For Bijgespijkerd, a Dutch marketing blog, I’m responsible for the entire technical part of the website. I covered it from building the WordPress theme out of an existing design, to developing custom plugins and widgets.
Bijgespijkerd has become a quite popular marketing blog, got a solid base of over 350 subscribers, over 1.500 comments and published over 500 articles in the first year. Sjef Kerkhofs and Vincent Neve founded the blog in late 2008, not really knowing what they could expect. Now they have one of the best upcoming marketing blogs in the Netherlands, got nominated for various blog awards and have won the Nobiles Blog Award in the start of 2009 which gave the blog a huge boost!
What did I built for Bijgespijkerd?
When I started at the Bijgespijkerd project, there was nothing but a sketch of what the layout should look like. After a few days, the first version of Bijgespijkerd kicked off and seemed to blend in properly in the world of marketing blogs. But the layout seemed a little old-fashioned as the focus was mainly on the content.
That’s where the fun really started when Bas Bakker generously donated a brand new design! The .psd layout was dropped in my inbox and I got to develop a new theme out of it, which I was more that happy to do off course!
Within the Bijgespijkerd project, I’ve used the following techniques:
- Custom WordPress widgets like the video widget in the sidebar.
- Build a custom WordPress theme out of a Photoshop design.
- Develop custom WordPress plugins, mainly for the backend of the blog.
As you can see, Bijgespijkerd was a project that many WordPress developers would love to start on. There’s nothing more satisfying than to raise a blog from HTML code, to a fully functional and successful blog!
Starting my career, for real
I was a freelancer for quite some time when I met Sjef and Vincent. We started working on the first versions of Bijgespijkerd and the rush started. For the first time in my career I had the feeling that I was working on a large project, working with experienced people and actually being appreciated for my knowledge.
Sjef Kerkhofs – Bijgespijkerd founder:
“Coen developed the technique (in WordPress) behind our Marcom-blog Bijgespijkerd.nl. During the process he became ‘one of the guys’ because of his passion and creative thinking. At this point we don’t see him as a supplier anymore, but as one of the founders of our blog!”
Today, I’m still working with Sjef and Vincent on various other projects. We are able to work together like we know each other for years!