Joomla in Faces. Interview with Anja de Crom (Team Leader of Joomla Community Magazine)

Published: 31 December 2025
Last modified: 07 January 2026

Anja

Eugene

Ever wondered who helps tell the Joomla community's story? Meet Anja de Crom. Her own story with Joomla reads like a map of community involvement: starting as a user, then organizing local meetups (JUG), speaking at events, helping run JoomlaDays, and even creating the uniquely informal Joostock camp in the Netherlands. Now, at the helm of the Joomla Community Magazine, she ensures all our stories are heard. We’re delighted to talk to her today.

1. Could you tell the audience a bit about yourself?

I’m Anja, I live in the Netherlands. I’ve worked with Joomla since version 1.5. I work as a Communications and Digital Coordinator for a small company. In my spare time I like to play music: I’m a singer, guitar player and I recently got a ukulele so I'm learning to play that as well.

2. How did your first encounter with Joomla happen?

I realized I was inventing projects just to be able to make more Joomla websites.

Anja

My partner needed a website for something. Someone we vaguely knew created one with Joomla, and my partner said: if she can do this, you certainly can. So I built the first one, and another one, and all of a sudden I realized I was inventing projects just to be able to make more Joomla websites. That’s when I decided to switch careers: from writing and journalism to web agency.

3. What motivates you to contribute to Joomla, and what do you gain from being involved?

I like it and I like to believe I’m good at what I do (which is: coordinating the Joomla Community Magazine). I think the magazine is a significant part of the Joomla ecosphere: we provide all kinds of articles, written by and for Joomla users.

4. How do you contribute to the Joomla community?

I’m the Team Leader of the Joomla Community Magazine. I’ve worked with the JCM since 2020.

5. What has been the most challenging part of your work with the Joomla Community Magazine?

There are no huge challenges. We have a great team and a group of wonderful authors who love to share their knowledge with our readers.

On photo: Anja de Crom

6. You run your own web agency with your partner. In your experience, what is the easier way to get more clients — promoting a person or promoting the company as a brand?

Ah — I need to update my profile in the Volunteers Portal 🙂. We no longer have the agency. I was offered a super nice full-time job at one of our clients and said yes. That meant saying good bye to running our own business and the clients we had. Luckily they're in good hands: we found a fellow Joomler in the community who was willing to take over, and as far as I know, all clients are still very happy having him as our replacement.

I don't know if there even is such a thing as an easiest way to get clients. It's a bit of everything, really. Usually they liked us first and Joomla later. Some came to us because they wanted to move to Joomla, from WordPress or Drupal. But most clients just want a beautiful website that’s easy to manage, with understandable logic. Joomla is perfect for that.

7. Are there any plans to “conquer new heights” and publish Joomla tutorials in major web media and reach a wider audience?

I think you should ask Joomla's Marketing Team about that, that's beyond the scope of the JCM.

8. What key advantages of Joomla would you highlight?

I can only speak for JCM. We highlight core features, bring community news, encourage people to contribute and offer tutorials and how-to's on a variety of topics.

9. In your opinion, what should be improved in Joomla’s ecosystem to make it even better?

It would make me really happy if more people realize that you can give back to the software you get to use for free.

Anja

It would make me really happy if more people realize that you can give back to the software you get to use for free. Too many people, users as well as extensions developers, take Joomla for granted or, even worse, complain about it. If we want Joomla to stay and remain the kick-ass CMS it is right now, we should all get our hands dirty.

Anyone can contribute: we need all kinds of volunteers, from designers to marketers to developers to coders to writers to leaders to ordinary Joomla users. Here's how to join our community on Mattermost:

How to join Mattermost

Let's grow the global Joomla movement and make it happen!

10. Joomla has turned 20 this year. What are your thoughts on this milestone?

Joomla is the best tool to create websites with. It's fast, flexible, secure, stable and, super important, unlike other tools, it's 100% yours.
It's getting better and better, and you don't need anything else to create a good website.

I would say: bring on the next 20 years!