Kay has a distinct advantage over most bloggers—she’s a professional writer. Not that she started out to be. She caught the bug at TexasTech, where she had gone with a degree in education in mind. Then one day she and her roommate wrote a letter to the University Daily about a proposed name change for the school—and when she saw her name in print, she was hooked. “Next semester I changed my major!”
After graduation, Kay developed her writing craft with a newspaper stint (in Lubbock, TX) and on-the-job education in constituent communications (in Washington,D.C). Government relations work with two Fortune 500 companies followed.
The tax stuff didn’t kick in until 1999, when she and her husband moved to Florida and Kay helped launch Bankrate.com's tax component (see her Eye on the IRS column). Her D.C. experience as a staffer on the Ways & Means Committee got her the job. “Watching the laws being drafted and then enacted was fascinating—and at times a bit scary!” So “when I got the chance at Bankrate.com to help explain to folks a bit of the process, Ijumped at it.”
After the crazy 2004 hurricane season, it was back to Texas. With no job lined up, she decided to freelance. “I made the mistake a lot of new business owners make: I wasn't focused and I didn't create a business plan up front. In my enthusiasm (and fear!) I took every job that came my way. Many were not good fits. When I realized that I was in charge, I stepped back, redefined what I wanted to do and how I could accomplish it, and things began to fall into place.”
Networking, one of the keys to her success, led to her first book: “The Truth About Paying Fewer Taxes.” A labor of love? Well, “this wasn’t the book I had planned to write—that outline is still in my desk. But when this opportunity knocked, I had to open the door.” She spent last summer writing the book, which hit the stores last month. It’s “a great way to introduce myself and my expertise to different audience.”
Kay also has a presence on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. “Any time you can get word out to different market segments, it's a good thing. Even when there's no specific A-led-to-B business result, the intangible benefit of having your expertise on display is always a plus,” she says.
Of course, blogging helps,too. “I started Don't Mess With Taxes in November 2005. (The blog was rated among Tax Rascal’s top ten tax blogs for 2008.) “When I was setting it up, I wasn't sure I was going to keep covering taxes for Bankrate.com, but I knew I wanted to keep writing about the topic, so I decided I'd do it myself,” she says. “Myr outine is to check out some of my favorite tax and personal finance blogs, read newspapers and newsletters, look at all the many possible tax issues I could blog about—and then pick one!”
Oh, don’t ask Kay about her personal interests—unless you’re prepared for a catalogof activities that would put most of us to shame. “When I'm not enmeshed in taxes, I enjoy birdwatching; going to independent and foreign films; listening to jazz, opera or Texas Roots Rock; and watching crime and mystery TV shows,” she says. Oh wait, there’s also“cooking and watching all types of sports (“Go Astros and Cowboys!”).And finally, she manages to squeeze into her schedule a couple ofcolumns for trucking magazines under the titles “Crazy Woman Driver”and “Views from the Grandstands.”
We’ve probably forgotten something… “At any rate, here’s wishing many happy blogging days ahead for the Crazy Woman Driver!