Custom WordPress Websites that Rock!
Does that title sound like click bait or what? Let's start with this. WANT TO WRITE THE PERFECT BLOG POST? You'll see that this post is indeed the most comprehensive post on writing a perfect blog post that you'll ever see. The idea is that I don't hope you read it - I have a specific …
BUT DIDN'T I'm constantly amazed when I hear complaints from website owners that their site isn't helping them reach their goals. I'm amazed not because they have a bad website, but because this conversation never happened. By this conversation, I am referring to a series of questions that …
TL;DR: I'm looking at the pros and cons for using Slack, a Chat app, and Discord for client or visitor interaction and would love your help. HELP! When I started this site way back when I was focused on all forms of communication and actively listening. I have always maintained that as a …
As you might know, I've always warned you about using images that are not your own. You also might remember that I suggested using images from Unsplash.com if you couldn't use your own images as it was a safe place to find safe and legal images to use. I remember talking about it on one of our …
This week is a little different from normal. While this started out as a question from one of my clients, "Hey Mike, is this real?" they asked, I've now seen it across multiple client sites and more and more out in the wild. It's a new scam that comes in via a comment or form submission seemingly …
What used to be called G-Suite is now called Google Workspace. I've been doing a lot of custom client work in it lately. Most know it just as the place they have their email handled (MX Servers) so that they can have cool email addresses like mike@areweconnected.com. Hey! I've used it since the …
We have a new FREE report and we're pretty excited about it! It's an insiders guide to all the dirty little secrets web designers don't want you to know. No, this isn't some kind of mamby pamby, light weight, cut and paste job. This thing has some series meat to it. It's 22 pages long and 2 MB …
Hey! It's been a while, but 2 Minute Tuesdays is back! This week, I answer a question from one of my clients, Marie, who said she liked this format that I was doing and wondered how to do something similar on her site in either video or audio. What a great question and a perfect topic for 2MT …
There was some big "WordPress" news last week when W3Techs announced that WordPress now powers over 40% of the top 10 million websites! WordPress plays in a league of its own. It's not only the usage numbers, also the ecosystem around WordPress is absolutely remarkable. There are more than 58,000 …
Good News! The shortest podcast you will ever hear is back! 2 Minute Tuesdays is back! I want to start with an introduction to the complicated and often times confusing world of Lead Capture - and guess what? 2 minutes is just scratching the surface. Well, to be clear, this 2 minutes is going …
A few weeks ago I showed you how to stop the spammers from swamping you with bogus emails from your comment and IDX system. You can read more about that: "How to Reduce SPAM". I also dabbled a bit for your website forms and discussed the idea of Akismet, the Honeypot, and CAPTCHA. One of the …
To earn better "Local SEO" we know that Google really likes consistency. Consistency comes in 2 parts: would be the 'A' in your N.A.P. would be in your posting schedule. Here's how to be consistent in both and improve your ranking for local keywords in your area. CONSISTENCY IN …
So, I was walking down the street the other day... I saw a local business the other day and looked them up online. Clarification: I'm literally standing in front of the business and could NOT find them online. Once I got home I did some deeper digging and found out that they do have a website …
The Clickable Phone Number. We've come to expect it. We're hungry and on our phone, we look up our favorite local pizza place, we see a number and if we click it, we'll be ordering that Large Canadian Bacon, Pineapple with Extra Cheese in moments. Right? So when that doesn't happen, when we …
Welcome to the first in a very long series of 2 Minute Tuesday podcasts that focus not on SEO but LOCAL SEO. Let me clarify that - each post (technically they are a podcast) is still going to be 2 minutes long, there's just going to be a lot of them! IMPORTANT REMINDER: While we're talking …
On this date way back in 2008 I needed a new website. I was transitioning from a job in a related industry and needed a URL that better reflected what I was now into. Mortgage > Title > Social Media/WordPress (with a detour along the way to do a bunch of Facebook Development stuff). How or …
In this post I'm going to show you how to create links in your Gutenberg (block editor) WordPress posts and pages that open a new tab in the viewer's browser. Before we get into it, did you listen to WHY and WHEN you want to do this? Don't worry, that link will open in a new window for you! …
This Part ONE of a TWO Part Series. We've come to expect that if you mention another site on your posts or pages, that we won't have to search Google for that site, you'll have a link we can click on right there in your post. It's just a common internet courtesy. But sending people to an …
For this week's 2MT, we'll explore the pages that you must have, talk about the pages that you don't need and more importantly - the lead capture that will help your new site reach your goals. While I had this post in draft mode for a while I honestly just had a new client ask that very same …
I've said it before and it bears repeating. We're in a constant battle for attention. One of the reasons we blog in the first place is to get our message out. The problem today is that the attention span of the reader has become so very short and new information is bombarding them from all angles …
One of the biggest stumbling blocks for me in creating new content is the time it takes. Afterall, we all only have so much time, right? I haven't done a 2MT in a while and I think this is the answer. No fancy schmansy intros anymore, no ticking stopwatch, no end of session bell. Just quality …
