{"id":1114,"date":"2017-03-15T12:30:54","date_gmt":"2017-03-15T17:30:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/2017.stlouis.wordcamp.org\/?p=1114"},"modified":"2017-06-30T14:19:40","modified_gmt":"2017-06-30T19:19:40","slug":"wcstl-speaker-interview-heather-acton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wcstl-speaker-interview-heather-acton\/","title":{"rendered":"WCSTL Speaker Interview: Heather Acton"},"content":{"rendered":"

Heather Acton will be talking on\u00a0Navigating a Career in WordPress<\/a>. She’s from Chicago, Illinois.<\/p>\n

Here’s Heather’s interview:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

NILE FLORES:<\/strong> What was it about WordPress that got you to start using it?<\/p>\n

HEATHER ACTON:<\/strong> My introduction to WordPress was in 2008 and was rather serendipitous. I had just learned HTML and CSS and wanted to integrate a blog, and a friend of mine was very involved in WordPress development. His posts on social networks about WordPress and the community were always positive and informative, so I did my own research and started my first project. I fell in love, and though I\u2019ve \u201cplayed\u201d with other CMSs, I\u2019ve never taken to one quite like WordPress.<\/em><\/p>\n

NILE FLORES:\u00a0<\/strong>What motivates you to give back to WordPress and its community?<\/p>\n

HEATHER ACTON:\u00a0<\/strong>Gratitude. I feel very thankful that I stumbled on WordPress in 2008. Sticking with the platform and the community has helped improve every facet of my life. I want others to be poised for a similar experience and know that support from those of us that have been around for years is key to keeping the platform and community healthy and growing.<\/em><\/p>\n

NILE FLORES:\u00a0<\/strong>How many WordCamps have you been to, and what was your best 1 or 2 experiences that you had when attending WordCamp?<\/p>\n

HEATHER ACTON:\u00a0<\/strong>Oh my\u2026I\u2019m guessing I\u2019ve been to around 14-18 WordCamps\u2026I\u2019ve lost count. My favorite experiences have been immediately after speaking, when a few people come up and say thank you and say that I\u2019ve helped or inspired them in some way. If I make a difference for just one person each camp, then it was worth attending.<\/em><\/p>\n

NILE FLORES:\u00a0<\/strong>What is your number 1 tip for WordPress users?<\/p>\n

HEATHER ACTON:\u00a0<\/strong>Always be learning. Just when you think you know it all, you realize how much you still have to learn.<\/em><\/p>\n

NILE FLORES:\u00a0<\/strong>What is your favorite feature in WordPress?<\/p>\n

HEATHER ACTON:\u00a0<\/strong>Ability to add custom post types and taxonomies. I\u2019m becoming a content architecture junkie and couldn\u2019t organize content-heavy sites without them.<\/em><\/p>\n

NILE FLORES:\u00a0<\/strong>What are your 3 most favorite WordPress plugins?<\/p>\n

HEATHER ACTON:<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Advanced Custom Fields Pro<\/em><\/li>\n
  2. Gravity Forms<\/em><\/li>\n
  3. WooCommerce<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    NILE FLORES:\u00a0<\/strong>What is your favorite WordPress theme?<\/p>\n

    HEATHER ACTON:\u00a0<\/strong>Sassified Underscores\u2026with Bootstrap essentials integrated (grid system mostly.)<\/em><\/p>\n

    If you’d like to meet Heather and sit in on her presentation, you’ll need to buy a ticket<\/strong><\/a>. Hope to see you at WordCamp St. Louis!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Heather Acton will be talking on\u00a0Navigating a Career in WordPress. She’s from Chicago, Illinois. Here’s Heather’s interview: NILE FLORES: What was it about WordPress that got you to start using it? HEATHER ACTON: My introduction to WordPress was in 2008 … Continue reading WCSTL Speaker Interview: Heather Acton<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1346476,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[29],"tags":[474925,459755],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-speakers","tag-heather-acton","tag-speaker-interview"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/files\/2017\/03\/2017-speaker-interview-heather-acton.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p837Xy-hY","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1346476"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1116,"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions\/1116"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlouis.wordcamp.org\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}