3 Simple Reasons to choose WordPress.

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Many business owners find themselves in a quandary over which platform to use for their business website. There is no shortage of options on the market, from Squarespace, Wix, Weebly, and more. And then, of course, there is the almighty open-source platform, WordPress. While all of the above bill themselves as easy to use CMS (Content Management Systems), no two platforms are created equal. While today’s site builders do not necessarily require tech wizardry, there is a learning curve to each platform and some are more flexible and intuitive than others. Those choosing a platform for their blog or website may want to check out the arguments in WordPress vs Wix to see which best suits their needs.

Here are three simple reasons why WordPress is the most popular CMS in the world.

  1. WordPress is a free platform that comes with no strings attached. You can take your website and go home if you aren’t happy with the web hosting customer service. There are hosting platforms out there that offer WordPress hosting services so it’s easy enough to leave their services. With all of the other choices, you will have to start from scratch with a company change.
  2. The WordPress developer knowledge breadth is vast. Whether you are searching for a DYI tutorial or seeking a developer to do the work, all one needs to do is ask Siri.
  3. The design flexibility and plugin functionality available to WordPress are endless. Whatever the need, be it a login protected area, a bidding platform, or registration functionality, WordPress has a plugin to accomplish it all.

Must Have WordPress Plugin: Flamingo

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While I have an aversion to contact forms in general, I concede that they have their place in website development. Over the years, I have used numerous contact form plugins for WordPress, many of which eventually fail to keep up with developmental upgrades. While some are superior to others, even the best of the bunch have their issues. Contact Form 7 is currently my default-free form plugin of choice. The plugin itself does not save submitted messages but, forwards them via e-mail. Since issues can arise on either the client-side or on the mail server side, submitted emails are at risk to be lost in cyberland. The chance of missing an email from a potential client should be avoided at all costs. Flamingo is a customer relations management (CRM) plugin that works with Contact Form 7 and is the perfect safeguard against lost emails. It requires minimal configuration and has two basic functions.

  1. It stores submitted messages in the WordPress dashboard.
  2. It archives email addresses from those messages that can be exported for email marketing purposes.

If you are using Contact Form 7 it is worth installing Flamingo along with it for added insurance. It makes managing your contact form messages a cinch.

Best Practices in Website Design

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As in any industry, there are many business owners who discount the value of abiding by today’s best practices in website design. In fact, some of the largest companies in the world make that mistake, just take a peek at Berkshire Hathaway Inc., a Warren Buffet led company and see for yourself. The must-have standards that I am referring to are really quite simple.

  1. The company logo should be clearly positioned in the top left corner of the website. Research shows that it is the best placement location for visibility as users click through browser windows, especially on mobile platforms. Visitors expect the logo to be in this position and when that is placed elsewhere they are often passed over.
  2. While the “hamburger” navigation menu is a valuable space saver on mobile devices, nothing beats a fully exposed navigation menu on a desktop computer. It allows visitors to make mental shortcuts and to easily peruse the information on a website. Some web designers have taken to including the “hamburger” navigation on full websites and it is a mistake.
  3. The most important products and call-to-actions should be positioned above the fold with easy to read buttons to beckon users. Many visitors don’t scroll down beyond what they see on the screen. Keep it simple and forgo competing messages and other distractions. This is a key point when it comes to website design and development so really focus on this when you’re creating your website.
  4. As of 9 months ago, a mobile responsive website is an absolute must. Without a website that is built on a flexible grid that re-adjusts components to fit properly on all mobile screens, a business might just as well post a “closed for business” sign.

Certainly appealing graphics and compelling content will add to the success of the website. You should use your website as a platform to get your message across. Include all of the things that any potential clients would find informative and appealing; don’t leave anything out. Not sure how to build your website around this? If you don’t, then looking at somewhere like this website design jacksonville fl company could help when it comes to the process of creating a website that is unique and professional. In turn, this will help to increase your client base going forward. Who doesn’t want to achieve this? Of course, every website wants visitors, especially if it’s a business website. Whilst enhancing web design will help to increase traffic to your website, you need to consider whether or not your website will actually be able to perform under this stress. With more people using your website applications, it can begin to slow processes down, which will impact the performance of APIs. Due to this, it’s advised that companies consider getting API testing done to ensure their websites are prepared for more traffic. This is important, or websites could begin to crash.

They are all important things to consider when enhancing your website. Regardless of whether you hire professional help, or if you do it yourself – if a website meets the four criteria detailed above, they will have a fighting chance at success.

WordPress Editing Tip of the Day

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Recently a client asked me how she might easily add symbols and special characters to her WordPress posts.  While this is a question that may belong in the WP101 textbook, the answer was not on the tip of my tongue. A simple Google search told me that a special plugin was not necessary to accomplish this task. The tool is readily available on the WordPress editing dashboard.  Simply click on the “Kitchen Sink” icon in the toolbar in order to expand the available options as shown in the example below.

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This will expose the Special Character Icon which, when clicked, will open the associated panel. (As shown in the image below.)special_character2

To think how often I’ve copied and pasted these characters into position when they were at my disposal the whole time. Filed under: #Goodtoknow!

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Five Must-Have WordPress Plugins for 2016

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WordPress is the most widely used content management system (CMS) in the industry. The platform was originally introduced as a blogging tool but, because of its pluginpopularity, it has morphed into much more. WordPress is a free, open-source platform but, the fact that it allows users to create, manage, and publish content in a highly stylized and interactive format makes it priceless.

Among its many perks, WordPress has hundreds of compatible plugins that add functionality to a website. From photo galleries to eCommerce solutions to SEO performance, WordPress is a viable web solution for most any business or organization.

Here are five plugins that are must-haves for all websites in 2016.

SEO All in One Pack

All in One SEO Pack is a WordPress SEO plugin that automatically optimizes your WordPress blog for Search Engines such as Google. This popular plugin allows users to set keyword settings, title settings, no-index settings, and webmaster verification settings.

Add to Any Share

Some level of social media participation is a must for all businesses today, and it is equally important to offer visitors the opportunity to easily share information from your website on their own social media pages. The AddToAny plugin offers sharing buttons for Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, WhatsApp, and many more.

Updraft Plus

We’ve all suffered the horror of losing precious information. Updraft Plus is a backup and restoration tool that is easy to install and set up. The plugin offers complete backups; manual or scheduled to S3, Dropbox, Google Drive, Rackspace, FTP, SFTP, email, and more.

Wordfence Security

The Wordfence WordPress security plugin provides free enterprise-class WordPress security, protecting your website from hacks and malware. Wordfence starts by checking if a site is already infected. It performs a server-side scan of source code and then secures it and makes it 50 times faster.

Google Analytics Dashboard for WordPress

This plugin displays Google Analytics reports in the WordPress Dashboard. It also inserts the latest Google Analytics tracking code in your pages. Tracking made simple.

Rock the Internet with a One-Page Website

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It used to be commonplace for companies to have what could best be described as a “Business Card” website – a single web page that provided visitors with basic contact information. These websites served businesses well when the internet was young and the competition was slim. One-page websites have made a comeback over the past several years but, like the internet itself, they have evolved to look and behave vastly different than their predecessors.

Today’s one-page sites are sleek and dynamic, showcasing all the important aspects of a business on a single page and begging for a call-to-action. Rather than navigating between pages, visitors are bounced vertically around a single page that deliciously showcases the products and services offered. These pages can be visually stunning and perfectly suited for mobile platforms where simple navigation rules.

Any business without a web presence today is isolating itself from a huge segment of its market niche. A simple one-page website might do the trick and, with the bones in place, the website could easily morph into something more as the business grows.

Here are the links to two websites that are rocking one page. While they both happen to be in the hospitality industry, one-page websites are suitable for any business particularly if they have lesser content to share.

Sugar Fire Pie One Page Website El Burro Mexican One Page Website

Mobile Responsive Design: Fluid and Flexible

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The word mobile-friendly or responsive is now part of our daily vocabulary – but what exactly does it mean?

A website that is ‘mobile responsive’ is designed to provide an optimal viewing experience in all browsers. This means that rather than simply re-sizing the entire site to fit proportionately into a browser window, a responsive site will creatively reorganize the elements in a way that promotes easy reading, navigation, and scrolling in order to optimize the user experience. All of the elements are placed on a flexible grid and simultaneously resize accordingly as the browser window changes. Photos, for example, may realign themselves from a row to a column for a better viewing experience. To witness the effect, try dragging the handlebars on the browser window on your desktop computer or just compare the difference in the appearance of a website as it appears on different devices.

With more than 50% of online traffic coming from mobile devices – mobile responsiveness is a trend that is not going away. In fact, Google is penalizing those websites that have not adopted a responsive theme. I have included images below from a site that I recently upgraded from a WordPress theme that was not behaving well on mobile platforms. Open Meadow Homes now has a thumbs up from Google.

A view of the homepage of Open Meadow Homes on a desktop computer. Notice that the navigation menu spans across the width of the page. As the user scrolls down the page the next section features three widgets side by each.

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A view of the home page of Open Meadow Homes on an iPad displays the navigation menu in a minimized form. The widgets too, re-position themselves for optimal viewing. If they simply resized to fit in the window the content would be too small to read without forcing the user to zoom in.

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Lastly, here’s an example of a view of the home page of Open Meadow Homes as seen on an iPhone 6 plus. Virtually all of the items have moved to a vertical position on the grid.

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WordPress Under Siege

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Hackers and spammers work tirelessly at their craft and they don’t do it for kicks.

WordPress websites are a favorite target of hackers and their intentions are not honorable. There’s big money in the business of hacking – primarily they want to steal from you, bombard you with adware and spam or collect intellectual information. If you have been hacked you are in good company. This month alone JPMorgan Chase, Staples, the White House and my client, Martin Cutler MD, were hacked by cyber criminals. Here are four simple steps that you can take to avoid be victimized.

CHANGE LOGIN/PASSWORD

Typically hackers work like an amateur burglar who walks down a hallway testing doorknobs until they find one that opens. To avoid this type of break-in be sure that you are not using the default ‘admin’ as the username and come up with a strong password.

UPDATE WORDPRESS, PLUG-INS & THEMES

Just as it is important to keep your antivirus software up-to-date on your computer, it is important for business owners to protect their CMS platform by regularly updating plug-ins, themes & Word Press when updates are available.

STOP SPAMMERS PLUGIN
Stop Spammers is an aggressive spam plugin that stops spam registrations, logins and comments using multiple checks. It looks for typical spammer bad behaviors and blocks those. I have disabled comments altogether on many websites because owners cannot deal with the high level of spam. This plugin has terrific reviews and works wonders.

BACKUP

It is important to back up your database regularly – whether you do it manually or install a plugin to do it for you. Backup buddy will back up your entire wordpress blog. Unlike free plugin’s which will only backup your database, backup buddy exports your database with images, files and whatever you have in your blog’s content folder. Don’t wait until it is too late!

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