wordpress plugin – Small Business Odyssey

July 28, 2012

WordPress Backup Creator: Backup, Clone and Transfer Your WordPress Blogs

The WordPress Backup Creator takes the pain and anxiety out of three important tasks – backup, clone and transfer your WordPress blog.

If you have ever tried to backup your WordPress blog or transfer it to another web host, you will appreciate the angst involved and the complexity of the task, particularly if you want your widgets and plugins copied or transferred at the same time.

I’ve tried several WordPress backup programs but they were either too complex or unreliable. In one case, I was issued with an update (to fix a bug) almost weekly … and this did not inspire confidence.

Recently I purchased the WordPress Backup Creator and found not only was it reliable but very simple to use, with very clear written and video instructions. The beauty of it was that it took so few steps and these were very easy to execute (I don’t know about you, but I lose patience if the steps are too unclear or too complex).

I had wanted to transfer my personal productivity membership site because the original hosting was way too expensive. This productivity membership site is based on WordPress. It is fairly complex because not only does it incorporate membership details, payment options, sales page and optin page but also 50 plus lessons (blog posts) and audios.

I am delighted to report that, using the WordPress Backup Creator, I was able to transfer my whole Productivity membership site without loss of data, plugins, posts or widgets. I was truly astounded at how easy and efficient it was (and I am one very relieved person). The Backup Creator enabled me to save more than $20 per month hosting fees.

As a result of this success, I have been able to reduce the price for anyone who wants to access my personal productivity membership site. The price has been reduced from $19.95 per month to $9.95, one-off payment.

Just purchasing and using the WordPress Backup program has improved my productivity no end.

Just think of all the work that you have put into your WordPress blogs and imagine what would happen if you lost your blog (and the associated comments). This WordPress plugin is so ridiculously cheap when you think of all that pain and anxiety you can save by just using the plugin to protect your WordPress sites.

If you are into cloning WordPress sites, then this is the tool to make that task so easy and profitable.

I certainly have no hesitation in recommending the WordPress Backup Creator:

WordPress Backup Creator

April 1, 2012April 1, 2012

Easy Video Press: Video Player for WordPress Blogs

[evp type=youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ln-Xbz3TgbM[/evp]

Easy Video Press is a WordPress Plugin that makes it very easy to play videos on your WordPress blogs. You can play videos uploaded from Amazon S3, YouTube or your computer.

You also have the option of customizing the video player – e.g. color of the background, buttons or outline. You can change the size of the displayed video and allow full screen playing. If you prefer, you can set the Easy Videos Player to play immediately someone visits your blog post (… and you can change this for each video).

Easy Video Press comes with four very short videos that explain each step in the process of setting up the Plugin and creating a video player for your blog post.

Monetizing videos with Easy Video Press WordPress Plugin

Easy Video Press enables you to add a hyperlinked logo to your video and build in a redirect to a website of your choice so that you can monetize the video. I have illustrated these features in the video player below:

[evp type=youtube logo=http://smallbusinessodyssey.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/meritsolutionsthumbnail1.jpg link=http://www.meritsolutions.com.au]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4StJfmKDus[/evp]

Easy Video Press: an easy WordPress Plugin for displaying a video player

This is a powerful WordPress Plugin that can open up the world of video marketing. It is easy to use and makes video playing on your WordPress blog so much easier.

All you have to do is install the WordPress plugin, customize the default settings (e.g. Amazon S3 URL’s, color scheme, video size) and then start using the video player within your blog posts.

When you want to display a video in your blog post, you provide a few details and the WordPress Plugin creates a “shortcode” which is automatically inserted in your blog post.

The following illustration shows the control panel that appears below your blog entry as you are developing your post. It enables you to:

specify the source of video – Amazon S3, YouTube or your computer
size of the video player
color scheme for the video player
cover image
logo image (if desired)
logo URL link (if desired).

If you want to use the advanced options available with Easy Video Press, you can do any of the following:

allow full screen
auto start video
hide controls/buttons or show them
redirect viewer at end of video

With either the basic or the advanced controls, Easy Video Press will generate a shortcode that is automatically inserted in your blog post when you hit the “Send Shortcode to Editor” button. You can then locate the video player wherever you choose within your post.

I was becoming increasingly frustrated with displaying videos on my WordPress blogs until I found this simple-to-use WordPress Plugin.

Easy Video Press is, as the name suggests, an easy-to-use WordPress Plugin that will take the stress out of your blogging and enable you to professionally display, and monetize, videos on your WordPress blogs.

March 7, 2012March 7, 2012

WordPress Websites: Policies for a Legal Website

If you are going to create or maintain a WordPress website, you have to ensure that you have the policies necessary to have a legal website. While there are legal requirements surrounding websites (such as Privacy Policy, Disclaimer, Earnings Disclaimer), Google also takes into account the existence of the legal policies when determining the value and ranking of a WordPress website. The absence of such policies can signal a site that lacks substance or is engaged in illegal activity (such as misleading people about potential services or earnings).

You can go the hard road and hire a lawyer to write the necessary policies for your WordPress website to make it a legal website or alternatively you can access a WordPress Plugin designed specifically for this purpose.

[Image source: Sarah B Brooks]

WP Policies: Free WordPress plugin for a legal WordPress website

The free WordPress plugin for incorporating policies for your WordPress site can be obtained here:

WP Policies (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-policies/)

This WordPress Plugin will automatically generate a range of policy statements to enable you to create a legal website and improve the value of your WordPress website in the eyes of Google and other search engines.

The free plugin comes with 10 policies at the moment and you can edit these to suit your own purposes:

anti-spam policy
disclaimer
DMCA notice
e-mail policy
earnings disclaimer
external links policy
medical disclaimer
privacy policy
terms of use
testimonial disclaimer

Often you will find that a set of policy statements will come with other purchases that you make (for example, if you purchase the software for a membership site as I did with my personal productivity site). You can use these alternative policies if you prefer and it is just a matter of editing the ones provided with the WordPress Policies Plugin.

Installing WP Policies for a legal WordPress website

You can install the free WP Policies plugin by following the tips I offer in my post, How to Install a WordPress Plugin.

You need, however, to check the permission setting for the folder where the default policies are stored before activating the plugin. The instructions for this and for the overall setup of the legal policies are included as a text file with the plugin when you upload it. These instructions show you how to add the variable fields for the policy statements (such as Company, address, email and phone number), that are added automatically when you ‘import’ the default policies (Step 4 in the Instructions).

You can delete or deactivate any of the policy pages you do not want to display by clicking on “Pages” in the Dashboard of your WordPress blog and either ‘trashing’ the page or changing the setting to draft (deactivates the page).

You can also display the pages in the footer by adding the code provided to the footer.php file of your WordPress Theme (Step 6 in the instructions) – see illustration in the footer to SmallBusinessOdyssey.

It is important to make sure your WordPress website is a legal website by adding the relevant legal policies – the WP Policies WordPress Plugin gives you an easy way to do this.

January 6, 2012January 6, 2012

Google +1 Button: Your Road to Increased Visibility

The Google +1 button acts in a similar way to the Facebook ‘Like” button. However, the Google +1 button has more far reaching effects and is likely, in the long run, to impact heavily on the effectiveness of your small business marketing.

The Google +1 button is not just a ploy to challenge Facebook’s ascendancy in social media, it represents a fundamental paradigm shift for Google – from content to people, from page rank to people rank. Google has for a long time ‘branded’ you (given you a ‘value’ ) based on your online content and your connections.

Google +1 Button represents a shift from page rank to people rank

In the days of Google’s Wonder Wheel, Google provided a visual representation of how you were viewed by Google itself and the relationships between you and particular keywords. I have written about this earlier in a guest blog post, Google is Watching You. Unfortunatley Google has dropped the Wonder Wheel but you can see the representation below that Google developed of my friend and colleague, Chef Keem:

Google has recognised that Chef Keem is a leading Squidoo Lensmaster (Giant Squid), that he lives in Austin, Texas and that he shares numerous recipes on his website and on Squidoo as well as via his videos, articles and blog posts. Google even recognized that at the time this Wonder Wheel was created, Chef Keem was establishing a new Bavarian Bistro (see the bottom link on the right of the image). If you ever want to see how to create an effective personal branding campaign, then visit Chef Keem’s Kitchen.

The reality is that Google is moving more and more to giving you and your business a “value” based on how your content is viewed by others and the extent of your associations on the Web. Google has even built up a knowledge bank about you based on your online social connections, e.g. people you are connected to on Google+, Google Reader or Google Talk.

Google +1 in search results

The net effect of all this is that Google will show your +1’s in the search results for people you are connected with. The corollary of this is that when you search on Google, you will see below the individual search results if anyone from your social connections has +1’d the particular search result. The following image gives you an idea of what this looks like:

If I use your cursor to hover over the individual names you will see how each of the people who +1’d the site are connected to you (in this case each is connected to me via my Google Plus Circles).

So the more people you connect with via Google Plus and the more you +1 Web content, then the more visibility you will gain in relation to what you value of the Web. Also if other people reciprocate and +1 your content, you will appear in more and more search results for people you are connected with on the Web. So the +1 button has a spiralling effect if you continue to build your social connections through Google Plus and if you +1 the content of others.

Your Google +1’s on Google Plus

Your Google +1’s are available to you as a stream on your Google Plus profile. The default setting for this is that this list of your +1’s is private. However, you can make it public on your Google Plus profile by changing the settings.

There are a small number of simple steps involved when you are on your Google Plus site:

Click your profile icon
Click ‘Edit Profile” icon
Click on the displayed +1 icon (see image below)
Tick – ‘Show this tab on your profile”
Click “Saved”.

Adding the Google +1 button to your website or blog

There are a number of ways that you can add the +1 button to your website or blog so that people can use the +1 button to recommend your content/site to others:

Use Google’s code for adding the +1 button to your website or blog
Use a WordPress Plugin specifically designed for this purpose

If you are reasonably advanced technically, go for option 1 above. However, using a WordPress plugin gives you greater flexibilty and it may be easier for you to install a WordPress plugin.

To find a WordPress plugin for the Google +1 button, just do a search on Google. When I did this, I came across the following Google result:

Now you can see once again, Google is using my online social connections to show who recommended this plugin. In this case it was Mari Smith, Facebook expert, who is in my Google Plus Circles. Because Mari recommends this plugin and because it is used on reputable sites like Mashable, I chose the +1 button plugin she recommends. You can access the plugin here:

Google +1 Button – WordPress Plugin

You can see this Google+1 button plugin operating on this blog, Small Business Odyssey. The plugin offers different ways to customise the Google +1 button, including adding the button before or after posts or in both positions. You can also add a count of how often the +1 button is used for your website, page or post.

In the final analysis, the Google +1 button gives you the opprotunity to increase your visibilty and to enhance your small business marketing online.

December 26, 2011

7 Major Changes in Small Business Marketing in 2011

As 2011 comes to a close, it is instructive to reflect on the massive changes to small business marketing that occurred during the year and to look at their implications. These changes were driven by a number of landmark events that spawned innovations.

One of the key drivers of the changes that small business marketing confronts today, and into 2012, is the direct competition between Google and Facebook for Number One position on the Internet (and all the revenue that goes with this position). The impact of this competition is being felt throughout the Internet marketing world and in social media. There are many people becoming disengaged by the endless changes created by the two Giants of the Internet as they try to outpace each other. One possible prognosis is that this could open up the arena for another player who undermines the customer base of the both the big players, as Facebook did to MySpace.

I want to focus on seven (7) key changes as a way to highlight the impacts from a small business marketing perspective. This approach is in line with my suggestion to write blog posts in sets and sevens. So here are the seven key changes in 2011 affecting small business marketing:

1. Google Places upgrade and resurgence

Google introduced improvements to Google Places, the platform for local businesses to highlight their location, hours of business and their products/services. Along with these changes, Google gave new prominence to Google Places in local search results, changing the display and increasing the value of a Google Places web presence. Sadly, very few small businesses understand the value of this change and have failed to take up their allotted Google Places website. In 2012, Google Places will be an absolutely essential part of your small business marketing. Without it, you may find yourself dropping deeper and deeper in the list of local search engine results as your competitors make full use of this facility (one which Google itself hosts!).

2. Changes to Facebook Pages

The big news of 2011, was that Facebook had more web traffic (visitors) in March than Google and took over the Number One position in terms of search engine volume. The race is now on and Google and Facebook are involved in a head-on tussle to capture (or retain) the number one position. This competition has generated many changes on both sites. Facebook has made major changes to its Facebook Pages to make further inroads into the business market. These changes have complicated the scene for small business marketing. It has meant that many small business owners have had to ignore Facebook or engage small business marketing consultants (who are struggling themselves to keep up with the changes). But how can you ignore the Number One source of web traffic that is also a social media site with over 700 Million members?

3. Introduction of Google Plus and Google +1

Google quickly responded to Facebook’s resurgence with the introduction of its own social network, Google Plus. It also introduced an equivalent to the Facebook “Like” in the form of the Google +1 button. There are other major changes in Google’s search algorithm and results display that accompanied these changes. The challenge for small business owners is, “How can you keep abreast of these changes and their implications for small business marketing?”. Again, you cannot afford to ignore the Google changes or your competition will be appearing in a much more prominent way than you as Google attempts to “reward’ those who get on board with its new social network and related changes.

4. The resurgence of LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the world’s largest online network focused on business and in 2011 grew to over 130 Million members. LinkedIn is a new and growing force in small business marketing. Depending on the nature of your business, it can be a critical component of your small business marketing, particularly in the light of the overall growth of social networking which looks like continuing unabated in 2012. The introduction of status updates by LinkedIn is an attempt to utilise its growing power to move into the Big League occupied by Facebook and Google.

5. The growth of local marketing

During 2011, there was a massive switch of focus by Internet marketers from affiliate marketing to local marketing. This was driven in part by two influences, (1) the decline of affiliate income owing to the depressed economy in the US and (2) and the recognition that around 80% of business for offline businesses comes from within a 5 kilometre radius. The changes to Google Places and the emergence of social networking ‘review” sites, intensified this new focus. What it means for your small business marketing is that you have to make the most of online local marketing tools because your competitors are being courted daily by Internet marketers who see this area of consulting as a the new “goldmine”. The new superstars of Internet marketing generate their income from monthly retainers paid by businesses, small and large, for local marketing services.

6. The massive growth of mobile marketing

With the advent of the Smart Phone and the associated growth of mobile usage, mobile marketing has taken off as the new frontier for Internet marketing. This growth is being aided by the focus on local marketing and has spawned the development of thousands of apps for mobile phones. Two new areas of online riches are emerging, (1) the creation and sale of mobile phone apps and (2) the development of mobile marketing strategies and tools (software). As a small business marketer, you are going to need mobile compatible websites and mobile marketing tools. One advantage of Google Places discussed above is that it is already mobile-compatible – which is another reason why it is so critical for small business marketing.

7. 2011 – The Year of the PlugIn

With so many changes on so many fronts, WordPress developers have had a field day. There has been a massive growth in WordPress Plugin development in 2011. I receive an invite every day to purchase two or three new plugins. It is becoming increasingly difficult to keep abreast of these software innovations. However, the WordPress plugins are designed to make it easier for you to accommodate your small business marketing to the changes that are occurring in Internet marketing. Many of the plugins help you to automate your small business marketing process.

In succeeding posts, I will further explain these 2011 changes and highlight their implications for small business marketing moving into 2012.