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When you call our offices, chances are you’ll talk to me. I’m Margaret Rode, and I started the company out of a drafty spare bedroom in 1998 after a career path through great organizations like Apple Computer, Hughes Aircraft, and Worldwide Partners.
Photo by the startlingly talented http://katymosesphotos.com
Why the detour? Because of an obsession that wouldn’t let me go.
In living and working all over the world, I’d seen that not everyone had equal access to the power of the Web to promote their business or cause. I’d volunteered for several nonprofit organizations and had seen firsthand how they struggled to work miracles with almost no resources at all. I’d seen how small companies sweated bullets — and often sacrificed their own time and quality of life — to save the lives of a few abused kids, to bring people together, or to push back against those wrecking their corner of the environment with impunity. Not only did most not know how to use the Web to find support for their efforts, but often they were scraping the bottom of the donation jar just to run off a few flyers at Kinko’s.
A hundred times a week, I thought to myself: “That’s just ALL kinds of wrong.”
The more I saw, the more it pissed me off and kept me awake at night. So I quit my job. And one client at a time, I worked with good people to build websites that helped them reach supporters and donors and buyers and friends. I taught them how to maintain their own sites, and set up social media, guiding them through the chaos of online marketing. And I watched them grow. And you know what? There’s no substitute for knowing you’re making a difference with your life energy, rather than just putting in your time until retirement. It’s risky being self-employed, and the hours can sometimes be crazy. But working with passionate, COMpassionate people makes it seriously easy to leap out of bed every morning.
Now, 17 years later, Websites for Good is a collective of talented, seasoned web design professionals who are as kind and passionate as they are smart. We have a growing global client list with some crazy-great organizations, and my new obsession is with continuing to do this for many years to come, and counting the millions of lives we’re helping to make better.
Drop me a line and say hello. We can talk about where you are, where you’d like to be, and all the different creative ways to get there. Plus, I love hearing from folks trying to do good in the world. It makes my day.
