My Journey

01. The Road Nobody Understood

It was 2013. I'd just finished my SSC exams. Every single one of my friends was heading to coaching centers to prepare for college admissions. The normal path. The safe path. I went to a freelancing coaching center instead.

Honestly? I didn't learn that much there. But I learned about oDesk (now Upwork), and that changed everything. I started picking up content writing gigs. At 16, while everyone around me was solving physics problems to get into a good college, I was writing articles for strangers on the internet for a few dollars. Nobody really understood why.

But it planted a seed. I realized you could actually make money from the internet without anyone's permission. That idea never left me.

02. The Blogspot Days (a.k.a. Getting Roasted)

By 2016, I was itching to build my own thing. Not write for other people — build something that was mine. So I started making websites on Blogspot. Free subdomains, zero budget, maximum ambition.

One of my early gems was aquariumplantfertilizer.com. I promoted it on Facebook. People literally laughed at how bad my writing and design was. That stung. But looking back, they weren't wrong — it was terrible. You have to be terrible at something before you can be decent at it.

I also built bestcatcarriers.net, which I quietly dedicated to my first cat that I had lost. That one actually had a happy ending — I managed to sell it. My first ever website sale. None of the Blogspot sites turned into anything big, but they gave me the courage to go buy real domains and try for real.

03. A Turtle Changed Everything

This one goes back to 2014, actually. I was on a boat tour with my family on a lake. We passed a fishing boat, and the fisherman had caught a turtle in his net. He was about to release it, but I asked if I could keep it. I really wanted a pet turtle.

I brought it home. Set up a tiny enclosure — way too small, but I didn't know any better. A few days later, the turtle died because of my ignorance. I was heartbroken. So I decided to learn everything I could about turtle keeping, so nobody else would make the same mistake.

In 2018, all of that knowledge turned into The Turtle Hub — a WordPress blog covering turtle care guides, species breakdowns, vet directories, everything. It was supposed to be a hobby project. Instead, it became the site that taught me SEO actually works, that content can compound, and that I could do this full-time. Alhamdulillah, it gave me the confidence to go all in on this path without worrying about traditional jobs.

04. Down the Rabbit Hole

Once I cracked the playbook with The Turtle Hub — SEO, WordPress, content marketing — I couldn't stop. I went a little overboard. AcuarioPets for aquarium fish and aquatic pets. Hauntpedia because who doesn't love a good ghost story. Giftlytic for gift recommendations. Gigapaw for pets. Classic Fork for food. Seven WordPress sites across completely different niches.

Along the way, I learned more about Pinterest marketing, affiliate strategies, and content pruning than I ever thought I would. The internet is wild — you can literally build a business writing about haunted houses and turtle diets.

05. The Agency & YouTube Years

In 2018, alongside everything else, I started Writers Motion — a content writing agency. I'd been freelancing on and off since 2013, working for international and local clients, all while juggling my studies. The agency was the natural next step.

I also dove into YouTube, running multiple channels. The Writers Motion YouTube channel crossed 7,000 subscribers — a small number by YouTube standards, but it was mine and it meant something.

The agency ran for six years. Then AI happened. Content writing went from a real business to pennies overnight. By 2024, I shut it down. No bitterness — the market changed, and I had to change with it. That's just how it goes.

06. Learning to Actually Code

Content sites were great, but I wanted to build things from scratch. Not just throw up a WordPress theme and call it a day. I wanted to actually ship products.

I started building custom web applications. AI Metadata Cleaner — a tool for cleaning AI-generated metadata from images. Tourfo, a travel planning platform. Host Duel, a hosting comparison tool for people tired of reading biased hosting reviews (that's everyone, by the way).

The jump from WordPress to custom web apps was huge. Suddenly I was thinking about APIs, databases, user experience, and deployment pipelines instead of just keyword research and meta descriptions. Terrifying and awesome at the same time.

07. The E-Commerce Chapter

Because apparently seven blogs, three web apps, a content agency, and multiple YouTube channels weren't enough, I decided to try e-commerce too. InkSane is my online store selling journals, notebooks, and stationery. Started with the "Penny For My Thoughts" journal line and expanding from there.

E-commerce is a completely different beast. Inventory, product photography, customer service, shipping — a whole new world. But that's kind of the point, right? Keep learning, keep building, keep shipping.

08. What I've Learned

If there's one thing this whole journey has taught me, it's that you don't need permission to build things. You don't need a CS degree (I have an engineering degree, close enough). You don't need venture capital. You don't need a 50-page business plan. You just need curiosity, internet access, and the willingness to look stupid while figuring things out.

I've been laughed at on Facebook for a bad website. I've killed a pet turtle out of ignorance and turned that guilt into a site that helps thousands. I've watched an entire industry I built a business in get disrupted by AI — and instead of complaining, I started building with it.

The journey continues. There are more ideas in my notes app than I'll probably ever build. But that's the fun part — the next thing is always the most exciting thing.