Edinburgh Conference Presenters

Ask Cath Andrews to use three words to describe herself and she'll say, Italophile, Evertonian, Abba-lover, - but otherwise she's fairly normal. Having higher qualifications in modern languages and Chinese, but having also fallen asleep at an interview for international banking and become disillusioned sitting in a rabbit-hutch translating for the United Nations, Cath worked for thirty-two years in the Probation Service, initially as a Probation Officer and later as a senior manager. There she got plenty of practice in dealing with difficult people and became particularly adept at disarming machete-wielding offenders and Chairing meetings of psychiatrists. On balance she preferred the machete experiences.

Taking advantage of an early retirement scheme in February 2009, Cath has since divided her time between her homes in Southport, near Liverpool (UK) and a tiny village in Italy where she and her husband Mike own an old farmhouse.

Cath's love of all things Italian led her to start building her website in mid-2009. She would describe it as work in progress, and her main obsession in life. She enjoyed Chairing the SBI European Conference in Barcelona, 2009, and is looking forward to Chairing some of the Edinburgh sessions - hopefully without the need for her machete-disarming skills.

Jennifer Hawkins - Scotland
Online Business Owner
www.beauty-soap-and-bubbles.com
www.juicer-recipes-for-energy.com


Jennifer was employed as a Senior Administrator in a local adult college for many years, working closely with students and The Scottish Qualification Authority. It was interesting and varied work, in which she met people from all walks of life. However, it was a challenging time while bringing up and tending to the needs of her children.

After a spell working in the Middle East working in Fuji Bank for the Japanese, Jennifer decided on her return to the UK, that she wanted a change of career and trained as a beauty/complementary therapist. She opened her own salon in January 2004. She was passionate about her work and loved the client contact and the beauty industry. However it was not allowing her time to enjoy her family or her dogs or her main hobby: photography. She was looking for something which would combine everything she enjoyed in life.

Jennifer helped her to develop a website for one of her husband George's businesses, and then she discovered SBI!! She started her first SBI website in 2007 and a few months ago started her 2nd site. Finding SBI has not only fulfilled her life by giving her the time to do things she enjoys, but she has learned so much from the experience. Jennifer is enjoying taking her online business to the next level.

Hilary Parke - Scotland
Online Business Owner
www.pregnancy-information-guide.com
www.pregnancy-scotland-secret-coast.com
www.dishwasher-scout.com
www.ecotherapy-scotland.co.uk/.com

On a sunny May morning way back in the mists of time, an excited ten-year-old opened her birthday present and was thrilled to find a tent! Within half an hour it was set up at the far end of the garden and it was the following November before she could be persuaded to sleep in the house again.

Ever since, Hilary Parke has been a bit of a vagrant and will take to a tent or campervan at the drop of a hat, in spite of having held down some fairly respectable jobs, such as ten years as head of a leading-edge independent school that specialised in cognitive skills, followed by being an environmental education officer for the Scottish Wildlife Trust. From bringing up two children on a smallholding to leading groups of teenagers on wilderness expeditions to far-flung places, including one epic trip to northern Russia to take down part of the Iron Curtain, she has been lucky enough to lead a very interesting life. A keen wildlife photographer and skier, in 1987 she wrote her first book, on Scottish skiing, and has written many travel features and short stories for newspapers and magazines over the years. She is currently working on a novel set in the Western Isles, a place she returns to frequently.

Having founded a natural childbirth group whilst expecting her second child, Hilary chose pregnancy information as the niche for her first SBI! site in late 2007 and soon discovered it was a tough one to win because it was so huge! She loves working on it, however, and the dishwasher site she bought from Ellen and Laci. She has now built three more SBI! sites, two of them for friends, and although she feels she is starting to get the hang of it, she needs all the help she can get! She is keenly anticipating the Edinburgh Conference and very much looking forward to welcoming all our, "Forum Friends" to her favourite city in all the world!

Ellen Schmidt - DrMedVet, Scotland
Online Business Owner
www.pet-health-pro
www.discover-horse-carriage-driving


Ellen is a qualified, practising veterinary surgeon, working in both worlds, offline and online.

Starting in 2006 her first SBI-site and completing an SBI e-learning course in March - June 2009, she gained the necessary foundation to build quality websites, which enables her to take her business to the next level.

The second website, www.pet-health-pro.com , gives her practice for veterinary acupuncture a virtual home and the potential to develop further income opportunities.

Don Coggan, Montreal, Canada
Online Business Owner
www.coggan.com
learn.sitesell.com

Says Don "After too many years in engineering management and sales, I left it all cold turkey in 1996 to become an Internet business consultant." Since that time, he's developed nearly 150 Web sites, mostly in English, but also in French and Spanish.

Although still a registered professional engineer in Quebec and Ontario, Don no longer practices engineering, preferring instead to focus completely on building Web sites/businesses that really work. This means using the proven C-T-P-M methodology whether in the classroom for SiteSell Education or for clients of SiteSell Services.

He sees this as yesteryear's work in value engineering tieing in seamlessly with SiteSell's value offerings to its customers, all made possible by a team of SBI! enthusiasts handling everything from precise and reliable market research to flawless site operation. He currently devotes 100% of his time to SiteSell Education and SiteSell Services.

Andy Jones - England
Online Business Owner
www.arcaic.co.uk/site-build-it/site-structure-it www.mini-laptops-and-notebooks.com
www.urban-photography-art.com

Andy Jones has worked in the computer industry for over 25 years in a variety of roles as diverse as the development of automated warehouse control systems to his current position in the area of document capture and content management. Along side his ‘real’ job Andy has continually engaged in numerous personal projects which within the last few years have migrated more and more towards technologies in and around the Internet.

While still considering himself a relative ‘SBI newby’ Andy has a broad range of skills and knowledge beyond SBI itself and hopes that imparting some understanding of what else is ‘out there’ to less technically experienced SBIers will help them understand better what they can achieve with SBI and where they should direct their efforts.

Stuart Langridge
Online Business Owner
www.stockexchangesecrets.com
www.combat-identity-theft.com

Stuart began marketing online with ezines in early 2003 as a way to promote his services as a financial adviser. The high returns and low effort of this form of lead generation convinced him that there was something in this 'internet thing' but his early efforts to build a profitable website failed miserably. In fact, even after joining SBI, his initial efforts to build a successful website were less than impressive.

Now, having learnt many ways to fail, Stuart has been left with an isolated number of techniques that he feels can help promote success online. His many tests and experiments have allowed him to distil SEO into a few key principles, blogging into something useful and link building into a quick and easy outsourced dream. Add this to the power of SBI and you have a recipe for success!

Stuart now works for an online media as Director of a multi-user and multi-lingual blog platform specialising in EU policy and politics, and is involved in the marketing of their news and job websites. This work also involves him in video use - interviewing academics, policy professionals, politicians and occasionally, heads (and former heads) of government.

Stuart has consulted for companies with e-commerce sites and content platforms, spoken to groups about SEO, Web 2.0 and blogging and been involved in discussions about online communications with the European Commission and key policy decision makers. He was arguably the only "live blogger" at COP15 in Copenhagen and now receives invites to attend policy events as a blogger and multi-media journalist.

MaryAnn Shank- USA
Online Business Owner
www.BusinessPlanMaster.com
www.YourSBICoach.com
www.CaliforniaRendezvous.com


MaryAnn took a career in professional business research in the venture capital world and turned it into her first SBI website. That was over five years ago. That site has ranked in the top 1% for the past four years, as do her other two sites. She takes particular pride, however, in watching her clients’ sites grow into success.

MaryAnn has been a full time webmaster and coach for nearly four years, and definitely credits SBI for changing her life. The two most life changing events were (1) being asked to moderate the “Day 4: Plan Your Monetization” forum, and (2) being selected as one of the ten coaches at the Chicago Boot Camp. Being a moderator meant that she was expected to know a lot, and so she had made it her business to learn a lot about monetizing a website. And the Chicago Boot Camp gave her an opportunity to learn from the top people in SBI, an opportunity that has never been duplicated.

“I am totally amazed at how much I don’t know,” MaryAnn was heard to mumble recently. “But I am tickled to share what I do know.”

But most of all, MaryAnn credits SBI with putting her in touch with some of the finest people on the globe, people who have become true web buddies. “That alone,” she said, “would have made the journey priceless.”

Julie Gilbert - Norfork, England
Online Business Owner
www.Homeschooling-ideas.com


After a career in the computer industry, Julie gave it up to be a stay at home Mum. To make sure she could stay at home longer, she decided to home educate her children! This has turned out to be a much more rewarding and interesting career than the one she had left.

Julie loves to learn - which works well, as life seems to present her with endless opportunities to learn from her mistakes. Her ambition in life is to wear only hand knit socks - so you will probably find her with knitting needles in hand. She also spins, weaves, quilts... well, you get the picture.

SBI has become a way for her to talk about all her other passions, and get paid for it! A match made in heaven.

Elizabeth Martyn - Norwich, England
Online Business Owner
www.healthy-eating-made-easy
www.beat-menopause-weight-gain


Elizabeth has always loved writing, and was on the staff of Good Housekeeping magazine in London before switching to the flexibility of freelance work when her children were small. She has written widely for magazines and websites and is author of several books.

Freelance work can be unpredictable, so Elizabeth launched her first SBI site in 2005 to give herself a solid source of income. She began a second site in 2008, and in 2009 gave up her freelance work to concentrate solely on building her online business.

An unexpected bonus of belonging to the SBI! community is the exciting opportunities that come along, and as well as co-authoring the Sitesell Master's Course, WAHM-It! A Work-at-Home Mother's Guide to Successfully Building a Real Business on the Net, Elizabeth has been a moderator on the SBI! Forums. Elizabeth loves teaching people about SBI! and enjoys mentoring friends and family w ho have been inspired by her success to build their own sites. A conference is the ideal opportunity to share ideas and inspiration with fellow SBI-ers.

Gabriela Rupp - Württemberg, Germany
Online Business Owner
www.successful-diet-cabbage-soup


Gabriela started her first SBI! site in 2004 and as well as building several other English sites since then her latest efforts have involved the creation of profitable German SBI websites such as gutscheinjoker.com and ekaffee.com.

Thanks to the lean business model with maximal flexibility for her family and the success of her SBI sites she enjoys the freedom to be a fulltime mother having happily found the perfect life/work balance. 

As a Business Management Graduate (Diplom-Betriebswirtin FH) from the University of Applied Sciences in Pforzheim, she draws on over 15 years of work experience in international marketing, planning and project management. During April 2009 she organized the first German SBIer meeting in Stuttgart (Germany) and following on from this there have been two further get-togethers. It´s abundantly clear that Gabriela is more than keen to play her part in helping other SBIers achieve success with their online ventures.

Peter, Skuse - Devon, UK
Online Business Owner
www.webvideofordummies.com
www.sbitube.com
www.backlinkbooster.com
www.wevids.com


Peter currently has over 60 websites (2 SBI! sites, but more coming!) and has been an Internet Marketer since 1994. Initially trained as a teacher, spent some time in the Army and was a Social Worker for 10 years.

Peter has a wide range of online businesses offering various products and services. Best known within SBI! in his role as Moderator for the SBI! Video Forum and owner of SBITUBE, the easy video hosting and embedding service for SBI! members.

Peter has specialized in Web Video for the past 7 years, and has created over 50 How-To and Training videos and DVDs. He loves teaching and hopes he can pass on some useful knowledge to others looking to add video to their website and/or make profitable DVDs to sell on their website, Amazon or Ebay, as it's a lot easier and cheaper than people think.

Kim Carroll, South Carolina, USA
Online Business Owner
www.landscape-solutions-for-you.com
www.interior-decorating-ideas-for-you.com

Kim Carroll built two SBI! Web sites in a little over two years. Before that, she owned and operated her own landscape and design business called, "Inside Out." Bad knees forced her to quit her off line business. It turned out that SBI! was a match made in heaven to continue her passion and share her knowledge.

Prior to owning Inside Out, Kim worked in Interior Design, wrote a staff development program for a multi-million dollar child development center, developed a music curriculum and worked at various other jobs. In October 2008, she oversaw the SBI! Orlando, June 2009, San Diego, October 2009, Cincinnati conferences, and the April 2010 Dallas conference. She will be organizing the September 2010 conference in Chicago.

Kim's online business continues to grow, all a result of the SBI! tools, as well as her own desire to share ideas for inside and outside investments. It goes without saying that she loves to help other SBIers succeed in their online endeavors.