No matter whether you are running a blog or another kind of website, online success is all about creating a relationship with your audience. However, how do you do that? How do you establish a bond to an anonymous mass of individuals who happen to stop by your website? Luckily, together with the means to build an online presence, technology has also provided us with a way to understand those who visit us there. I am, of course, talking about web analytics. Analytics tools take a lot of the guesswork out of running a website. Without them, we would all […]
32 Must-Have (And Free) WordPress Plugins
WordPress will never be able to do everything you want it to do… and that’s a good thing. If the platform contained every functionality known to man, it would be a monster. Goodbye, five-minute install! Fortunately, there are plugins. Lots of plugins. WordPress add-ons make up for what the core lacks. It’s no wonder the extendability provided by plugins is one of the platform’s biggest strengths. It is, therefore, no secret that, while there are tens of thousands of plugins in the WordPress directory, the difference in quality can be vast. In an attempt to divide the wheat from the […]
The Complete Newbie Guide To WordPress Hooks
If you look at a WordPress page with any of the available developer tools, you might get the impression that it is mainly made up of HTML and CSS with some occasional JavaScript. However, what you see there is only the end product. In the background, much of any given WordPress page is actually constructed from PHP functions and database queries. These get interpreted by the browser who then spits out the page in a viewable form. While CSS works well to make superficial changes (colors, sizes, etc.), if you want to make bigger, structural alterations, you will need to […]
14 Ways To Speed Up WordPress And Decrease Page Load Time
Don’t you love the feeling of a freshly set up WordPress site? The way it loads within the blink of an eye, and isn’t weighed down by any content, plugins, or sidebar widgets? Pure bliss. Unfortunately, over time most WordPress sites will grow slower and slower as they accumulate bloat. Plugins, images, custom code—everything starts to eat up resources. If you are also one of those people who neglect basic site maintenance, soon it will feel like someone poured sand into the gears of your server. I say enough with that. Time to reverse the trend. In this guide, we […]
A Beginner’s Guide To The Genesis Framework For WordPress
If you are an active member of the WordPress ecosystem, over time you will naturally acquire some knowledge only other community members can relate to. Like, who is Matt Mullenweg? What is the WordPress Codex? Who or what is this Yoast everyone keeps talking about? It can’t be avoided, things will just come up that way. Therefore, it is only a matter of time before you stumble across a name with biblical connotations—Genesis. Maybe you have already heard about Genesis and think of it as just another theme. However, when you dive deeper, you will quickly notice that it appears […]
WordPress Heading Tags: What They Are And How To Use Them
I have a serious problem with the WordPress editor. In my humble opinion, it has one big flaw that I have very little understanding of and that hinders beginners from creating good content. What I’m talking about is that the so-called kitchen sink—a second line of formatting options at the top of the WordPress editor—is hidden by default. To access it, users have to click on the furthest button on the right that says Toolbar Toggle. Only then does the second row of buttons appear. Why do I care so much? Because, besides the ability to indent and underline text, […]
How To Customize The WordPress WYSIWYG Editor
The WordPress editor is the central work hub for content creation. Once you have your site up and running, you’ll probably spend about 80% of your time there. If you think about it, that’s pretty impressive. One part of your website that lets you take care of 80% of your work? Sounds like a powerful tool. The WordPress editor is something we take for granted. Its look, behavior, the even its formatting options are so intuitive that even newbies will quickly become familiar with it. This familiarity, however, is somewhat artificial. Just like the rest of the platform, you can customize […]
75+ Brands, Celebrities, And Famous Websites Using WordPress
With its root as a blogging platform, it is easy to disregard WordPress as a serious business solution. The fact that it is open source and free to use for anyone can also certainly contribute to its image as a product for hobbyists. Clients who don’t know better might doubt its scalability for larger projects, and developers may therefore think they couldn’t land big-name clients by offering WordPress services. However, what people tend to forget or be unaware of is that WordPress by now powers 25% of the Internet. Yes, that is one quarter. Yes, of the entire Internet. So, […]
The Ultimate SumoMe WordPress Guide
Many people out there think that running a website and running an online business are basically the same thing. Yet, as every WordPresser knows, building a site or starting a blog is the easy part—turning it into a successful and lucrative venture on the other hand is a whole different deal. Two central aspects of going from the former to the latter are promotion and lead generation. The first serves to attract people to your website, the latter is the first step in their journey from window shopper to paying customer. On the Internet, lead generation usually means getting people to […]
The Beginner’s Guide To Using MailChimp For Email Marketing
Email remains one of the most effective marketing tools. Having a direct channel for connecting with your audience is a priceless way to bypass all the noise on the Internet. Among the many email marketing providers is MailChimp. The service is a favorite for bloggers and small businesses. And the best part is, it completely free to use up to 2000 subscribers. In this article we will go over the basics of using MailChimp for email marketing. Our goal is to help you create your very own MailChimp account, start collecting email addresses on your website, send out your very first email campaign, […]
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