If you are using Wordpress as a basis for your business website, you’ll expose yourself as a newbie, possibly open yourself to online security risks, and lose potential SEO benefits the software provides if you don’t take time to learn how it works. While it is true that installing Wordpress is simple, setting it up correctly contributes to your website’s success, which also has an impact on your business success.

We’re talking business here, right? I do acknowledge that there are many extremely successful bloggers who established blogs on free sites, like Blogger, before Wordpress came of age. These days, sites like that are most useful in your SEO linking strategy and should NOT be the base for your primary website. This is also true of Wordpress.com, another free blogging platform.

For starters, free blogging sites offer limited theme and plugin options. The most important for you to understand about them, however, is that they own your content and can arbitrarily take your website down at any time. While “free” may sound good to you, building SEO for a website is actual time spent, whether you outsource the work or not. Why in the world would you choose to invest that much energy on a domain and content that you do not have complete control over? It boggles my mind…

Hire an Expert Wordpress Developer

So here you are. You have a great business idea and you know you need a website to make it happen.  Everyone is saying that Wordpress is what you should use too. You’ve found a lot of helpful and free articles on the internet explaining how to install and set it up so why would you want to hire someone to do this for you?

Based on stories I’ve heard from my clients and some of the projects that I’ve been asked to finish, I can think of several reasons. Primarily, they come under the heading of insufficient technical skills or a lack of understanding about how computers and database applications work. If you don’t understand the underlying technologies of your Wordpress software, you can get into trouble which can affect your business plans.

Other things that make it easy to spot a newbie include:

Lack of Focus
Have you ever visited a site with frequent and unrelated posts designed to bring in affiliate sales? Offering too many different things or choosing too broad a niche can make your website invisible. Up-front keyword research, to isolate low competition keywords with adequate search volumes, is essential to your website’s success, whether your products are affiliate offerings or your own content, like an eBook.

Having Too Many Pages
While every place you go on the internet is considered a web page, Wordpress uses the term pages differently. When I wind up at a site where the majority of the content is pages, I know that the site was created by an inexperienced Wordpress user. The beauty of Wordpress is that it notifies search engines automatically when post content is updated.

Default Installation Content on the Site
Another dead giveaway is seeing the default installation content, like the blogroll or the standard meta login. Worse yet is spotting the “Hello World” post or the default about page on the site.

Categories
Visiting a Wordpress site with nothing categorized is a tell-tale sign of a newbie blog. So far as I’m concerned, no content should exist in the “uncategorized” category.

Cross-Browser Inconsistencies
Although I’ve been tempted, I’ve never published a site with a “best viewed in …” message on it. Without inflaming the debate about which browser is better, and taking the high road, assume that you should not enforce the use of one browser over another. Over the past several years, I have learned that not all themes are created equal and solid CSS skills, as well as knowing what to look for in the theme, are necessary to resolve browser incompatibility.

After a free consultation, people often say that they can put up their own sites. After weeks of trying, some have come back to retain my Wordpress website development services.

Our blogs are intended to present us as professionals. The best advice that I can offer to you is that, if you are not technically adept, hire a professional who can deliver the website you want and help you learn what you need to know so you can build your online reputation and add value to your bottom line.

Wordpress was awarded the 2009 Open Source CMS Award last month. Not only is this a great honor for the software, it validates a decision I made to specialize with this CMS years ago and all of the recommendations that I’ve made to website clients for the past several years. Wordpress is a powerful CMS and, with the improvements introduced during the past year and this award, it is crystal clear that the software has stepped up to the plate for consideration as the basis for any website project.

Wordpress Wins 2009 Open Source CMS Award

Many of you who know me understand my deep appreciation for Wordpress. I began using the software as a blogger in late 2004 when I set up my first self-hosted blog. Since that time, my interest in blogging has become a way of life for me.  My Wordpress development skills have been a good source of income for me and I love being a self-employed entrepreneur.

In fact, entrepreneurship is a frequent topic on my blog. An important attribute of being an entrepreneur is having a willingness to take measured risks but crucial to entrepreneurial survival, regardless of one’s niche, is resilience. Ideas bloom, excitement builds, partnerships are formed, and there are many ups and downs along the way.

This amazing interview with Matt Mullenweg, the father of Wordpress, really gives a lot of great insights into a smart way to start and grow a company. Other participants in this show are Jason Calacanis and Joel Spolsky. All are visionaries and well respected in the internet arena. The interview is nearly 2 hours long but it is well worth your time to listen, at the very least. I must caution you that Jason uses some colorful language while telling some of his stories.

Personally, I find it enjoyable when something occurs that seems synchronous to events in present time. The other night, such an event occurred. While rifling through papers in my desk drawer, an old fortune from a fortune cookie surfaced. It read:

One’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.

Not only is this synchronous, it also is quite profound in its simple truth. Once we are introduced to a something new, and the idea takes root in our minds and inspires us, it is virtually impossible to operate as we did before we made our important discovery. Our eager minds pursue the idea and follow it through permutations and twists in the road. Through every turn, the core substance of the idea remains solid and the starting point to which you always will return, should you find a need to adjust your strategy.

Take Internet Marketing, for example. A few years ago, I decided that I would get income through online means. In pursuit of that vision, I began subscribing to newsletters and purchasing products that would teach me more about what people were doing online. Some of the methods that I evaluated are not ones that I use or would recommend but knowing what not to do is almost as important as knowing what to do, isn’t it? Due to my interest and attention, I am able to spot trends and, when it comes to opportunity offers, I have a pretty good system for separating the wheat from the chaff.

As I put my own business plan into motion, it became obvious that my time spent learning about internet marketing was extremely helpful to people who retained my services for Online Branding and wanted to get income online. Although my primary source of income is still from my consulting services, the fact that I am personally involved with my customers doesn’t imply that I am not an internet marketer. I source all of my business through Web 2.0 methods and enjoy working with people.  And, the best part is that my business is totally portable!

My mind was stretched by this self-induced learning. When I approach a potential business liaison or client, it is nearly impossible for me to talk merely about traditional means of sourcing new business. When I set up ecommerce websites, for instance, I make recommendations beyond layout, technology, and graphics. My degree is in business and that knowledge, coupled with the education I’ve received through personal learning, are assets to any project that I undertake and I’ve heard this repeatedly from my customers.

All things being equal, anyone who has a business website is an internet marketer. Here is the caveat; The prettiest site in the world cannot manufacture new business and cash flow. If you haven’t done so already, it would serve you well to either learn about, or retain the services of someone who knows about techniques that will improve your website’s visibility through Web 2.0 techniques that drive targeted traffic, as well as performing the time-consuming SEO methods that will get it listed and ranked by search engines. If you are in business and have no website, you are missing an incredible opportunity. Personally, I feel that it is sheer folly to be in business without a website. It is statistically proven that people look online prior to making any purchase decision.

Even though this is not business related, our minds can also be stretched by ideas that present themselves in everyday life. The ingenuity of a child who is working out a difficult “engineering” problem related to the sand castle they are building at the beach is a good example. It is not an unimportant side note to remind you to take time to relax your mind so as to re-charge your creative juices.  If we are fortunate, we retain our sense of awe about things that are remarkable and have nothing to do with making money, like watching swallows soaring high above us or witnessing the oceans that undulate through forces unseen. At times when you need to restore yourself, it is good to have easy access to those things that opened your mind as a child.

In my ongoing study of internet based businesses, I’ve subscribed to many newsletters and met online acquaintances through Skype. Occasionally, I will receive a Skype broadcast or email message inviting me to something like this:

Subject: Up to $15 per hour

This is something to get excited about! Here is a way that you can make $15.00 per HOUR by simply clicking on ads. I just did this tonight.

This is not your standard fly by night, run of the mill, surf site where your money gets tied up for weeks or even months so please hear me out and read this carefully.

I’m not excited. Are you?

I don’t mean to be disrespectful if this sort of offer is exciting to you, as each of us has different strengths and interests, but each time something like this is introduced, I wonder what would motivate someone to want to spend their time in this way. Equally pointless is taking online surveys “for cash.” These sorts of programs are aimless and, in my opinion, tend to stunt your creativity.

When I began my online journey and was more naive, I followed the recommendations of my “mentor” and tried ad surf sites. My takeaway from that short-lived cycle was that it was BORING! All of the ads seemed to make similar wild claims of instant riches without effort, suggested they were “the best ever” fill-in-the blank, and some even claimed to be the last stop in a quest to get income online. Pictures of fancy cars, palacial homes, and luxury vacations endeavored to lure in unsuspecting people who were trying to find a method to augment or replace income earned through traditional means.

The payoff at most ad surf sites is a point based compensation allowing the user to post their own ads at the same site which possibly will result to capturing a lead and/or new customer who might be surfing ads for similar reasons. Sadly, what passes for compelling landing page copy is nothing more than hype, in most cases.

An article posted today at the Philadelphia Business Journal reports that Interactive Advertising is down 5.3% from last year. The statistic is sourced from a PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP study and includes both display ads and digital video advertising. However, when digital video advertising is separated into its own category it is on the rise by 38%.

In fairness and most likely, the drop in interactive ad agency revenue, which would be interesting to a firm like PricewaterhouseCoopers, has a lot to do with our ability to leverage free resources to get our marketing message out there. The risk of using free advertising sites is relevant to one’s niche and presentation skills, especially using video.

Although the Law of Attraction suggests that new business will find us if our intentions are clear, any business person will agree that advertising makes their business more visible. As business owners, we need to make wise choices, especially when it comes to advertising an marketing expenses.  If you are on a slim budget, putting your content up on YouTube fulfills the digital video marketing need.  The challenge is to get your video noticed, viewed, commented and recommended.  In a best case scenario, it will be interesting enough to go viral.

It is somewhat of a conundrum determining how to effectively advertise our business online and ways to make our advertisement stand out. Consumers don’t want to be “sold” anything and we are bombarded by advertisements everywhere we go so something about your video needs to be special enough to make it stick in the minds of your target market.

Using social networks give us a potential audience. However, making friends merely to push ads about your business idea can get you labeled as a spammer and your account could be shut down.Social Media Mavens, claiming to know the best ways to leverage those venues, have had their Facebook accounts shut down without notice, which must have been just a little embarrassing since this was their claim to fame.  Additionally, your new online friends will learn to ignore you if all you are doing is sending ads.  It is highly recommended that you develop relationships with your social networking connections and send advertisements to them ONLY if they express an interest in learning more about what you’re doing.

Print advertising can be expensive but it is a way to reach people who you may not encounter online.  Using free online advertising sources like Craig’s List is another way to get out your good news but there are  restrictions which you need to understand and comply with or you ad will be taken down at those sorts of sites too.

Having your own website, hosted on your own hosting account, is an essential tool for anyone in business. Up front evaluation of your niche and target market is necessary. People shop online first so knowing what your market is searching for is critical. If you aren’t good at copywriting, hire someone to do this for you so you have effective content on your page which will resonate with your market niche.

When you have your new website finished, don’t forget to use PRWeb to announce yourself and your business site to the world.  At no cost, you can notify a wider audience.  For a nominal fee, the reach becomes wider.  PRWeb ads convert to print advertising, in some cases and the wider the reach, the better are your chances to draw in suspects … er … prospects.

Frequently we forget the importance of Brand Equity. As internet marketers, that brand is not a business opportunity or a company we may have chosen to represent. While those things may assist us to get income, they are tools we use. By carefully managing the online image that is our name, we build potential for a future we cannot envision today. Nothing is more important than protecting our online brand image.

It may seem a little obsessive, but I set up Google Alerts for my name years ago after learning that my Real Estate clients were Googling me. That also heightened my awareness of what they might learn about me. In that instance, they were interested to learn of my artistic pursuits but, frankly, it didn’t impress me that this was the most prominent data they could locate. Energy was diverted to changing that.

The same tactics that I used to erase my Real Estate career from page one of Google will work for you if you are just starting out online. Immediate results were achieved by interacting on forums and commenting on blogs. Ensure that your posts are relevant to the topic and add value and always include your name in a signature block.

As an Online Branding Consultant and Wordpress Website Designer, I’m fully aware of branding strategies for companies. Using education, experience and business acumen, I’ve helped many people identify and implement their online branding strategies.

To assist those of you who have not studied business, it might be important to explain the four different types of branding strategies that are used.

Single brand identity is as it says a separate brand for each product. By way of example, if you have a company with several products, you would develop each product identity as a stand alone brand name. Hershey does this by having product groups, but each product name is name is much better known. Most of us know that M&Ms are a Hershey product but do we automatically relate the Hershey name to Twizzlers or Heath Bars? The resources required to manage multiple unique product brands must be considered if this is the strategy you are choosing for your business.

When a company uses its name for all their products, they have implemented an umbrella branding strategy. This is the approach that is employed in my business model for it allows flexibility and ease of brand management. More famous examples exist, however. Sony, HP, Linksys, and GE, are household names for their product lines while the model numbers are obscure things we only look at when filling out a warranty card or contacting technical support.

Multi-brand categories are different brands for different product categories. In this scenario, the same company has different company names for their product groups. As a former Minnesotan, Pillsbury comes to mind. Through acquisition, they grew from milling flour to a large conglomerate owning several restaurants and store food brands. Mergers have returned the company to their core competency of baking products and they have since divested all their restaurant holdings.

Lastly, a company might choose to have a common name stem. This is useful for leveraging brand loyalty. Nestle has done this with Nescafe, Nesquick and Nestea.

What is a brand and why should you protect yours?  The marketing mix should focus on consistency and quality. Even if your business is primarily affiliate marketing, Top Gun affiliate marketers like Ewen Chia and Michael Cheney have instant access to their loyal lists to get income whenever they want it due to the careful management of their names and the products they have chosen to endorse.

Your brand is your reputation and, if you manage it well, it will serve you for years to come.

We all use Google everyday to look for information. Every now and then, there is a new link on the main Google page which catches my eye. If you haven’t done so yet, follow the Doodle for Google Contest link. The theme of this year’s contest is “What I Wish for the World.” The drawings which I previewed are all absolutely delightful but the originations of the young people who created them are what I found most compelling.

Here’s a YouTube video with some animated Google Doodles which is promoting the contest.

Every internet marketer has access to the entire world to promote their businesses. Not everyone is guaranteed visitors to their website daily, however. We all know that Google has this sort of leverage. To see a huge company like that use their advantage in such a selfless way warmed my heart.

Community involvement is not a new business idea. Engaging our prospects or existing customers through being present in a non-threatening way is a great method to get to know these people as people. Initiating a contest can permit you to attract targeted traffic to your site and it can be a lot of fun for you and your staff too. You are only limited by your imagination.

As internet marketers, we often overlook things that are not trendy. Leaving our desks to actually interact with our local community is something we rarely do. This could be due to the fact that we have an “online” business but I don’t think we should use that as an excuse. Getting involved with our regional and local communities can only stand to facilitate meetings with other like-minded entrepreneurs and expand our circle of influence.

If you haven’t done so already, cast your vote at Doodle for Google Contest. If you are inspired, try to think up a way to use this great promotional tool in your business too.

Although this is a lengthy video, Seth Godin is a grizzled and respected internet veteran with immense influence. If you have not visited his blog, you could benefit from acquainting yourself with him there.

I’ve been online since the dial-up days, long before internetworking or email exchange was possible on computers with dissimilar operating systems. Working for a company with military contracts provided access to something called Arpanet which preceded the internet, as we know it today. When personal computers came on the scene in the late 1980s, we initially shared files using a technology called sneaker net. This involved copying files to a 5.25 inch floppy disk and delivering to the person who needed to access the file.

At that time, online tribes gathered in Usenet Groups where discussions could occur or news could be read with minimal lag time. As well, if someone had an axe to grind or was biased by some other affiliation, online and unofficially declared social etiquette was to indicate your position in the posted replies or at the end of one’s signature. Participants used telnet to visit these “chat rooms” and dial up speeds were a whopping 1200bps.

Bulletin boards were along the evolutionary chain of online tribe building. During their heyday period from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, these venues were maintained by hobbyists or corporate system administrators and the application software was hosted on dedicated computers. Operating costs sometimes translated to a fee based service. Because dial-up access often included expensive long distance calling rates, these sorts of tribes were geographically localized and members of the BBSes tended socialize in person on a somewhat regular basis.

Fast forward to now. These days, it is an anomaly for someone to not have high speed internet access. Bulletin boards have progressed to become forums and free internet messaging tools make it painlessly simple to gather into online tribes in a heartbeat. Skype Chat rooms are a great place to get connected and interact with like-minded people and I have learned a lot from my involvement with some of them.

Most Skype chat rooms have clear guidelines posted and all of them have hosts and co-hosts to monitor discussions and ensure that members adhere to the rules. Friendships can develop quickly when you can get a feeling about things that people think and care about in the rooms. Some friendships evolve on a more personal level which may even lead to conducting business together in profitable partnerships or JV endeavors.

Over time, I have observed that all Skype Chat Rooms are not created equally and that room owners, hosts, or members don’t always play nice. Unlike face-to-face friends, you do not have the benefit of body language, voice tone, or inflections behind the words. Even when you voice chat with someone, the anonymity factor of distance permits people to misrepresent themselves. If you are a guest in a Skype Chat, you will soon learn that room hosts can be arbitrary about who remains a member. Since it is their room, I guess this is their perfect right but, if you are the victim of a random ejection for no apparent reason, it can be disconcerting.

I approach all new memberships with caution and tend to leave or distance myself from Skype Chats where the room owners are only intent on pontification of their own professional worth, seem to bully members, or where the overall intention seems to be gossip, belligerence or unfocused conversations leading nowhere. We attract what we are thinking and, if we are embroiled in mean-spirited conversations, interacting with vulgar and opinionated people, or wasting our precious time on non-productive conversations, what will we attract?

This post is mainly written to recommend two of my long-time favorite chat rooms:

1. GutzMedia Training 24/7 Chat
2. Julie’s Skype Tips Chat

My evaluation is primarily based on these observations:

1. Quality of content & member interaction
2. Spirit of mutual support
3. Lack of spammy affiliate links
4. Membership exhibits common courtesies we learned in Kindergarten such as: play nice, don’t push each other on the playground and share your toys.

Skype is a remarkable online business meeting place and Skype chat rooms can facilitate great learning. The two rooms recommended in this post have never publicly disparaged anyone and I’ve found their membership to be very helpful. If you’re looking for interaction and friendship, I do suggest checking them out. These chat room owners are good people with superior online reputations whom I have come to know, respect and like. I believe that you will like them too.

Feel free to look me up on Skype if you have any questions. I can introduce you to these rooms too. My Skype ID is marj.wyatt.

I have an addendum to this post. Gutz 7/24 Skype chat has recently made a business decision to come off of Skype Public Chat and adjourn to their free Social Network hosted at Ning. Membership is free and getting involved with the Gutz Media Live community can only serve to improve your connections and business mindset.

As of October 19, 2009, the value obtained from participation in Julie’s Skype Tips chat room has become questionable.  This room appears to be absorbed in conversations that will only help brand new Skype users, business owners in Message Magic, or people whose Skype Accounts have been hijacked.  Thus, even though the information about the history of online chats remains of some value, there are NO Skype Chat Rooms that can be recommended.

My friend, Zeb Olsen is a Twitter Wizard. He has helped me tremendously, over time, and I am sure you can benefit from learning more from him as well. I am sharing a video he produced recently that describes tactics and tools you can use immediately to get a handle on different ways to use Twitter in your business.

These marketers have come up with another brilliant YouTube video that is fun as well as being informative.