Ben Rojas serves as the President of All in One SEO (AIOSEO) and is a self-taught developer specializing in WordPress and PHP, boasting over 25 years of experience. He began his career as a developer at Awesome Motive and quickly advanced to lead the entire AIOSEO team.
In this interview, Ben Rojas discusses how his experience in WordPress development set the foundation for his role as president of AIOSEO. He also shares his insights onhow he would approach starting his career if he were beginning today.
“My top piece of advice is to remain teachable and adaptable, allowing you to continuously learn and grow.”
Ben Rojas – President of All in One SEO
Continue reading to discover exclusive insights from one of our favorite leaders in the WordPress community.
Introducing our new series, #MyWordPressStory, where we share valuable insights from some of the most successful figures in the WordPress industry.
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Alternatively, you can explore the quick links below for more information:
- Introducing Ben Rojas, President of All in One SEO
- Ben’s WordPress Journey: From Support Roles to Web Development and Now President of All in One SEO
- An Inside Look at All in One SEO
- Advice for Aspiring WordPress Developers: Ben’s Insights on Adaptability and Excellence
- Looking Forward: The Future of WordPress and All in One SEO
- Concluding Thoughts
Introducing Ben Rojas, President of All in One SEO
Before ascending to the role of President at All in One SEO, Ben began his career in IT and customer support. His journey as a developer started even earlier when he wrote his first HTML code at just 13 years old, inspired by library books.
During a conversation with James Agar from the CanadaCreate team, Ben reminisced about how his family limited his computer time, encouraging him to play outside. He creatively navigated this restriction by writing code by hand on lined paper, preserving records of these early coding attempts.
Since then, Ben has embraced a lifelong learning mindset, which has positioned him as a prominent leader in the WordPress community today. Next, let’s explore how he discovered WordPress.
Ben’s WordPress Journey: From Support Roles to Web Development and Now President of All in One SEO
Ben Rojas began his journey in web development at a young age, securing an IT position at a nonprofit organization in 2008. It was during this time that he first experimented with WordPress.
Shortly thereafter, he moved into a customer support position for a WordPress eCommerce solution called Cart66, which is now integrated into WP EasyCart. His goal was to deepen his understanding of WordPress coding.
Ben rapidly enhanced his development skills and became a developer on the Cart66 team. Simultaneously, he launched a side business creating PayPal plugins for Easy Digital Downloads (EDD), which is now a part of Awesome Motive.
After a brief detour from WordPress development, Ben returned to his roots and rejoined the EDD community, becoming part of the Awesome Motive team in 2016.
He initially worked as a software developer for Envira Gallery before quickly moving to OptinMonster, where he could fully utilize his PHP development expertise.
At this stage in his career, Ben focused on personal growth. He dedicated himself to continuous building, refining his work, and finding ways to support his team.
My mindset was focused on giving my best effort every day. I aimed to leave work knowing that I had done everything I could, so I could return to my family and say, ‘I gave it my all today, and I will do the same tomorrow.’
Ben Rojas
At CanadaCreate, we always appreciate insights from industry leaders!
During a period of increased productivity, Ben took the initiative to help his team transition to a new JavaScript framework, significantly improving their efficiency.
After demonstrating his skills at OptinMonster, Ben was invited to lead All in One SEO (AIOSEO). He transitioned from being a developer at OptinMonster directly into the role of President at AIOSEO.
Despite lacking prior management experience, Ben embraced the challenge. Reflecting on his early days as President of AIOSEO, he humorously remarked, ‘It was quite challenging… like trying to drink from a fire hydrant for the first couple of years.’
Alongside learning the intricacies of running a business, Ben identified his greatest challenge as president as taking over a very outdated codebase.
The AIOSEO team faced a crucial decision: to improve existing flawed code or to start fresh. Under Ben’s leadership, they opted for a complete rebuild, a more challenging path that ultimately proved to be more sustainable.
In just 11 months, his team successfully restructured AIOSEO from the ground up, enabling them to provide users with an exceptional product moving forward.
Exploring All in One SEO
Now, let’s delve into Ben’s current initiatives at AIOSEO. But first, here’s some background on the product and its development over time.
With over 3 million users, All in One SEO (AIOSEO) stands out as one of the leading SEO tools for WordPress. During a conversation with CanadaCreate, Ben highlighted that it was the first-ever SEO plugin for WordPress.
At CanadaCreate, we are big fans of AIOSEO and utilize it across all our websites. For more insights, feel free to read our comprehensive AIOSEO review on this powerful SEO plugin.
From its inception, AIOSEO has been instrumental in helping WordPress users enhance their on-page SEO through features like meta tags, sitemaps, and more.
The original plugin provided a solid foundation, but Ben’s team has been continuously enhancing the tool and its features over the past few years. They have introduced new functionalities to assist users with redirects, internal linking, local SEO, and much more.
The Search Statistics dashboard is a powerful tool that allows users to evaluate their SEO performance. This built-in feature of AIOSEO connects WordPress with Google Search Console for seamless integration.
Here are some key functionalities of Search Statistics:
- Monitor your keyword rankings and track important SEO metrics.
- Identify underperforming posts to combat content decay.
- Enhance the technical SEO aspects of your website.
In summary, Search Statistics provides actionable insights to help users enhance their content.
Ben and his team have received numerous positive responses regarding Search Statistics. Many users have expressed that it meets their needs, appreciating the convenience of accessing all this information directly from their WordPress dashboard.
We at CanadaCreate share this sentiment. Our editorial team utilizes the tool daily to refine our content and improve our search rankings.
The Keyword Rank Tracker offers a deeper understanding of keyword rankings, enabling more effective analysis of search engine results pages (SERPs).
The latest and most exciting feature that Ben is enthusiastic about is AIOSEO’s Writing Assistant. This tool integrates flawlessly with SEOBoost, providing comprehensive insights into your content, including readability scores and keyword usage metrics.
The tool provides up to 30 examples of competitor websites that are successfully ranking for your targeted keywords. This information can offer valuable insights and assist you in achieving a top 10 ranking with your content.
Guidance for Future WordPress Developers: Ben’s Insights on Flexibility and Excellence
For Ben, providing customer support for a technical product was a pivotal starting point in his WordPress development journey. He advises aspiring developers to ‘Get started and never stop learning.’ He emphasizes the significance of education and utilizing free online resources.
For those new to WordPress development, he suggests beginning with PHP and JavaScript to build a solid foundation in the technologies that underpin the platform.
Ben also advises against overlooking JavaScript, as WordPress increasingly depends on it, particularly with its shift towards a block editing model.
Ben believes that mastering both PHP and JavaScript will simplify the process of learning other essential programming languages and frameworks. For example, a strong understanding of JavaScript will make it easy to learn jQuery.
💡Interested in learning how to use WordPress? Explore CanadaCreate’s Free Video Courses.
Ben encourages aspiring developers to actively seek development opportunities, even if they start small. For example, you could assist friends and family with their websites or explore freelance options to gain experience.
He believes that this type of experience enhances your competitiveness when applying for junior developer positions.
When discussing advice for developers, Ben emphasized, ‘The most important quality is adaptability.’
For instance, if you find yourself working on a project with a codebase that doesn’t match your preferences, adapting your code to fit that standard will still provide valuable learning experiences.
He encourages developers not to hesitate in asking why certain practices are followed. He advises, ‘My top recommendation is to be open to learning and adaptable; this will foster your growth.’
‘Begin your journey and commit to continuous learning.’
Ben Rojas
During our conversation with Ben about his experience at OptinMonster, he highlighted the significance of attitude and mindset, crediting his family as a key source of motivation for his work.
I strive to teach my children the importance of a positive mindset. Ultimately, if everyone adopts this attitude in their work, it will lead to a better world.
Approaching work each day with a positive attitude can transform your workplace. I have experienced this firsthand, and I encourage newcomers to be adaptable, as it goes beyond just coding.
Looking Ahead: The Future of WordPress and AIOSEO
What lies ahead for Ben Rojas and AIOSEO? Here’s his perspective:
We will continue to enhance our AI writing assistant, making it more efficient and introducing new features.
Additionally, we have recently launched our keyword rank tracking tool, which we will keep improving to better serve our customers.
Moreover, we have some exciting projects in development that I can’t disclose just yet, but we are very enthusiastic about them.
Ben Rojas
Ben shares the same excitement for the WordPress community as a whole.
As a passionate developer, I truly appreciate the ongoing efforts to enhance security and performance. This focus should have begun much earlier, and I’m thrilled to see it happening now.
The block editor has significant potential for enhancement, and I’m pleased to see improvements being made.
Concluding Thoughts
During the early part of our conversation about his journey in WordPress, Ben humorously remarked, ‘I’m not really the type of person who plans five years ahead.’
However, when asked about his future in the industry, Ben expressed, ‘I love what I’m doing. I’m excited to remain here for the long term.’
He also seized the chance to reiterate his earlier point about growth. ‘To connect back to where we started, I will continue to learn throughout this journey. I encourage my team to do the same.’
Ultimately, that’s what will enable us to keep growing and stay ahead of the curve. That’s what excites me… that is my vision for the next five years.
At CanadaCreate, we eagerly anticipate watching Ben Rojas as he leads the AIOSEO team with a positive, innovative, and customer-focused approach. We are grateful for his time spent discussing his vision with us and for creating a product that enhances our daily work.
Bonus: Expert Guides for Optimizing WordPress SEO
We hope you gained valuable insights from Ben Rojas, the President of All in One SEO. You might also find our WordPress SEO guides helpful:
- Comprehensive WordPress SEO Guide for Beginners (Step-by-Step)
- Understanding Google E-E-A-T: An In-Depth Guide for WordPress Websites
- Simplified WooCommerce SEO – A Step-by-Step Guide to Achieving Top Rankings on Google
- Tips for Increasing Global Visitors: International SEO Strategies for WordPress
Several of these articles on CanadaCreate were authored by Ben himself.
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