Revenue from Free Plugins: Welcoming Ben Meredith To WordCamp Raleigh

Have you ever written a post introducing yourself? I am right now. In addition to speaking this year, I am my own speaker liaison.

Part of my role is to publish blog posts promoting the speakers. This one will be EPIC.

In the famous words of Shawn Carter, allow me to reintroduce myself.

I’m a freelance WordPress developer with 2 plugins in the official .org repository. WordCamp Raleigh 2014 was my first WordCamp, and I was hooked.

Weeks after last year’s conference, I coded and released a plugin on slightly more than a whim that has now garnered more than 5,000 active users, and 17 5-star reviews. That (free) plugin, in conjunction with my other (free) one, has generated around $5,000 in revenue for me so far this year.

That’s right, folks. I am a literal thousandaire just from WordPress.

In all seriousness, I’m thrilled to have developed plugins that are helping people out, and also generating some spare coin for me. If you want to learn how I turned those free plugins with free support tickets from non-paying customers into revenue (and recurring revenue!), come check out my talk in the developer track. It’s centered around what I think is the strongest aspect of WordPress, the community.

Buy your ticket today!