Tag Archives: design

Announcing the Prose Theme for WordPress

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You may have seen recently that we merged StudioPress, creator of the powerful Genesis theme framework , into Copyblogger Media. Why did we do it? I can sum it up for you in a single phrase: because we’re control freaks . With Genesis, we saw an opportunity to create WordPress themes that were tailored exactly to our customers’ needs and desires. We could incorporate the features that are most important for content-rich sites, the expert SEO you insist on, and the security to keep your sites as safe as possible. Brian and I worked closely with Genesis founder (and our new partner) Brian Gardner on a new collaboration. A WordPress theme designed for those of you — bloggers, copywriters, consultants, and content marketers — who in one way or another produce great content to make a living or part-time income. I’d like to introduce you to Prose . An elegant minimalist design The first thing we knew was that we wanted the design to support your content, not fight with it. Some themes make great use of animated widgets, or are designed to highlight striking imagery. Or they’re great for e-commerce, or building a corporate brand. And Genesis has terrific themes that do all of those. Prose is something different. It’s all about words. Your words. It’s simple and elegant, so it doesn’t distract. But it has enough design sophistication that it never looks amateurish or “fly by night.” Like the perfect little black dress, it doesn’t call attention to itself … it just makes you look amazing. Point and click design controls But just because you may not be first and foremost a designer, that doesn’t mean you want to commit yourself to a single rigid design mold. Writers are creative people, after all. And we knew you’d insist on being able to change some key elements yourself, without “breaking” the overall clean, designed look of the theme. That’s why we built in point-and-click design controls into Prose. They let you control site colors, typefaces, font sizes, and other critical elements of your site design. Instantly. Do your readers want a larger font size? That’s just a few clicks away, starting right from your WordPress dashboard. Want to try a different column layout for your site, or to change the look of your subheads? Takes less than a minute. And if you don’t like it, it’s a few clicks to change it back again. You can change how your links are styled, how tall you want your header to be, and dozens of other key design elements. And you don’t have to know any CSS, HTML, PHP, or any other letters. If you can point and click, you can customize your site design. Search optimized and powered by Genesis You might have seen that Genesis isn’t just a WordPress theme, it’s actually what’s called a theme framework. So my first question when I saw that was, What’s a theme framework? The first thing you need to know is that when it comes to web design, form and function need to be separated . In other words, how your web page works (like the code that Google looks at to find your content and how to rank it, or the security that keeps evildoers from hacking your blog) should be separated from how your web page looks . Why? Well, in the first place, Google is a big fan of clean code. The Google “bots” are sophisticated, but they’re only so smart. Clunky, junked-up code can confuse them — and if Google gets confused, they won’t give your site the ranking you deserve. In the second place, the web evolves. Those “back end” elements always need to be up-to-date. Security evolves, SEO evolves, WordPress evolves, and your page function needs to grow with those things so that everything works the way it should. But the last thing you want is for your carefully designed web page to suddenly look completely different because you updated your WordPress theme. That’s the beauty of a framework. When you click the button to update Genesis, it automatically takes care of all of those security and SEO issues for you. But it doesn’t touch the design of the page, because that’s handled by “child themes.” OK, so what’s a child theme? The theme framework is all about how the site works . A child theme (like Prose and 27 others from StudioPress ) is in charge of how the site looks . The colors. The layout. The typefaces. The child theme controls the “look and feel” of your site. And the exact same content will have a very different feel depending on how that content gets presented. The nice thing about child themes is that with the Genesis framework, you can change them in just minutes. That means you can take a funky site with a handmade flavor, like the Genesis Bee Crafty theme, and in about two minutes you can give that exact same content a sleek professional gloss by switching to the Enterprise theme. And you’ll never touch the important “behind the scenes” code that makes your site work exactly the way you want it to. The biggest security hazard for most blogs Unfortunately, bad guys are everywhere, and blogs get hacked every day. The most common culprit? Bloggers who haven’t updated their theme or their WordPress installation because they’re worried it will mess up the look and usability of their sites. Outdated software is a major security hazard. In fact, Brian Gardner told me that one of the reasons he developed the Genesis framework in the first place was to make updating his own sites one-click-easy. When it’s easy for you to update WordPress and your theme framework, and you don’t worry about anything breaking, you won’t put it off. And that keeps your blog (and your readers) safer. Get Prose + Genesis today Pick up Prose with Genesis today and you’ll get: Prose’s point-and-click design controls to create the exact look you want A great-looking theme that puts the focus on your content All the SEO and security benefits of the Genesis Framework Unlimited updates and support The ability to use Prose on as many sites as you like (no developer surcharge) Find out more about the best WordPress theme for writers and content marketers here. About the Author : Sonia Simone is Senior Editor of Copyblogger and CMO of Copyblogger Media. Follow her on twitter .

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Blogging with a Learner’s Mind

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“¿Qué quiere para su desayuno?” she asked, inches from my face. I thought as quickly as I could, and managed to haltingly request a piece of toast. “Pan tostado, por favor.” It was the only breakfast food that I could remember from Spanish class. It ended up being all I ate for breakfast for the next week. Clearly, I hadn’t yet found my learner’s mind. Each of the first few nights I spent in Bogotá I curled beneath the covers with a pounding headache. Trying to think and speak in another language was physically painful. Of the six Americans going through exchange student orientation that year, my Spanish was the worst of the bunch. Those first weeks I spoke like a four-year-old. It was excruciating, especially for someone who took pride in her communication skills. Despite the painful beginning, I learned a valuable lesson that year. It didn’t have anything to do with the Spanish language. It had to do with losing my fear of looking like a fool . Public humiliation If you’ve ever tried to make yourself understood in a language you’re just learning, you’ll know what I mean. You’re proficient in your native language, but to learn a new one you need to start from the beginning. You have to be willing to speak like a toddler for a while. Once you’ve learned some basic vocabulary, you might begin to speak like a young child. All the while, you mangle words and raise eyebrows and send people into fits of laughter several times a day. It’s the public humiliation aspect to learning a new language that no one ever mentions. You’ve mastered your own language, but to master a new one you have to be willing to look like a fool for a while. A fool with a tool Fast forward … let’s say “many years.” As a blogger, I find it’s great to feel comfortable making a fool of myself. Blogging is a decidedly public venue to make beginner’s mistakes in, but the only way to become an experienced blogger is to be a beginning blogger for a while. You publish a draft post by mistake. You send out a link that doesn’t work. You discover — too late — that you’ve left out a crucial piece of information. The only way to get past blogging mistakes is to make them in the first place. When it comes to developing products to sell, we go through the same thing. Our first sales pages suck. The first products we develop may not sell . We cast about, trying to get a bite on our lines. Often we head home empty-handed. And it all happens in public. But each failure gets us closer to success, even if the only thing we learn is what doesn’t work. Baby chicks are easy to spot Twitter is another space where it’s easy to see who the beginners are. I know, because I was one of them not long ago. People start out talking about their breakfast. They check into Foursquare incessantly. They try to direct message someone, but post it publicly instead. After a while though, they observe how the power users make the most of Twitter . They figure out a way to fit it into their workflow so it doesn’t consume all their time. They master the language. Here’s the thing: if you want to master a new skill, you have to start somewhere. As uncomfortable as it is, you have to submit yourself to looking like a fool while you master the tool. There’s no use standing on the sidelines analyzing . You can’t study your way through the beginner’s phase. You can’t strategize yourself into mastery of a new skill. At some point, you have to dive in, make your mistakes, get them out of the way and move on from them. That’s where having a learner’s mind will help. A learner’s mind is fearless Children are wired to learn, which is why they make such huge developmental strides in their first years of life. In the space of a year, they go from unable to hold themselves upright to running; from crying to expressing their needs quite clearly. They fall, shed a few tears, pick themselves up, and keep going. They don’t worry about what people will think: they don’t give it a thought. All the while, they’re learning and making great progress. We can apply this attitude to the new skills we’re learning, too. We can expect mistakes and embrace them when they happen. We can pick ourselves up, brush ourselves off, put our chins up and keep going. Plan to fall Blogging, Internet marketing, Twitter and all the rest of these newer technologies present great opportunities. You can learn a lot by studying them before you start to use them. You might be able to avoid some mistakes by doing that. But you can’t vault yourself from beginner to expert just by reading about it. You have to take the first steps, and prepare for the inevitable bumps and bruises that come with making real progress. It’s the only way to learn, really. And it’s the only way to get past plain toast for breakfast every day. Worth it, though, don’t you think? About the Author: Pamela Wilson helps small businesses grow with great design and marketing tips. Learn the basics with her free Design 101 e-course at Big Brand System.

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The Simple Tricks Experts Use to Always Get Paid For Their Time

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When I think about it, I still get that feeling in the pit of my stomach. I was chatting with a woman with an interior design business about the changes she needed to make in her website. The conversation was going well — she loved all my ideas and was ready to rebuild her site. I started getting excited, thinking I had found my next project. I was already putting together her proposal in my head. Then she uttered those dreaded words … “I’d love to take you to lunch and pick your brain sometime.” I didn’t know what to say or do. I felt my face turning red and I stammered out an excuse about getting back to her when I checked my calendar. Requests for “brain-picking” are rampant in any business, and they’re never fun if you’re the one whose brain is being picked. It used to happen to me so much that I found myself becoming resentful. Every time I spoke with someone new I heard a little voice in the back of my head saying “Ugh, I bet they’ll never hire you, they just want a bunch of help for free”. That little voice was not very helpful for landing clients If you’ve ever been in this situation, there is a way to turn this around. There is a way to handle these situations with grace and without frustration. There’s even a way to make those freebie requests go away — or, even better, turn into paying clients. It is your job, and your job alone, to set appropriate boundaries and clear up what you’re happy to give for free and what you charge for. That might be hard to hear. But if you want to move through these situations with grace (and encounter them less often) you have to stop placing blame — and start making it a policy to get paid for your time. Sound impossible? It’s not. Here’s how: 1. Take full responsibility The most important thing you can do is stop being angry at the prospect for asking. Put yourself in their shoes for a moment. If you were given the choice between getting a new computer for free or paying for the same computer, you’d pick free every time — and you’d never think about the company who doesn’t get paid for the sale. Why would you? I know free is my favorite price for everything. It is your prospect’s prerogative to ask for your time for free. Let me say that again — it is their prerogative to ask . In fact, they’d be missing a golden opportunity if they paid for something when they didn’t have to. You can’t blame the prospect for taking the smart route. You’re also missing the subtle compliment that goes with being asked for advice. When someone asks you for your time for free, be grateful that they view you as someone who can offer valuable advice . Gary Vaynerchuk constantly says how grateful he is to get thousands of emails a day — he doesn’t take it for granted that every one of those people thinks that he is worth taking time out of their life to write to him. Everyone asking for your time is already “sold” on you to a degree — they must be or they wouldn’t be asking you for more! Instead of viewing them as a dead-end cheapskate, see them as someone who is so invested in you that they’ll either be a potential client or a source of referrals. 2. Clearly establish your service offerings Sometimes people ask you to work for free because you haven’t given them anything to buy. When I offered web design I didn’t have any packages for ongoing support. I charged clients a per-project fee, and considered the project done when the client signed off on the design. Invariably, people would contact me after the project was officially “over” with some tiny request — things that literally took 5-10 minutes of my time. Crafting a new invoice for this small request seemed silly, yet all of these requests were starting to seriously eat up my time. I started to feel like I had to provide free service for life for each one-time purchase, and I felt like people were taking advantage of me when they asked for these small favors. Looking back, I can see that they weren’t taking advantage of me. The issue was mine. I should have had a clearly-defined ongoing support package to offer in response to those requests. That would have made things clear — either you had purchased my ongoing support or you hadn’t. As it stood, everyone was in the grey zone. If you don’t like people asking for your time for free, but also don’t have any sort of well-defined offer in place to charge them for that time, the blame falls squarely on you. 3. Decide what you’ll give away … What are you willing to give out for free? This is where content marketing is your friend, because you offer plenty of valuable free resources like your blog or newsletter. It also may be appropriate to do brief introductory phone calls, or host one group in-person session per month for people who are interested in working with you. Whatever it is for your business, get clear. For the record, you do not have to offer any time for free. It is possible to get hired without any kind of free consult beforehand if you do a great job building the relationship ahead of time with your content marketing . In my business people sign $5,000 contracts with me without any kind of free introductory consult. 4. … but don’t assume that free advice is all they want We often make the mistake of assuming that someone isn’t willing to pay just because they ask to “pick our brain.” Again, they’re asking because we all love free. That doesn’t mean they’re unwilling to pay, it means they’re hoping they won’t have to. They’ve expressed interest in learning more from you, which means they are a potential client and should be treated as such. Remember that you are in business here, which means that you exchange value for money. Don’t let “free” become your default mode. It is your job to take the lead. If you lead them down the free path that’s exactly where they’ll go. Lead them down the customer path instead. 5. Respond with confidence Here’s a script for how to handle someone asking you for coffee or lunch to “pick your brain”: I’m glad to hear you’re interested in getting deeper into this. The next step is my one-hour consultation. Would you like me to tell you how that works? Notice that you’re asking permission and putting the prospect in the driver’s seat. You’re also using the clear service offering that you established in step two. You’re not explaining why you’re charging, because there’s no need: your time is valuable . That’s a given. Even if you’re not used to thinking of it that way yet, get used to responding to these queries as though you are. If they want to hear more about your consult, that’s great! You have the green light to sign a new client. Some people will backpedal and start saying they’re tight on money. Here’s another script you can use in that scenario: I completely understand, you have my card so just get in touch with me when you’re ready. You can also take a look at the articles on my blog if you’d like some more general advice that can tide you over until you’re ready to embark on this project. What you don’t want to do is hedge, waver or discount. Stand firm with full respect for your business and you’ll find that the prospect will share that respect. Hold firm and freebie requests will fall off You’ll notice that the people at the very top seem to struggle with this topic less, even though they get the most requests. Why? When you’re clear and confident in what you offer, paying for your time becomes the natural progression. Get clear, get confident and start being honored by those “freebie” requests. That’s how you become an expert that always gets paid for their time. If getting all of those requests because you’re the top expert in your field is a problem you would like to have, check out my course Creating Fame . It’s a step-by-step guide to making you and your business famous using social media. Enrollment opens for a limited time on Thursday, October 7th. About the Author: Laura Roeder is a social media marketing expert who teaches small businesses how to create their own fame and claim their brand online. She lives in Venice Beach, California, where she video blogs, makes frequent trips to the library, and volunteers with local middle schoolers.

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Scribe: New Versions & Better Features (And a Great Deal Ending Soon)

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There’s a whole bunch that’s new and improved with Scribe – our content optimization service that makes SEO copywriting simple. Plus, we’ve got a fantastic promotion that’s coming quickly to an end. Because there’s so much to talk about, I’m going to give you a quick bullet point summary that also serves as hyperlinked navigation for this post. Let’s go: What’s Scribe? A great deal on Scribe (ending Friday, June 4th) New integrated keyword suggestion tool Scribe 2.0 for WordPress Scribe for Joomla Scribe for Drupal All versions of Scribe included Free SEO copywriting podcast What’s Scribe? First, let’s not assume everyone knows what Scribe is or does. Here’s a quick summary. Scribe is a search engine optimization software service that analyzes the content of web pages, blog posts, online press releases, or any other web content … all at the click of a button. Next, Scribe reports back and tells you how to tweak your content to get better search engine rankings and more traffic, all while maintaining quality reader-focused copy. Find out more about Scribe here . A great deal on Scribe (ending Friday, June 4th) A few weeks ago, I released a free report on SEO copywriting that contained a special deal on Scribe if you used the promotional code PROMO27. That promotion is ending this Friday, June 4, 2010. Here’s the deal: With PROMO27, you get 300 monthly evaluations (our largest Advanced Plan) for only $27 a month. The Advanced Plan is usually $97 a month, so this is some serious savings. Here’s how to get that great deal before time runs out: Head over to the Scribe site to check out the demo videos, testimonials, and all the ways Scribe makes SEO copywriting simple. When you’re ready, go to the Plans and Pricing page . Select the Advanced Plan on the far left and click Sign Up. Create an account, and click Register. In the Promo Code field on the next page, enter PROMO27. Once you’ve completed your purchase, you’ll see you’ve been subscribed to the Advanced Plan for $27 per month instead of the usual $97. Remember, the code PROMO27 is the key to the deal, so don’t forget to enter it. But it won’t work after 5:00 p.m. Central on Friday, June 4, 2010, so hurry (because we’ll never be offering this deal again). Get started with Scribe today . New integrated keyword suggestion tool The coolest new feature in Scribe is the new alternate keyword suggestion tool. This new tab shows you alternate related keywords relevant to your content, and the search volume for each term. You’ll now discover other keyword phrases you should be targeting – either for more traffic or less competition – all from inside an version of Scribe. This is just one more way Scribe makes content optimization more efficient and effective. Scribe 2.0 for WordPress We’ve released a new version of Scribe for WordPress. Here’s what’s new: 1. You already know about the new integrated keyword suggestion tool for researching and evaluating keyword options based on search frequency. 2. You can now restrict or allow Scribe access for different authors/users. 3. You can manually select the theme or plugin you wish to use with Scribe. 4. You can now use Scribe for WordPress with WooThemes, the wpSEO plug-in, and the Platinum SEO plug-in. 5. We’ve corrected a bug that caused some WordPress pages to not analyze properly. 6. There’s now an enhanced Scribe widget box that shows you the number of evaluations you have left while editing. 7. Scribe WP is ready for the impending release of WordPress 3.0. Watch the demo video for Scribe WordPress . Scribe for Joomla Scribe now works with the Joomla CMS thanks to the hard work of Joomla guru Barrie North of Joomla Shack and Harry Hopkins from Reliable Studios . Just as with Scribe WordPress, you can now optimize content for Joomla without ever leaving your Joomla control panel. Watch the demo video for Scribe Joomla . Scribe for Drupal Scribe now works with the Joomla CMS thanks to the hard work of Drupal master Tom McCracken of Level Ten Design . Same story here … as with Scribe for WordPress and Joomla, the Scribe technology is fully integrated into the Drupal control panel. Watch a demo video for Scribe Drupal . All versions of Scribe included A lot of you publish on multiple platforms, or have clients who do. So when you subscribe to Scribe, you get Scribe Web and Scribe for WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal, all inclusive. This will likely not always be the case, so yet another reason to get on board with Scribe today . Free SEO copywriting podcast Check out the podcast I did recently with John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing about SEO copywriting . This conversation combined with my free report will make your use of Scribe even more effective and efficient. About the Author : Brian Clark is founder of Copyblogger and wants you to know that Thesis + Scribe = SEO Made Simple. Get more from Brian on Twitter .

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Scribe: New Versions & Better Features (And a Great Deal Ending Soon)

Johnny’s Copyblogger Wrap-Up: Week of April 12, 2010

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I blogcrastinated (see Tuesday’s post below) on writing this for a long time because I’ve been busy perfecting the my Rock Band drumming. Nobody warns you about the time-suck danger that Wii holds for the self-employed. I only got down to it and wrote these summaries for you when, somewhere between some kick-butt drumming for The Donnas and Bikini Kill, my 5-year-old son came in and told me to turn the music down. Man, as soon as I graduate, I am so out of here. Anyway, here’s what happened this week on Copyblogger: Monday: The Mercenary’s Guide to Building Your Internet Marketing Empire There’s a really cool knife in this post’s photo, so you should without a doubt read the post or that knife may kill you. (I got a knife like it once, after I saw the first Rambo movie. To date, I have killed no boars or communists with it. But I still like to read about marketing, just like Rambo.) Be like Nathanbo. Jump off cliffs and make things explode (with profit). You can have it all by reading the full post here . P.S: Rambo wasn’t in it for profit. He was in it for justice. Just so we’re clear. Tuesday: 5 Warning Signs You Might be a Blogcrastinator I keep trying to blogcrastinate with these wrapups, but I’m apparently doing it wrong. Just last week, I sent Brian my review for the week of December 10, 2008 and he made me go back and do it for the week immediately prior instead. This despite my argument that while people might remember last week’s posts, probably nobody was thinking about the ones that ran on 12/10-14 of ‘08. Luckily, Michelle Russell has five symptoms that will smack blogcrastinators back to December of ‘08 and help them get on the right track again. Read the full post here . Wednesday: 5 Dumb Design Mistakes That Crush Copy (And How to Fix Them) Pamela Wilson deserves an “Amen, sister!” for this post because it’s so spot on. See, there are two types of people in the world: copy people and design people. (That’s right — there are literally no other kinds of people in the world.) Copy people think that only the words themselves matter. And design people wear black berets and smoke clove cigarettes. Think about it. Definitely take a look through Pamela’s list of dumb mistakes to see if you’re making them. Also, definitely get a black beret. Read the full post here . Thursday: How to Master Social Media Marketing This post is all about the Social Media Success Summit, where Brian and several of his partners in crime will be presenting. You should check it out because if you go, you’ll basically end up being like Superman if he were on Twitter. He isn’t, but if he were, he’d be all: using my x-ray vision down at the dept store dressing rooms if you know what I mean LOL Read the full post here . Friday: Three Lively Blogging Debates to Explore in 2010 On Friday, James Chartrand threw some gasoline onto the fire of nerd combat by enumerating three blogging debates that are likely to sprain many a typing finger in 2010. So hike up your suspenders, consult your monster manuals, and weigh in, folks. The web is only going to get more sports-related if we don’t voice our opinions. (Isn’t it interesting that thanks to the internet, the old maxim has come true? The geeks really have inherited the earth.) Check out all of the nerd fight action here . About the Author: Johnny B. Truant is one of the creators of “ Question the Rules : The nonconformist’s punk rock, DIY, nuts-and-bolts guide to creating the business and life you really want, starting with what you already have” — an awesome new course which will launch on April 28th.

00a215758blogger.gif Johnny’s Copyblogger Wrap Up: Week of April 12, 2010

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Johnny’s Copyblogger Wrap-Up: Week of April 12, 2010