Introduction to WordPress – taking control of your website

Copyright 2012 – Eric Bobrow
All rights reserved – do not reproduce or distribute

Thank you for visiting the Internet Marketing for Architects Course website. The video lessons and certain other materials are available for members only. If you would like to watch the training video on this page, please login to the website. If you are not already a member, please visit the following page for more information and to sign up for the Internet Marketing for Architects Course Eric Bobrow, Creator of the Internet Marketing for Architects Course

Click the video preview image to start playback. Controls (pause, play, scrub forward or rewind back, volume, full-screen, etc.) will be visible when you hover your mouse over the video after it has started playback. You may watch it at full-screen by clicking the small icon in the bottom right. To download the video as an MP4 file, right-click the DOWNLOAD link and choose Save Target As or Save Linked File As or a similar command (this varies by browser).

Please post your comments and questions at the bottom of this page. Thanks!

— Eric

TECHNICAL NOTE: The first 40 minutes of this video was recorded on an auxiliary machine at slightly lower video and sound quality. The second half of the lesson was recorded on the primary computer and is at full quality.

LESSON OUTLINE

INTRODUCTION – AGENDA FOR THE LESSON

• What is WordPress?
• How much is it used?
• Who uses it?
• Why should you consider using it for your website?

Setting up a WordPress-based site

• Installation
• Login
• Tour of the “back end” administrative area

Creating Content

There are 2 basic types of content:

• Posts – a traditional “blog” (originally a short name for a “weblog”); easy to add fresh material, instantly accessible
• Pages – similar to a traditional HTML-based website, these are “static” and may be accessed from a menu or links from other parts of the site

Demonstration of creating a new post

• Viewing the post
• Viewing the post on the home page
• Adding an image (graphic or photo) to a post
• Adding headings

Creating another post

• Viewing the new post
• All posts show up on the home page automatically

Creating a Page

• Editing environment is very similar
• Adding multiple images in a gallery
• Viewing the page
• Exploring the gallery

Changing the Site Structure and Style

The Navigation Menu

• Going to the Home page, the new page isn’t in the menu
• Adding the page into the navigation menu
• Create another page, add it to the menu
• Create a third page, add it as a subitem of one of the other pages in the menu

Changing the Theme to Rework the Look and Style of the Site

• Management of themes is in the Admin area
• Change theme settings – the tag line, the top image, the color scheme
• Changing Settings > Reading options to set the home page to a static page, add a “blog page”
• Changing to a different theme – “2010” – preview and activate, then visit or view the site
• Do a Google search for free WordPress themes
• Downloading the Architekt theme
• Installing the Architekt theme, activating and seeing what’s changed
• Use Widget area to add Contact Information
• Review Sarco, Homeplan Design, Downer Associates, JHD, show how varied these can be, even using the same U-Design theme
• Go back to 2011 theme

Add a New Plugin for Contact Forms

• Visit plugin area of back end
• Use Add New Plugin option and search for Contact Form
• Install Easy Contact Form
• Create a Contact Form
• Create a Contact Page and add the form
• View the Contact Page

ADDITIONAL NOTES:

The contact form that was filled in during the lesson demonstration was successfully received in my Inbox. This was not shown, but is worthy of mention: it worked the way it was supposed to!

One of the questions that came up in the Q&A section focused on whether it was possible to set up a website in a way that would make it impossible for someone to “steal” or copy the contents. The short answer: not really; if you put something up for public viewing, others can possibly copy and reuse it.

However, there is a free website called Copyscape that enables you to see whether your material has been copied. You can submit a web page URL and then see if the contents have been duplicated in whole or in part, elsewhere on the web. During the presentation, this magical technology actually found that part of the page I tested (the home page of Costa Rica firm Sarco Architects – www.sarcoarchitects.com) had been copied and appeared on another site. It was amazing, but it left one question unanswered: who would copy this information, and why?

The answer was gratifying. I researched this a bit further after the lesson concluded, and saw that Copyscape makes it easy to visit the pages that appear to have duplicate content, so one can inspect them and decide what to do (if anything). In this case, the other page that was reported by Copyscape actually was a LinkedIn profile page for someone who recently joined Sarco Architects and is working in their new office in Panama. So, of course, it was natural and appropriate that they use some of the verbiage from the Sarco website to describe the Sarco branch office.

This just goes to prove that Copyscape did a great job of finding duplicate content, but in this case, everything was OK!