My name is Clayton McIlrath and I am an entrepreneur currently living in CO. I personally enjoy the process of learning, exploring, and doing all things creative as well as sharing my experiences with others. Being an entrepreneur and business owner, I hope that my experiences may help someone else start their own venture and find success and freedom as I have! Feel free to contact me anytime for questions or opportunities.
It’s been a year and a half since i started this blog, and it’s amazing to look at how far I’ve come. This blog started out as a playground, where my best designs were wallpapers and my experience with development was limited to mostly front-end. In those days, I was proud of my average of [...]
A question that is brought to my attention almost daily is, “how do i succeed in this rough economy?” .. well today, I’ve put together a simple article for you (which is also going to be printed in our local newspaper), which should serve as a simple reminder and nothing more. YOU have the power and tools to change your circumstances, these notes will just remind you where to start.
Everyone has opinions and advice for starting a business, but most advice tells you how to start a business with a capital investment or loan.. but when we started Chosen we didn’t want either.. we wanted to follow the same path that 37 Signals traveled by “getting real” with development and work-flow and then finding ways to have your money work for you rather than surviving on income alone. So we with little capital and a lot of heart we dove into this business head first…
A while back, I developed an application to automate our workflow and gather information from potential clients before meeting with them. This was a pretty basic RFP form, but I had many people tell me how interested they were in it, and that they wanted to use it for themselves. Within a few weeks of launching that RFP we had finished our new brand and it was already outdated. Rather than updating and re-skinning I decided to start from scratch and share the old one with whoever wants it. You can customize this application as necessary, but please give credit to Chosen with a link back to this site or the main Chosen site.. even if the link is hidden, we still like it there for SEO.
There are SO MANY articles out there that get very deep into web development and programming concepts, but not many people know what to start learning if you’re just starting in this field. I’ve put together a well-rounded list of resources and websites to read on a regular basis and learn as much as you can. If you become familiar with all of these websites, you’ll quickly be the best in your field. All the information is free to anyone with a passion or desire to learn.
Combining a poor economy with an ever changing web makes it challenging to stay on the cutting edge. With multiple web languages, platforms, and techniques it’s important to dedicate your time to being versatile and flexible while not wasting time learning skills that you won’t use. In the past 2 years I have learned and mastered many tools and techniques, and I’m here to share what has been valuable and where you can trim the fat from your day.
