Written by I didn’t plan any of this. There was no business plan, no investor deck, no five-year vision. There was just a college kid in Varanasi who couldn’t stop building websites.
It Started With Curiosity, Not a Career Plan
When I was doing my MCA at Banaras Hindu University, I discovered something that genuinely excited me — building websites. Not because someone told me to. Not because it was part of the curriculum. I just wanted to see if I could make something that worked.
My first real project was my college’s alumni website. Then event websites. I’d sit in front of a screen, figure out how things connected, and feel a rush when someone actually used what I built. That feeling hasn’t changed in over 15 years.
I tried Joomla. I tried Drupal. They were fine. But when I found WordPress in 2009, something clicked. It didn’t box me in. I could extend it, bend it, make it do things it wasn’t originally designed for. For my MCA final project, I chose WordPress — custom plugins, custom themes. My professor wasn’t expecting that. He gave me strong grades.
Four Months of Nothing
Here’s the part nobody puts on their LinkedIn. After graduating, I had four months of absolutely nothing. No clients. No projects. No income.
Varanasi in those days meant unreliable electricity and internet that would drop in the middle of a file upload. I’d spend hours at cybercafes just to stay connected. Some days the power would go out three, four times. You’d lose work. You’d start over. You’d wonder if this was actually going to lead anywhere.
I won’t romanticize it. Those four months were hard. Not because I was looking for a job — I had already decided I was going to run my own business. The hard part was watching every friend and college mate chase placements and job offers while I chose a path nobody around me understood. My family’s concern wasn’t “when will you get a job?” — it was “are you sure you’re doing the right thing?” And honestly, some days I wasn’t sure either.
The Move That Changed Everything
After seven years in Varanasi, I moved to Lucknow. Better infrastructure, more stable internet, a fresh start. I signed up on Elance (now Upwork) and started bidding on WordPress projects.
My first few projects were small — $200 here, $500 there. Theme customizations, plugin tweaks, things I could do well because I’d spent years understanding WordPress from the inside out. I wasn’t the cheapest option, but I was thorough. Clients noticed.
One project led to a referral. That referral led to a bigger project. The bigger project led to a client who stayed for years. That’s how it actually works — not a viral moment, just consistent delivery.
From “I” to “We”
There came a point where I couldn’t handle everything alone. So I hired my first developer. Then another. Then a support person. Wbcom Designs went from being “Varun who does WordPress” to an actual company with a team.
That transition was harder than I expected. Writing code is one thing. Managing people, setting expectations, handling client communication across time zones — that’s a completely different skill set. I made mistakes. I underpriced projects for the US market. I over-promised timelines. I took on clients who didn’t know what they wanted and spent months going in circles.
Every mistake taught me something. The biggest lesson: clarity matters more than anything. If a client can clearly articulate their problem, we can build the solution. If they can’t, no amount of code will help.
Community Became Our Thing
Somewhere along the way, we found our niche. Clients kept coming to us with variations of the same request: “I want to build a community for my audience.” A fitness brand in Australia. A university in the US. A professional network in Europe. A trade association in Africa.
The tools were different each time, but the core problem was always the same — people wanting to connect their people. We got really good at understanding that problem. Not just the technical side, but the human side. What makes members stay? What makes them leave? What features sound exciting in a meeting but never get used?
Today, we serve clients across the US, Europe, Australia, and increasingly, Africa. Each market has its own expectations, its own communication style, its own definition of “done.” Working across four continents from India has taught me more about business than any MBA could.
What Africa Is Teaching Us
Our newest growth is coming from African businesses, and it’s been eye-opening. These clients think mobile-first because that’s how their users live. They need solutions that work on slower connections. They’re building communities around commerce, education, and professional networking in ways that feel fresh and pragmatic.
I see a lot of parallels with where India was a decade ago — hungry, resourceful, building for real problems. It’s exciting to be part of that.
What I’d Tell My College Self
If I could go back to that kid building alumni websites in Varanasi, I’d say three things:
Keep building. Not for a portfolio, not for a resume — because building is how you learn what you’re actually good at. Every side project, every experiment, every “this probably won’t work” teaches you something that a textbook can’t.
Don’t chase every client. The best work comes from clients who know what they need. Learn to spot the difference between someone with a clear problem and someone still figuring out if they have one. Both are fine — but only one is ready for you to build.
The four months of nothing will end. They feel permanent, but they’re not. Keep showing up. The work will find you if you’re good at what you do and honest about what you don’t know yet.
Fifteen years later, I still get that same rush when we ship something that works. The projects are bigger, the clients are global, and the power doesn’t cut out anymore. But the feeling? That’s exactly the same as the cybercafe.
If you’re building a community platform and want to work with a team that’s been doing this for over a decade — let’s talk.
