Have you ever watched HGTV on Sunday mornings? There’s a line up of shows that revolve around a professional (landscaper, builder, contractor, etc) comes to a home and works with the homeowner to fix, renovate, or complete a project that has been on the back burner for weeks, months or years. Along the way, the professional shows the homeowner how some of the things are done. Maybe they’ll put in a tile floor or hook up some new plumbing or wiring fixtures. Don’t forget the demolition. Demo. They always help with demo. Who can’t swing a hammer through some drywall? And who doesn’t love it?!
I call this Assisted DIY and often tell my wife, “if someone would just coach me along the way, I could do all this stuff myself and we’d save a boatload of cash.”
So, what’s this have to do with THICKSOLE?
Well, in a lot of ways, that’s what we do around here. We help clients take their ideas for websites or apps and assist in putting them together into finished projects. There’s no way we’re going to expect a client to start ripping into Xcode, or writing up some javascript for their fancy new web forms – just as a carpenter would never ask me to build custom cabinetry from raw hardwood. But, by using tools like WordPress, we are able to bring clients into the fold and let them get their hands dirty by not only creating content and maintaining their own sites, but we also spend time explaining the structure if they ever get ambitious to try out a new look/theme for the site, add new functionality with a plugin, or want to try their hand at some CSS.
We might build the house, but once we give you the keys, you’re a better home owner and in more control than you may have ever thought possible.
Long time hosting client, Phil Harvey, called last week and let me know about the release of his new book, Show Time. He was looking give his site a refresh while adding info about the new release. The schedule around here was pretty hammered with the app work we’ve been doing, but how can I say ‘no’?
I remembered the custom WordPress theme I was screwing around with to release for authors. As a mock up, I css’d everything in red, black, and grey. It happened his new book cover was red, white, grey and black. So, I took it as a sign. In just a few days, I was able to not only get his new site set up, but migrate everything from his old site over to the new WordPress platform. I like how it turned out:
This morning I read that WordPress is still the most popular blogging platform in the world, and it made me happy that years ago, we picked the right horse. But how important is it to blog today? Is this just old school nonsense? Isn’t everyone moving on to mobile apps? Well, it is important that your blog works on mobile devices of course and things like responsive design take care of that. You can even create an app based on your blog content if you desire. But the process of blogging is critical to work through your thoughts and ideas. As well as to explain exactly what you were thinking when X decision was made.
I found a video from a year or two ago where Tom Peters and Seth Godin are on stage and discussing just this topic. Of course they explains the power of blogging much better that I can. Check it out for yourself:
Every time I demo a new WordPress site, the reaction is overwhelming. The ease of use, clarity, and structure of a well built site blows away non-technical pros that are used to being chased away from technology either by an overzealous tech person, or by a shoddy CMS that is set up for only the developer that put it together. At the end of those calls, I end up thinking, “why don’t more people use this?!”.
For one, there’s all that in-between work of buying a domain, setting it up on a server, installing WordPress, configuring a theme, and then you get to the fun part. So, I’ve been working on a new super affordable “package” for any non-technical professional that needs a website and doesn’t want to get bogged down in the technical aspects.
To start, I’m putting together a custom theme for Authors and Publishers. It’s being set up to feature a new publication but flexible enough to handle a library of titles. It will also handle all of the other activities that the author is up to. Here’s a sneak peek:
Launching in 3 different color schemes, there should be one to get you started. Along with the theme, I’m teaming up with the NYC-based hosting company, ClearDev, to take care of purchasing a domain, setting up hosting, installing WordPress (via their automated installer – the INSTALLATRON), and configuring the theme.
After that, we’ll meet via GoToMeeting for a quick one-on-one overview (less than an hour) of how to manage your new site in WordPress. It’s everything you need and I can’t think of a way to make it easier.
Well, there are a couple more things I plan on throwing in, but I’ll save those for launch.
In the meantime, check out the shot above and any feedback or questions you have, feel free to fire them off in the comments or hit me in the “contact” form. The feedback has been great lately and I appreciate it.
One of my favorite things about WordPress is the ability to quickly change the look of the site while all of the content just pops into place. Recently we updated 6 sites for John Wiley & Sons. They wanted the color scheme changed from green to blue with a new logo added. A few of the sites had hundreds of articles already produced, so in the old days, this would have been a long process.
But by changing a few things in the WordPress theme CSS, we updated all the sites in no time. I can imagine the pain this would have generated going through traditional channels, but one of the most beautiful things about WordPress is the way it empowers the end user. The marketing/editorial crew is often held hostage by layers of bureaucracy and hurdles from the design & tech crew. With a fundamental understanting of CSS and the WordPress structure, anyone can now make changes to their site. With websites, sometimes it’s just a splinter in your finger, and everyone is chomping at the bit to turn it into brain surgery.
These sites have been instrumental in differentiating their product from the competition, and it’s great to see them updated each week with fresh content, and there’s still drive to keep the look fresh and clean.
A new WordPress vulnerability came across my news feed this morning. It seems like there’s always something new floating around that sounds incredibly scary. Here’s some info on the new hijinx, and an update here:
Hackers are compromising WordPress 3.2.1 blogs in order to infect their visitors with the notorious TDSS rootkit, according to researchers from Web security firm Websense.
It’s not clear how the websites are being compromised, but there are publicly known exploits for vulnerabilities that affect WordPress 3.2.1, which is an older version of the popular blog publishing platform.
Sounds scary but there are some simple things you can do with your wordpress site so you can sleep easier at night.
Run a daily backup of your database using a simple plugin like WP-DB-Backup
Have a copy of your wp-content folder on your local computer
Keep your WordPress install updated with the latest version
Update your plugins and get rid of the ones you tried and don’t use
The same with your themes. Remove the themes that didn’t work out.
With these simple practices, if the worst happens, getting back up and running is a fairly uncomplicated scenario. It’s the little things that can make all the difference when something is compromised.
There will always be things out of your control like a random attack on your site, but make sure to take care of the things you can control.
Long time client Larry Sicular wanted to get control over what people found when they Googled his name. The results were a hodgepodge of social networks, past jobs, and random mentions. He decided to build a site to serve as a launching pad into all things Sicular! Designed by Melissa at costd.com, we developed the site in WordPress and added some cool custom functionality to handle his portfolio of articles and manage his favorite snapshots.
You can check out the end result here: http://sicularassociates.com. It’s clean, professional, and most importantly, crawling up in the search results.
Sometimes it bugs me. Maybe because I’m an old WordPress user and haven’t added the bar to my workflow. Other times it throws off the look of my site. Of course you can go into the code and remove it, but I happened to stumble across a handy plugin that makes the removal a snap. The name? Oh, it’s “Disable Admin Bar” and you can download it here.
It’s fairly simple with just a couple of options in the admin. Download and activate the plugin, then you’ll see a new line under “Settings” called “Admin Bar Options.” Click that, you’ll see a page with two options. I check them both but use your best judgment. Now you can enjoy complete freedom from that sometimes oppressive admin bar.
On December 30 we pushed a new site live for Oxford University Press to highlight their new Mayo Clinic Toolkit. Assembled in WordPress, the design is gorgeous (done by Eduardo). The homepage slider uses a slightly modified version of the plugin “featured content slider“, and to get the three column homepage pull of news stories, I used this helpful article.
The schedule on this project, like a lot of other projects in 2011, was tight. It was done over the last two weeks of the year, which is always a weird time since half of the planet seems to be on vacation. So there were no reindeer games at Thicksole this year, but launching a site at the end of the year is a strong way to close it out. Plus the way this looks and operates, I’m really happy with the results!
It happens. Sometimes you just can’t think of what to do with a certain book, author, or product line. So, here’s a quick list of sites that I’ve built over the last few years and hopefully you can snag an idea or two.
An update site: pull news from todays headlines and show how they relate to your book or books (example: Wiley Business Updates)
Single theme/design across many sites – save money, build a brand, and cover many topics. Example: Wiley update sites for Business, Accounting, Finance, and Management.
Evolved announcement site. This was set up to build buzz about a coming product but turned into it’s own site with considerable traffic. (Example: About OBO)
WordPress site into iPhone app (if you have the content, would it be useful in a mobile environment?)
A marketing hub for email sign ups and social media
Topic site with multiple contributors
Brochure site – more static and less interesting maybe but at least you’ll turn up in a search!
Location based site – where things happen (example: Wiley ES Backyard)
Exclusive site for members or instructors (we built this for Wiley Accounting)
Video site for product support (again, we built this for Wiley Accounting)
Site transplant – move an old static site into CMS (Example: Wiley IFRS)
Repurposed content – take pieces of a book put to posts.
Create a book – you wouldn’t be the first author that created a book from a series of posts
Thing a day site. Everyday post a new photo, idea, video, etc. It’s a great discipline.
So if you want to try one of these ideas, go for it. The good news is today, the expense of building a site is LOW and there’s no lifetime commitment. You can pull the plug early and try something else until you find the site you want to take the long walk with.
. He was looking give his site a refresh while adding info about the new release. The schedule around here was pretty hammered with the app work we’ve been doing, but how can I say ‘no’?
