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Sunday, April 27, 2008

One Button for All of Your Sharing Needs

ShareThis offers a remarkable way to get your blog into the greater blogosphere. Rather than getting a separate widget for every single social site into your posts, ShareThis offers one single button that gives your readers the bookmarks and tools that they use. No fuss.

In WordPress go to your plugins section. The button is popular enough that it might be at or near the top of the plugins available. If not, simply type in ShareThis in the search bar and you'll be able to download the plugin. Just follow the instructions for downloading. Then go to the site, register at ShareThis to get your customized script to enter into your ShareThis setup (in Dashboard).

It's simple, is snappy, it's free, and the button is sleek. ShareThis will help get your blog rolling around.

Saturday, April 26, 2008

WordPress Widgets

If you're looking for ways to enhance your users' experience at your blog, WordPress widgets can save you a lot of work.

The WordPress Widgets blog offers an updated listing of widgets for your personal or business blog, offering reviews and tips through its posts and comments that help you decide what or what not to include. It's worth bookmarking and reading for tips and tricks. Be sure to read their disclaimer.

So what's the best guideline for using widgets in your blog? Here are a few guidelines in making your choice:
  • Know what your target audience wants
  • Don't clutter your design with too many widgets
  • Know your reasons for the widgets you use
  • Don't be afraid to experiment
  • Use Google Web Optimizer to track your users behaviors
  • Don't be afraid to quit on a widget that provides no benefit
The new WordPress version 2.5 also has an excellent, searchable database in its Plugins section. Take a look at your blog and decide what's missing and what widget(s) would increase your web's usability and presence in the marketplace. Happy blogging!

Friday, April 25, 2008

WordPress Themes

Flexible web design that helps establish your brand as business needs change is a key feature of WordPress blogging. The open source community for WordPress is so vast that it's very easy to find great themes for your blog. Many of the available themes can be previewed and downloaded for free.

Of course you can also create your own theme if you understand some CSS basics, tweak a downloaded theme, or even pay for a professional to give your blog a distinctive brand-friendly style.

The WordPress ThemeViewer is a great place to get started with some inspiration. Take some time to preview the themes, play around with them on your blog and determine if the free themese are the way for you to go.

We plan to review some of the free themes for WordPress and some of the professional services available for turning your blog into a remarkable place to grow your customer (fan) base.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

WordPress is Blogging Bliss

WordPress continues to shine as a remarkable platform for your blog. Blogger and Typepad are certainly great easy-to-use blogging platforms, but if you want your blogging experience to be blissful, you aught to start learning the basics of WordPress.

We'll discuss the promising features of WordPress, the reasons why you should include WordPress in your blogging toolbox and the resources for all of your blogging on WordPress needs.