Jen Feeny: A Web Designer Supporting Fellow Business Owners

Danou Charette

To celebrate its fifth anniversary, The Storyteller presents a series of portraits of clients and partners, highlighting their vision and commitment to a cause that is close to their hearts.

This month, we spoke to Jen Feeny, web designer and collaborator of The Storyteller.

Jen Feeny is a website and marketing specialist from Winchester, Ontario, a charming village just south of Ottawa, who also happens to collaborate with The Storyteller on web projects. Not only does she support local businesses by designing their websites, she also empowers other entrepreneurs by speaking about her own experiences building a small business.

An intuitive web designer

Jen Feeny started her own business, Jen Feeny Marketing, in 2014.

After studying marketing, she learned about website design on the job while working for a roofing company, then gained more experience in a marketing agency.

While on maternity leave with her first child, she realized she wanted to be able to spend as much time as possible with her baby, so decided to branch out on her own. Originally, she saw this as an opportunity to train in a different field. Since she’d always been passionate about health and fitness, she took courses to become a health coach. During her program, she helped a few of her classmates set up successful websites for their new businesses. This made her realize she already had a valuable and viable business skill, so she decided against health coaching and instead launched her own web design business.

Ten years (and three children) later, she has helped countless businesses create or update their websites to align with their marketing goals. She loves to support people who are not techies and strives to create a connection with each and every client so that their websites honour the essence of who they are.

“I do what I do because I love to see businesses thrive”

Jen relies on her strong intuition to guide the design process, creating clean, simple and clutter-free websites.

Using social media for the greater good

As a marketing expert, Jen knows the importance of having a social media presence. Her Facebook business page features her latest web designs to promote both her services and her clients’ businesses. In addition to using Facebook as a promotional tool, Jen also uses it as a platform for sharing the more personal challenges and struggles of entrepreneurship.

Addressing a wide range of topics, from the importance of knowing your worth and showing your authentic self, to pricing strategies and potential rejection, she also discusses work–life balance, something she knows all about as a busy mom. She has received lots of positive feedback from other entrepreneurs thanking her for these helpful posts that make them feel less alone in their experience. As she says, “even if it only reaches one person, if it helps them feel a little bit better, it’s perfect.”

Supporting fellow entrepreneurs

While most of her clients are established local family-managed companies, her social media posts are directed towards a very different audience: entrepreneurs, particularly women, hoping to build their own business.

Her number-one piece of advice for these women is to have a solid support network in place. Starting a business is hard work, so it’s important to have cheerleaders for encouragement on those hard days and to be able to delegate certain tasks to specialists.

“Whether it’s finding someone you can use as a sounding board or getting some technical support to help in an area that is not one of your strengths, or even getting help with home/kids duties, you need support so you can still have space to enjoy life.”

Taking her own advice, she recently hired a part-time developer, and contract SEO and social media specialists. She is a strong advocate for setting boundaries, both to uphold the quality of her work and ensure she still has quality time to spend with her family.

Although her schedule can be quite full, she sets time aside to collaborate with other digital businesses. The Storyteller, for example, has been hiring her over the past few years to work on different internal and client projects.

Dessin

Working with The Storyteller

What types of projects have you worked on with The Storyteller over the years? 

I started out by designing The Storyteller’s website about three years ago. We worked so well together that I have also designed websites for some of The Storyteller’s clients , such as Galeries Kirkland, Danou and Synapcity.

What features or qualities do you appreciate most about The Storyteller?

Their efficiency and organizational skills. They are great project managers with an excellent overall vision and understanding of every project they work on.

What are the positive impacts of working with The Storyteller?

It has been a refreshing experience to partner with The Storyteller who takes care of project management and website copy. I am used to clients sending pages of copy that needs to be overhauled or has gaps, so it’s really amazing to just focus on design and know the strategy and content is taken care of. The Storyteller is an amazing collaborative partner for creating a more effective website that is built around unique branded storytelling.

Many thanks to Jen Feeny for taking the time to share her story with us! To learn more about her business, visit her website or her Facebook page.