First, an important note: BACKUP YOUR SITE before you attempt this!

Here are the steps to take, to back up your Wordpress site:

1. Log in to your Wordpress Dashboard – enter “http://YOUR_BLOG’S_ADDRESS/wp-admin” in your address bar, and enter your username and password.
2. Click the “Manage” tab at the top of the page.
3. Click the “Export” option.
4. Make sure “All Authors” is selected in the “Options” section of the “Export” page.
5. Click the “Download Export File” button at the bottom of the page.
6. Name the exported file and save it to your computer.
7. Using an FTP (I recommend Cyberduck for Mac, or WS FTP for Windows) program, download ALL of the files from your web server, to your computer.
8. Make sure all everything you just downloaded is secure. Preferably, burn them to a DVD or CD and store them offsite. If this isn’t possible, an external hard drive works well too.
9. It might not be a bad idea to back up your MySQL database right now, but that is outside of the scope of this post, and I personally have never done that. If you follow the instructions here, you will have everything you need to restore your site in the event of a major meltdown.

For a great introductory lesson, try making a subtle change to your “functions.php” file. This will add some really great functionality to your blog, and it isn’t hard to do.

Edit some PHP

In my personal blog, www.GarrittHampton.com I talk about a change that I made to my “functions.php” file, to change the text that is displayed for “Protected” wordpress Posts. You can see the results here, http://hampton-family.com/Yvette/?p=161. This was a simple change, that has made a big difference for my site. It has made it much easier for readers to subscribe to my VIP Content, and that means MORE SUBSCRIBERS!

I encourage you to take the time to try this on your own site. I think you will be happy you did.
For Clear Instructions, CLICK HERE.

Don’t forget to visit the Wordpress Support Forums for more great ideas and expert help.

I was going for the longest title and subtitle in blogging history.

Since the first “dotcom boom”, a web page has been a necessity for any serious business. While this is especially true for online businesses, it is equally true for brick-and-mortar, and home-based businesses. It is not even acceptable for a business to not have a website, and in fact, I would propose that it is not even acceptable for a business to have a mediocre website. When our kids can put together a highly trafficked MySpace or Facebook page in their spare time, we just have no excuse as business owners not to devote a portion of our resources to putting together a GREAT website. Customers make immediate judgments about a business the second they land on it’s website. In many cases, these are subtle, subconscious judgments, but they impact the business/customer relationship powerfully.

Luckily, since the “dotcom boom” and “dotcom bust” things have gotten much easier. There are so many powerful tools available that enable every business owner to produce a really professional looking site, with only a moderate amount of work. These tools truly negate any excuse that these businesses might have, for not having a website. Additionally, with the advent of “Web 2.0″, the proliferation of social networking sites has spurred the creation and refinement of many of the most powerful of these tools.

Without a doubt, my favorite tool for web design is Wordpress. Wordpress, has definitely benefited from the improvements in technology, brought about by the social networking craze. On the surface, Wordpress is just blogging software, but at the core, Wordpress is a Content Management System (CMS).

What the heck is a CMS, and why should you care? The purpose of a Content Management System is to collect data, organize it, and present it over the internet. It allows massive amounts of data to be presented in an orderly, and easily searched and navigated manner. It combines a server-level database, like MySQL, with a browser-displayed front end (a web page). In short, it makes designing a data heavy website a breeze. By data, I mean words, links, numbers, pictures, video, audio, customer accounts, passwords, code, or any combination of these: basically, the meat of a website. For a good example of data, managed by a CMS, take a good look at this site. It is filled with words, pictures, video, links, and on the back end, administrator, editor, author, and subscriber account information. It is also, very typical. If you can imagine having a site like this, or already do, you need to know about CMS.

While Wordpress isn’t the only CMS tool out there – in fact, there are countless others – It is my favorite, and if you have read this blog for any length of time, you know I recommend it all the time. I first used Wordpress in 2005 when I had to do a ground-up redesign of a real estate website, for one of my consulting clients. I had been designing web pages for about 9 years, and up until then, mostly edited HTML by hand, in TextEdit, or Notepad. I used to design every page of a site, verify it in multiple browsers, fix any problems, then upload all of the files to the host, using Fetch, Cyberduck, WS FTP, or another FTP program. I had used a couple of WYSIWYG HTML editors, but found them to be more of a hindrance or crutch, than a real benefit. Keep in mind, I designed HUNDREDS of pages this way. I had built several, highly complex sites like this: everything from a personal sites, band sites, record company recording studio sites, to the site for our high-end stationery store. It was a very tedious process, but it yielded great results for the time.

When I started the site redesign, I felt like my designs were starting to look a little dated, and I knew I needed to find a faster way to work. I had heard about Wordpress on Leo Laporte’s radio show, and thought I would give it a try. I installed version 1.5 (I think) and never looked back. I was able to create a great looking site with tons of content (50+ pages, MLS search, home value tools, mapping, lead capture forms, and more), in a very short time. It was a “Eureka!” moment.

Since then, Wordpress has only improved. I am currently running version 2.6.3, and it is excellent. It is highly customizable, and gives very professional results without a lot of work. Plus, if you are willing and able to dig in and do some real under-the-hood work, Wordpress can yield amazing personalized results. Because of the excellent Wordpress support forums, with a little searching, you can usually find great ideas for making your blog work exactly like you want it to, and usually there are clear examples of code that you can use or adapt, to make the needed changes.

I don’t expect you to know how to administer a MySQL database, or even install Wordpress. The good news is, you don’t have to, and if you do, all the better! Most web hosting services offer guided installation of CMS systems, in fact, Go Daddy has a one-click Wordpress Setup that I have used many times. It makes setting up a Wordpress blog take just minutes.

Take the time to dive in to the world of CMS. You will find that managing your website becomes much easier, and your site will look and perform much better as a result.

Wordpress Resources:

You can download Wordpress for free at Wordpress.org

You can cut your teeth on Wordpress, with a free blog, at Wordpress.com

My personal blog at www.GarrittHampton.com has tons of Wordpress tips: everything from Installation, to Themes, to Plugins, to the truly geeky stuff like editing CSS and php.

Check out the Wordpress Support Forums for expert help.

Check out http://wordpress.org/extend/ for great Wordpress Themes, Plugins and ideas.

Here are some of the other Wordpress posts on this site: http://RenegadeMarketingStrategies.com/?s=wordpress. Notice that some of these posts are for subscribers only. To access all of the VIP content on this site, subscribe to our newsletter.

In this subscribers-only “Expert Tips” post, I will give an overview of the plugins I am currently using in my own blogs, explain how they work, and tell you how to install them on your own blog to give it power and flexibility you won’t believe. Keep in mind that although this post is specific to wordpress, most blogging software offers the use of some plugins, and while you may be using another blogging tool, you can take the suggestions in this post, and use them as a jumping-off point to search for similar plugins for your blog. Also, don’t feel constrained to using the plugins I have suggested. There are usually some great competing plugins for each of the ones I am using. For example, visit the plugin page at wordpress.org, wordpress.org/extend/plugins/ and search for plugins to allow you to add a Digg link to your posts. Just enter “Digg” in the search box. You will be amazed at how many plugins allow you to do this one thing. The same is true for almost all of my plugins.

While all of these plugins are available for free download at wordpress.org/extend/plugins/, wherever possible, in this post, I will link to the homepage for the plugin or designer. To install them, download them from either the Wordpress.org plugins page, or the designer’s page, then unzip them and copy them into your wp-content/plugins file using an FTP program, or your webhost’s control panel, file management software. Once you have placed the plugin in your wp-content/plugins folder, log in to your Wordpress dashboard, and click the plugins button at the top right of the page. From there, follow the instructions on the page to activate and set up the plugin.

Akismet

Akismet is, without a doubt, my favorite Wordpress plugin. like most great tools, It does one thing and does it very well. Akismet is a comment spam filter.

If you have ever had to deal with comment spam, you know that it can quickly eat up your time, frustrate you, and cause you to lose faith in humanity. Before I found Akismet, I used to have to moderate approximately 200 spam comments a week. After a few times, spending 10 minutes deleting spam comments, and finding that I couldn’t even weed the spam comments out of my blog, without losing the good ones as well, I turned off the comments on my blog. I hated to lose the power of allowing comments on my blog, but I couldn’t stand the trouble that they brought.

Akismet has fixed this problem, for good. Now, I allow comments on all of my blogs, and never have to deal with comment spam. Akismet is such a great plugin, it is now included with every installation of Wordpress. I encourage you to activate it immediately when you install wordress.

Google XML Sitemaps

One of the most powerful SEO tools I have found, is Google Sitemaps. Sitemaps are XML or HTML documents that tell search engines what, and how many pages are on a website. They also tell search engines when these pages were created, and how often they are edited, and how to find them. The idea behind Sitemaps is, “why wait for search engine spiders to find pages on your site, when you can just tell them where they are”. I have found Sitemaps to be a very quick way to get ranked on Google, and like I have said before, If you can get found on Google, you can get found anywhere.

You can visit Google’s Sitemaps page here. While you are there, take a look at the rest of Google’s Webmaster tools. They are very powerful.

With small sites, it is possible to build XML and HTML sitemaps by hand. But if you have more than a few pages, or if you update your site often, it gets VERY time consuming to keep your sitemap up to date. If you regularly post to your blog, say weekly, it is nearly impossible!

This is where Google XML Sitemaps comes in. This plugin will automatically update your XML sitemap every time you update your site, then it will automatically notify Google, Yahoo!, MSN, and Ask.com about the changes. Very Handy!

I Love Social Bookmarking

Social Bookmarking sites allow users to submit links to sites, pages, videos, blog posts, or other content that they like, and then, allow other users to vote on the the submitted links. Links with more votes move further up the list. While this is a somewhat obscure concept, it is simple to understand the effect of these sites. Digg is the most popular social bookmarking site, right now. If you have a blog post that gets voted to the top of Digg, you will get literally thousands, and maybe tens of thousands of hits to your site. It is not uncommon for sites to be knocked offline, due to high traffic, when they hit the front page of Digg.

In order to benefit from the HUGE amount of traffic that these sites provide, you have to actually get people to link to you (Digg you). If you have a really great site or post, they might do this manually, but it is much easier to get people to Digg you, if give them an easy way to do it, then encourage them. This is what the
“I Love Social Bookmarking” plugin does. It places a link at the bottom of every blog post that allows people to Digg that post, or submit it to any of several other social bookmarking sites, in a few easy steps. To see it in action, Purple heart and “Social Bookmarking (Digg This)” link at the bottom of this post, then DIGG THIS POST. I’d do it for you!

SEO Friendly Images

SEO Friendly Images automatically sets the proper ALT and TITLE attributes for images you put on your blog, and if you haven’t added these tags, it adds them according to criteria you set. SEO Friendly Images also validates the xHTML in the post, to W3C standards. That’s a lot of technical gibberish to say that this plugin cleans up your posts and tags images, so they are easily indexed by search engines.

Tell-a-Friend

Tell-a-Friend adds a button to the end of every blog post, that allows readers to email the post to a friend, or group of friends. To see this plugin in action, click the “SHARE THIS POST” button at the bottom of this post. In marketing, “calls to action” are very important. While you might expect that your readers, clients, or customers should know exactly what you want them to do, you can be reasonably assured that you will have a much better response, if you just ask them to do something specific. That’s what this plugin does. It asks your readers to spread the word about your great content.

Ultimate Google Analytics

Google Analytics is a very powerful website statistics service provided by Google. The Ultimate Google Analytics plugin adds JavaScript to each post, page, and link on your blog, that allows Google Analytics to generate statistics on what your visitors are doing while they are on your site. Additionally, Google Analytics can tell you how visitors arrived at your site (did they enter a search term in a search engine, or click on an inbound link on another site), and how they left your site (did they click on an outbound link, or did they close the window or browser).

I have found Google Analytics to be an irreplaceable tool, in that it allows me to very effectively, guage the effectiveness of certain aspects of my sites. It allows me to work to increase the “stickiness” of my site, by adding more of the features that my readers like, and it allows me to track the effectiveness of different advertising campaigns, because I can see which landing pages people are entering through, then what they are doing once they are on my site.

For anyone who is serious about conducting business on the web, I highly recommend a good statistics program, and Google Analytics is by far the best that I have used.

Wordpress Automatic Upgrade

Wordpress Automatic Upgrade does just what it’s name implies. It automatically upgrades your wordpress installation to the newest version. This is a great time saver for me, because I have multiple Wordpress blogs that I manage, and manually upgrading all of them would be a real hassle.

yaCAPTCHA

yaCAPTCHA adds a CAPTCHA field to the end of forms. CAPTCHA is the technology that creates distorted text images, to ensure that the person filling out a form is an actual person. In concert with Akismet, yaCAPTCHA insures that the only comments I get on my blog, are from real people. I also use CAPTCHA technology on my subscription form. To see this plugin in action, comment on any post on this blog.