How to Go from Being a Service Provider to a Sought-After Expert as a TYPO3 Integrator

TL;DR: Many TYPO3 integrators are competent but fly under the radar. If you want to be the one people come to—rather than having to go out and find clients—you need to showcase your expertise to the outside world. This article explains what that means in practice and how to get started.

The Uncomfortable Truth About Expertise

You might be the best TYPO3 integrator in your city. Clean site packages, solid extension development, every upgrade without a hitch. But if nobody knows who you are, nobody will ask you.

That sounds harsh. But it’s simply the reality.

Often, it’s not the most competent person who wins, but the one who’s more visible. How is someone supposed to hire you if they don’t even know you exist?

Most integrators do a good job, sit at their computers, and hope that word will get around somehow. Some get lucky. Most wait a long time.

What visibility actually means

Visibility doesn’t mean posting on LinkedIn every day or running a YouTube channel with elaborate video productions. That puts many people off—and rightly so.

It’s about making the knowledge you’re already producing visible to the outside world.

You solve problems every day. Others face some of the same problems. Write down how you solved a specific problem. Share your insights from real projects. It takes you an hour, but it stays online for years afterward.

I started doing this in 2006. At first, I wrote blog posts about news I found interesting, then about specific solutions from projects. Text articles at first, and later videos as well. Not because I had a plan, but because I was genuinely interested in the topic and thought: This could be useful to others, too.

In 2010, I added my first YouTube videos. And at the TYPO3 Camp Munich in 2011, it happened for the first time: People recognized me who I didn’t know. At the time, I was still working full-time as a nurse. The whole thing was just a side project. Still, the visibility was already having an impact.

The channels are secondary

Where you become visible depends on where you feel comfortable and where your target audience is. Both matter, but the latter is more crucial.

You can find TYPO3 integrators on LinkedIn, in TYPO3 community forums, at events like TYPO3camps, and at user group meetings. These are the places where recommendations are made and where you’re recognized as a person, not just a name.

Community forums are often underestimated in this regard. If you help others there, answer questions, and share solutions, you build trust without writing a single promotional line. That’s the kind of visibility that feels like a conversation among colleagues.

Sponsoring community events can also send a strong message. It shows that there’s more to you than just a freelancer churning out jobs.

Substance beats volume

Visibility without substance doesn’t last long.

Anyone who’s just looking for attention but lacks real knowledge will be exposed sooner or later. The bubble bursts.

On the other hand, those who write and demonstrate based on real experience—rather than just talking—are here to stay. I’ve been writing and publishing about TYPO3 for 20 years. Not because I had a perfect strategy, but because the topic genuinely interests me. I do some of this from my couch because I enjoy it. You can tell. And that’s exactly why it works in the long run.

That’s the difference between self-promotion and authority: one attracts attention, the other attracts trust.

“I don’t have anything special to say”

Almost everyone who isn’t yet visible has had this thought.

The answer: That’s not true.

Maybe a hundred others have already solved the same problem. But not in your way, not in your words, not with your personality. And maybe the others haven’t even written about it.

There are people who connect better with you than with another expert. Not because you’re more knowledgeable, but because your tone, your style, and your personality are a better fit.

Someone who sees that you’re a heavy metal fan or a passionate soccer fan might connect with you more quickly than with another TYPO3 integrator who’s objectively just as good.

There’s a perfect match for everyone. Your personality isn’t a hindrance—it’s a defining trait.

The same goes the other way around: there will be people you don’t click with. That’s okay. You don’t need everyone as a client.

How you’ll know you’ve made it

The goal isn’t follower counts or clicks.

The goal is for inquiries to come to you without you having to go out and get them. No cold calls, no ads, no messages on LinkedIn. Instead: Someone has read your article, watched your video, met you at a conference, and then approaches you with a specific project or a collaboration request.

That’s the moment when an integrator becomes a sought-after expert.

It takes time to get there. Visibility isn’t a sprint. Initial reactions—someone commenting, asking a question, or mentioning you in a forum—often come after three to six months. Realistically, it takes one to two years before the first project inquiries start coming in on their own. That sounds like a long time. But every article, every forum post, every conversation at a conference adds a building block—and remains online long after you’ve posted it. Eventually, the foundation will be so solid that the inquiries will come on their own.

Where to Start

No grand plan is needed.

Take the last problem you solved in a project. Write an article about it on your website. Explain the problem, explain your solution, and explain what you learned in the process.

That’s the first step. Not perfect, not polished. But visible.

If you’re active on a platform where your target audience hangs out, share the link there. No sales pitch, no big fuss. Just a quick note about what you’ve written and who it might help.

Another approach that’s often overlooked: community forums. When you answer questions, comment, and help others there, you build visibility without actively promoting yourself. Here’s a small but effective tip: Keep your forum signature up to date and include a link to your website there. That way, every helpful post leaves a trail that leads directly back to you.

One more note on consistency: What matters isn’t how often you post, but that you do so consistently. One good article a month is better than ten posts in a week followed by a three-month hiatus. The platform makes a difference here—LinkedIn tends to reward more frequent activity more than a blog does. The bottom line: don’t let long gaps develop.

The rest will come with time.