Social Media for WordPress Beginner's Guide
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Social Media for WordPress Beginner's Guide - Michael Kuhlmann
Table of Contents
Social Media for WordPress
Credits
Foreword
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Support files, eBooks, discount offers and more
Why Subscribe?
Free Access for Packt account holders
Preface
What this book covers
What you need for this book
Who this book is for
Conventions
Time for action—heading
What just happened?
Pop quiz—heading
Have a go hero—heading
Reader feedback
Customer support
Downloading the example code for this book
Errata
Piracy
Questions
1. Share it the Easy Way
Before you read this book
A brief overview of social media
Social media is the new Web 2.0
Going social does not mean going viral
The WordPress advantage
Doing more with core functions
The karma of pingbacks and comments
Food for thought: RSS feed basics
Time for action—building an automated newsletter with a keyword-based RSS feed
Part 1—creating a subscriber signup form
Part 2—creating a keyword-specific RSS feed
Part 3—creating an automated newsletter campaign
What just happened?
Utilizing MailChimp and Yahoo! Pipes
Partnering and building sponsorship opportunities
Exploring more applications to this tutorial
Pop quiz—understanding key terms and key concepts
Have a go hero
Summary
2. Building the Social Network: BuddyPress and WP Symposium
Before you enable the social layer
Take a measured approach to your feature rollout
Make your passion your niche market
Set aside time
Top 10 plugins to supplement your BuddyPress site
Activating BuddyPress plugins
What just happened?
The Default BuddyPress theme
The Facebook connection
Prepare for a work in progress
Easing your users into BuddyPress
Time for action—how to convert site visitors to site members
Part 1—connecting your WordPress site with Facebook
Part 2—greeting your new visitors with a warm welcome
Part 3—providing your new site visitor with incentives
What just happened?
Use your own voice
Don't overwhelm your new site members
Profiling your site members
Pop quiz—audience engagement
Gamification: The art of user-generated content
Time for action—how to get your users to create original content for you
Part 1—create a post content form with ratings
Time for action—how to enable users to share your content
Part 2—simplifying the process of sharing user reviews
What just happened?
Why post reviews and ratings matter
BuddyPress versus WP Symposium
The issue with privacy
Single and multiple developers
What can I build with WPS?
Have a go hero
Summary
3. Community Forums for the Masses
Comments versus forums
When to use comments
When to use forums
When to use support forums
Watching out for common pitfalls
Time for action—how to automatically display selective forum posts in Twitter
Part 1—setting up groups and forums for BuddyPress
Part 2—creating tweets through forum content
Part 3—automating and customizing tweets with WordPress
(Optional) Part 4—automatically deleting duplicate Twitter content
What just happened?
Keep your tweets conversational
Benefits of automating processes
Pop quiz—forum fun
WP Symposium Forums and Simple:Press
WP Symposium forums
Summary
4. VIP Memberships
Three important facets of membership sites
Customer value proposition
Timing
Time for action—how to open limited membership registrations and reward users
Part 1—setting up member-accessible content
Part 2—adding a countdown to your members options page
Part 3—rewarding your site members
What just happened?
S2 Member and CubePoints
Another foray into gamification
Pop quiz—in the VIP
Have a go hero
Summary
5. Keeping Up with the Stats
Understanding key terminology
Pageviews versus hits
Absolute unique visitors versus unique pageviews
Bounce rates and conversion rates
Creating a Google Analytics account and tracking your site
Time for action—the quick guide to implementing analytics for your site
What just happened?
Time for action—tracking a tweet to your site through Google Analytics
What just happened?
Reporting data with Google Analytics, bitly and Twitter
The gold mine of campaign tracking
Pop quiz—the quick guide to analytics
Reviewing and reporting analytics
Comparing traffic from one week to another week
Time for action—the quick guide to reading analytics
What just happened?
Analysing your site data one week at a time
Summary
6. Managing your Site
Damage control—key aspects of maintenance
When to use a dedicated server
When to upgrade WordPress and your plugins
How to manage your site users
Time for action—how to create automated daily backups for your site
What just happened?
Advantages of using Dropbox
Anticipating downtime
The upsell during downtime
Pop quiz—WordPress maintenance
Getting organized and managing time
Top ten free plugins to help you run your site efficiently
Lowering the barrier of writing
Time for action—how to write and automatically publish posts through e-mail
What just happened?
Posting through Posterous
Have a go hero
Summary
7. Beyond the Plugins Towards True Engagement
Engaging site visitors
Acknowledge
Reciprocate
Personalize
Promote
Repeat
Time for action—how to automatically tweet custom content
Part 1—Creating custom Google Alerts
Part 2—Automatically formatting your content for Twitter
Part 3—Automatically tweeting your content
What just happened?
Google Alerts and Yahoo! Pipes
Using automated tweets to supplement original tweets
Pop quiz—social media artillery
Design speaks
The essence of typography
Mobile design—ushering in a new standard
Beyond the Web
Time for action—how to create a vector-based QR code for print production
QR codes and online promotions
QR Codes and Microsoft tag
The right format for the right job
Have a go hero
Summary
A. Further Reading
Chapter 1—Share it the Easy Way
Chapter 2—Building the Social Network: BuddyPress and WP Symposium
Chapter 3—Community Forums for the Masses
Chapter 4—VIP Memberships
Chapter 5—Keeping Up with the Stats
Chapter 6—Managing your Site
Chapter 7—Beyond the Plugins Towards True Engagement
Index
Social Media for WordPress
Social Media for WordPress
Copyright © 2012 Packt Publishing
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.
Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author, nor Packt Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by this book.
Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.
First published: April 2012
Production Reference: 1160412
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd. Livery Place
35 Livery Street
Birmingham B3 2PB, UK.
ISBN 978-1-84719-980-5
www.packtpub.com
Cover Image by Michael Kuhlmann (<[email protected]>)
Credits
Author
Michael Kuhlmann
Reviewers
David Hopkins
Derek Key
Adii Pienaar
Acquisition Editor
Robin de Jongh
Lead Technical Editor
Kedar Bhat
Technical Editor
Apoorva Bolar
Project Coordinator
Alka Nayak
Proofreader
Mario Cecere
Indexer
Rekha Nair
Production Coordinator
Arvindkumar Gupta
Cover Work
Arvindkumar Gupta
Foreword
One of the most amazing statistics I have ever read, I read while reading this book—15 percent of the web now runs on WordPress.
The impact of this statistic is staggering. The size of that two-digit percentage, when multiplied by the entire Internet is so vast as to be incomprehensible. Yet the bigger imponderable the greater statistic comes when we realize that 100 percent minus 15 percent is 85 percent. That 85 percent has yet to discover WordPress.
In my career, I deal with web statistics every day. At Packt we publish books on IT and web technologies, and so it is to the web that we go for our research to base our assumptions of what is popular, what is worth spending our time, and an author's time on the technologies that will sell books. WordPress is virtually unique in that its popularity grows steeply and almost linearly over time, right from day one, and has done so for the last eight years, up, up, and up. Eating up the Internet bit by bit like an unstoppable virus. One might be forgiven for thinking the whole of that other 85 percent might succumb given time.
When setting up a content based website the fact of the matter is that there is no longer a reason not to use WordPress. Drupal and Joomla! have had their day and are declining in popularity. WordPress has now won the battle of the CMS outright. And the reason is simple. With a few tweaks and a five-minute installation, WordPress is the most search engine-friendly way to put content on the web bar. Yesterday that was enough to get you noticed on the web. Today, WordPress is only half the story. The other half is social media. And that's where Michael's book comes in.
When you begin to combine WordPress with Social Media elements you have the power of the Internet at your disposal; a way to fully engage readers; and that's a concept as staggering as the one we started with. Michael is a true expert and has written a book that is a pure joy to read because it gives you and me the tools we need to succeed where we may have failed before, yet without cost or high-level skills. The plan of action contained herein is, simply put, a template for web success that anyone can follow. I couldn't commend this book more emphatically to anyone who needs to be heard above the deafening noise of the Internet and nowadays that probably means all of us.
Robin de Jongh
Acquisition Editor, WordPress Social Media and WordPress Marketing
About the Author
Michael Kuhlmann is a writer, entrepreneur, and web designer who specializes in WordPress and BuddyPress development. He has worked nearly 10 years in the publishing industry and has written a handful of tutorials spanning topics from print design to web design. To date, his BuddyPress themes have been downloaded more than 100,000 times.
He serves as the director of web design for Thompson Media Group, a publishing company, where he oversees seven brands and their respective web properties and marketing collateral. In 2008, he co-founded http://avenuek9.com, a pet site catering to canine lovers and their furry friends, which garnered the attention of The Huffington Post and Perez Hilton. His latest offering comes in the form of a WordPress hosting service http://joinevo.com, which is a mobile-friendly WordPress platform and marketing service.
Prior to becoming a web designer, he served as a managing and news editor for a San Diego newspaper. His work has been published in The New York Times, The San Diego Business Journal, and The San Diego Union-Tribune among other notable publications.
This book is dedicated to my amazing wife Shannon and our precious daughter Lily. I would also like to thank my family, friends, book editors, and all the dog owners at Morse Park for your continued support. You are all awesome!
Last, this book would not have been possible without all the editors involved—Adii Pienaar, Kedar Bhat, David Hopkins, Derek Key, and Robin de Jongh. If we all didn’t live in separate time zones, I’d take us all out for drinks. Thanks guys!
About the Reviewers
David Hopkins is a regular blogger on aspects of social media, social networks, learning technology, and general blogging activities and techniques. He started his current blogging activity in 2008 but was an advocate of blogging and online communities from a far back as 1999 and his first role as a web designer.
Using advances in social media websites and online social networks, David has made the most of what is available and has grown an International reputation for his blogging and conference activity.
You can follow David on his eLearning Blog (www.dontwasteyourtime.co.uk) and Twitter (@hopkinsdavid) where he writes on aspects of eLearning, technology, social media, and social networks.
Derek Key is currently a member of the business development team at Schipul—the web marketing company. He has worn many hats at Schipul from account executive, to customer support to now being a key member of the business development department. He's no stranger to getting knee-deep in project management and navigating the technical trenches of the various CMS software used to create amazing websites for his clients.
Derek has a wide range of experience, from marketing for the web, print, TV, and radio, to business development. He hails from the University of Texas, where he majored in advertising and has a minor in business foundations.
His love for all things techie dates back to his days in high school. Besides learning and exploring new possibilities online, and helping clients grow their businesses, Derek is a photography addict (www.derekskey.com), music fanatic, and football fan.
Adii Pienaar is an entrepreneur, husband, and very new father; the combination of these roles resulting in an epic and challenging journey. Unlike the bio's of most serial entrepreneurs, Adii is (as at the time of this going to press) a one-hit wonder with his role as co-founder of WooThemes. That status isn't for a lack of trying either; it's just that the other attempts lost more