Jim Westergren
A blog about me, my projects, SEO, Web Development and Personal Development.
"If we did all the things we are capable of, we would literally astound ourselves." - Thomas A. Edison

Fifth Annual Report: My Success

On the 5th of December 2004 when I was 22 years old I changed my life 180 degrees. I quit my earlier very special life and moved back to Sweden to change my life totally.

I had no money, education, experience or connections and some people highly doubted that I could get successful – personally I took it as a great challenge. I started by borrowing my mothers computer and begun to learn HTML and internet marketing.

That is now 5 years ago.

Every year since then I publish an annual report how the year has gone and with future plans for the next year. Every year I try to do more good.

This is the fifth annual report for 2009.

If you are interested, read my 4 previous reports here:

Main highlights from 2009

Our son Alvin arrived!

This was by far the greatest in 2010. Photos of him can be seen here. I am so proud and happy. He was born on the third September and is now a little more than 4 months old.

5 months in Bolivia

In may 2008 I went back to Sweden after having lived 10 months with my wife in Bolivia. It was very nice to live there and it was also something that further developed me as a person.

Learning PHP programming

During 2008 I learned myself PHP programming using Google and testing. I am still a beginner but I can do it pretty well. More than half of my work time now goes for programming and it is so much more fun than SEO. :)

Built my own CMS (web publishing system), Clesto

I built myself the Clesto CMS which I am using to build my own simple web sites. It has been downloaded 363 times as of this writing. Here are some examples of web sites built with Clesto. I am very happy with the system and it has received some great feedback. I did not only learn PHP while making it but also other things such as web security and web performance.

Created SEO-guide.se

In may 2009 I finished SEO-guide.se which has more than 100 pages on SEO in Swedish. It has it’s own membership system with automatic payment activation. I wrote all text, XHTML, CSS and much of the PHP myself from scratch which was a great learning.

Made the card game Magic Bolivia

I love games and I made a card game that I named Magic Bolivia (web site in Swedish) which I play and enjoy a lot. Not a highlight of the year but worth to mention.

Learned and took over the economy of my company

It used to be my father that administered the economy for my company. But as he could not continue anymore we spent a week together and I learned it. So now I am doing the accounting, pay taxes and so on myself.

My biggest and greatest service during my 5 years, N.nu

The second biggest news in 2010 after my son is the establishment of my free web site service N.nu. It will enable anyone with an internet connection to make his own nice web site and it is super simple. The service will be officially released in some weeks in 3 languages, but already more than 300 people has created a web site in the system and given great feedback. It is based on my Clesto CMS but of course also with other functions such as domain mapping, guestbook, own forum, image gallery, web stats and so forth. There will be a free and a paid version.

Summary of 2009

2009 was a year our lovely son came and a year of learning and establishing a new business project. 2010 will be very focused on N.nu and clients on the side. The profit of my company was not good in 2009 but it was worth it for building the future.

Goals for 2010

Not so many goals but a great effort will be placed to make sure to reach them.

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About the Author Jim Westergren Jim Westergren is a company owner from Sweden who lives together with his wife and son. Some of his interests are SEO, web development, writing and taking photos. Read his full about page or contact him. Follow Jim on Twitter or subscribe to this blog.
In Swedish: presentation, blog.
5 responses »Leave a comment
  1. Amit Bhawani
    said on January 11, 2010 at 3:01 pm

    You have got nice goals for 2010 and i feel for getting those huge number of members for your n.nu project you may try out freebies stuff like offering free wp themes or else ad free setup for the very first year, which can create a buzz on the web.

    Btw how did you learn php? Any online course or offline institutes?

  2. Jim Westergren
    said on January 11, 2010 at 3:50 pm

    Hi Amit,

    I have some plans on how to reach it.

    I learned PHP using Google and working with it to make my CMS. Testing testing testing.

  3. Ravi Kiran
    said on January 20, 2010 at 3:45 pm

    Dear sir,

    please help me to protect my adsense a/c from cheaters.

    I think someone clicked on my ads for cheating me and make loss for me.

    I found that AdsenseClickLock site,but its not free,so please post a new article for solve the problem.

    Thanking you,

  4. Keith Davis
    said on January 30, 2010 at 11:31 am

    Hi Jim
    You say “I quit my earlier very special life and moved back to Sweden”.
    Where did you move from?
    In any event you sound happy with your life and proud of your achievements.

    Sorry to get down to the nitty gritty, but how have you found things financially?
    I’ve decided that without tremendous talent and some good luck… it’s not easy to make a living on the web.

    Good luck with 2010.

  5. Praveen
    said on February 16, 2010 at 4:53 am

    Jim,

    It’s wonderful to see how good you are doing. Happy for you and happy that you finally learnt the “wretched” PHP ;)

    Good luck with 2010 and my Best Wishes to you and to the Family :)

    Take Care Buddy,
    Praveen

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