Super Women of the Web: Exclusive Interview with the Owners of JustMommies.com

The creation of the Internet has helped individuals make their dreams of owning their own business a reality. Thanks to anonymity, unlike reality, persons are not judged by their looks, gender or personality but rather solely on their ability to run a business. The owners of "JustMommies.com" took a few moments out of their busy schedules to do an interview with me.

Tell me a little bit about yourself. What area did you grow up in?

Patty: I was born and raised in Florida. I moved to Georgia when I was 18 and that is where I met my husband.
Teresa: We grew up in the Tampa/St. Petersburg area of Florida. Up until age 13 we lived in Port Richey, Florida

What did your parents do?

Teresa: My parents were divorced when we were very young and my stepmother and dad raised Patty and I. I have always considered my stepmother my mom, but I also have a relationship with my mother as well. My dad and mom (stepmother) were insurance brokers and my mother does graphic design for a living. She spent 12 years in the Navy during our childhood and we did not see her as often as I would have liked.

What type of educational background do you have (private school, public school)?

Patty: I went to five different schools during high school and then homeschooled my senior year of high school. I was living with my aunt and uncle who were in the military so we moved a lot. I have been to college four times now and have quite a few credits but no degree. I dropped out of nursing school with one quarter to go. I was doing fine academically but after seeing someone in the emergency room that had shot himself in the head, I just decided that nursing wasn't for me.

Teresa: I went to public school mostly, except for the half year that I spent in a private Christian school. As an adult I attended nursing school in Florida. I went through a divorce and did not complete it. I later completed a medical assisant program. I made a second attempt at nursing school. I was actually attending nursing school when we began Justmommies. As Justmommies grew bigger I ultimately decided my heart was here and nursing school would have to wait again. I am still unsure if I will go back and complete my degree.

What did you want to do when you grew up?

Patty: Hmm, when I was a little kid I always wanted to be an actress. My parents even signed me up for an acting class for a short period of time. I wasn't outgoing though and was really shy in highschool so I don't think this was something I was meant to do.

Teresa: I think I wanted to be a scientist.

Tell a story about how Just Mommies came to be.

Teresa: Ok, this is actually kind of funny. Patty badgered me for quite a while to start it up and I just thought it was too much work. I thought it would be way too difficult to get something off the ground. One day, I just went out and bought the domain name and the hosting and said ok, let's do this. We started with just the two of us and a few other members. We were posting to ourselves for a while. I do the web design for Justmommies. This started off as a hobby and has grown into so much more. I taught myself html and then proceded to dabble into php. I still am a beginner with that, but just about everything on justmommies was designed and coded by me, with the exception being our pregnancy tickers. Those we did hire a programmer for. I take a lot of pride in seeing how far we have come.

Patty: In 2003, Teresa and I belonged to a couple of other sites for parents. I decided that I wanted to see if we could start our own site. At this point, Teresa wasn't totally interested but she humored me and helped me set up the site. We had it hosted with a free hosting company. The domain name just redirected to a free message board. Well, that didn't go very far. About a year later we decided to really see if we could do this. Teresa designed our web page and I invited everyone I knew. Then we went to work at making sure everyone felt welcome and making sure that we had an active "looking" community, even though there were only a few members. The biggest thing we worked on with our community was making sure that it was positive and friendly. This was something important to both of us. I believe the reason Justmommies has been such a success is because we started off with keeping things nice. Some people think this is sugar coating but when it comes down to it people like Justmommies because our community is friendly.

What was the reaction of friends/family when you told them your plans?

Patty: Oh my husband was not supportive at first. In fact, for the first two years, I heard a lot of negativity. He didn't take me seriously. I had tried to go into business for myself several times before so he just figured this was another dumb idea of mine. Now, he is very proud of me and tells everyone about the site.

Teresa: My husband had a very hard time with it at first. We had a lot of fights during the first year of Justmommies. It was very difficult on him. Justmommies takes an incredible amount of my time. Now, my husband is pretty supportive. Of course, he still makes cracks and jokes about it from time to time. As for my family, my dad has always been very supportive and my mother is fairly supportive as well.

Without giving exacts, can you disclose a rough estimate of the start up costs?

Patty: Okay, this is laughable! When we started Justmommies I had a computer that my sister (Teresa) bought for me for $35 at a garage sale! Before that I was operating off of a web tv that I got at a discount store. The domain name cost about $10 and hosting started off around $20 a month. Of course, the hosting costs have gone up a whole lot since then but when we first started we only had about twenty members, maybe.

How you started building your member list?

Teresa: Advertising is the biggest way we built our member list. That and encouraging our members to be welcoming and friendly. I can't stress enough how important it is to be welcoming to new members. Send them an email or a personal message letting them know they are important to you and you are glad they are here. One of the other things we try to do is give back to our hosts and to our community in general. We have contests and prizes regularly to reward and thank our hosts for all they do to make our community the wonderful place it is today.

What changes would you like to see with JustMommies?

Patty: Hmm, I would like to see us have more interactive tools and content. You know cool stuff! That is one thing I would like to have more of. I would also like us to have an established reputation as having the nicest community for moms. I am not sure if we are there yet, but I want people to walk away from JM thinking that everyone is just so nice here. From my experience with online message boards, there are some unfriendly ones out there. Sort of like back in high school, there were some mean girls. Well, Teresa and I were not mean and we don't like that. When I was on other communities I saw the mean girls run off all the nice people and that was something that I did not want to see on our site. That is one of the most important things to me. I want our community to be nice, have nice people, and to be some place where everyone feels supported and welcome.

Teresa: We would really like to expand our content. Have more interactive features and tools. We really would like to hone in on what mom's want. This is one of the biggest advantages Justmommies has - our site is run by moms, not by men in business suits who only think they know what mom's want.

Where do you see JM in the next 5 years? 10 years?

Patty: I try not to think that far in advance or I start to feel overwhelmed. I would like to see Justmommies become one of the sites that everyone has heard of but that is just something that I keep in the back of my head.

Teresa: I hope that Justmommies will be the largest site for moms on the internet.

How many members you have now?

Patty: We have close to 18,000 members and growing. (We have been getting about 1000 new members a month)

Any advice for other women thinking of starting up their own company?

Patty: Trust your instincts. Don't make your decisions based on what you think you are supposed to do or trying to be like another person or company. Be yourself and trust yourself. Don't worry if you make mistakes because you will. Also get help. If you don't know what you are doing with bookkeeping or legal issues hire someone to help as soon as you can. Don't just go with anyone. We made this mistake in the beginning with a lot of things. Now I am picky. If you talk to me like I am stupid or don't take me seriously, I will find someone else to work with.

Teresa: Patience and persistence. Starting a business takes time before you will see the results you are looking for. What I see a lot of women do is go in with a bang and then fizzle out. Read, read, read. There is so much information out there. Get books on marketing, web design, advertising, and business. Check out all the websites and tools available to webmasters online if you are doing an online business. Use your hobby or something you love as a seed for your business idea. If you are doing something you love, you will succeed at it.

The author would like to give special thanks to both Patty and Teresa for taking the time out of their schedules to share their experiences with me.
Justmommies.com is a website open to anyone, not just mommies who are interested in interacting with others of similar interests. Whether you're thinking about becoming a parent and need some support or are a "seasoned pro" at parenthood, JustMommies has a place for you. Justmommies can be found by going to www.justmommies.com