Q & A — Desperately Seeking WordPress

Whats the difference between emails and newsletters?

This is a very common question that I receive. There are usually several 'subscribe' buttons on websites.Some of them include: These are the icons that are commonly misunderstood: #1 Email @ Sign This can mean 2 different things. It can EITHER be a link to a contact (and I mean email) form OR it can be a link to the feed providing the option of email … [Read more...]

Search Engine Finesse – What are Keywords and Do they Matter?

Is your increased traffic a result of hard work or coincidence? I got a few extra comments this week since I installed the SEO plugins from last week's lesson. But I'm not really sure if that is a coincidence - perhaps the subject of SEO is popular right now (perhaps! ha.) and this has nothing to do with google searchers finding me. I've been reading several websites and books this week … [Read more...]

My research into Commercial Email Marketing Providers

I did some research a couple months ago into newsletter services for our DSWP monthly newsletter. There are a number of plugins, and most combine the newsletter recipient info with the WordPress user registration tables. In my case, I needed to also combine the sign-up form from the Members Only site. And all that information is only for the sign-up form!! Then we have to put this data … [Read more...]

How to create buttons, email links, and more…

Dear Becca,(I love your avatar - too cute!)Your questions answered:1. By grey boxes around everything - I assume you mean the images? To remove these, go to Appearance>>Edit, and find the Style.css- should be listed at the bottom of the right-hand side. - scan through that file until you find:a img {border: 3px solid grey; .....}- change the border width to zero like … [Read more...]

How to add Breadcrumbs (not the edible kind)

Breadcrumbs are the "You are here: .../blog/this post" you see here:If you have a particularly big or complicated site, this is a handy navigation tool for your readers. Follow these instructions to download the Yoast Breadcrumbs plugin, and configure it.To download the plugin:1. go to plugins>> add new2. type "breadcrumbs" into the search form and click … [Read more...]

The scoop on Widgets and Plugins

Updated for WordPress 2.8:I had an interesting question from a client last night, wondering how come her gorgeous sidebars disappeared when she put widgets in them. Here's the scoop:Sidebars: Most of the time, the theme you are using gives you two options. First, you can just leave the sidebars without widgets and the default stuff will show up. Usually Categories, Archives by month, … [Read more...]