small business, and his latest crusade is battling slow websites. In doing so, clients have had dramatic reductions in Cost per Lead (CPL) and big bumps in traffic. Whether you have 300 or 300,000 sessions per month John is happy to share tips to help you succeed.
John is one of the Lead Organizers for the Houston WordPress Meetup Group and an Officer with SearchHOU. He enjoys sharing his WordPress knowledge and giving back to the community. He has spoken at the DFW WordPress Meetup Group, the Fort Worth WordPress Users Group, Houston WordPress Meetup Group, and SearchHOU.
Todd McKee
Topic: Centralizing News through WordPress REST API
S. Todd McKee, MEd is the Senior Web Developer for the Office of Communications & Marketing at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) in Little Rock, AR. Todd and his team are responsible for UAMS’s online visual identity, determining the vision and strategic goals of UAMS’s web presence, providing web and application development services, and supporting their content management systems. Todd has served on the Teaching with Technology committee and given numerous talks on technology in education. He spends most of his day looking at code and solving everyone’s problems. Todd lives in Little Rock, AR, with his wife and two of his four daughters.
Sean Jackson
Topic: Beyond the basics of WordPress SEO
Sean Jackson is a founding partner of Rainmaker Digital (formerly Copyblogger) — creators of Copyblogger.com, StudioPress/Genesis, Rainmaker Platform, and other online products/services. Often referred to as the “Geek that Speaks,” Sean has a true passion for technology and how it is applied to the needs of marketing. Sean is an active member of the Dallas business community in leadership roles with DFW Search Marketing Association and is a Past President of the Dallas Ad League.
Amanda Giles
Topic: The Way to Theme Enlightenment
Amanda Giles is WordPress Evangelist and Enthusiast who loves converting people to WordPress. She’s been developing websites since 1994 and has been building WordPress themes since 2009. She hails from New Hampshire where she founded the Seacoast NH WordPress Meetup in 2011. She works as an independent consultant and also as part of Spark Development, a small agency focusing on WordPress web development. You can often locate Amanda by her loud sneezes and it’s likely because of these sneezes that she leads such a blessed life.
Elayna Fernández
Topic: WordPress 101 Workshop
Elayna Fernández, known worldwide as The Positive MOM, is an award-winning storyteller, a master digital strategist, and an avid student of pain. Elayna helps moms transform their pain story into positive growth, step into balance, and create joy and success on their own terms – in all areas of life.
Elayna travels the world as an International keynote speaker and panelist in the topics of motherhood, mindset, and mompreneurship. Her guidance encourages, empowers, and equips millions of moms in 134 countries to increase their impact, income, and influence, without guilt, shame, or regrets in motherhood.
Elayna is Certified Guerrilla Marketing Master Trainer, Certified Passion Test Facilitator, Certified Success Principles Trainer, a graduate of the Steve Harvey School for Business Acceleration, and a web designer for over 20 years. She has been awarded as Best Marketer, Mom Entrepreneur of the Year, Best Latina Lifestyle Blogger of both 2015 and 2016, and the 2017 Best Family and Parenting Creator at the TECLA Awards, and she has been named one of the Top Latina Influencers in the USA two consecutive years. ThePositiveMOM.com, has been ranked one of 100 Top Moms Blogs Worldwide both in 2016 and 2017.
Born and raised in a slum in the Dominican Republic, Elayna now lives in Fort Worth, Texas, with her loving husband and 3 homeschooled daughters.
Her philosophy is “BE Positive and You’ll BE Powerful!”
Matt Hayman
Topic: Sales 101 – Finding Clients and Freeing Up Dollars
Sales, Sales Management, Team Builder, Branding, Speaker, Trainer.
As the Head of SAP Anywhere, Matt is responsible for working with the broader team to declare product market fit, achieve financial aspirations and maximize customer satisfaction. He currently oversees the Sales, Customer Success, Support, and overall execution of SAP Anywhere’s employees/clientele on a global scale.
Matt has spent the majority of his career focused on SMB sales. From door2door sales, selling to fortune 100 companies, or running his own companies, Matt has a diverse sales background which he now uses to manage, teach, and train others. As an international sales leader he travels the globe sharing his insights through keynotes, blogs, and social media, on overcoming the 2 major obstacles in sales; prospecting and freeing up dollars without making major changes to how you work today.
Matt currently resides in Dallas, Texas, with his wife and 6 kids. When he isn’t traveling he spends his time coaching multiple youth sports and building his community.
Elisha & Elyssa Fernández
Isaac Irvine
Topic: Using Social Media to Grow your Personal Brand and Build your Freelance Business
A cheerleader for small business owners and buying local, Isaac “loves the heart and soul that local businesses put into their products and services.” He’s especially interested in helping people build their personal brand using stories on social media. When he’s not at work, you can usually find Isaac and his kids riding their bikes at the local skatepark or sampling local coffee offerings. Isaac is a native of Northern California who transplanted to Phoenix ten years ago to work for GoDaddy.
Jeff VanDrimmelen
Topic: Integrating VR (Virtual Reality) Content into WordPress Websites
Jeff VanDrimmelen’s biggest claim to fame is that he build the University of North Carolina’s WordPress Network. This initiative has now grown into tens of thousands of websites that runs all their web systems on campus.
Since then he has owned several WordPress based website and software companies and is currently the Senior Marketing Director at a Virtual Reality start-up that is focused on making virtual collaboration and productivity spaces.
He is the father of 4, and husband to one amazing woman. Together they reside in Frisco and work to try and figure out how to raise these amazing kids they have been blessed with.
Aaron Edwards
Topic: Introduction to WordPress Multisite
CTO of WPMU DEV (140+ premium plugins and support) and Edublogs (hosting 3 million+ education blogs), managing a team of 30 developers around the globe. WordPress plugin developer specializing in Multisite for 9 years, working from home in Dallas. Proud father of 3 and a world travel nut.
Cathy Rueter
Topic: Five Tips for Better Blogging as a Beginner
Cathy Rueter took time away from an active freelance writing and editing career to work as a reporter and newsletter editor for ten years. She’s returned to her passion of writing and pursuing a career as a Christian author, blogger, and Development Editor. She is currently the vice president of the DFW Chapter of American Christian Fiction Writers. Originally from the Greater Grand Rapids, MI area, she now lives in Dallas/Fort Worth with her family.
After a few stumbles, her WordPress website “Up in the Attic” with Cathy Rueter is growing up thanks to the wonderful people at the Fort Worth Chapter of WordPress. Running her own website/blog, FB Writers page, guest blogging, editing, and writing keeps the words tumbling out of the attic. Open one of the boxes “Up in the Attic” and discover a variety of topics and treasures.
Peter Walker
Topic: Get Paid! Plugins, Gateways, BitCoin: WordPress eCommerce Project Management
Peter Walker has been on the online journey for over 25 years, starting with the Star Fleet Command BBS in October 1988. His previous experience on his digital journey include being a professional audio engineer and a post secondary new media instructor. His main purpose in professional life is content editing & managing, UX/UI, front end HTML5 development, WordPress, and project management.
Chris Silver Smith
Topic: Getting SEO Advantages from Social Media
Chris Silver Smith is the founder of Argent Media, a search marketing agency specializing in SEO, Local SEO, Social Media, and Online Reputation Management. Chris has provided consulting for many Fortune 500 and Internet Retailer 500 companies including Pottery Barn, LL Bean, Orbitz, Zappos, and Time Inc. Chris has served on the board of advisors for Universal Business Listing, the SEO Board of Advisors for Thomson-Reuters FindLaw, and on the board of the DFW Search Engine Marketing Association. Chris occasionally serves as an expert witness for court cases involving online trademark infringement, defamation, and search engines. As an expert witness, he has served in cases involving PODS Enterprises, U-Haul, Google, The Academy Awards, GoDaddy, Fox News, and more. Chris is also a long-time columnist at Search Engine Land and Marketing Land.
Adam Fout
Topic: The Basics of Content Marketing
Adam Fout is the lead content writer at Blue Steele Solutions, a full-service marketing company in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex with clients all over the U.S. After completing a series of degrees in technical communication, he left the manuals and SOPs behind and made the switch to digital marketing and content creation.
He writes regularly on the subject of content marketing and customer retention, is a regular contributor to a variety of publications (including PostFunnel and The Layout), and specializes in the intersection between content marketing and WordPress.