Todays question is how best to add the little online / offline blocks for the various message services to your blog.
First you have to get the HTML code for your service from them. Then you will need to add it to your blog one of two ways. First if you use a widget ready theme you can add the code directly into the text box. Give the box a title like – Online Status or what ever you would like.
This is easiest because you don’t need to edit the blog itself and you can move it up or down with the widget editor. I really do love themes that are widget ready.
The second way if you don’t use a widget ready theme is to edit your sidebar. You can do this inside the theme editor if you have set your theme pages to a chmod of 666. If not you will need to download the page with your sidebar on it (usually sidebar.php in most themes) and use your favorite editor to add in the extra HTML.
You will upload it back and see if it is correct. Remember to always keep a back up of the original before you edit any part of your theme.
If it is you are all done if not you need to go back and try again.
Have a question on WordPress or blogging in general? Leave a comment or click here to ask your question on my survey form.
Inserting hyperlinks in your posts is quite easy to do. When you are in your post just highlight the area of text that you want to hyperlink. Click the little bar and a pop up window will open.
Add your link in the top box, click the check box to decide how you want the link to open and the third line will give you the hover text.
A bit more detail now.
The top box will be a full url. They give you the start by default “http://”. You can just fill in the rest.
You have two option in the next line. You can have the link open in a new window so that when the reader closes it your blog will still be there. If you don’t then the page will load in place of your blog and the only way for them to get back is to use the back button.
Finally, the hover text – You can use this as a teaser to get someone to click through. For example you have a link to a product you could add a benefit to the hover text.
If you have a question you would like answered please leave a comment or you can leave your question here.
Well I am probably prejudiced so I will start with that caveat. I prefer a blog to a website for affiliate marketing. There are a variety of reasons for this but first and foremost is that the search engines at this point love blogs.
If you have a consistently updated blog and take the time to submit it to the directories to raise your backlinks a blog will get indexed faster and more often then a static web page.
Now if you use a CMS like Joombla that has an RSS feed built into it it may be a draw. However, I can put up and customize a blog much quicker than I can any of the CMS programs out there. Grab a theme, change an image or two and I have a unique site. With WordPress 2.1 I can even use the backbone of WordPress as a content management system and still have a blog but have it look like a website.
The key to any site for affiliate marketing will be to create content that people want and presell effectively. Content and how it is presented will ultimately decide the success or failure of your site whether you use a blog or a static web site.
If you have a question you would like addressed here please leave a comment or you can ask your question here.
The absolute number one question asked in my surveys is what do I write about?
As a friend of mine says that is like asking how long is a ball of string?
The answer will depend on you, your knowledge and more importantly your passions. Here is one way that I do this. It works for others too so this may solve your problem.
Pick a topic that you have a real interest or passion for first. That usually gives you something that will be easy for you to write about. For me it is using Word Press. For my friend Jon Olson he is the Traffic Exchange Guy. He will go talk to anyone about using them at the drop of a hat.
The next step is to find out what kind of questions people are asking about your topic. Check out forums, groups, etc to see what topics are being discussed and what kind of questions are being asked. This will give you topics to write about that you know people are interested in.
Finally, one of the best ways is to ask people. I do that regularly here. If you have a question you would like answered about Word Press or blogging in general leave a comment or you can go to the survey link below.
Now if you are interested in using this type of service we use Ask Data Base to keep track of these items for us. There are also scripts available that will allow you to run surveys too.
Now if you are also looking to create products this information will show you exactly what type of things people are looking for answers about. This will give you topics for your blog that are things of interest to you and do your market research at the same time. Hope this helps you to create a blog that you can enjoy and be useful for others.
If you would like to see how Jon uses these questions check out his Hit Exchange Blog.
Just a quick post to remind readers that Word Press has issued updates for bot the 2.1 and 2.0 versions.
Version 2.1 will be replaced with 2.1.1. Version 2.07 will be replaced with 2.09. Yep they skipped 8. Guess they didn’t want to be like the change from 2.06 to 2.07 which was very short.
Version 2.1 will have new features but the 2.0 version will be supported through 2010 but you will only get security updates.
My apologies for the lack of posts of late but could use some more questions and have been extremely busy working on a new program I will be releasing. Look for information on that to be posted at Mike Paetzold Recommends on Monday.
If you have a question on using Word Press blogs or blogging in general leave your question here or post a commnet and I will do my best to get it answered.
The question today was is there an easy way to add something to have people subscribe and be able to mail to them.
The problem with this is that yes there is a plug in that will do that but I personally would not use it. Nothing wrong with the plugin that I have read about but for any type of email marketing (yes sending notices of new posts constitutes marketing to this Old Bald Guy) I want to use someone like AWeber who makes it there business.
It is way too easy to have spam complaints or get your domain blacklisted when using your own auto responder even if you follow all the rules. Usually very quickly your delivery rate drops and that means less people actually receiving your email. If that happens the major autoresponders not only have all the subscription info etc but they also know who to talk to at the various ISPs. I don’t know that and quite truthfully don’t think I could do as good a job as they can even if I took the time to learn.
Now all of that being said you can find the plugin at Blue Anvil. Looks like it has gotten good reviews but I won’t be testing this as I feel that strongly about using pros for my mailing.
The most complete instructions for doing this are available at the Word Press site.
There are 5 basic steps to do an upgrade.
1. Back up your data. This will include the full data base, the .htaccess file and the various parts of your theme that you have modified. For me I download the data base via phpMyAdmin. Grab the wp-conig file, and the whole wp-content folder. It is more than needed but keeps me from missing one file I forgot I changed.
2. Turn off all the plugins. Log in to the dashboard and click deactivate on each and every one. Sometimes older plugins will not work with new versions and if they are off I know whethter the install was good.
3. Upload and overwrite your current version of Word Press with the exception of the wp-content folder and the wp-config file.. If you do then upload the backup you made in step 1.
4. Run the upgrade command. It will be your full blog URL/wp-admin/upgrade.php and follow the dirctions. Even old bald guys have no problem with their directions.
5. Reactivate the plugins one by one to make sure they are still compatible. If a plugin causes a problem them go to the authors site and see if they have an upgrade to work with the new version. Quite a few do now for 2.1 that weren’t compatible the first day or so.
If you have a problem with the installation there is an extended install instruction at the link above for the codex. Hope this answers the question that was asked in the survey for that reader if not leave a comment and I’ll expand the answer. Have a question you would like to see answered here? Leave a comment or scroll down to the Can I ask you a question button a few posts below.
This is the next in a series of posts answering the questions that were asked in the survey below. If you have not added yours feel free to do so now. Your question may be answered here.
In most themes your font size and styles are controlled by your css file. If you are in your theme editor it is usually called the stylesheet or if you are looking for the file through FTP it will be called style.css and will be found in your theme folder. In the case of this blog I use the Regulus theme and this blog is in the blog directory the path to style.css would be public_html/blog/wp-content/themes/regulus/style.css.
This will in no way be a complete tutorial on css but I will try to shed some light on what the various code does on this page in a piece by piece manner.
To learn more about all the things you can do there are various tutorials available online and a quick search of Google will give you quite a few places for much more involved information thatn I will go into here.
As with all editing of the theme for your blog make a back up copy before you start. This way if you make a mistake and I always seem to at least once in a while you will be able to return to the format you had.
body {
font-size:0.625em;
_font-size:10px;
text-align:center;
background: url( images/bg_body.gif ) repeat-x top #eef;
}
The above is the start of the code for this theme. The first section designates the font type for the blog. The items after body tells how big the font will be on this blog, the default alignment and the background image that will be used.
There will be different sections that will change the look of different parts of the blog depending on what are the css file is controlling. On the theme that I am using all of the post attributes are listed under content. If I want to change the size of the font of the posts that is where I would do it if it is defined in this section. On this particular theme it is not so the font size will be controlled by the body section.
The author of the css file has made notations to tell which parts are controlled where and that is usually the case.
The first section designates how big the content area will be 460 px wide and aligned left with a 12px white border to the left and a 20px white border at the bottom. This is an area you will rarely touch as it can throw your whole template structure out of alignment.
The next section sets the placement for when you use left align and adds in the margins for the right hand side of your post again at 12px so that your content has equal margins.
The next area defines the color for your text when it is in p tags or li tags.
Finally the rest of the code defines the attributes of the h2 tag when used in your post and title. First the size within the title then the size when used in your content area. The last 2 sections define the color of the h2 tag when used as a link. If you go to the top of the post and hover over the title you will see the color change to a blue (#68f) as the post title is linked to the single page for this post.
The css file will continue to define the various attributes of different tags within the content area. If it is not specified as to be different it will use the attributes listed at the body area. The actual place to change the font attributes of size and color on this theme is in the first blockquote area where the size is set at 10px but until you have checked the content area you won’t know for sure.
This is the next in a series of posts answering the questions that were asked in the survey below. If you have not added yours feel free to do so now. Your question may be answered here.
Now if you know HTML it is relatively easy to add a static paragraph or two to the top of your blog. I use that on one of mine – The Old Bald Guy. There I have a short intro of what to expect from the blog and a warning that when they see red it is my evil twin and he does not know what the word politically correct means. (I know – I try hard to stay ahead of the guys in the white coats. What can I say but I do enjoy the split personality of that blog.)
You do need to either ftp the page or have set your theme page permissions to 666 to edit within your dashboard.
***********WARNING************
Always take the time to make a back up before you start so that you can return everything back to the way it was if you make a mistake.
The main index template is the first page you need to edit. Depending on your theme you may also need to edit the single page template also. You will see the following code or something similar on your main idex template.
You will see the header include and then the code you want to find will be “div id=”content” enclosed in angle brackets < >.
Add your html there and make sure you have closed all tags. Save the page and then view your site. If all has gone well then you are done with the main template. If your theme uses a separate page for single posts you will need to redo it there also in the very same manner.
If per chance it totally messed things up then replace it with the back up that you made and if you are a member of Word Press Made Easy membership site pop in to the forum and leave the info on what your problem was.
you will be able to return to the format you had.
