Joe McFarrin is eCommerce Expert and CEO at IWD Agency (@IWDWeb), an eCommerce Agency that specializes in Magento development, graphic design and marketing solutions for online brands. This award winning development firm focuses on helping its clients profit and succeed online.
McFerrin has no problem with keeping busy throughout the day. When at work, he moves from one area to the next taking on as many tasks as he can to keep business moving. To add to his versatility, he engages in various outdoor activities outside of work. Within our interview, we had the chance to get an up close look into the exciting life of Joe McFerrin.
Can you describe what you really do at work?
I still do a little of everything to make sure all areas of the business run smoothly. Even though I touch all areas of the business, my primary day to day task are dealing with client relations, R&D, marketing and project management. I also do accounting, HR, and continuous improvement task. But really what I spend most of my time on, I hate to admit, are EMAILS!
If money was no object, what would you spend your days doing?
Probably never look at another EMAIL again 😉
But really, I enjoy outdoor sports like hiking, surfing, skiing, kayaking, fishing, biking hunting, and so on. So I would probably go on a couple excursions to do more of this kind of stuff. I also still enjoy geeky stuff and building cool products. So I would imagine I’d still want to be apart of a company building awesome online gizmos, at least as a hobby.
In you spare time what do you get upto, and how do you balance this with your workload?
As mentioned in the above question, I enjoy outdoor sports so I do this as much as I can. Having a desk job for most of my waking hours I am conscious I need to get moving for part of the day. So, I do make an effort to take some time out everyday to do some kind of sport or physically activity. I feel like when I do not do this I am in a little more cranky mood.
How do you see the future evolving for Magento and the eCommerce space in general?
I’ve been working with Magento since their inception. I have seen them grow with excitement then slowly taper off with not as great of a reputation. I think coming up soon is a possible turning point. I think a lot will ride on their Magento 2.0 implementation. Will customers really want to re-platform on this or this might be a time where they decided to jump ship and go to another platform. Time will only tell on this.
Regarding eCommerce, I think this space has just started and will rapidly evolve. I am excited to see the future and changes. I can’t wait to have drones delivering freshly cooked breakfast to me every morning 😉
What is usually your last thought before falling asleep?
Usually just telling myself to shut up so I can fall asleep. Many times I’ll read a magazine or local publication as reading generally puts me to sleep.
Who is your role model, and why?
I have different role models for different areas in life but for business I do admire Steve Jobs. He was of course able to build a great company with awesome products that people love. Also, Elon Musk is doing some pretty incredible stuff as well.
Whats the worst thing you have to do as part of your job role?
Emails!!! 😉
What motivates you?
Building stuff people love that makes their life easier and that our team can be proud of.
What is the most played song on your MP3 player or phone?
I’m really all over the place. I switch between types of music and playlist all the time depending on my mood. Recently while working I have been playing a playlist on Spotify called ESM (Electronic Study Music). It doesn’t distract me but overall good upbeat tone.
Would you like to plug anything?
Yes, we always have something new coming out 😉
Weeetail is our newest product. It is a Magento hosted solution on steroids. You can design, manage, and modify a Magento solution without any coding knowledge or technical skills. It is very feature rich already and we are rapidly coming out with new features / enhancements. It is a new product line of ours, so we would be thrilled to hear any feedback. You can see it at: http://iwdagency.com/weeetail