sheilaahite.com wordpress conversion by Tom Stier

When some of my clients first approach me seeking to make changes to their website, I find that their current site was made at a different time time in web history, when it was customary to create a website and then consider that particular task ‘done.’

Meanwhile, discussion, information and news about the work of their business or organization continued to be created in the offline community, perhaps on a daily basis, but this information was not visible to any online customers because it resided mostly on paper and then later, in emails and online via 3rd party sources.

The business website would not reflect these discussions.

Now these discussions are also held on social media sites ~ Facebook, Twitter, etc.

For an organization to maintain control, they need to have a website that can serve as the official center of their message at all times.

A website needs to stay flexible, current and connected.

The content – the words and images – need to stay separate from the presentation, the structure of the site.

site for 'On the internet nobody knows you’re a dog' cartoonist Peter Steiner

On some older websites, knowledge of html is required to make the smallest change or addition. The pages mix content and presentation in their static code, and changes can only be done by editing each page by hand.

This means that adding another page to the site would require the link for the new page to be added to the menu sections for each page manually.

Almost all current websites no longer use this method, but instead are database driven, using a website software that allows a one-time change to propagate across an entire site.

Website software choice is generally divided between proprietary (licensed paid) and open source (license free) choices.

There are many choices for proprietary website softwares. One problem with this approach is that the site will be completely dependent on a small group of developers for new features and support. This tends to drive up ongoing costs.

If the website software is also provided by the hosting company, this can place further restrictions on flexibility. You cannot easily move your site to a new host.

In some cases, the proprietary route makes sense because the unique needs of the business require it, and the software is focused on that aspect.

I work in many proprietary website softwares, but recommend and specialize in using WordPress open source software as the basis for almost all of the informational sites I build.

The basic functions of this license-free software continue to evolve. A world-wide community of developers contribute improvements to the core software on an almost daily basis. It is one of the most popular softwares in the world.

we provide webmaster services for this wholesale jewelry importer site

With the addition of add-on free and premium plugins, it is possible to replicate the kinds of functions found on high budget/high traffic sites using WordPress. In fact, some of these sites are using WordPress.

A feature such as social media connections can be relatively easy to add to a WordPress site, and if a new and better service or integration comes along for this function, it is also relatively easy to upgrade.

For most conversion projects we would first be looking at a conversion of the existing page content, or your updated content, into the new WordPress version of the site.

Accessible via the famously easy to use Dashboard, the client would then have the ability to edit or add to this material in-house or continue to use our webmaster services.

Some of my clients update their sites daily on their own, only needing my help when they would like a new feature or strategy for their promotion efforts.

The existing site presentation graphics can be replicated as a WordPress Theme (a collection of files that controls the position and display of information on the site) or we can engage in a new Theme design process.

Chinese Martial Arts website by Tom Stier

I have worked with outside graphic designers to realize WordPress Themes and on other projects I have been both the site and custom Theme developer.

The cost for a WordPress conversion is generally divided between setup of the site structure and function and Theme creation.

This scenario allows you to have an attractive and useful web presence, while saving costs by using in house staff to make changes to the site.

According to this article  the site is part of a $56,000 contract with Bodden Hamilton Partners in New York City.

On looking at the code for this site, one sees the following:

<html>
<head>
<title>Discover Lenox </title>
</head>
<frameset rows=”100%,*” border=”0″>
<frame src=”http://windowsnweb.com/wordpressdev/” frameborder=”0″ />
<frame src=”../EXPO PLUS/UntitledFrame-4″ frameborder=”0″ noresize />
</frameset><noframes></noframes>
<!– pageok –>
<!– 07 –>
<!– –>
</html>

Yes, that’s right. It is a frameset, a rather old-fashioned method of constructing websites, with an instance of the free WordPress software displayed in one of the frames. Search engines don’t deal with frames well.  “Some search engines can’t follow framed pages at all, but even the best search engines will have problems. More importantly, many search engines choose not to index frames because they are so problematic.”

According to the Berkshire Eagle article, members of the town committee overseeing the project were concerned with the slogan “Lenoxology” and the delay in the “Launch.” How quaint. These folks seem to have a mentality that has frozen their concept of the web back to 1998, coincidentally when framesets were at the height of their popularity! This site, and I suspect, the process behind it, is completely wrong-headed.

If they had asked me, I would have suggested building on a home grown, grassroots effort to discover and nurture existing local bloggers, such as Seth Rogovoy’s excellent “BerkshireDaily”, local developers and regional portals, such as the fantastic Berkshires Live that are already organically promoting the area. It seems to me that this committee had no interest in what was already interesting to Google about their town.

The site does look ‘nice’, however that is something that will always be determined by the beholder, and the device they are using to view the site. And that has always been and will continue to be something that is difficult to nail down in the ever changing world of hand-held devices.

Smell The Town?

If you were looking for a place to stay or eat in Lenox what would you do? Would you go to discoverlenox.com and click on “Smell?”

Unfortunately, Mr. Google, the most frequent visitor to this site, will not be impressed by or care what the slogan or launch date is. It will have some problems ‘reading’ the frameset

(This post has been re-printed in the latest issue of The Berkshire Beacon, and is available on their service that displays the publication online! That would be page 7, folks.)

Update: the site is no longer in a frameset, it now appears to be a normal WordPress installation. Also, the ‘Smell’ link is now called ‘Scent!’

To include a self-hosted video on your home page, without any branding on it is, unfortunately, not an easy thing to do.

The reason YouTube is so popular for embedding video is thatYouTube makes it gosh darn easy to upload and convert them and then embed them on WordPress or other type of web sites. The YouTube servers are very powerful and (in my experience) reliable.

There is the an added seo benefit of having your videos hosted on one of the most frequently visited sites in the world, although it does YouTube a lot more good than it does you

So YouTube handles the following tasks for free!

• Conversion
• Hosting
• Provide Embed Code

This makes ongoing video promotion – and the likelihood that you will be producing and uploading videos on a regular basis – much easier to accomplish.

The downside for some situations is that you may not want visitors to your site to see a logo and a link away to YouTube, no matter how unobtrusive it might be. The example below shows a YouTube video by that fine upstanding garage band, The Minimum Rage.

Hosting

To embed video that is not hosted on a free external video service, one might think of converting and hosting the video on the same server that one’s website is hosted.

That is usually fine for a short few minutes of video or two, however with longer videos you would be transferring many hundreds of megabytes (MB) compared to the small amount of kilobytes (KB) a typical web page will contain.

This can lead to bandwidth problems with your host, even if only a small group of people are viewing your video page at the same time.

So, you will need an external hosting service for your videos.

Conversion and Embed Code

Another expense is in converting your raw video format into a web-based format, something that Youtube does on the fly.

Your developer has to install the javascript and embed code or plugin that will display a Flash-based container on your page. That container will add the play and pause buttons to your video file, establishing a user interface. Then the converted video has to be uploaded via FTP.

The container software itself may come in a “free” version that includes a logo and link to the developer’s site and a “commercial” license version that allows no branding or your own custom branding.

The Flash

Unfortunately, there is the lack of support for Flash-based players on some hand-held devices, especially Apple products iPhone and iPad. Support for Flash, which has historically powered most video appearing on web pages, is being phased out and a new standard based on HTML5 is being phased in. Services such as YouTube offer evolving ways to view their video content on these Flash-disabled devices.

There is a chance that the video container you might use to embed your self-hosted video on your home page will display NOTHING unless it provides an alternative display of non-Flash content!

The 3rd Party

There are also 3rd party services that approach video delivery with much more of a marketing angle. They might include the ability to add share and even Buy Now buttons right in the video itself, test market videos etc.. These services are not free and you would still need to have an account on a service like Amazon Web Services to host your videos.

What’s your experience with posting videos on your site?

First, we really should discuss this somewhere privately, like on Facebook or Google+/-

The RIAA actively seeks out people who engage in the HIGHLY illegal act of selling or, heaven forbid, SHARING, of purchased LPs with friends or STRANGERS. Allowing your LPs to circulate means one more person might not purchase that LP or 8Track and, it is KILLING MUSIC.

Look at what NAPSTER did to sales of Compact Cassettes! Perfect Sound FOREVER, wiped out completely!

Still, the practice is becoming popular among many folks nearing retirement age that have been fired after their 30 or 40 years at the company. They set up a little blog where they post their Loverboy or Metallica LPs for $10 or $20. Whoops did I say METALLICA! Watch out, they filed a lawsuit against sharing of their demos! OOPs too late, here comes that RIAA demand for $3500 to avoid litigation! Best to sell those puppies in a dark alley, somewhere in South America.

Seriously though, as someone who has a barn-full of legally purchased LPs, and also innocently tried to sell used LPs by mail order in the 80′s, I have been meaning to look into this.

My best guess is most LPs are so worthless, it is not even worth the effort to look at them, except:

Mighty "Tinny" sounding, too

To hoarders, and young folk who are going retro phase and have a Minny Mouse Record Player and some Go-Go boots.

Some LPs are rare because, perhaps 100 copies used a rejected cover photo of the drummer beginning to explode.

Some nuts like looking at a decent sized image of the recording artist and reading text that is not 2pt sized. What nuts!

Salvation Army, Hadassah and Goodwill stores are almost completely staffed with undercover RIAA agents, so that is OUT.

I’m also pretty sure that researching, googling, Goldmine Magazining, music blogs, forums etc for each disc and then looking into the sales channels, and then grading, organizing the stock and then packing and taking those rare trips to the Post Office….. WHOOPS where did my Post Office go, it was here yesterday!...and then avoiding the wrath of the RIAA……… it’s probably safest……easiest……and bestest to just………

keep them forever!

Note: Since I have a lot of old records, I certainly don’t consider them worthless! This post is meant to be totally tongue in cheek! I take certain liberties in describing events in piracy issues also!

“Tom, what is the difference between domain hosting and web hosting?”

This got me to thinking that what might be needed is a real world analogy to picture the relationship between the two. Something like the computer/real desk ‘desktop’ analogy we are all so well familiar with these days.

I think one could find the domain/hosting analogy right in your own backyard.

In your car!

After you purchase a car (this could be analogous to your internet project, i.e. website) you need two items to take it for a spin (legally, at any rate).

One is a driver’s license and the other is a vehicle registration.

On the web, domain names act as a type of registration. They tell the whole world that this unique identifier, your .com, belongs to only your vehicle (website), and your website alone.

The Registrar keeps track of the billions of domains and makes sure that the correct owner matches the correct domain name.

The registrar also keeps track of the “driver” that currently  houses this unique domain, the web hosting location.

Because, now that you have this unique domain name (registration), there is still the necessity of having a license (hosting) to ‘drive’  that 4 wheeled domain where as many eyeballs as possible will see your cool new wheels.

As with a driver’s license, you need to have a hosting account if you want to put your website to work. This is the place where you put all the files that make up your website. Like your license, you can even have your smiling face on your website!

As in license and registration, domains and hosting are items that need to be maintained in good order and recurring fees paid if you want to keep your site “on the road.”

I almost forgot about insurance, which is also something you need to stay on the road. I guess that would be the ‘insurance’ of having a good developer driving your internet marketing efforts!

So, next time you are in the market for a solid web presence that was previously owned by a little old lady that only took it out to do occasional local marketing, come on down to tomstier.com and kick a few tires!

We told our caller the facts of life in this hyper-connected world. Without access to the site folder and files of this other website, it was not possible to remove the offending material. It is possible to request Google remove items from their search results, but it  can be a continuing process and take some time.

New design for Editorial Service Site

The best thing for him to do, we said, is to take charge of his online presence by reinvigorating his own website, adding positive material on a regular basis to his site, and participating on professional social media sites. Accentuate the positive.

By doing this, internet searches on his name will lead to more outside references verifying his good qualities. The unhelpful mentions will be competing with this more positive material, and gradually will fade down from the search results on his name.

Unfortunately, this all seemed overwhelming to our potential client. He thanked us for our time, restated again that he just wanted the other mentions removed, and that he was mostly concerned with this intrusion into his privacy.

Presumably, he called the next name on his list until he found the ‘web guy’ who would take his money and remove all mention of him from the web, possibly using a magic spell.

This made me think about how the web has changed our concept of privacy in many ways.

People need privacy. They really do not want government or corporations knowing too much about their private lives. On the other hand, the upcoming generation seems comfortable revealing intimate details of their lives on Facebook or other networks that are easily monitored by complete strangers.

After all, by participating in FaceBook or LinkedIn even in a limited manner, people reveal personal information that is sold. That’s the business model.

This brought to mind how my parent’s generation would have looked askance at this. In the culture I grew up in, talking about one’s work was simply not done. You shared private issues or opinions only with close, personal friends. And it was definitely not considered good form to toot one’s own horn.

But nowadays, as the concept of work continues to tilt more and more toward entrepreneurship and creating one’s own business, tooting one’s own horn – or ‘accentuating the positive,’ as I call it – is an essential. Thankfully we have many opportunities to do this via the internet. This idea made our caller uncomfortable, and I don’t blame him. But if you have a web presence at all, it’s an essential practice.

You don’t have to let anyone else control the way you are perceived, no matter what shows up when you google your name. By creating your own web presence, you can control your privacy, and encourage people to see only what you want them to see about you.

That’s Google Places, and it’s a FREE method for you to get your business placed on the first page of search results for your business keyphrases!

All you need to do is sign in or sign up for your free Google account (Is there anybody left that doesn’t have one?).

Then go to Google Places and just fill out as much information as you can. Google is going to verify your address, for your own protection and to make sure you really are where you say you are. Go right ahead now, you can trust Google!

One neat feature is that you don’t have to exactly show where you are on the map, just the general area your business serves. This is great if you work out of your home or want privacy.

This is something that you have to take advantage of sooner rather than later, because your competitors can also sign up and get their little marker on the map, too.

After your initial sign-up at Google Places, you can go back in and edit your descriptive paragraph and business category. One annoying thing is that you cannot make up your own category, you have to choose from Google’s limited list, at least for this free version.

We should expect there will be more ‘premium’ features for this and placement in the marker hirearchy as time goes on and Google seeks to montetize some services. But for now, this is something you have to be ‘marked’ on.

Website re-design by tomstier.com 2010

Two questions we web developers are asked most frequently (after the initial “What will it cost“) are:

1. What is SEO and
2. How can I make my site more friendly and accessible to users and visitors around the world?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization – which means setting up your website in such a way that you’ll be accessible and enticing to as many search engines and search terms as possible. (This is important in garnering eyeballs to your site; it’s not so necessary if you’re using your web site as a business card that you only hand out to a select few people who you ‘invite’ to visit your site.)

Here’s the skinny on number 2: give information away for free. Like I’m doing, right now, for you. If you have a post about vitamins, and you’re selling vitamins, don’t save that information for the few rarified people who you contact via email blasts or have actually signed up to receive your newsletter. Post that same information on your site – for free. People may still want to sign up to receive your newsletter in their inbox, but in the meantime all that good juicy information you’ve been sharing with them will be shared with thousands – perhaps millions! – more people around the world.

And don’t worry about the ‘look’ of your website so much – what search engines are looking for are key phrases, words, that relate to key phrases people are typing into Google and Bing all the time.

Finding out HOW people are trying to connect to your business requires a little detective work. More on that next time!

Above is the Google Analytics Dashboard for one of my WordPress makeover web site design clients. It shows daily visits hitting peaks of about 9,000 visitors a day. You may wonder “How is this done, and can you do this for me?”

Two Important Commitments

This client is not a coder and does not know how to write html.  At the time he contacted me, he had a site that he had built himself using various web page building softwares. He would build new pages for his products as he introduced them, and try to link it all together as best he could. You could call it “loosely integrated.”

When you use a web page building software like my client was using, you build your page on your desktop or notebook computer and then you have to upload it to your web site folder using something called ftp (file transfer protocol). By doing this on a regular basis, he became familiar with the process and then made a very important commitment. He chose to update his website daily.

Another important decision he made was that he became a ‘Google searcher’. He knew his money key phrases and he tried to keep his site pages updated with keyphrases and text that he guessed his potential clients would be entering for their searches. This means that his pages actually had these phrases, in all their various permutations in full view, directly on his pages, and no SEO tricks.

He also realized that this keyphrase research was a moving target, and as new vendors would start entering the first page of results on Google he would adapt and change his page copy to counter these ‘attacks’.

Next – How is this done, and can you do this for me?

Q. I’m an utter novice when it comes to website design, construction and maintenance. Once you’ve got me up and running, will I be able to update, reconfigure, add content, a blog etc. on my own? Do we need to consider all these questions up front?

A. There are three main roles in establishing a WordPress (or any content management system) site.

I’m the Developer – I set up the software, the site interface, and functions.

You are the User – your job is to add content on a continuing basis. At a basic level all you really need to do is post. Text posts are easy, adding an image to a post is slightly more complicated, adding or updating a gallery is a little more complex. You will have all the tools you need to do these things in the Dashboard.

The third task is that of the Site Designer. This is a task that we can share, as in you supply concept images or layered photoshop files (preferred) of how the site will look and I interpret this into a WordPress Theme (a collection of template files that determine how the pages will display) or you can have me come up with an original concept for you, then I’m the Designer. Both of these methods require a review and approval process.

I use WordPress and other Dashboard-enabled web softwares because they have a built-in ability to grow as you add new content to your site or desire to reshape the content that is already on your site. I consider all the requirements your project will need before choosing the best matching dynamic web software.

Q. From your standpoint, is the most convenient way to try to do it all at once, or can we improvise as we go along? For purposes of providing an estimate, I think I’ll be able to give you most of what the site will need, but I’m trying to get some idea what happens if we need to make changes after the initial start.

A. The site can start with a basic setup – Home, About, Projects, Contact – some variation of these permanent pages, plus your initial post(s) or news releases. There is an assumption that the site will grow over time, as you track what visitors are most interested in. You may want to tweak content on the pages, add posts (User tasks). You may want to add a newsletter sign-up form, the ability for visitors to directly purchase items from the site, Facebook or Twitter connectivity (Developer tasks) – it’s up to you.

Q. Are all website hosting companies created equal? I would assume they’re interchangeable, but I don’t really know.

A. They are not all equal. They change over time, they are bought and sold, new owners sometimes let quality slide. It is only when things go wrong that you find out how good they are. Can you call them? Do they have a live chat? Do they answer support tickets quickly and intelligently? Do they have a community forum that is transparent? You can find horror stories about most hosts easily enough. To be fair, hosts fight a daily battle with hackers who are trying to bring them down for ‘kicks’, and with users who intentionally abuse their account limits as well.

Q. Are there ways to measure how many visits etc. are coming to the site?

A. Yes. We favor Linux/Cpanel hosting. Cpanel hosts include a server based program AWStats and there is also the mighty Google Analytics.

Q. Let me know if there are any books you think I should read on all this.

A. There is quite a lot of WordPress info on the web, and books, also. YouTube has videos on the posting process, adding an image etc. But, like I mention above, there are the Developer tasks and the User tasks. You don’t really need to concern yourself with the development side, you will just want the site to work!