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Torque
Since
June 28, 2018

Tom Rankin

Tom Rankin is a key member of WordCandy, a musician, photographer, vegan, beard owner, and (very) amateur coder. When he's not doing any of these things, he's likely sleeping.

Managing WordPress: The 4 Best Practices Your Clients Need to Know

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Featured, Tools

Published

June 25, 2019

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WordPress makes it fairly easy to set up and run a website. However, this doesn’t mean there’s zero upkeep involved in managing your site. It doesn’t matter if it’s a blog, a business site, or even an online store – they all involve a lot more ongoing work than your clients might anticipate. For example, your clients will need to take care of creating regular backups for their websites. That can be a time-consuming task, especially if they don’t know the right way to approach it. Whenever possible, helping your clients learn and automate this type of work before setting […]

How to Conduct a Backlink Audit for Your Site (In 4 Steps)

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Tools

Published

June 20, 2019

1 Comment

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a balancing act. In order to rank well, you need to account for on-page factors such as titles and keywords, as well as off-page considerations like your server’s performance. Plus, you’ll need to keep an eye on your site’s backlinks, which play a key role in its visibility. Although it can be an intense process, a thorough backlink audit is an excellent way to improve your SEO and drive more traffic to your site. With the help of a few key tools, you can spruce up your backlink profile to ensure that it’s helping and […]

How to Write a Client’s Website Content (For Non-Content Creators)

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Community

Published

June 18, 2019

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In an ideal world, your clients would always have the budget to hire the experts they need for any given project. Alas, the real world isn’t like that. The cold truth is that, more often then not, you’ll end up the sole provider of everything required for a project. However, on some small projects wearing two hats (i.e., as both a developer and a content creator) could actually net you additional income, and streamline the process for your clients. What’s more, this is feasible even if you lack much in the way of creative writing skills. In this post, we’ll […]

How to Manage a Large-Scale WordPress Site (5 Best Practices)

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Development

Published

June 13, 2019

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Every website owner and developer hopes their site takes off and becomes successful. High levels of traffic, engaged users, and a steady stream of content from multiple contributors sound great when you’re managing a small site. Of course, the reality is that handling a large-scale WordPress website is no easy task. Fortunately, once you get your feet under you and learn how to manage a high-traffic site, you’ll find that it’s completely doable. In fact, there are several big-name WordPress sites out there to prove it. All you need to do is follow a few best practices. In this article, […]

Are WordPress Page Builders Still Relevant in the Post-Gutenberg World?

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Community

Published

June 4, 2019

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Unless you’re brand new to WordPress, chances are you’ve heard about the platform’s new editor. It’s obviously here to stay, but what’s less clear is whether it’s the right choice for every website. The ‘Block Editor’ is hardly based on a new concept. It uses the same basic design and elements that popular page builder plugins have been relying on for years. This means even though it’s now a default feature, the Block Editor has well-established competition. In this post, we’ll take a brief look at the history of the Block Editor and where it is now. Then we’ll discuss […]

Happy New PHP: A Look at WordPress’ Recent Jump in Minimum PHP Requirements

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Community

Published

May 29, 2019

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As far as programming languages go, PHP gets major updates fairly often. This means that as time goes on, WordPress needs to update the minimum required PHP version to keep up with those updates and provide users with a better experience. While you’re reading this, WordPress is making a jump to PHP version 5.6. It’s not the latest PHP version, but it’s still a major change that’ll impact the way WordPress users do things. There’s no need to worry, though: this update is a good thing. In this article, we’re going to break down the reasoning for the jump in […]

How to Use Chatbots to Free Up Your Clients’ Customer Support Time

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Community

Published

May 22, 2019

1 Comment

Automated website features are a hot topic, and that includes chatbots. One of your clients’ biggest concerns will be how to balance their customer support requirements against the need to develop their businesses and product lines. When it comes to solving this dilemma, automation is an ideal solution. While there are plenty of other uses, chatbots are perfect for automating customer support channels. In fact, we’d say this is a primary desire for many clients. That means you’ll need to get up to speed with how to create and maintain chatbots on the websites you build. In this post, we’ll […]

5 Common Problems You Can Avoid by Opting for Dedicated WordPress Hosting

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Tools

Published

May 20, 2019

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It can be easy to focus on your website’s users and front-end design, while overlooking the importance of behind-the-scenes factors such as your web hosting. However, choosing your hosting provider and plan carefully can prevent many problems for your site down the line. Fortunately for WordPress users, there are several providers that offer dedicated WordPress hosting plans. This type of hosting can help you keep your site running fast at all times, maintain tight security, and even streamline the process of maintaining your site. In this post, we’ll explain the differences between the most popular types of WordPress web hosting. […]

4 Reasons You Should Choose WordPress for Your E-Commerce Site

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Business

Published

May 14, 2019

1 Comment

If you’re looking to start an online store, the platform you choose is essential. While there are a wealth of options, making sure you pick the right one can smooth out the setup process, and ensure that you’re prepared no matter how large your e-commerce store grows. WordPress has become a popular e-commerce platform, and it offers a number of key benefits for online store owners. We’ll talk about these in more detail later on. In a nutshell, however, the platform is scalable, secure, and flexible enough that it can handle practically any type of e-commerce site. In this post, […]

How Much Should You Encourage Self-Sufficiency in Your Clients?

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Community

Published

May 9, 2019

4 Comments

An oft-stated goal of modern web design is to empower the client, by giving them the skills and tools they need to run their website. However, it’s logical to assume that this isn’t a good thing all of the time. After all, too much self-sufficiency might damage your earning potential. In reality, the answer to whether you should encourage self-sufficiency is more complex than a simple “Yes” or “No”. It can be the case that giving a client free rein actually keeps them on the books while trying to handle every need they have could result in driving them away. The […]

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