This code is used to place and code (or ad code…whatever you’d like) on your WordPress blogs front page only

(You can also have it appear sitewide, if you follow additional notes below)

(This code is used only for one placement on your front page ) (more than 1 placement lessons to come soon!)

SEE EXAMPLE:

1- Open up LOOP.PHP

2- Find this piece of code in LOOP.PHP

<?php while ( have_posts() ) : the_post(); ?>

3- Place the following code segment right ABOVE it

<!– CODE added to place in CODE addin onto front page only –>
<?php $postnum = 1; $showads = 3; ?>
<!– end CODE added to place in CODE addin onto front page only –>

4- Note:
This is set up to place the code after  your third blog post 3, if you want to change that, then change 3 to another number  (Example: =5)

5- Great! Now onto the 2nd part

_________________________

6- Find this code in LOOP.PHP (closer to the bottom)

<?php endif;

7- Place the code listed below right ABOVE it
(though erase the part that says “ERASE THIS LINE AND PLACE YOUR CODE HERE” and place in your desired code

<!– CODE part 2 added to place CODE addin –>
<?php if (is_front_page()) { ?>
<?php if ($postnum == $showads) { ?>

ERASE THIS LINE AND PLACE YOUR CODE HERE

<?php } $postnum++; ?>
<?php } ?>
<!– END – CODE part 2 added to place CODE addin–>

8- That’s it!
______________________________________________________

What if I want this on every POST, ARCHIVE and HOME PAGE?
A:  Use the following code instead (as noted in step #7)

<!– CODE part 2 added to place CODE addin –>
<?php if ($postnum == $showads) { ?>

ERASE THIS LINE AND PLACE YOUR CODE HERE

<?php } $postnum++; ?>
<!– END – CODE part 2 added to place CODE addin–>

______________________________________________________

I thought this post would be a great help to those looking for this “look and feel” option for your theme. In fact I’ve seen this kind of widget in several themes (built in), but nothing that really does this simple need function (in the way of plugins).

For clarification, it’s a sidebar widget that only shows the thumbnails (or with titles..etc) on “recent posts” organized (or with the ability to organize) into columns (2-up, 4-up, 6-up)..etc. I’ve included a snapshot example to illustrate the need:

Now I will say that you can do ALOT with this plugin, so this is only 1 example. The other cool thing is that it generates PHP that you can add to your INDEX.PHP or PAGE, POSTS..what ever!

This means your not limited to the side bar (see an example of it added to a WordPress front page)

The plugin also grants tons of options, including CATEGORIES, PAGES, specific PAGES, specific CATEGORIES…………TITLES, hide titles, LINKS, hide links…..

In any case, The item is called :

Special Recent Posts PRO
http://codecanyon.net/item/special-recent-posts-pro/552356

and only costs $6 (well worth the headache of trying to do it yourself)

____________________________

They also have a FREE version:
Special Recent Posts FREE

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/special-recent-posts/

Though the FREE version only allows 1 column, rather than multiples (and more limited options)

Lastly, I’m not a sponsor or being paid to advertise this plugin, I just thought it was a great find (and something I think many might be looking for)

Hope that helps!

It was the other day that I was searching for “this” particular need on the Internet and came across several articles. While the articles were informative, each of them seemed to be missing basic steps and/or were listing code that produced errors on my site. So for the sake of simplicity and straight forward information, I am listing the procedure in very basic steps so that anyone can add a 2nd, 3rd, 4th……menu to your theme. This lesson does not take into account child themes, it is simply the way to modify your theme as is, right out of the box

(This tutorial assumes you have a basic understanding on how to edit and save your theme files) Really there is only 3 steps, though I’ve taken the time to explain everything to walk you thru it.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++

STEPS:

1) Go into APPEARANCE –>MENUS
Create a new menu by clicking the (+) sign (tab on top), and then dragging PAGES or CATEGORIES from the left menus to the right. Save this with a name that makes sense…such as “New top menu” or “Footer Menu”

2) Ok now you’ll want to add a piece of code to your FUNCTIONS.PHP file (in your theme folder)

Copy the code “exactly” as you see it (the code contains your “primary” (main) navigation, and now your “secondary” (new) navigation.

Do a search for “wp_nav_menu”
If you are using the Twenty Ten theme then it will look like this:

// This theme uses wp_nav_menu() in one location.
register_nav_menus( array(
‘primary’ => __( ‘Primary Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
) );

Now delete that code and use this one instead:

// This theme uses wp_nav_menu() in 2 locations.
register_nav_menus( array(
‘primary’ => __( ‘Primary Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
‘secondary’ => __( ‘Secondary Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
) );

=======================
What does that do?
It adds a function to your theme, so if you go back into:
APPEARANCE –>MENUS
Under “THEME LOCATIONS” on the left, you should now see a “Secondary Navigation” under the ” Primary Navigation”
=======================

3)- Now go ahead and choose the NEW menu you created in step #1 from the drop down list under ” Secondary Navigation”
(see my graphic example)

4) OK halfway there! The Theme now recognizes the new navigation AND you have a “menu” to go INTO that navigation

Don’t see it yet on your site?
Thats right, 1 more step to go, before its live! You’ve only added code to the back end at this point.

Now this part is simply a matter of where you WANT to place the code that shows up on your HOME (front page). For this tutorial I’ve placed mine at the top just above the header……though, you can really place it where ever you like (for instance just below the main navigation or in the footer) (I’ll give you tips on those choices later)

So to get started, I am placing mine just above the top banner header.

To do that, locate  the code (inside your HEADER.PHP file)

<div id=”masthead”>

and drop this code right below it

<!– top navigation add to the theme–>
<div id=”access” role=”navigation”>
<?php wp_nav_menu( array( ‘container_class’ => ‘menu-header’, ‘theme_location’ => ‘secondary’ ) ); ?>
</div>
<!– END top navigation add to the theme–>

SAVE and check out your blog!

Notes / Tips:
The last bit of code you added can be moved wherever you like within you HEADER.PHP file. (well, experiment a bit, that is)

So if you wanted it under you existing navigation, then move it down farther in the code

======================
CSS NOTE: (very important)

You’ll want to style your menu separately. In the code above it references “access” within your css “STYLE.CSS” file. What I recommend is to go in and copy all your files named #access and rename them to something else, such as #access-top. Then re-paste, back in your “STYLE.CSS” file, so that you can style that menu separately from your main navigation bar.

This gives you control over the bar separate from the other, and lets you give it a different look and feel

See new code with new css added:

<!– top navigation add to the theme–>
<div id=”access-top” role=”navigation”>
<?php wp_nav_menu( array( ‘container_class’ => ‘menu-header’, ‘theme_location’ => ‘secondary’ ) ); ?>
</div>
<!– END top navigation add to the theme–>

======================

—————————————

ADDING MORE than 2?

If you follow the steps above you’ll notice that you can add more navigation bars by doing 2 things:

1- Add another navigation to this code

    // This theme uses wp_nav_menu() in 2 locations.
    register_nav_menus( array(
        ’primary’ => __( ‘Primary Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
        ’secondary’ => __( ‘Secondary Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
    ) );
    

So it would now look like this:  (notice the “Secondary2″ added!)

    // This theme uses wp_nav_menu() in 3 locations.
    register_nav_menus( array(
        ’primary’ => __( ‘Primary Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
        ’secondary’ => __( ‘Secondary Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
        ‘secondary2′ => __( ‘Secondary2 Navigation’, ‘twentyten’ ),
    ) );
    

Get it?

2- You’ll also need this code again (below) pasted in a different places (though rename “secondary’ to something else such as “Secondary2”

<!– top navigation add to the theme–>
<div id=”access-top” role=”navigation”>
<?php wp_nav_menu( array( ‘container_class’ => ‘menu-header’, ‘theme_location’ => ‘Secondary2‘ ) ); ?>
</div>
<!– END top navigation add to the theme–>

If you want it in your “footer”, then use the code in your FOOTER.PHP file instead

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

(make sure you save a backup of your FUNCTIONS.PHP & HEADER.PHP files in case you mis-type your codes)

TO REVIEW:

1) 2 codes added (1 goes into FUNCTIONS.PHP, the other goes into HEADER.PHP
2) New menu created in APPEARANCE–>MENUS
3) CSS code added (using existing) to work for new menu bar

For instance, a large organization can afford the luxury of a social-media focused individual who “can” take all day (or their 8 hours) and properly engage across media channels for a warm and friendly level of interaction.

The other model is the hard working blogger (usually a 1 person operation) who prefers to spend his or her time on the creation of content and fresh articles.

This article’s strategy “can” be utilized by both but is meant for the single entrepreneur who ALSO needs to alert their followers to fresh posts as they are submitted. This method is also a great way to save massive time (keeping your channels active with content) and driving traffic back from those who are alerted to your activity (your fans, LIKES and followers)

Without further ado, I have devised a simple 3 point plan that each uses a different method for submitting.

Note: While these solutions can overlap each other (submitting to multiple social channels), I have chosen this method for the “features” each offers to its respective social media platform.

Takeaway:
1- You create 1 blog post and hit SUBMIT
2- The post is sent out to the 3 major social channels (Twitter, Facebook, Google+) per RSS feed output and INTO the platforms.

My simple illustration demonstrates how this works:

Social platform #1: Google+ (using Hootsuite)
I’ve created an article on this which you can find here

Social platform #2: Twitter (using “Twitterfeed“)
“Twitterfeed” is free, and is my favorite for Twitter auto posting. Mainly because you can append to the front and back of your posts with Hash tags (if you desire). It also can be limited to “title only” which keeps the number of characters down.

Social platform #3: Facebook (using “Facebook App – RSS Graffiti“)
MY preferred method for Facebook, as it adds a thumbnail and works within the Facebook platform

This article is meant to give you a FREE solution for the top 3 platforms, the learning curve for each is extremely low, making setup quick, fast AND reliable!

Note: You must have an RSS feed for these to work, if you are using a WordPress blog, then your feed address is wwww.yourwebsite.com/feed/

2 things you need to get started:

1- Sign up for a FREE Hootsuite account (you can also pay for the PREMIUM version, if needed…I just went with the FREE one, myself)

2- I’m going to pass the torch and recommend this article that walks you thru the process of RSS feeds into Google + easily and quickly.

As of this post, I have tested this with working results!

Notes:
- Right now this is limited to Google+ PAGES and NOT your personal profile
- After adding my Feed and activating my Google+ account in Hootsuite, it takes about 1-2 hours before kicking in.

Related Queries:
Adding RSS Feed to a Google Plus Page
Add content of RSS Feed to a Google+ Page
Automatically post RSS Feeds to Google+..
Auto posting to Google+

(note: modified data for example purposes)
(numbers rounded) (Example created to demonstrate discrepancy)

Highest ALL PAGES page: Homepage
48% exit after Homepage
14% go onto “website page 1″
13% go onto “website page 7″
12% go onto “About Us contact”
9% go onto “website page 8″
remaining = various

To locate this information you’ll want to take these steps:

CONTENT–>SITE CONTENT–>ALL PAGES
(This lists highest to lowest)
(click on highest page)
(then NAVIGATION SUMMARY (tab towards the top))
- look up “next page” paths
REPEAT for next highest pages

Now if you take a look at this report (image included), you’ll notice a few things:

1- EXITS and NEXT PAGES add up to 100% (47.75% plus 52.25)

2- The #under the column % PAGEVIEWS, do not add up to the NEXT PAGES % of 52.25%, in fact they add up to more ….at 80.59% (huh what gives???)

This became an area of frustration for me, as it looks like either the calculation is off, or that you simply can’t add. So it required breaking down what’s going on here to a logical conclusion as to how GA is really handling this. I came up with 2 points of interest.

1- by default Google Analytics doesn’t report all the Previous and Next pages. So you are only seeing the top 10, the rest is hidden (which also means the number is even higher than the 80.59%!!! (huh???)

2- Google Analytics is treating its NEXT PAGES percent (which in this case is 52.25%) and breaking it down from 100% (100% of 52.25%, that is….)

Ok, I get it, so how do I get the NEXT PAGES percentage to be correct?

Easily enough, I created a quick calculator in Excel that you can use to recalculate.
Download the file here:

STEPS:
1- change the numbers in cells 2A thru 11A to the numbers from your “% Pageviews” under NEXT PAGES

2- In box 21A, type in your total percentage from NEXT PAGES (my example was 52.25%, though I rounded off to .52)

Thats it!, your corrected percentages are under column B

Which my report now looks like this:

Highest ALL PAGES page: Homepage
48%  exit after Homepage
7%  go onto “website page 1″
7%  go onto “website page 7″
6%  go onto “About Us contact”
5%  go onto “website page 8″
remaining = various

This will get your numbers back to the correct percentages so that your presentation is showing the correct numbers!

In reflection, we need to point out 2 of the biggest changes that occurred last year on the Google end of things. These updates pretty much changed the playing field for SEO professionals:

Google major updates from 2012 to keep aware of:

PANDA:
targeted low quality sites who had depended on link building tactics as their business model.
(such as article marketing sites) – this change has effected smaller micro-sites that are used to push link value back to hub sites.

PENGUIN:
targeted over-optimized websites, too much keyword-based anchor text
also sites involved in link building schemes

(aka – Scraped content, spun articles and artificial link profiles )

_____________________________________

I also want to mention a new tool that popped up. I’ve listed some notes for those who want a quick overview:

Update:

New Google Tool
tool that enables you to disavow links to your site
(clean up spammy backlinks that are low quality or unnunatural links notification / warning)
(ex: disallow p*rn sites, etc)
Disavow links page:
http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/disavow-links-main

Q: Will most sites need to use this tool?
A: No. The vast, vast majority of sites do not need to use this tool in any way. If you’re not sure what the tool does or whether you need to use it, you probably shouldn’t use it. (Google statement)

Can takes week to clear bad links

_____________________________________

Ok moving on, we have the collective of upcoming trends / predictions. Some of this might seem redundant however it is important to note what is changing and what may not

Updates / Predictions:  SEO for 2013

1- There has been a crackdown on low-quality Exact Match Domains (EMDs), Small sites
(see PANDA) – This Google change continues to evolve suggesting that small link bait sites are becoming a thing of the past as an SEO tool.  The important thing to note is that it “should” reduce those 1000’s of spam sites influencing the rankings.

2- Natural Anchor Text – Diversify | make natural | don’t obsess over it!
A takeaway suggestion in regards to over-optimizing your pages with inner links. A natural order in this case is your best bet.

3- Build Value in your product (rather than using all shortcuts in your product)
(focused on building a brand for the future – long term)
This should be a given….less weight will be given to ONLY SEO optimized sites. A return to the old rule school of creating great prodcuts first.

Takeaway: Get more people talking about your product than you trying to convince them

4- More emphasis on video promotions (recommended)
YouTube and related is hot! – More folks are clamoring for video content. Video is not slowing down.

5- More emphasis on “social signals” in SERPS rankings (may be a major ranking factor)
(Google will increasingly take signals from your social media profiles (especially Google+)
(AuthorRank uses Google Plus profiles)

5B – Anticipate the full implementation of Authorship into Google’s algorithm this coming year.
(Authorship allows Google to identify the real deal (through things like page sharing) from the imitation or emulation of expertise.)

Takeaway: Don’t ignore the potential that G+ can have on your posts for ranking. While G+ is slow moving, the intention is for it to become a component

6- Anticipate increased weight for Mobile Friendly Websites – mobile is moving forward as a prime factor

7- Expect more effort towards target audiences, researching keywords, and producing quality content vs. simply buying links that search engines ignore.

8- Google will try to put an end to search result manipulation so that it can generate more Adwords revenue.
This is a prediction that makes alot of sense from a financial aspect for Google. I’ve read this in numerous sources – also a possibility to giving weight to PAID results to level off SEO manipulation (white hat AND black hat)

9- As always – more weight on compelling content  (age ol term – Quality vs Quantity)
(Though I prefer ..more quality quantity)

10- SEO to become more competitive with changes mentioned AND Google business model restructures

11- CONTENT – Favoritism to longer posts – (also mentioned last year)
Takeaway:
- longer posts (articles, pages)
- quality content
- less spammy tactics
- “average” use of inner linking opposed to abusive inner linking

12- PR and Social are now playing such a key role towards influencing search rankings that most great links are now created as a by-product of good PR.

13- Personalized search results will begin to take more precedence
(influencing personalized search is very important)

14- SEO has evolved from pure SEO to (conversion rate optimization, digital marketing, social signals building, content building)

Takeaway: An SEO’s job is not as cut and dry as in previous years. The modern SEO role will have to cross over into other areas embracing  “Inbound Marketing” as a whole

15-  Unique content still matters as much as ever!  (thank God!)

16- The Rule of 60 is also important for your title tag. As Ruth Burr wrote in a recent case study, “When your title tag is too long, instead of simply truncating it and adding an ellipsis to the end the way they used to, Google is trying to algorithmically determine a better title for the post.”

Takeaway rule:  Length: (do not exceed 70 characters) or 6 to 12 words”

17- Current SEO On-page Tactics – Continue as ongoing

18- We are approaching the ending of “link building” and into the era of “link earning”! – (well said by SEOMOZ!!)

__________________________________
Google – Matt Cutts: important statements last year

- Cutts pointed out that Google doesn’t hate SEO. The goal of SEO is to make websites more crawlable and faster. When SEO becomes an issue is when spam comes into play, such as if you go overboard buying links, doing comment spam links, or keyword stuffing

- The number of Twitter followers is a potential social signal. Google isn’t able to crawl Facebook, either because people set their profiles to private or Google is blocked from crawling. When Google lost access to Twitter’s firehose, Twitter blocked Google for several weeks. If Google can’t crawl and see how many people you follow or who follow you, they can’t use that as a reliable signal.

- Create a site that will stand the test of time, Cutts said. A site that people will tell their friends about and bookmark. That’s the site Google wants people to build.

- duplicate content – Google tries to show the content they think came first or has the most value.
__________________________________

RESOURCE NATION: (suggestions for 2013)

1. Commit to writing more content (blog at least once a week)

2. Get at least one quality link each week.

3. Add new content/update old content on your website.

(take a look at your analytics and see which pages are performing the best and which ones are doing the worst, focus on fixing the worst ones)
__________________________________

SEO – New Model (suggested trends)

Blogs – Write appealing content that other people will WANT to link to.
(social validation)

Visual Content – Powerful, unique, or even comical, images lead people to link to your website.
This includes video content as well!

Product Launches – product launch inspires people to talk about your business
(we do this already)

Guest Blogging
Creating valuable content for other websites provides an easy to link back to your business
(doesn’t seem to be an option at the moment)

______________________________________

SEOMOZ comparison Breakdown
Changes – Change of focus (old SEO vs New SEO)

1- Partnerships and Cross Promotions OVER Link Exchanges / Reciprocal

2- Social Sharing of Organic Links OVER Email Blasts

3- Links coming from Direct content OVER purchasing Links

4- Curated Lists (Yelps list of, Business list of…) OVER directory adding

5- Guest Postings (niche) OVER Article Marketing

6- Communities that Link organically OVER Forum Commenting

Sources for evaluation:

Source 1
Source 2
Source 3
Source 4
Source 5
Source 6
Source 7
Source 8
Source 9
Source 10

WHAT DO YOU ADVISE?

1- Timing is everything!

You want to roll out your “winter wear” campaigns during the snow season, not before, not when it’s not needed. This way by the time it “is” season, they are not worn down with a smattering of ads from the summer months

2- Higher quality leads are key to having a better ROI!

Again, the key term here is “quality leads”. Spamming will cost you time and annoy…better yet, let’s make sure who your sending to “has” an interest in what your selling.

3- Keep your list fresh!

Always make plans to update your list, delete dead accounts and keep it current, so that your efforts are going out to fresh prospects, not hand me down email addresses. It has been written that 40% of your returns relies on the “correct” list being used, whether it’s by direct mail or email.

4- Target those who are more “likely” to take an interest in your product

This comes from efficient profiling and a trusted database

5- Educate your customers!

Don’t just sell, sell, sell (or rather market market market ;)…..give them some intelligent info as to why they “should” choose what you are selling. Raise the awareness of your brand!

6- Build your customers profiles!

Learn and fine tune who is best suited for what. A good example of this can be seen on the Amazon.com web site. Have you ever noticed the recommendations seem to match what your interested in? HMM….it’s like they read minds or something! Make sure you have means to capture this data and analyze it.

7- Offers – Make a CTA (call to action)!

Give them an incentive to purchase….examples: limited offers, coupons, specials, a certain need, a demand..etc

8- Test, Test, Test!

Don’t take your eye off the ball – You must keep with the times to recognize consumer change and migration. Track the results of your campaigns. Your also looking for that “low hanging fruit”, the opportunities that are waiting to be picked. This can be accomplished by measuring your “customer experience”.

9- Provide many ways for clients to contact you!

This shows that you are concerned about your clients and haven’t limited it to just mail in, just web or just phone…give them variety!

10- Testimonials have power!

People like to hear the response of “real people” (those who purchased something from you and had a great experience). Consider adding some to your corporation’s web site.

Well, I hope that gives you a foundation to work with. Stayed tuned for future articles!

You may have heard this term thrown around over the years, or you might have already actually incorporated the style into your own marketing efforts. Those who use it, tend to stand behind it, as it’s a form a marketing that really works if you let yourself wrap your head around it. It has been called by many as one of the most “efficient” forms of marketing. now, the emphasis of this site is of course “Inbound Marketing”, however many principles began with various forms of marketing such as DM (and in many ways cross-over)

Though for the purpose of this article, my aim is to list out the key points of what it is and why it’s important. It has been a form of marketing that many have already utilized and continue to utilize to provide the best “experience” and “need” for your customers.

First a few key directives:

Spam = annoying, old school, bothersome, could and “will” put off” potential customers

Wait! what do you mean….my mailing list may be in the 1000′s, but I “do” get “some response?

Yep, well a mailing list is part of it, but not the old school spammy way. The “send it and they will come” days are a thing of the past, and it’s definitely not the way of Direct Marketing.

Remember this simple 3 step directive:

DATA–> TO INSIGHT —>TO ACTION

So what is it?

Essentially it’s the practice of taking a product and trying to sell it to those who have an “interest” in what your selling. Say for instance a friend, or an associate. Better yet, those who trust you and appreciate your efforts in marketing them things that they have a need for. It’s educating your customer, so that they can make the right decisions. It’s educating them on why “what” you have, is what they are looking for”. In short it is a form of “customer relationship management“.

So how does this all work?

You’ll hear the term “database” often. A trusted / professionally scrutinized database is key to your efforts. Sometimes if you are starting from scratch or trying to up your Intel, then it is recommended that you A/B test at least 3 main elements of your campaigns to fine tune your data.

What are those?
1- Pricing
2- Your Offer
3- Your opening statement (or headline)

This is accomplished by mailing out your offer in 3 separate variations to see which of the 3 produce a better response and better ROI. This can be tested more than once to fine tune your results data.

Results!
You can actually measure the data, refine it and repeat! This is how master marketers get the right info and the right products into the hands of those who desire or need it.

Forms of Direct marketing:
1- mailing (direct mail)
2- email
3- tweets
4- postings

Takeaway:

Whittle your list down to those who are most likely to take advantage of your offers. Once they do, track where they came from, who uses what, and what they use it for. This can be elaborated on by listing which zip codes tend to respond to your marketing efforts most. In other words your “demographics” and who you should target..how much did they spend.

Make sense?

Direct marketing can be a very professional and consistent form of advertising.

Make sure to check out my article on “10 Steps to Competent Direct Marketing“

This method assumes you have a sufficient understanding of WordPress files, and how to get into your MYSQL DATABASE datadase

RECOMMENDATION for backup:
for decent auto scheduled backups, I suggest the plugin WP-DBManager
(set it to backup your database in the “sql.gz” format (GZIP )
(you can set this under DATABASE–>DB OPTIONS (once plugin is installed)
- where it says:
Automatic Scheduling
(Automatic Backing Up Of DB) – set Gzip to YES

If unsure, about your backups, you can always create a BRAND NEW DATABASE or which you “import into” using the following method:

STEPS:

1- Login to YOUR ISP PROVIDER, go into the section that resembles MYSQL DATABASE

2- Find the corrupt database (should know the name of the database first (if more than one databases))
(is it fixable or corrupt)?
(if corrupt then move forward, if fixable then you only need to do a REPAIR)

3- Create a new USERNAME login (and password) (thru your MYSQL DATABASE section of ISP site)

4- Go into FTP files and update your WP-CONFIG.PHP with your new USERNAME and PASSWORD
(- also download your last working DATABASE to your hard drive (from the folder WP-CONTENT–>BACKUP-DB if using the plugin mentioned above)

5- Go into the new login for your Database, “CHECK ALL“, then choose “DROP” from the drop down
(this empties out the database back to zero) – SO BE CERTAIN THAT you have a backup saved somewhere first!

6- Grab your backed up DATABASE FILE (should be something like: 1356516987_-_d60773932.sql.gz)

Database backups: I get these from using the plugin ” WP-DBManager“, which is set to back up every day

7- Upload this directly to your database by using the IMPORT function in MYSQL DATABASE
(this will rewrite the files back into your empty database with your older non corrupt database files)
(be patient, as it might take a few minutes)

8- Now you should be able to go directly into your WordPress site
by typing in:
http://www.yoursitename.com/wp-admin/

9- Does the site come up and re-populate like before?
If not, either something went wrong with the database, or your THEME files are corrupt as well, of which you should do a full reinstall
(to reinstate clean WordPress files)

If you are able to get in with no problems, I suggest doing 2 main things:
1- Go into DASHBOARD–>UPDATES, then click the REINSTALL on the “latest version of WordPress.”
(you should also update to the most current version at this time)
2- Go into SETTINGS–>PERMALINKS, click the SAVE CHANGES button
(this is necessary to refresh all your links, so that your directories are all connected again)

That’s it!

OTHER NOTES:
- after, I suggest locking down security measures, such as:
- changing login / password
- update your .htaccess file with security measures (or the ones you had in their previously, before REINSTALL)
- check your theme files, maybe overwrite thru FTP with your previous backed up ones
- Delete any theme files that you are not using (from the FTP)
(sometimes, these unused theme files contain back doors for Hackers to get in)

1- Log into GA
2- Go to TRAFFIC SOURCES—>SOURCES–>SEARCH–>ORGANIC (if only looking at organic)
3- change the date range to desired range
4- Go  to bottom of page and look at how many keywords are listed (for instance it might say “1- 841″ or such).
This tells you how many keywords for the period you are looking up there are.
(For example, the total keyword count for me was 2033)
5- Select 500 from bottom first
6- Go to your URL listed at top in your browser.

It should look something like this:

https://www.google.com/analytics/web/?pli=1#report/trafficsources-organic/a2508626w4554830p4686234/%3F_.date00%3D20120401%26_.date01%3D20120630%26explorer-table.rowStart%3D0%26explorer-table.rowCount%3D500/

Now change the end of the URL to your total number (for instance mine would be 2033) – see example

https://www.google.com/analytics/web/?pli=1#report/trafficsources-organic/a2508626w4554830p4686234/%3F_.date00%3D20120401%26_.date01%3D20120630%26explorer-table.rowStart%3D0%26explorer-table.rowCount%3D2033/

HIT ENTER!

That’s it, you should now have your entire collection of keywords showing in GA, you can now export to pdf, or to Excel!

After dealing with a recent issue of BAD bots hogging up my server resources, I began to look into solutions for keeping these nasty critters out. At one point my web site was even shut down BY my ISP because it reported close to 414K hits from bots that were hogging the resources (on a shared server, that is)

I did give the solution “Black Hole” a whirl, however after following instructions, my site wouldn’t come up due to errors.
So instead of trying to figure out why a recommendation that was actually quite old (2010) wasn’t working I went a different direction.
(Note: if “Black Hole” is still working, then “perishablepress” might want to update their notes to current rather than adding on a addendum that seemed to confuse.

I did find a solution on the site hackrespair.com, that seemed to be just what I was looking for.

In short, by adding a bit of code to your .htaccess file, you can cut the BAD BOTS of at the pass

The link for the code is located here: http://pastebin.com/5Hw9KZnW

I suggest cutting and pasting FROM section marked “RAW Paste Data” on the bottom (also it makes sense to check back as the code is updated – current right now to June 2012)

Then follow these recommended steps from the site:

1.First, see the list using the above link.
2.Copy it to your computer’s memory.
3.Next open your .htaccess file via your editor.
4.Paste this list at the very bottom of your .htaccess file

Note: you can also block using the robots.txt file, however this method seemed to be a bit tighter in keeping the bots out than the robots.txt method

That’s it!

So for starters let’s look at the 2 metrics available to you:

The confusion might occur when you flip between the 2 metric pages (ALL and LANDING) and start to see different readings on higher ranking pages. I believe this metric had to be addressed depending on “what” information you are seeking. Hopefully the statement below will shed some light on the 2

ALL PAGES
(located under CONTENT–>SITE CONTENT–>ALL PAGES)
Refers to your most popular page views.

So say 3 visitors each visit a different page on your site then click over to the homepage, the 3 different pages would get 1 page view and the home page would get 3 page views
= giving the home page a higher PAGE VIEW ranking (thus ALL PAGES), though this doesn’t mean from the statement just made that 3 visitors came to your site LANDING on the homepage first)

——————————

LANDING PAGES
(located under CONTENT–>SITE CONTENT–>LANDING PAGES)
- Landing Pages refer to the 1st page a visitor lands on (on your site) from another web site, such as Google, Bing or other. Since Google Analytics doesn’t have a listing for referrals (under) this section), I would assume it also includes landing on your page from links as well)

- Landing Pages would be more relative to measuring your SEO results as since they are coming from an outside reference, such as a Google listing or search engine. Still you might get a better perspective referring to the keywords directly under the section (TRAFFIC SOURCES–>SOURCES–>SEARCH–>ORGANIC)

Conclusion: Between the 2 metrics, you can determine a couple things. What pages are most popular on your site (once they are on there) and what pages are most popular when entering from the outside for the first time.

1 metric tells you what content visitors are most interested in (or maybe sections of your site for that matter). The other tells you what is most popular for drawing others in.

Google Analytics: Difference Between ALL PAGES and LANDING PAGES data

The official memo was:

wp-content/cache/ are exceeding the maxdir size limit. This directory is filling up with thousands of files rapidly, causing issues for the server.

To be honest I didn’t see a working section in the “Quick Cache” plugin to deal with this issue
(which is to empty the cache folder daily or more)

So I came up with a solution:

2 things are needed

- A script
- a plugin to run the script automatically thru WordPress (at intervals)

1- Install plugin
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/crony/

2- Go to – CRONJOBS–>MANAGE CRONJOBS—>”Add new Cron job”

3- add script to section “Custom PHP to Run”
(note for script, you’ll need to grab it from this article)

4- set “schedule” to “Once Daily” (or your desired amount)

5- SAVE changes

This will run a PHP script that will go into the “Quick Cache” folder and empty the contents daily. It’s nice because it works seamlessly in the background

Objective: You need to create a PHP script and place it in your ROOT directory

Disclaimer: Read directions and MAKE SURE your path is correct or you could end up deleting stuff you didn’t want to
(in other words run a test after you’ve backed up your site)

———————————-
You need to create a PHP script and place it in your ROOT directory

1- to do this, create a text document and paste in the following code:

<?php
function remove($dirname = ‘.’)
{
        if (is_dir($dirname))
        {
                echo “$dirname is a directory.<br />”;

                if ($handle = @opendir($dirname))
                {
                        while (($file = readdir($handle)) !== false)
                        {
                                if ($file != “.” && $file != “..”)
                                {
                                        echo “$file<br />”;

                                        $fullpath = $dirname . ‘/’ . $file;

                                        if (is_dir($fullpath))
                                        {
                                                remove($fullpath);
                                                @rmdir($fullpath);
                                        }
                                        else
                                        {
                                                @unlink($fullpath);
                                        }
                                }
                        }
                        closedir($handle);
                }
        }
}
remove(‘test/’); // This is the directory folder that the files reside in to be deleted.
?>

—————-

2- make sure that you replace the part of the code that says: (with the folder name that you want your contents emptied FROM)

remove(‘test/’); // This is the directory folder that the files reside in to be deleted.

So to clarify, if your folder is located at:
(the folder that your want contents emptied from)

Example only:

http://www.simpleinbound.com/wp-content/cache/

then you need to add  wp-content/cache/ to the line, so that it looks like this

remove(‘wp-content/cache/‘); // This is the directory folder that the files reside in to be deleted.

———————-

3- Now SAVE this file, rename it emptycachescript.php, and upload to your ROOT diretcory

——————————–
4- put some contents in the folder that you want things deleted from (for purposes of testing)

(NOTE YOU CAN TEST IF THIS IS WORKING BY RUNNING THE SCRIPT THRU YOUR BROWSER)

SO you would type in:

http://www.yoursite.com/emptycachescript.php

Now go back and check, to see if the folder is now empty?
Yes? – cool then its working!

NOW that you’ve got the script, you can set it up to run thru your ISP, or cron or automated process plugin

_____________________________________________

WordPress users? I have added a solution for you
Please seed this post which details the process using the PHP script from this post

Did you know that you can have your TAG descriptions visible on your WordPress pages? So you want TAG “descriptions” to show at the top of the page as well? Maybe you want to delete that ugly default that says

Example:  “Tag Archives: Custom Font”

Why would you need this? Maybe you don’t want to have a category for everything in your blog. Maybe you have a special need to tag a few articles that have common categories but a specific tag (and you want that TAG to have a description showing that helps in SEO!!!) For instance, your articles might be categorized under “News”, but you want your tag page for tag “2012″ to have “it’s own header description.

——————————

Now to clarify the kind of pages I’m talking about, it might be a page like :

http://www.simpleinbound.com/tag/custom-font/

which is a tag page that gets categoried under “WordPress”

——————————

01- Open the file tag.php

02- Edit

03-  Find the section that is similair to this

<h1><?php
printf( __( ‘Tag Archives: %s’, ‘twentyten’ ), ‘<span>’ . single_tag_title( ”, false ) . ‘</span>’ );
?></h1>

04- Add this code right beneath it

<!– CODE added to DISPLAY  TAG descriptions –>
<?php if (is_tag()) { ?><?php echo tag_description(); ?><?php } ?>
<!– end CODE added to DISPLAY  TAG descriptions –>

05- SAVE

___________________________________________

NEXT STEPS:

01- Go into your TAGS (in your dashboard located at)

POSTS–>POST TAGS

02- Do a search for the Tag that you want a description added and click EDIT to add it to the “description field”

I pasted in some HTML code like this:

<p>
<strong>2012 specific articles:</strong><br />
Archive of 2012 related articles of interest<br />
Check back as many more are added to this archive
<p>

That’s it – the tag page for this tag should now have a description

======================================================

How to Get rid of TAG headers (found at top of TAG pages)

If you don’t like that default header that appears on TAG pages, you can comment it out by the following method

Example:
“Tag Archives: found footage”

Comment this section out:

<h1><?php
printf( __( ‘Tag Archives: %s’, ‘twentyten’ ), ‘<span>’ . single_tag_title( ”, false ) . ‘</span>’ );
?></h1>

should look like this:

<!– commenting out TAG page headers –>
<!–
<h1><?php
printf( __( ‘Tag Archives: %s’, ‘twentyten’ ), ‘<span>’ . single_tag_title( ”, false ) . ‘</span>’ );
?></h1>
–>
<!– END commenting out TAG headers –>

Thats’s it!

If you have set up your blog or RSS feed to funnel into Facebook, you may have run into this once or twice. What we’re talking about is your RSS feed posts showing up in Facebook more than once upon posting. The reason might vary for how you setup your accounts but I thought it best to offer a few suggestions for you to troubleshoot.

Hopefully one of these will lead you in the right direction:

1- Check your WordPress plugins, make sure there isn’t one that might be doubling up or sending out a post from your feed into Facebook. If one looks suspicious, you might try deactivating it until you can test this against your accounts.

2- Are you using Facebook’s “RSS Graffiti” plugin? Check the settings to make sure you didn’t set up 2 channels by accident that post back to your Facebook page

3- Lastly but not least (and for the record the one I eventually tracked the issue down to)
Are you using http://twitterfeed.com/ to autopost your RSS feeds into Facebook?

Make sure you login and check your settings. http://twitterfeed.com/ allows you to autopost your RSS feed back into Facebook thru Twitterfeed. It’s a great solution, however it’s quite possible that 1 of 2 things occurred.
1- you accidentally created the service twice (of which it will hit Facebook 2X on every post)
2- you created 2 accounts (forgetting about the original you set up) which are also hitting Facebook 2x

In any case, if this is so, make sure and deactivate at least one them

Some detective work:
Make sure you check your Facebook Apps to see if something sticks out that shouldn’t

A- Go to your personal profile
B- Right top corner: HOME–>ACCOUNT SETTINGS–APPS
C- Look thru the list of Apps being used

ALSO – remember that if you have multiple ADMINS (assigned to the problem page), one of the other ADMINS may have an APP or setting that is being funneled thru “their” account. You may have to log into their personal account, or have them do it to see if anything is setup on their end. For instance, if your personal account and their personal account are both using the “RSS Graffiti” plugin, then it may be triggering twice on the same Facebook Page.

Usually by trying all the above you can filter your way down into where the issue is occurring

Keywords:
- Posts appear twice
- Facebook posting more than once
- Facebook RSS feed appears twice
- Facebook RSS feed is doubling up

Simple.

Example:
Say you have a music act that posts regular feeds from its Twitter account, and YOU want to repost them out of your own personal account. Theoretically this would give you 2 points of promotion, 1 thru the main Twitter account and 1 thru your own personal Twitter account.

Well this idea can be used for businesses in the same way with all sort of combinations.

Example 2:

Your personal account feeds in “common interest feeds” AND you’d like your business Tweets to come thru directly as well (thru your personal account that is)

OK so with that out of the way you have to solve a couple issues:

________________________________

STEPS:

1- What is the RSS Feed from your Main account (music act account, business or other)

- replace the part of the feed that says “addyourusernamehere” with your Twitter user name

https://twitter.com/statuses/user_timeline/addyourusernamehere.rss

Side Note:
You can get different Twitter feed suggestions from this page

2- How do I feed my Twitter feed back into Twitter?

Good question, that’s pretty easy…… however you may run into an issue with your Twitter feed (used in step #1)

Let me explain:

A) First you would need create an account on Twitterfeed.com
(this allows you to import feeds from other sources and send them back into your Twitter account)

B) Using Twitterfeed, you can have multiple RSS feeds coming into one source and outputting directy back into Twitter…cool eh?

C) Problem, Twitterfeed will give you an error if you try and use a “Twitter RSS Feed” as a source (such as the one posted in Step #1)

in fact the exact message is “”twitter does not allow posting of twitter feeds back to twitter”

D) How to solve this?
Well, what I had to do is create a working version of the feed, one that was converted and then re-processed (so to speak)
I found a solution by going to http://www.feedkiller.com/ and entering in the Twitter RSS feed (from step #1) into the “mix field” (note you may HAVE to have a least 2 feeds for this to work, though the 2nd could be a dead feed or some feed that never updates)

The result will give you a new working feed THAT YOU CAN use!

E) Now go back to Twitterfeed and enter in this new RSS feed
(when adding this make sure and select “advanced and select “Post new items based on GUID’)

Final note – if http://www.feedkiller.com/ at some point is no longer working, you’ll need to find another way to convert your Twitter feed such as http://www.rssmix.com/ or such.

THATS IT – using the steps detailed above you should be able to import a Twitter Feed dirrectly into another Twitter account

(Note: I didn’t test it, but you may be able to run the feed thru Yahoo Pipes as well to re-process it)

Usally it is found in the “footer.php” file, but when deleted it can cause your blog theme to mess up.
A simple solution is just “comment” it out. This should keep it from showing without deleting the theme code. Notice the <!– character added twice

(Example)
Before

  &copy;
                <?php echo date(“Y”);?> – <?php bloginfo(‘name’); ?> is proudly powered by <a href=”http://wordpress.org/”>WordPress</a><br/>

  <?php /*Please leave 1 credit line to the theme designer. Thanks.*/ theme_credit();?>

After:

  <!–&copy;
                <?php echo date(“Y”);?> – <?php bloginfo(‘name’); ?> is proudly powered by <a href=”http://wordpress.org/”>WordPress</a><br/>–>

  <!–<?php /*Please leave 1 credit line to the theme designer. Thanks.*/ theme_credit();?>–>