Weekly Recommended Resources
I get so many requests for tips and advice on the resources that my Virtual Assistance and Web Development companies use that it seems a great idea to publish a weekly resource.
These are online resources that will help you develop, gain knowledge, find new information and absorb new ideas.
Enjoy!
This Weeks Recommended Resource
WordPress Tip of the Day is a free video podcast from the “Internet Genius” Ben Cope that delivers high-quality video training for WordPress in 5 minutes or less every day in a format that is easy to follow, easy to understand, and always free!
read moreCritical Tools For Building an Online Business
I am regularly asked what tools and resources we can recommend to help people build their online presence in a linear and logical fashion.
Some time ago we created a PDF that our web development and virtual assistance clients have access to at Your Office On The Web on the client document password protected page.
As there is nothing client sensitive in this document I wanted to share it here with you along with a few more resources that are not currently listed in it. As you can imagine, it is a “living” document and updates regularly. Here is it’s most recent incarnation.
Click here to download Recommended Resources. Some of these resources are coded with my affiliate links, some are not.
Other resources that we use and recommend.
Video Resources
- Instantly and automatically send your video viewers to any website, shopping cart or affiliate promotion after your video stops playing.
- Embed “buy now” buttons directly into videos.
- Embed opt-in forms inside your video and capture email addresses for list building purposes
- Create and protect “member only” videos thereby ensuring that only paid customers can gain access to your exclusive content.
- Publish your videos on any website in seconds.
You will also need to signup with AmazonS3 to host your videos for pennies. Very affordable!
WordPress Themes and Plugins
Each WordPress theme comes expertly coded in valid XHTML and CSS, and all are made compatible with the latest version of WordPress. DeniseGriffitts.com uses the Who’s Who Theme. This website is currently using the Cherry Truffle Theme.
WishList Member is a powerful membership script that can turn any WordPress blog into a full blown membership site. Your Office On The Web is expert at installing and configuring this very powerful plugin.
An excellent theme that is not only easy to learn and use, but you also get have the option between self-service and full-service. The full service option gets you free phone support, free setup, free installation, and 1 hour of customization. Plus, you can use the theme on multiple sites.
WordPress Tip of the Day is a video podcast that delivers high-quality video training for WordPress in 5 minutes or less every day in a format that is easy to follow, easy to understand, and always free!
Other
I use Overnight Prints for all my print collateral and most of my clients do as well. The paper stock is excellent and the free online designer allows you to create your own custom business cards and other print collateral with their Interactive Designer. Or you can choose from 1000′s of designs by using the Classic Design feature. Trust me when I tell you the quality is superb!
You can absolutely use your Paypal account either directly from your website by using “Buy Now” or “Add to Cart” buttons or you can use Paypal as your only payment provider in 1shoppingcart. It is not mandatory these days that you have a merchant account if you don’t need or want one. My web development site has a Paypal payment page that you can see here. This is an easy solution that allows you to take payments for services without having to log into your account to send invoices or payment requests.
read moreNew WordPress Theme – Stardust by Ben Cope
I recently began working with a brand new WordPress template created by “The Internet Genius”, Ben Cope called Stardust Theme and love it! In fact, we are currently using it for 3 different clients. Since each client has a very different business sensibility it is imperative that we work with templates that are very easy to customize to the clients needs without looking like we are just using the same template over and over again.
Take a look at MelanieJWilliams.com. This site is not completely done, but will give you an idea of just how lovely this template is.
Features
Why you’ll love the Stardust WordPress Theme …
- Complete Content Management
- SEO Friendly
- Feature Page Template
- 9 Different Color Styles
- Custom Theme Options Page
- Optional Home Page “Stickies”
- Optional Video or Opt-in Form on Home Page
- Widget-Ready
- Flexible Layout
- Social Media Integration
- Professional Design
- Multiple Layout Options
- Tons of theme options for images, social media icons, twitter and more
- Enhanced Professional Graphics and Support
- Custom Image Support
- Full browser compatibility (IE 6/7/8, Firefox, Chrome, Safari)
Membership Websites
When laying out the plan for your WordPress platform website you may want to consider creating a membership site meaning that you are providing valuable and needed content to paying customers each month. Quite literally a membership site means that you sign up readers to pay a monthly subscription fee. Your members will receive coaching, teaching, business tips, audios, videos, downloads or anything else that your particular niche can provide. We strongly recommend using WP Wishlist which is a very affordable and incredibly powerful WordPress plugin. Popular features include Total Content Protection, Sequential Content Delivery, Easy Member Management and much more.
WishList Products Interview Series
Special guest Philip Mutrie talks about how WP WishList helped him grow his optin list to 12,000 people. That all by itself makes it worth listening to but of course they covered other very important topics such as some powerful ways to increase interaction with your members, why creating “sub-groups” can increase member loyalty, why not accepting everyone can improve your membership and lastly, they discuss the 2 step registration process. Click here to listen to interview and then decide if a membership site is the perfect solution for your online business.
Other Recommendations
We recommend GoDaddy for domain name purchases but don’t really like hosting WordPress sites with them. We find that they put way too many sites on one server which means bottlenecks and slow loading pages. We now host all WordPress sites on HostGator and have been very happy with the results.
If you have any questions about WordPress and membership sites please email them to me at info @ virtualassistantindustry.com.
**You have permission to reprint in your publication or to your website/blog any articles by Denise Griffitts found on this Website as long as Denise Griffitt’s name and contact information is included. Denise Griffitts, Virtual Assistance Industry Expert, http://internetmasteryblog.com, info @ virtualassistantindustry.com, 888-719-6711.
read moreTracking Blog Visitors Through Google Analytics
If you follow me around at all you know that I am a huge fan of WordPress Platform website/blogs. In fact, I blog about it quite a bit here on my Internet Mastery Blog. Just type in “wordpress” in the search box and you will find a lot of very helpful information.
Plugins can extend WordPress to do almost anything you can imagine and one that is on my “MUST INSTALL” list for any WP installation is Ultimate Google Analytics.
How to install and activate Ultimate Google Analytics
- Login to your Google accounts control panel. If you have not set this up yet, you will need to create an account here.
- Create a website profile by clicking the “Add Website Profile” link.
- Provide the URL of the site that you will be adding Google Analytics to.
- You will be provided with two options. You need the Web Property ID from the yellow box at the top of the page entitled “Tracking Status Information. The code will look something like this: UA-999999-9.
- Login to your WordPress Admin. Depending on the version of WP that you are using you should be able to install new plugins directly from your dashboard. If not, you will need to download this plugin and FTP into your account.
- Once you have installed and activated the plugin, enter your Google Analytics account ID and save your options.
Make it a point to login to your Google accounts regularly to track visitor traffic such as the total number of visits and page views your site received, the average number of page views per visit, (P/V) and the number of visits and page views over time. You will also be able to see visits by new and returning. This is valuable data to have and will assist you in creating content that your visitors want to return to time and time again.
**You have permission to reprint in your publication or to your website/blog any articles by Denise Griffitts found on this Website as long as Denise Griffitt’s name and contact information is included. Denise Griffitts, Virtual Assistance Industry Expert, http://internetmasteryblog.com, info @ virtualassistantindustry.com, 888-719-6711.
read moreCreate a WordPress Membership Site Today
If, like me, you like using WordPress for your website/blog, then you’ll love the resource that I recently began using for my web development clients which is aptly named Wishlist. In fact, I will go a step further and say that I am an ardent WordPress Platform fan for way too many reasons to list here.
Many people have tried to turn WordPress into a membership site but in the past it’s been quite tricky. There are some fabulous WordPress plugins out there but to build a membership site you have to “tweak this”, and “tweak that” and if you aren’t technical, it quickly becomes quite frustrating. That’s why I was so excited when I came across WishList Member. I have installed it on several client websites and am now installing it on several of my own business sites. Wishlist is a membership solution that was built specifically for WordPress.
The best part is, it has all the features you would want in a membership solution AND it is compatible with all of your other favorite plugins! So you get the best of both worlds. Plus, they’ve added some very cool features to make running and managing a membership site a whole lot easier. As a Web Developer one of the things that I appreciate the most is the customer support and the support videos.
Like I said, if you like using WordPress, then you’ll love WishList Member.
Enjoy!
read moreYour Partner In Success Radio Show
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