Entries Tagged 'wordpress' ↓

Are you a Wordpress Junkie?

January 2nd, 2008 — blogging, wordpress

How much of a Wordpress Junkie are you? Try yourself and tell me what you got!

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My favorite Wordpress Plugins

July 31st, 2007 — blogging, wordpress

Today I decided its time to share with you my favorite WordPress plugins that i use in all my wordpress installations. Some of them are helping generating traffic and others are getting my blogs to work perfectly.

Besides letting you know my top WP plugins, this list is to give all of the wordpress bloggers a comprehensive list of things they can use to help your blog grow.
If you have any others plugins you use or think is worth mention, please leave a comment bellow.

This list is in no particular order, as all of them are important somehow.

  1. Akismet - Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web serivce to see if they look like spam or not. Comes in by default.
  2. Add Meta Tags - Adds the Description and Keywords XHTML META tags to your blog’s front page and to each one of the posts, static pages and category archives. This operation is automatic, but the generated META tags can be fully customized. Also, the inclusion of other META tags, which do not need any computation, is possible.
  3. All in One SEO Pack 1.2.1.4 Out-of-the-box SEO for your Wordpress blog.
  4. FeedBurner FeedSmith - This plugin detects all ways to access your original WordPress feeds and redirects them to your FeedBurner feed so you can track every possible subscriber.
  5. Related Posts - Returns a list of the related entries based on active/passive keyword matches.
  6. Subscribe To Comments - Allows readers to recieve notifications of new comments that are posted to an entry.
  7. Social Bookmark Creator - Add social bookmark links to your blog.
  8. Google Sitemaps - This generator will create a Google compliant sitemap of your WordPress blog.
  9. Adsense-Deluxe - Place Google AdSense ads in your WordPress Posts. If you want to monetize your blog i recomend using adsense. You can signup using the link in the sidebar.
  10. Global Translator - Dynamically translates a blog by wrapping the Google Translation Engine.
  11. No Ping Wait - Speeds up posting by moving generic pings to execute-pings.php.
  12. OneClick Installer - Installs any plugin or theme without having to upload them manually via ftp. Can also delete theme and plugin folders.
  13. SRG Clean Archives - This plugin is designed to display your archive listings in a clean and uniform fashion that’s Search Engine friendly on a dedicated page.
  14. WP-ContactForm - WP Contact Form is a drop in form for users to contact you. It can be implemented on a page or a post.
  15. Democracy - This poll plugin is easy to use, install, and manage. It uses AJAX to load data, making it quick and fun to use.
  16. WordPress Database Backup - On-demand backup of your WordPress database.

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10 Essential Blogging Tools

November 7th, 2006 — blogging, wordpress

So, you finally decided to take the blog leap. You’ve heard all about the marketing and search benefits so you stepped up to the plate and signed up for a TypePad, MovableType or WordPress blog software package and now you’re a blogger. Okay, now what? Add the ten essential blogging tools listed below and you will also be well on your way to creating and promoting a blog that is a powerful marketing tool. I’ll explain the use of the tool and offer some suggestions, including the tools I use on my own blogs including the DuctTapeMarketing blog.

Feed Reader

 The best way to learn about blogs and blogging is to read, or at least scan, lots of blogs. One of the wonders of blogs is that you can have every new post from every blog you want to read delivered to your desktop or to online location via RSS, so you can easily read and scan the posts of many blogs in a very short time. Newsgator is a good online choice for feed reading and also has a version that integrates with Outlook. I use a frëe online service known as Bloglines. Subscriber Center

You need to make it easy for your blog visitors to subscribe to your blog’s RSS feed so they can read your blog in their favorite feed reader. The best way to do this is to go to FeedBurner and burn your own RSS feed there and use the tools they provide to set up automatic subscriber links so people who want to use Bloglines, Google Reader, MyYahoo or Pluck, for instance, can clíck on one button to subscribe. Tech types can figure this out without the buttons but why not make it easy for anyone to figure out.

Side note: Subscribe to each of these yourself and you will force some blog spiders to visit your site.

Email Subscription Option

A lot of people will nevër get the whole feed thing, but everyone gets email. Create an option for people to subscribe by giving you their email address � they will simply receive your blog posts like an email message. FeedBurner offers this service for frëe. FeedBlitz is another option or, if you already have an autoresponder email list service they may offer this service. AWeber offers this and helps me integrate these blog email subscribers into my other mailing lists.

Blog and RSS directories

There are hundreds of blog and RSS directories and getting listed in many can be a good thing. I use a piece of software called RSS Submit , but you can also visit Robin Goode’s frequently updated list and submit your blog and feed by hand.

Hint: Subscribe to the RSS feed he offers and you will be notified when new directories are added.

Ping Service

Pinging is a term used for letting the various blog and RSS directories know when you have posted new content. Again, FeedBurner offers this as an automatic option called PingShot and you should activate it. PingGoat and Ping O Matic are other options but they require that you visit and update your record each time you post new content.

Bookmark Manager

As you surf around the web or hop from blog to blog you may find sites that you want to point out to your readers. Online bookmark managers allow you to bookmark and categorize web and blog pages as you collect them and are a great tool for managing all of the stuff you find on the web. I use del.icio.us but BlinkList does a fine job as well.

Blog Stats

I like to track a few key stats in real time because it shows what other blogs might be linking to you or posting about your blog. A lot of people just like to track this kind of thing for fun and frequently visit sites like Technorati. I like to track it for networking opportunities. I use a tool called MyBlogLog because it allows me to see where traffïc is coming from but also tracks what links on my blog visitors are clicking on. It’s amazing how this data can help you write more effectively. (MyBlogLog also ranks your links so visitors can see which links on your site are the most popular.)

Desktop Posting

With most blog software you must go online and post using a set of tools provided by the blog software. Many bloggers like to use a desktop application to create and submit their posts as it gives them some extra tools and allows them to more easily integrate content and files on their computer.

I use w.blogger but also like Performancing, Qumana and ecto (apple folks) (w.blogger also doubles as a really simple HTML editor.)

Tell A Friend Script

My blog software (pMachine) has a feature that allows a reader to clíck a link and send the post to a friend. This tactic brings me lots of readers. You might try looking here for some simple scripts that do that same: http://www.javascriptkit.com/script/script2/tellafriend.shtml
http://www.stadtaus.com/en/php_scripts/tell_a_friend_script/

Republish Your Feed Headlines

The ability to republish your blog posts on other web pages, sites you own or sites of strategic partners is a great way to expose folks to your blog content. One more time we turn to FeedBurner for a painless way to republish your blog post to any web page you choose with something they call BuzzBoost.
About The Author
John Jantsch is a veteran marketing coach, award winning blogger and author of Duct Tape Marketing: The World’s Most Practical Small Business Marketing Guide published by Thomas Nelson - due out in the fall of 2006. He is the creator of the Duct Tape Marketing small business marketing system. You can find more information by visiting http://www.ducttapemarketing.com.

 

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