2024: Wins, Challenges and Lessons Learned

As the year wraps up, it’s time for my annual tradition: reflecting on 2024. Think of this as a public diary entry where I celebrate wins, share struggles, and get real about the highs and lows – including insights into my earnings and the challenges of juggling passion projects, speaking, family life, and work. Who knows, maybe there’s something here you can relate to or take away for yourself!

Trying to hold it all together

Luckily, client work picked up again. At the same time, I aimed to maintain my 2023 output, all while family life with our three girls got even busier. Nila, our oldest, started secondary school – a transition I underestimated – and we’re still trying to find our groove with it. Some videos ended up being edited four to six months after recording. I even stumbled upon one I finished editing back in March but forgot to release 🤦‍♂️. All of this highlights that 2024 was a bit too much, and I need to accept that I can’t do it all. More on that later.

A year on big stages

My highlight definitely was that I had the pleasure of edutaining around 1,700 people on five stages this year. On WordCamp Vienna, Beyond Tellerrand Düsseldorf, Smashing Conf Freiburg, uxcon Vienna, and Push UX in Munich. I really enjoyed leaning into my dramatic performance 😂, seeing my new talk “Typographer vs. Accessibility” almost as a play.

I really craved, enjoyed and celebrated these occasions, having the permission to be weird and entertain. And it worked out, as I got so much great feedback of how funny and informative my talk was. I even got offered to speak at an event in the US, but I thankfully declined it. At this time, it’s too challenging to be away from home for more than three days.

In 2024, I only guested on a few podcasts, as I did not really actively apply to many. Among them were: devs love it, Modern Software Makers, and Talk Paper Scissors.

My mini-viral-moment on YouTube

Surprisingly and unexpected, my video about Inter 4.0 took off, getting almost 30K view in the first two weeks. That’s more than any other video I did in the past four years 😳.

A few more stats from YouTube:

• The channel grew to over 8,400 subscribers (+2,800 this year).
• My total views grew by 48% to 86.7K views thorough the year.
• I published 10 Videos and 11 Shorts.
• Held 4 Live Streams, three of them were guest interviews.

A focus on accessibility

While YouTube was a surprising highlight, I still find it relevant to accompany my videos with written content. This is why in 2024 I published 15 articles. They focused on Q&As, font pairings and mostly on accessibility. Also summarizing aspects of my conversations with the guests on YouTube. I still find it important that people can briefly get the essence of my videos and interviews without having to watch the whole thing.

Social Media became less important

Personally, I feel kinda saturated by social media. Nevertheless, I feed it with the things I publish anyway. If something brings a few new subscribers, why not.

• On Instagram my account has 1,736 followers (+496 this year).
• I was more active on LinkedIn, having grown to 1,806 followers (+1,005), while I became a bit pickier with connections, growing to around 405 (+142).
• On TikTok I’m at 133 followers (+45). Yeah, I don’t really treat this seriously.

The newsletter is a bit stagnant

For this year, I feel like I’ve reached a plateau with the Font Friday Newsletter, which has been meandering around 2,900 subscribers over the past few months. Nevertheless, having so many people wanting to receive my emails still means so much to me! I also really enjoy the direct exchange and replies I get.

• The list grew to 2,901 subscribers (+341 this year)
• Average open rate of 55%
• I reviewed 39 Fonts
• Raffled 7 premium font families to Patreon supporters

In November I finally migrated the mailing list from greedy MailChimp to MailerLite. This saves me around $300 per year, and I’m so happy that I finally did it, as I postponed it for so long. Hugs to the best WordPress-dev-cousin in the world, Stefan Grassberger, for the tech support.

Earnings in 2024

Revenue from Pimp my Type activities decreased a bit compared to last year, but I’m very happy with it. Some speaking engagements were paid quite little, but the experience was always worth it, and workshops also could compensate for that. In August, almost four years after starting out on YouTube, my channel finally got monetized, which brought me €42 so far 😉.

I also noticed that I held only two coaching calls this year, three fewer than in 2023. On the other hand, I’m deeply grateful for the 23 active supporters on Patreon, which is an increase of six from last year.

Uncertainty what I should focus on

Beside all that good news, I also feel a bit exhausted and restless. Maybe taking a longer break from Pimp my Type would be good? But then I’m afraid of losing what I gained or falling back into insignificance. So I rather keep going without knowing why and where to. But do I need to know?

What is this project? What is Pimp my Type? it’s incredibly important – a way to give back to the world by sharing the knowledge I’ve been lucky to learn. It’s my playground. It’s a reason to spend time with the thing I love the most: type and typography. It’s a place where I can live out my desire to entertain on stage and in front of the camera. It brings me joy, a sense of accomplishment, self actualization. But I also experience how draining it is to constantly feel the need to come up with something, stay relevant, keep in touch.

Am I taking it too hard? Do I really need to make this a serious income source? I’m definitely dedicating a lot of time to this project – time that could potentially earn more if focused on client work. This thought weighs on me, especially when I think about providing for my family and spending more time with them. Yet, I truly enjoy what I’m doing, and don’t I deserve that too? Pimp My Type could remain a fun side project, but dedicating one to two days a week – and possibly even half of my attention – feels like too much for something that right now does not sustain me.

So the next question is, do I really want to turn this more into a job? Won’t I lose my passion when it becomes an obligation. Or has it already? I was extremely hesitant this year and postponed my efforts to find sponsors. Maybe because then I need to deliver. Then I need to show results. Am I running away from that next challenge, or am I protecting myself? All good questions to discuss with my therapist 😉. I don’t have answers right now, maybe you do?

Plans for 2025

Despite all my pondering and struggles, I look forward to things to come with Pimp my Type. Like designing a poster for the 200th Font Friday edition, having more guests and future speaking engagements. I also see that with AI getting more influence, it becomes even more important to know what works with typography and what doesn’t. I also want to dive more into how to use AI tools in a smart and productive, not-hyped way.

Looking back at this year fills me with pride, happiness, and gratitude – for what I accomplished, and the support from my family – and you! But it also shows me that I need to change some things. So let’s see how this will develop and thank you for sticking along ☺️.

I’m curious how you experienced the year! Any piece of content you liked best? Anything you wish to read about in the future? Tell me in the comments!