Your Wordpress.org Dashboard . . . .

1st: AKISMET - what is that???

A SPAM fighting service which checks the content of the comment anonymously with an online server, to

determine whether it is spam or not.

2nd: What do you need? What is the Akismet Key?

A. You need a valid Akismet Key - if you have a WORDPRESS.COM account you were given one when you

signed up for it - go into your wordpress.com account settings and copy the code from there to the .org

site.

B. To get your “FREE” Akismet Key for personal use - go to: http://akismet.com/personal - register and they

will email you your “FREE” Akismet Key.

For Additional info: http://codex.wordpress.org/Plugins/Akismet

Presented by: Judy Musgrove, Cover To Cover

Helping you manipulate Wordpress and understand how to get your website/blog up and running - This instruction is geared to the beginner WordPress user.

While there are many things I will not touch on, I will mention that it can be done!

2nd Step:

Settings - there are key area’s here to process -

1. General

2. Reading

3. Discussion

4. Privacy

5. Permalinks

General - this setting allows you to add your:

Site Title - Can be your Business Name or URL

Tag Line - Brief Description or Elevator Speech

Date & Time:

Pacific = UTC –7 (that is a negative sign in front of the 7)

Mountain = UTC –6

Central = UTC –5

Eastern = UTC –4

Reading:

This is where you change your home page from

the blog to a static page - Wordpress default

home page is the Blog page.

You don’t want the Blog page as the Home

page?

1st go to Page

2nd Add a New Page with the title you want

for the Home page - “Welcome” - now SAVE

- do not add any content to the page yet

3rd - Add a New Page (Title - My Blog) for

your Blog / Posts - I will explain below - but

for now, just add the new page - no content

in the page area - save

4th - Go to Settings

5th - Go to Reading

6th - Click on “A Static Page (select below)

and in the drop down box next to Front

Page, select “Welcome” or the page you

designated for the Home page

7th - In the drop down box for the Posts

Page select (My Blog)

Last Save all settings - test it to make sure

that when you type in your URL that your

site opens on the “Welcome” page

Discussion:

There are (7) sections in this area -

Go To: Section 4 ( Before a comment appears ) and

check both boxes in this section -

Before a comment appears . . . .

An administrator must always approve the

comment

Comment author must have a previously

approved comment

I like the control over the comments - Spam is an

issue, but I want to make sure that whatever is post-

ed is done in a good way - I am not against a critique

- I am for it - it can show that you are listening & you

Privacy - I am not sure if this is a default - to have the first item marked - but I have seen it many

times where this setting is turned off - so now I just automatically check this setting to make sure

Default Settings for Permalinks = “Default” - this is where you

see the (? & numbers for your page title)

However, just click on the Day & Name setting - and save! Now,

your page name will have the title of the page in the URL

address bar - Example: http://judysbusinessblog.com/about

Allowing for better SEO - Search Engine Optimization - Google

can now read the address bar!

PAGE ID’S AND POST ID’S Each page and post has their own identifier - so how do you find the numeric identifier for a post or a page?

See page 4 for the info!!! Add Notes Below

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Go to your “POSTS” section - click on “edit post”

Now, Click on “Get Shortlink” the NUMBER after the = sign is the Post ID #

"PAGE - ID" - This is not a column in the Table, but by hovering the mouse over the Page Title, the Page ID is revealed as part

of the URL displayed in the browser status bar (in Firefox the status bar is displayed at the bottom of the screen). A Page's ID

number is the unique number WordPress' database uses to identify individual Pages.

http://judymusgrove.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=2&action=edit

Having fun yet???

THEMES Take a moment here, let’s discuss:

What is this Blog / Website about?

What is the subject?

Do you want Custom Headers? Widget Ready Themes? How about themes with sliders? Magazine or Gallery style?

Do you offer Services only or Products & Services

Is this a personal or business site?

Let’s Go Exploring! http://www.themes2wp.com/download-wordpress-

themes/wordpress-themes/

http://www.templatelite.com/

http://www.web2feel.com/

http://www.widgetreadythemes.com/free-themes/

http://www.wpthemes360.com/

http://www.qualitywordpress.com/

http://www.ezwpthemes.com/

http://www.wordpress.org

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

We are walking thru the Themes, how to install, how to find, how to upload etc.

Issues: like error messages - what to do - previewing - activating - looking at the

documentation to make sure that the plug-ins needed - we find and install

http://halloweencostumesandmoreonline.com

http://targetmarketingstrategies.com

http://judysbusinessblog.com

http://monicahallspa.com

http://thoseamazingwomen.com

http://rusticravendesigns.com/MyBlog/

http://sunnyshealing.com/healing/

http://www.martiniglassart.com/WhatsUpWithChad/

POSTS AND PAGES . . . . Posts - Single entries to your blog - online journal

- composed of multiple posts - ongoing correspondence

personal viewpoints, tips, articles to share, etc.

All Posts have a title

All Posts have categories

All Posts have tags

To add a new post:

Under the Posts section in the Dashboard expand the section - click on add new

Type a Title for your Post

Start Typing your content - this is a mini text editor and very similar to your word processing software

The menu bar in order from left to right:

Top Bar: Bold, Italics, Strike Through, Bullets with dots, bullets with numbers, Block Quote, Left Justify, Center,

Right Justify, Link, Undo Link, More tag, Spell Checker, Toggle Full Screen Mode, Show/Hide Kitchen Sink

Bottom Bar: Formatting Functions (this expands), Underline, Align Full, Font Colors, Paste as Plain Text, Paste

from Word, Remove Formatting, Insert/ Edit Embed Media, Insert Custom Character, Outdent, Indent, Undo,

Redo, Help

Top Bar

Bottom Bar

Categories: The general topic the post can be classified in -

Tags: Micro-categories - Posts with similar tags are linked together when a user clicks one of

the tags

Example: Category = Dessert, Baking

Tags = Chocolate, Brownies

Adding a New Page is similar to adding a New Post - Enter the Title of the Page and the

contents go into the text area

Menu Bar is the same as Posts -

A Page is something Static - isn’t going to change - examples:

About

Services

Welcome / Home

Contact Us

You can SAVE DRAFT - this is great when you want

to return to it later - the draft does not appear on

your website

Page Attributes:

Order = hierarchy

About = Parent = 0

Judy = 2 under Parent “About”

Bobbie = 1 under Parent “About”

Adding Images to Posts & Pages

Go to the Text Area of the Post or Page -

Place your blinking cursor here or where you want to add the image

Click On Add An Image - Add an image window opens

Add An Image

Click “Select Files”

Locate the image on your computer that you want to use - and click on it - the picture file will load

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Default Title = name of file however, you

can change the name here - great for

Identification and Google

What appears in browser for the picture

Link URL is where the image is on the server / internet - every image, video, text has a URL

Alignment - do you want it Left, Center or Right Justified in the text area

Size - will display different sizes available - you can manually resize - make smaller

VERY IMPORTANT - INSERT INTO POST NEEDS TO BE CLICK ON!

Want to put a border around your image?

Want to put spacing both vertical and horizontal around the image? I will show you how - write your notes

here:

________________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________

Adding a Video - the easy way:

Go to YouTube

Find the video you want – or if you have an account - upload the video to your account

Click on the EMBED function

I check the 560 x 340 - just click on it

If I want to select a color then I click on that as well

Now I highlight all of the coding in the embed area

I press CTRL C - for copy

I go back to my text area in Wordpress where I want to insert the video

I click on the HTML Tab

Video Continued:

Place cursor in the body of the HTML box

CTRL V - Paste

Save your Draft

TIP: To Center the Video in the middle of your page box area add the center tags - <center>

</center>

Placing the slash in front of the word center ends that command

Make sure that Center is surrounded by the Less than / Greater Than brackets < >

Click PREVIEW so you can see if your video is displayed in the center of the text area and it is showing

Widgets: Widgets are independent sections of con-

tent that can be placed into any widgetized area pro-

vided by your theme (commonly called sidebars).

To populate your sidebars/widget areas with individu-

al widgets, drag and drop the title bars into the de-

sired area.

By default, only the first widget area is expanded.

To populate additional widget areas, click on their title

bars to expand them.

This is where you can add your

picture or a picture

A slide show

A video

Custom Menu

Calendar

List Categories

Links

A Sample from http://judysbusinessblog.com

TIPS: Create a sitemap of your website – http://xml-sitemaps.com

After it generates your different files of your website - download the sitemap.xml.gz file to your computer

You need to place this file in your public-html directory in your c-panel - you will need to upload this file to the public-

html directory

Create a Google Account - if you do not have one -

Go into Google’s Webmaster Tools Section - https://www.google.com/webmasters

Add your Domain to Google - you will need to add a site - then you will need to add code to verify the site

I use this category for verification - use

whatever is best for you

Download this file to your computer

Upload that file from your computer to the public-

html directory of your domain - go into your c-panel

or use “filezilla”

Now Verify

Adding an image to your sidebar - the EASY Way!!!

Open your posts page

Add a new post

In the text portion of the post - insert the image you want to use

After Image is inserted - click on the HTML tab

Copy the HTML coding

Go to Appearance, Widgets, Add a Text Widget to the side bar

Place cursor in the text area of the widget and CTRL V - paste - use your <center></center> tags

If too large - look at the dimensions and alter as necessary - the width and the height dimensions