How I (a simple gardener) accidentally became a full–blown marketing ninja and big time ad publisher

Welcome to this site! I am Kim Pittoors, a Dutch SEO expert at Nethit and also the founder of SEOnieuws.com. A news website about SEO. Today I am gonna share my story for the first time, the story of a simple gardener with a hobby that got way out of hand.

How I got into making websites

Computers have always fascinated me, even as a child I had all sorts of fantasies about what computers would be able to do in the future. But I actually didn’t start making websites until late 2005 when I signed myself up for an online course to learn HTML just for the fun of it.

Little did I know that this was about to change my life completely within a couple of years. At first, I made a couple of websites about free games and software. It was a great hobby to have. Later on, I started making free websites for friends and family members.

Going Freelance and getting a Steady Job

Next thing I knew friends of family members (and family members of friends) also started to contact me, that’s when I decided to become a freelance web designer (while still working half-time as a gardener).

After Freelancing a couple of years, I got offered a full-time job at a small web design agency where I learned the tricks of the trade. It was a very exciting time and I learned a lot. (HTML/CSS, Javascript, PHP, WordPress, Joomla etc ..)

How I got into SEO

While I was working for the web design agency, I also kept working on my own projects. I made lots of websites, but guess what: Nobody came, no visitors!

Maybe you can imagine the frustration I had to deal with. All the hard work that I had done seemed to be useless, a complete waste of time! It felt like whatever I did, it just wasn’t good enough!

Do you know that feeling? Do you know how it feels to put so much energy into something and to get nothing in return?

It’s a horrible feeling many starters have to cope with! So that’s when I got into SEO. I didn’t know anything about SEO at that moment. I just started reading lots of articles about it and tried to apply what I had learned to my sites. And after a while, it started to work.

My sites went up and the visitors finally came in:

First SEO success (30.000 sessions a month on ghanja.be)

It was great! My hard work finally started to pay off. My websites were growing and I kept making more of them. That’s when I acquired the taste for it! I developed an instant addiction to winning in Google.

How I became an SEO

A couple of years later someone offered me a steady SEO job, I was a bit reluctant at first because I actually liked being a web designer. But after a while, I decided to do it. I needed a new challenge anyway.

I started working for a big SEO company where I was given the opportunity to specialize and gain experience. Meanwhile,  I also got married and became the father of a beautiful daughter. Money was not a problem and life was good!

How I started my own company

Meanwhile, my sites kept growing and growing and In the fall of 2014, I realized that the ad-revenue from my sites would even be sufficient to live on.

At work, things didn’t go so well, the company I worked for was becoming a bit too greedy and that made my job a lot less pleasant.

That was when I decided to start my own SEO and web design company called Nethit.

Nethit is a company that makes and monetizes popular websites. When I am not busy working for clients I work on my own sites which provide a steady flow of passive income.

I already know how to make websites and how to rank them. So I am currently more focused on conversion, usability, web psychology and social media marketing.

But I also spend time learning more about Linux and about Linux servers (Bash scripting, Python etc..). I switched from Windows to Linux last year and that was one of the best choices I ever made. I wish I had done this sooner. I love Linux Mint by the way. I can recommend it, especially for starters.

My own Projects

I have lots of activities, but my online business guides are still the best source of revenue I have. Since 2017, I use the commercial name RTX Media for these activities. But the real company behind it is Nethit.

Another commercial name I use is Joomlacy. At Joomlacy you can download One Click Registration and Add user Frontend, a couple of popular Joomla Extensions I originally made back in 2009.

But at this moment I spend most of my time writing for my Dutch SEO news website SEOnieuws.com and working on a new interesting project called SEOradar.nl (a Google Algorithm Tracker).

Next, to all this, I also have lots of other (newer or less successful) projects which I don’t mention here. Not every project can be a big success. Trying and failing is part of the journey, it’s the best way to learn something new. And there is always something new to learn just around the corner.

Passionate about SEO

So this is why I am so passionate about SEO. It changed my life and my future. To me SEO is freedom. The freedom to do stuff you like without having to worry about where your next paycheck will come from.

The freedom to choose your own working hours and to work from home. (No more stressing about being late for work in traffic jams.) The freedom to start my own company without much pressure and to spend time on innovation and creativity if I want to. And most importantly: The freedom to spend a lot of time with my family. I can recommend this lifestyle to anyone!

And you know what? SEO can change your life too. I’d love to help you reach your goal, whatever that is. Feel free to contact me if you have questions about SEO.