Writing by Brick Marketing on Friday, 25 of January , 2008 at 7:13 am Leave a comment
I have not seen this WordPress tip in many places, however I think it can be a worthy blogging tip to put into practice. If you receive a lot of trackbacks on your blog you will notice that they get mixed in with the comments. First, a simple definition of a trackback.
[source] A Trackback is one of three types of Linkbacks, methods for Web authors to request notification when somebody links to one of their documents. This enables authors to keep track of who is linking to, or referring to their articles. Some weblog software programs, such as Wordpress, Movable Type and Community Server, support automatic pingbacks where all the links in a published article can be pinged when the article is published.
So essentially a trackback is one blog advising another blog that there is a link connecting them and that the link comes from a particular article. The receiving blog pings back and it is that ping back that often ends up in the comments area. You have two choices, delete the trackback or leave it inplace. Trackbacks can be valuable for linking so it is often wise to leave the trackback in. However the trackbacks dotted through your comments make it look a little untidy. Follow these steps and our comments will not only look tidy, they will look professional. Before starting - make a copy of your comments.php file, just in case you make an error.
Step one: Open for editing your comments.php file and locate the following code.
<?php foreach ($comments as $comment) : ?> immediately after this code place this:
<?php $comment_type = get_comment_type(); ?>
<?php if($comment_type == 'comment') { ?>
Step two: locate the following piece of code:
<?php endforeach; /* end for each comment */ ?> place this code on the line before:
<?php } /* End of is_comment statement */ ?>
Step three: locate this piece of code:
<?php else : // this is displayed if there are no comments so far ?> immediately before place this code:
<h3>Trackbacks</h3>
<ol>
<?php foreach ($comments as $comment) : ?>
<?php $comment_type = get_comment_type(); ?>
<?php if($comment_type != ‘comment’) { ?>
<li><?php comment_author_link() ?></li>
<?php } ?>
<?php endforeach; ?>
</ol>
All done. Save the file and go into any post that has a mix of trackbacks and comments. This WordPress tip is easy to put into place and provides a nice neat look to your blog software.
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Category: Blog Software, Blogging Tips, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Saturday, 19 of January , 2008 at 6:34 am Leave a comment
Gotbanners is one blog plugin that has several applications. Written specifically for WordPress to counter the banner blindness that can occur when returning visitors see the same banners every day, this plugin is quick to install and quick to configure.
The plugin works by taking the assigned banners and rotating them. Whenever the pages is loaded (or refreshed), the banners are shuffled into a new display order. To configure Gotbanners, simply copy the banners code into the configuration panel, save, and place the widget into your sidebar.
Whilst designed for affiliate 125 x 125 type banners, I can envisage this blog plugin being used for any banner campaign. If you want to promote static pages, competitions, related sites, or any other link; create a series of banners and let Gotbanners do the rest. The plugin is also capable of handling double width columns to display two columns of banners. This WordPress tip will certainly help to avoid any banner blindness.
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Category: Blog Plugins, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Wednesday, 16 of January , 2008 at 7:03 am Leave a comment
A lot is written on the topic of Blog SEO but I see very little written about the use of graphics. Your graphics are just as important as the text, in fact more so if they do not render well on the screen.
Each browsers uses a different set of rules to render the graphics to the screen. If you use FireFox, particularly some of the older versions, you may find that when hovering your mouse over an image nothing happens. Internet Explorer on the other hand will display the ALT tag text. Some users prefer to have the graphics function of the browser switched off - in other words, they do not want graphics displayed. This can make a page look rather strange unless you code the graphics correctly.
The Insert/Edit image function in WordPress has a very limited capability. When inserting an image into your content you can use the Insert/edit image function but you will need to enter the code window to clean up the graphics tags.
Optimized Graphics Tags:
<img src=”http://yourimage-url.here” alt=”name of image” title=”name of image” border=”0=none 1,2,3 etc for thickness” width=”xx%” height=”xx%” align=”left, right, center” vspace=”10″ hspace=”10″>
That is a long tag. A quick look at each component.
The IMG SRC (image source) tag tells the browser where to find the image.
The ALT tag is the text that is placed on the screen if the browsers image function is switched off or if the path to the image has been broken (the image may have been deleted for example) - use keywords in this text.
The TITLE tag is the text that is displayed when the mouse hovers over the image (you can get clever and use promotional text here - for example - “click here to see more on blog SEO“) - again, use keywords in the text.
The BORDER tag sets the thickness of the border - zero for no border or you can leave the tag out altogether.
The WIDTH and HEIGHT tag allow you to render the graphic in a size other than the original. You can use sizes greater than 100% but always check how well the graphic appears. You can use just the width tag as most browsers will automatically resize the height according to the width. I find it best to use both tags.
The ALIGN tag places the graphic to the left or right of the text or centers the graphic with text top and bottom. If you are looking for a magazine affect with the text wrapping around the graphic - use the left or right attribute. (note again, not all browsers render this correctly).
The VSPACE and HSPACE are measurements in pixels that tell the browser how much ‘white’ space to place around the graphic. If you leave this tag out the text will placed hard up against the graphic.
Once you have placed the graphic, if it is a third party graphic (taken from another site) then it is always a good idea to link to the graphics source in the accompanying text.
If you follow those tips, your graphic should render well in most browsers and search engines will know where the graphic came from and its importance to the content.
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Category: Blog SEO, Blogging Tips, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Monday, 14 of January , 2008 at 6:16 am Comments (1)
These WordPress tips can be used to present your blogs content using some attributes that are not present on the WordPress toolbar. To use these tips you will need to enter them through the code screen when creating your content.
You are probably familiar with the bold and italics attributes. You can also use strong or emphasized to highlight your text. Other attributes include big and small and superscript and subscript.
To get this effect use the following codes either side of the text you want to enhance.
<b> </b> for bold
<i> </i> for italics
<strong> </strong> for strong
<em> </em> for emphasized
<big> </big> for big
<small> </small> for small
<sup> </sup> for superscript
<sub> </sub> for subscript
One attribute that is a little more complicated is the horizontal rule that I have just used. It is good for breaking up topics within the one post. This code includes parameters such as ALIGNMENT - left, right and center. WIDTH - the length in pixels of the line and SIZE - the thickness in pixels. The noshade command determines whether or not the line is filled or hollow as sown below.The code for the above line is:
<hr align=”center” noshade=”0″ size=”4″ width=”400″ /> and for the line below:
<hr align=”center” size=”4″ width=”400″ /> (note the omission of the noshade)
Several points to note with this code. All the attribute parameters are inside double quotes. The tag, HR, is between the < and > - note the trailing / - this closes the tag.
A short word of warning. If you pride yourself on having 100% strict xhtml then do not use the HR tag as it is not supported. You should also check your formatting in both Internet Explorer and FireFox - there are times when what works in one will not work in the other.
For headings, use a heading tag. Note the closing tags at the end of the line - these must be used. The tags for these are <h1> </h1> through to <h6> </h6>. You will also need to take into account your themes CSS which is file of code that changes some of the attributes. The CSS for this theme has been altered to display the <h1> </h1> code in white (which does not work on a white background> so I have omitted the code from this list. Your template may well support the use of it.
heading 2
heading 3
heading 4
heading 5
heading 6
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Category: Blog Content, Blogging Tips, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Saturday, 12 of January , 2008 at 7:38 am Leave a comment
One WordPress tip that I don’t see posted all that often is WordPress’ ability to save numerous posts without publishing.
The worst thing that could happen to any writer is writers block. Conversely, I am sure there are times when you could write all day. If you post using the WordPress platform then it is very easy to create all that content without actually posting it.
What about holidays. Do you worry about keeping your blog up to date whilst on holidays. A simple solution is to take your laptop with you everywhere. Of course you do have the problem of reliable internet access. You could also post via your mobile phone. There are simpler ways to do things. You can enjoy your holiday or your time away and still keep posting, every day if that is your schedule.
Here’s How
The graphic on the left is a screen shot from the Coolayla WordPress panel and is taken from the sidebar in the ‘Write Posts’ tab.
WordPress has a feature known as ‘Post Timestamp’. One of its uses is to allow a blogger to write an article that will be published at some time into the future.
To use the feature, write your post as usual - however do NOT publish it. Once completed, check the check box (item one) marked ‘Edit timestamp’. Then modify the time and date that you would like to schedule the article for publication (item two). Finally, ensure that the ‘Post status’ - ‘published’ check box is checked (item three).
Hit publish and WordPress will file the article away until the designated date and time. The article will be automatically published on that day.
The other feature I mentioned, which is to create content without publishing, is very straight forward. Once you have completed your article, ensure that the ‘draft’ check box in ‘Post status’ area has been checked. Then simply hit the save button rather than the publish button. At any time in the future you can load up that article, make any changes, check the published button in the ‘Post status’ area and hit publish.
It is often a good idea to have a number of articles pre-written this way. You never know when writers block is going to hit, or when you are going to be called away. A simple WordPress tip that can save a lot of time and worry.
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Category: WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Wednesday, 9 of January , 2008 at 7:48 am Comments (1)
WordPress is a great program to run a blog on. Every time you write a new post or edit an old post, WordPress pings services you have listed. The problem is, if you are like me, you write a post; publish it; read it and say oh-oh, made a mistake - and go back in to make a few changes. Then you save it again. Some writers think safety first and hit ’save and continue editing’ frequently while writing or editing their post.
The problem is, once a post has been published, WordPress pings those services every time you hit that save button. This could create a situation where your blog gets accused of spamming. The only solution is to make sure your post is perfect before publishing - or use a WordPress plugin that pings without spamming.
There are a few WordPress plugins you could use including MaxBlogPress Ping Optimizer which is available from WordPress.org. MaxBlogPress prevents WordPress from pinging until you publish your post. You can edit as often as you require, the post will be pinged only once.
A previous post listed a variety of Blog and Ping sites that can be used to ping your post. You can just select copy and paste into MaxBloPress with the knowledge that each post will only be pinged the once
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Category: Blog Plugins, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Friday, 4 of January , 2008 at 10:15 am Leave a comment
WordPress is one of the most popular blogging engines in use at present. Over the last few months WordPress not only released an upgrade (2.3.1) but shortly before Christmas released an urgent upgrade, 2.3.2 to fix security issues.
Since the WordPress upgrade release, I have received numerous calls for help. It appeared that many users were experiencing strange problems and these problems in general related to the WordPress database. A little research and I discovered that the latest version of Wordpress utilized the database in a different manner to previous versions.
Generally speaking, the problem can be traced back to the WordPress plugins that had been installed.
Resolving the Problem - Before doing anything, check your plugins for any upgrades. Ensure they have been upgraded to the 2.3 version of WordPress. If after upgrading you still experience the problem you will have to dig a little deeper. The problem will most likely lie with one or more of the plugins that have not been upgraded. Disable each WordPress plugin that you have not upgraded - one at a time. After you have disabled the plugin, check to see if you still get the error. No error - bad plugin. You can now enable the other plugins that you had disabled - one by one, again testing for errors. If you get an error - disable that plugin.
Wordpress Tip to Prevent Future Problems - Problems of this nature can be prevented to some extent by first, reading the installation FAQ’s thoroughly. It is also a good idea to undertake regular maintenance of your WordPress blog. Maintenance should include the following:
- Backing up your WordPress blog on a regular basis
- Checking each of your plugins for updates on a regular basis
- Undertaking an analysis of your plugins to determine their value - if they do not provide any benefit to your blog - disable them
- Deleting plugins you are not using. WordPress still loads all plugins even if they have been disabled. Your blog will load faster if the unused plugins are deleted.
Finally, if, after disabling all plugins you still get the error message, the problem will lie with the theme itself. You will need to either find an updated version of the theme or install a new WordPress 2.3 compatible theme.
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Category: WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Tuesday, 18 of December , 2007 at 11:20 am Leave a comment
Now that you’re getting to know more and more about blog marketing, I guess its time that you learn the value of backing up. Much like your PCs and laptops, it is important that you back up your blog database because you’ll never know what could happen. Your WordPress blog database for example contains all your entries, comments, and links that you have gathered throughout the years of blogging and you simply can’t afford to have them deleted just like that — kaput in an instant!
Backing up your blog must be done regularly, the same way you back up your important files. You know what could happen if you don’t—all your entries and photos sent to oblivion. You’ll never know when your web hosting server will crash or your blog gets hacked by some clever programmer whose only goal is to annoy you, so it’s good to be prepared.
Don’t wait until a series of unfortunate events happens to you blog. Get into the habit of backing up by following these simple and easy steps. No, you don’t need to be a geek to do this.
- Use an FTP client to download all the site files (the Wordpress folder)
- Log into phpMyAdmin and select your Wordpress database
- Click on “Export” and make sure that all the Wordpress tables are there
- On the “Structure” section tick “Add Drop Tables,” “Add AUTO_INCREMENT,” and “Enclose table and field names with backquotes”
- On the “Data” section leave all the boxes unticked
- Tick “Save as file” and download the database (you can use compression if your database is big (SOURCE: DailyBlogTips)
If you don’t have access to your WP’s phpMyAdmin, you may use the Database Backup plugin instead. And remember, backing up habits can save your online life. So save the blog, save yourself,save the world.
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Category: Blog Content, Blog Plugins, Blogging Tips, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Wednesday, 12 of December , 2007 at 10:32 pm Leave a comment
Earlier, I presented tips on how to choose a Wordpress theme and mentioned that your choice of a theme can be influenced by your decision to monetize your blog. There were two opposing reactions : WP doesn’t allow and YES you can! IMHO, it is possible in a way that Wordpress.com or the [.] org version for that matter doesn’t officially offer referrals or affiliates schemes. It’s the themes and the plugins that do the talking…or rather, monetizing through Google Adsense and other Pay Per Click programs.
Perhaps one of the most preferred programs is the Adsense that has allowed few good men out there to earn as much as $300,000 a month. The likes of Markus Frind of plentyoffish.com - a dating service website, and Kevin Rose of digg.com, and Jeremy Shoemaker of Shoemoney.com are lucky enough to earn really big bucks. Of course, these people have worked hard to make their websites popular as they are now. No, they don’t use Wordpress on their websites I’m sure of that. But the figures they are earning are enough to motivate us bloggers.
The closest thing bloggers and web marketers like us have to earning online is obviously blogs. Whether you use WP, Blogger, MySpace, or whatever obscure blogging platform, you can put AdSense. Work harder to be more popular and get noticed via some linkbuilding here and there or writing some controversial posts, you can laugh your way to the bank after you get your AdSense check.
The thing with Wordpress is that there are hundreds to thousands of themes and plugins being made by designers and developers all over the world. Some people are smart enough to design themes that allot spaces for PPC ads.
But just because you can monetize through Wordpress, it doesn’t automatically mean you WILL. Most people forget about “hardwork”. Remember that Frind, Rose, of Shoemaker didn’t get rich quick—they worked hard for it. They may not use our beloved WP on their sites but their bank accounts more than motivate.
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Category: Blogging Income, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Monday, 10 of December , 2007 at 11:07 am Comments (4)
Some bloggers often take for granted the design of their websites. Since WordPress is perhaps one of the best web blogging platforms in the blogosphere, it is important that one takes some time in choosing the right theme or design. SEO-wise, WordPress still rules the blogging world because of its permalinks and it allows bloggers to easily add tags or link titles that all play an important factor in optimization.
Blogging on WordPress is favored by more people because themes are easily customizable and are free. There are hundreds to thousands of free themes available but there are also premium themes you can choose from.
Here are some tips on how to choose your WordPress theme for a more successful blogging career:
1. Identify the look and feel of your website. Simply put, decide on how you want your blog to appeal to your readers. If it’s a personal blog, choose a theme that you know you can customize or tweak. But if you’re gunning for a more corporate blog, it is best you hire professional blog designers.
2. Decide yourself if you wish to monetize through your blog. If you do, you may look for themes that allot spaces for more banners, buttons, and ads.
3. Identify how many people also use the same theme. While customizing the website if easy, not all bloggers are able to personalize their blog designs. If you choose a more popular theme, you may have a hard time standing out. However, a popular theme often is supported very well.
4. Choose a more search engine-friendly website theme. Such WordPress theme is best to use should you wish an optimized blog. Your well-optimized website could rank well on the likes of Google because SEO is the current name of the game.
5. Check if your theme is widget friendly. Widgets allow bloggers to easily change the code with just a click or a drag. But remember, changing the code directly is still better.
6. Determine if your blog entries are easily readable. Try posting 2 or more sample blogs so you can see how the entries and comments can be viewed.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned after more than 3 years of blogging from blogging — it’s the importance of changing the blog design. If you don’t change often, people can get bored with it. You should learn how to attract readers and give them a reason to always check your website. After all, isn’t that one of the many reasons why you blog? To let people know what’s on your mind.
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Category: Blog Design, WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Sunday, 25 of November , 2007 at 4:33 am Comments (1)
If you’re going to get your blog on the social networking sites, you need to make it as easy as possible for folks to do it. There are loads of sites out there now using ShareThis, and so should you. It just adds a small green icon to your posts that when your readers click on it, it expands and gives them easy access to adding you the most popular social sites. It also gives the option of emailing the article to their friends or interested parties.
The only way you’ll get on the all important bookmarking sites is if you make it as easy as possible, and this plugin is becoming the number one way to do just that.
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Category: WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Sunday, 18 of November , 2007 at 2:00 am Leave a comment
So many themes and plugins are out there, but one thing always makes m think twice before installing: The amount of work.
No one enjoys downloading, unzipping, and then FTPing in to install it, and that’s where the OneClick Install plugin comes in. After you install this plugin (the old way) you’ll find a OneClick Install option under “Dashboard”. All you need do to install a new theme or plugin is to download the zip file, go to your Dashboard, select if it’s a theme or plugin, point to the zip file, and click “Upload”. Yes, it sounds like several steps, but it only takes seconds.
This will automatically unzip your new item and install it for you. So much faster and simpler than the old way. Although, as always, keep in mind how many plugins you’re running as you don’t want to shoot your content vs. code ratio. Still, it is a very useful tool to have and saves you loads of time in the install process.
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Category: WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Thursday, 1 of November , 2007 at 10:56 am Leave a comment
A long time ago, WordPress decided to include the “nofollow” tag for the comments section of all WP powered blogs. What this does is tell the search engine spiders to ignore the links in the comment section of your install, providing no search engine love for people nice enough to leave you comments. The idea, at the time, was to combat the tremendous amount of comment spammers out there who were trying to advertise their gambling and medicine sites.
With much improved anti-spam plugins out there now, and WordPress’ own Askimet spam system, it’s not really needed any more, but the code is still in the system. There has been no mention of it ever being removed, and that’s just a sad state of affairs for people who leave legitimate comments on your blog(s).
So, someone decided to write a plugin that removes the “nofollow” command, and allows your commenters to get their links to their sites counted by the search bots. It’s fairly small in size, so it shouldn’t hurt your content-to-code ratio much, and it’s just a nice “thank you” to those folks who leave you a comment. If you’re worried about spam comments still getting through, you can change the options on the plugin to remove the code after X number of days so that you have time to go in and delete the comment before it counts. (My rule of thumb is two days)
While you may ask “Yes, but what does this do for me?”, it’s just an easy way to build goodwill with your readers. And if enough people do it, and you then start leaving comments also, you will receive the backlink counts also. And, as it is in comments, it shouldn’t do anything to harm you with the new Google PageRank system either.
Give it a shot, show your readers that you appreciate them.
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Category: WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing on Saturday, 27 of October , 2007 at 9:10 pm Leave a comment
One drawback to running a blog on your own is having to update. It really is the only major drawback, but the advantages of controlling all aspects of your own site is worth it in the end.
All that being said, the brains at WordPress have already upgraded the recently released version 2.3 to 2.3.1. You can read all about the fixes, and grab the update, here. It seems to be a fairly major update with over 20 bug fixes for those where at 2.3 already.
Don’t ever think you can just skip these incremental updates as there are bots out there that look for older installs to attack.
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Category: WordPress tips
Writing by Brick Marketing Staff on Monday, 15 of October , 2007 at 8:31 am Comments (1)
WordPress has a default permalink structure that looks like this:
http://blogmarketingjournal.com/?p=123
The problem with this is the individual blog post permalink, which is identified by the second part of the URL (everything after the final /), provides no SEO benefits. Another problem with it is should you ever change blogging platforms then no one will be able to find any of your archived blog posts because this is a proprietary permalink structure that will only work with WordPress. That’s bad.
I recommend the first thing you do after you set up your blog is to change this permalink structure. To do that, click on Options and then click on “Permalinks.” You’ll see 4 permalink structure options. I like Date and Name Based, but some people prefer Custom. If you choose Custom then you’ll have to create your own structure and that’s a different lesson. I’m just going to deal with Date and Name Based right now.
Mark the box next to Date and Name Based. Scroll down and you’ll see some code in a box. You’ll have to copy and paste that code into your .htaccess file, which means you’ll have to open your ftp, modify the file, and upload it again right to the place that it was before. If you don’t have an .htaccess file you’ll have to create one.
To create an .htaccess file, open up Notepad and paste the code. Be sure to save the .htaccess file with a file name that looks just like this: .htaccess. It must have the preceding period in it and it cannot have .txt or any other extension after it. Once you’ve done that then you can can upload the file to where it needs to be. The file must be placed in the same folder as your index page file and that could have one of several different names. It is likely a php file, but not always.
One more thing: Before you upload the .htaccess file, change your permissions so that WordPress will have the authority to write to your .htaccess file. If you don’t do this first then you won’t see any changes to your permalink structure and you will likely see 404 error pages when you try to view an individual blog post.
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Category: WordPress tips
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