My Story
At university, I studied and graduated with BA (Hons) Sports Management and went on to do an MA in International Marketing Management.
Here was the idea – I wanted to combine these two to work in the sports marketing industry.
And offline too.
How times have changed?!
Originally, along the way when I worked through various jobs, I gradually leaned toward SEO and anything related to that. From working at a digital marketing agency to being in-house, from working at a small local homeware company to an international fashion brand…I’ve covered a lot of areas.
And that gave me amazing insights of various industries as well as access to very smart people around me.
During that time, I mix it up by also being involved with the WordPress community and speaking at events to share my knowledge about WordPress SEO.
But something nagged at me towards the latter years of my full-time employment.
On the side, I have always enjoyed helping other people to manage their sites but still continued to work full-time. By doing this I was able to further develop my WordPress skills…which allowed me to start my own business, in July 2016.
I help entrepreneurs and small businesses with WordPress sites to grow their online visibility, increase their audience engagement and encourage conversions.
My other side-business
But that’s not all, as I also run a deaf awareness website at Hear Me Out! [CC].
As someone who who is partially deaf/hard of hearing and has been since birth, I spend a portion of my time creating content on my website, speaking at events and connecting with other people to raise awareness and to bridge the gap between the hearing and deaf worlds.
All my life, I have gone through barriers and hurdles because of this, so I believe that it’s my duty to share my story, experience and advice so that other people don’t have to go through the same thing as I do.
For more details about my professional background and what I did for the companies I worked for, you can visit my LinkedIn page.
What Have I Done?
- Volunteered at WordCamp Edinburgh 2015
- Spoke at WordPress Edinburgh Meetup
- Spoke at WordCamp Belfast 2016: How to Find Endless & Relevant Ideas Using Just Google
- Ran a workshop on Yoast SEO WordPress plugin at WordCamp Belfast 2016
- Co-organised WordCamp Edinburgh 2017
- Led the organisation of WordCamp Edinburgh 2018
- Spoke at WordCamp Belfast 2018 about YouTube captions
- Spoke at UX Scotland 2019 about the power of captions
- Spoke at BrightonSEO in September 2019 about the power and benefits of video captions
- Speaking at WC Europe Online in June 2020
What is Keeping Me Busy?
- Running my business Khalifa Media Ltd (formerly known as IgniteRock) and helping clients to grow their visibility, engagement and conversions
of their WordPress sites - Writing blog posts here to bring value to those who are running their own websites and share personal stories
- Being deaf/hard of hearing, I share my knowledge and stories on my other website Hear Me Out [CC] about the d/Deaf and hard of working world
- Creating YouTube videos around deaf awareness to help break down barriers and bridge the gap between hearing and deaf worlds
- Being involved in the WordPress community by attending Meetup groups and local WordCamps
- Being sociable on Twitter and Instagram
- Volunteer at with UK charity to run workshops about disability and deaf awareness
- Constantly reading books that can add value to my life in various ways
- Learning British Sign Language to plan for the future, help me connect with the deaf community better and to enjoy the process of learning the language
of their WordPress sites