Shannon Mattern has been building with AccessAlly for a long time—nine years to be exact. When she recently reached out to share some design updates she’d made to her site, it turned into the perfect opportunity for a much-needed catch-up.
A lot has changed since we last connected. Her business has exceedingly grown to offer more to her clients: more personalized support, more thoughtful offerings, and more ways to set them up for success.
Shannon is the proud CEO of Web Designer Academy, a business coaching program dedicated to helping women web designers avoid the same burnout she once faced.
Rather than simply updating a few screenshots from her previous site design, we asked Shannon to share the story behind her business—revealing how an early turning point shaped the personalized, sustainable model she runs today, with AccessAlly at the core.
When a freelance career didn’t deliver freedom…
Shannon’s story is one I’ve heard from countless other entrepreneurs before they finally decided to build something of their own.
She had done what she was supposed to do: worked hard in school, went to college, and landed a respectable corporate job.
But beneath that sense of security was a growing realization that stability didn’t equal fulfillment, and the path she was on wasn’t necessarily leading to the life she wanted.
Determined to change her situation, Shannon began freelancing on the side—building websites for small businesses late into the evenings and on the weekends. Her goal was simple: “make enough to replace my day job income so I could be my own boss.“
And she did—just not in the way she expected.
Her freelance work took off, client demand grew, and her calendar filled quickly. But the hourly pricing model she was using came with a catch.
To keep her income steady, she had to keep saying yes: yes to more projects, more deadlines, and more work squeezed into the same limited number of hours in a day.
“Oh my gosh, this is NOT working! This is actually even worse!
Before long, Shannon realized she hadn’t created freedom at all. Instead, she had traded one boss for many, along with constant work, very little flexibility, and even less breathing room.
The start of something more intentional…
Once it became clear that freelancing wasn’t a long-term solution, Shannon shifted her focus. Instead of continuing to offer her services, she began teaching other web designers how to apply what she had learned through online courses.
Those courses gained traction quickly, growing just as fast as her freelance work once had. That momentum eventually led to an invitation to speak at a conference.
After her talk, Shannon offered a spontaneous Q&A session where 600+ women shared their email addresses and began sending in their questions.
A pattern emerged almost immediately. The questions weren’t about design—they were about pricing, clients, boundaries, and how to run a sustainable business.
That response made Shannon’s next move clear. In the weeks that followed, she launched her first small group coaching program. When the sign-ups came rolling in, it confirmed what she had been sensing all along:
Women web designers weren’t just looking to sharpen their skills; they were actively searching for real business support.
That moment marked the beginning of what would become Web Designer Academy.
How shared experiences shaped the mission…
As Shannon began working more closely with these women, the stories she heard started to feel familiar. Many of the same challenges she had faced early in her freelance career were showing up again and again in conversations with other female web designers.
They talked about underpricing their work, overdelivering to prove their value, and waiting for permission or validation before taking the next step.
Much of it traced back to the same social conditioning Shannon had struggled with herself—being taught to play small, say yes too often, and quietly accept less than they deserved.
Hearing those stories didn’t just resonate with her; they reminded her exactly why she had started searching for a different path in the first place. That shared understanding sparked a deeper sense of purpose behind her work.
From there, she expanded beyond individual courses into a full membership experience.
Today, Web Designer Academy has grown to include multiple programs, resources, live events, courses, and podcasts, all designed to support women web designers through the same challenges Shannon had once faced herself.
Balancing personalization with a growing business…
Even as Web Designer Academy grew, Shannon stayed deeply committed to delivering a personalized experience for every client. That level of care wasn’t something she was willing to compromise on.
The problem with that was a lack of scalability. Her business was expanding, the community was growing, and maintaining that same hands-on experience was starting to require more time and energy than one person could realistically sustain.
Before adopting AccessAlly, personalization meant piecing together multiple tools and processes to make everything work. Access rules lived in one place, automations in another, feedback workflows somewhere else entirely.
Even then, the setup still required constant manual oversight. It worked—but only at the cost of Shannon spending countless hours behind the scenes managing systems instead of focusing on the work that mattered most.
So she sought out a system that could grow with her—one that allowed her to design programs intentionally, deliver personalized experiences, and still protect her time.
When AccessAlly entered the picture, that balance finally became possible. It brought together the pieces she had been juggling across other tools and made them work cohesively inside her WordPress site.
“It’s a very personalized experience, and it’s highly automated, which makes it very scalable for us to be able to serve a lot of people without a whole lot of time and effort on our end.
For the first time, the technology supported her goals instead of adding more complexity to an already growing operation.
How Shannon uses AccessAlly to keep things personal
Shannon’s “by-far favorite” AccessAlly feature is CRM tagging. The tags applied by her connected email platform interact with AccessAlly’s permissions to recognize where each member is in their journey and automatically handles content access.
As someone joins a program, reaches a milestone, or moves into a new phase, the system delivers the right content at the right time—without Shannon ever having to unlock content or manually shuffle members around herself.
She can focus her efforts where they matter most—writing lessons, enhancing her course offerings, and developing new programs—without getting caught up in the technical details of managing content access.
ProgressAlly plays a similarly important role in how Shannon delivers personalized feedback, giving each student a private space that feels built just for them.
When clients submit proposals or assignments, everything related to that work lives inside their portal, rather than being scattered across email threads or shared folders.
From there, Shannon records video feedback and places it directly into the student’s dashboard, where it stays connected to that specific piece of work. Over time, each client builds a personal record of feedback, progress, and guidance they can return to as they move forward.
Together, these AccessAlly tools allow Shannon to offer a high-touch experience that still scales—protecting both the quality of her programs and the sustainability of her business.
A people-first business, made possible with AccessAlly
The work Shannon does through Web Designer Academy has never just been about growing a business. It’s about creating freedom—first for herself, and now for the women she supports every day.
The success of Shannon’s clients is what continues to shape how she builds and runs her business. It’s why she’s so intentional about personalization, why she’s invested in systems that respect people’s real lives, and why she’s careful not to grow in ways that would dilute the experience she’s worked so hard to create.
“When I have women reach out tell me that what they learned from us allowed them to work for themselves and design a life that allows them to be there for the important things; hands down, that’s the most rewarding thing for me, helping other people create that freedom in their lives.”
From our side, supporting her business means making sure the technology stays out of the way of that work. AccessAlly exists to handle the complexity behind the scenes so Shannon can focus on creating programs, guiding her clients, and showing up where it matters most.
Being able to support a business built with that level of care—one that prioritizes people over shortcuts — is exactly why we do what we do!
Visit Web Designer Academy to see the programs Shannon has built, the community she supports, and how AccessAlly helps make it all possible.
