(Part 4 in a series of 4)
In the previous three lessons, I’ve been covering WordPress. We started off with by installing WordPress. Then we talked about the best way to configure WordPress. And then in the previous lesson we talked about WordPress themes and plugins.
Today we’re going to take it a step further and look at how to customize a theme to meet the needs of your business…
(Watch this video…)
Main points:
See video for examples of…
-Editing the colors, fonts, and other style in the CSS Stylesheet
-Adding an AdSense ad to the sidebar
-Editing the footer to take away a credit/footprint
-Changing the graphics
Action steps:
1) If you’re not happy with the look or function of your WordPress site, customize it!
Remember, if you need help there is a massive support forum at: http://wordpress.org/support/
In the next lesson, I’ll be talking about making money with your blog.
As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below 🙂 And if you’ve customized your WordPress theme, be sure to show it off to us!
Have a great day!
Eric you’ve done another super video and you made it look so easy.
I’m glad you said that when you made changes it was trial and error until you got it to look the way you wanted. I found it took me several attempts for many of my changes until I was happy with how it looked.
Thanks again and I’m looking forward to your next video.
Thanks for all the great information.
I went to change all the text-decoration from none to underline and enlarged all the font-size by 4px using the notepad ++ and then doing all of this on my computer and then using filezilla and nothing changed when I refreshed my sight.
What is up with that?
I will look around in support section.
Thank You for your lesson
Wow Eric, talk about informative! I’ve been following your lessons for a while now and just want to let you know that they’ve been so unbelievably helpful.
It was just the other day that I was searching for information on how to customise a WP theme, particularly with Adsense, and all I had to do was wait for your next lesson.
Thanks to you, I now feel confident enough to go and have a play around with those scary looking codes!
Bravo to you for the service you’re providing to us all – can’t wait to start making some money!!
Cheers,
Kristy
Hi Eric,
Thank you so much for the video. I’m not really a technical person but you made it looks easier for me. Your videos are real winners because it shortens the learning curve and it makes things easier and more understandable. I hope you can also make a video of the oio publisher how to actually set it up in a blog.
Jennifer
Eric,
another great lesson.
Instead of doing offline changes and keep using filezilla, can we use Theme test drive plugin and Firebug and make changes quickly.
perhaps you still need to ftp changes to your site then re-refresh. jm
do you tweet? http://www.twitter.com/oneblackbird
Great
It’s just amazing. You are firing at all
those nasty things that kept most of us
from having their WP sites published or
working the right way.
Thanks Eric
This is the lesson I’ve been waiting for. That’s a good idea to edit the files offline. Alternatively couldn’t you edit it online and then download it overwriting the existing one on your local computer?
I am so delighted to belong to this place. I have learnt a lot in web design in just few days of watching some videos, i did my wordpress myself for the first time, customize it and waiting to do more with it from your subsequent lessons. Thanks Eric.
Thanks Erick!
After these tutorials I think we are finally ready to get our blog up and running!
Matt
http://TrueColorsTest.com
Hi Eric – Thank you so much for all this great information. I am just starting out and would like to ask you about a couple things. Where do you acquire the Copywrite Logo using my name? ALso, will you be covering Google Adword and Keywords campaigns at all?
I am learning so much. Thanks for all your time and effort – I really what you’ve done!
All The Best,
Jeannie
I wish I had found your lessons before wasting a fortune on poor quality supposed training courses which didnt give me what I needed. Just a quick question re hosting Host gator say you cant have any investment sites – my forthcomming blog is concerned with economic and technical analysis and how this is used to predict the movements in the stock markets – do you think Host gator would close it down and if so can you recommend a suitable host (this is not a scam or get quick rich site but is information only and based on my MBA and forthcomming PHD research).
Thanks again and keep up the good work 🙂
Thanks! Nice site 🙂
My guess is that perhaps you did not upload it to the correct folder. Make sure you’re overwriting the corresponding file in the correct theme.
If you’re sure you did overwrite the right file, then perhaps there is an overriding text style that you missed in the CSS stylesheet.
Glad to hear it!
I have not used a theme test drive plugin, but it sounds like it could work.
That’s correct, you could edit it online and then download it as a backup. In some ways that may be easier for you, as you can more quickly refresh to see your changes.
I’m not sure what you mean by the copyright logo. do you just mean the symbol “C” with circle around it?
The HTML code is
©Or you can just copy and paste the symbol itself into your source code, and I think all browsers can read it.
Yes I will be covering Adwords/PPC traffic.
Something that you touched on in the article and a lesson I learned the hard way,
“Either way, be sure to keep a backup of your theme offline.”
After a couple of goofs that didn’t work when I supposedly knew what I was doing I learned to not touch anything until I made a back up. Then every couple of changes that works I redo the back up to make sure I do not lose what I did.
Thanks for the lessons I appreciate it and am learning a lot.
Bo Tipton
The Ornery Marketer
I can not speak for HG, but I am confident that a stock market related blog would be fine. I think they mainly don’t want sites where actual investments are being solicited and received, because so many of those are scams.
Hi Eric,
Great video again. Keep up the good work.
Have you every considered or see any value in trying to combine a membership site with a wordpress site? I see from a quick search that there’s plenty of plugins available to do this.
Ray
http://www.visiolo.com/t/156
Eric,
Just a note to tell you I appreciate you, and all you do to help out all us noobs out here who tend to bounce from site to site trying to get answers (and many times failing!)Anyway it’s good to know your lessons are just sitting here waiting to answer my questions.
Absolutely. I have recently added a WordPress membership plugin to the notes under lesson #32, and in fact I am considering turning Eric’s tips into a membership site after these lessons are complete 😉
I am not sure about changing the footer link for the theme designer credit.
If i am not mistaken, the agreement for using the theme clearly stated it’s a must to leave the credit untouched if you want to use the theme.
Please comment
I’ve been following your lessons for and I am so happy to learn from somebody who thing to teach another people online for free.
Eric Good bless you.
My question is I will like to secure this info lessons somewhere on my computer, I could I save them?
Thanks to you, I now feel confident enough to learn more about WP.
Bravo to you for the service you’re providing to us all –
Tshibangu
It depends on the license for each individual theme.
Some are pretty clear that you must leave the link. Some do not require it. And some use more grey language like “please leave my link.”.
WP does provide instructions for removing links from footer:
http://codex.wordpress.org/FAQ_Layout_and_Design
And WP does say that you should abide by the author’s license.
In my case, I typically will customize my themes to a point where I believe they constitute a new theme. Therefore, I think it’s justifiable to remove the credit. It’s still a grey area though, and I know there are people who would disagree with me.
But if you were to look at the coding of all the themes on WP, you would find that there is already massive amounts of borrowing from each other already. And for a long time, the majority of themes were all based largely on the code of the default WP themes. So it’s a bit of a grey area.
Thanks 🙂 For now I am not making them available for download because I am planning on selling them in a package when they are all done. In the mean time, you can access all the previous episodes here: http://www.ericstips.com/tips/category/lessons/
“I am planning on selling them in a package when they are all done.”
This will be an amazing contribution to the internet. Can’t wait to be an affiliate!
Colin
Thank you!
eGreetings,
I notice that you use Filezilla…
Can you tell me if it has the option of right clicking on a file on your server and “copy path to clipboard” ?
I use that option a lot in SmartFTP but would like to switch to Filezilla.
Thanks so much for your time.
Terrific lesson!
Kind Regards,
Jeri
Hi, Eric:
You are a marvelous teacher. I’ve been stuck in information overload for a long time, trying to figure out all the pieces of the puzzle through various training courses. But, chicken that I am, I’ve been too scared to attempt my first blog. For once, my fear has paid off…because I discovered you and you make everything logical and easy to understand.
I must admit, I got a little lost with this course, but I was able to follow your other lessons quite well. You’ve turned me from one who hated WordPress (because I didn’t “get” it), to one who can’t understand anyone NOT using this wonderful program.
I do have one very basic question for you. Perhaps I missed the lesson. How do you go about setting up and organizing your directories and folders on your desktop? I’d like to set up my WordPress folders exactly the way you have it…with the wp themes, plugins, content, etc.. Is there a specific lesson that takes us step-by-step through this very basic process?
Again, thank you so much for all your help. I now understand some of the more difficult aspects of the process, but need to organize correctly from the start so I can proceed without any glitches. Also, I’m a little confused about how to download a zipped program to a folder and then upzip it for use with WordPress.
Do you have a topic list for your upcoming lessons?
Thanks again and again for all your help. I recommend you to everyone and have your website posted on my Facebook page.
It does not have that feature. It does display the remote site path at all times though, and it is selectable, so you can copy and paste it easily. It doesn’t show the filename in the path though, only the directories, so you would also need to add the file name to the path.
So I guess it depends on how much you use the feature.
SmartFTP is good too. I used it for many years, and still do use it sometimes. I switched to Filezilla when SmartFTP started charging.
I will not be covering that specifically in a lesson, so this is what I would recommend…
In your My Documents folder (or depending on your version of Windows it might be called Owner’s Documents, or it might just be your Visa username) create a folder called WEBSITES
Then create a shortcut on your desktop which goes to that folder (rather than putting the folder itself on your desktop).
In general I recommend only putting shortcuts on your desktop rather than files or programs themselves.
The reason I sometimes put them directly on my desktop in the videos is just so it’s easy to see.
Then within that WEBSITES folder, you would make individual folders for each of your websites (like the ideacash.org folder that I made on my desktop in the video). If you have certain website(s) that you work with frequently, you can create shortcuts on your desktop for those too.
Then within each website’s folder, you would put everything belonging to that website (html files, wordpress folder/files, etc.)
Also within each website’s folder I create a folder called EXTRA. I use the EXTRA folder to store things that are associated with that particular website, but that are not a part of the website itself.
For example, the EXTRA folder might contain my photoshop PSD source files for the graphics, a Word doc source file of a PDF that I’m giving away on the site, old html files that I’ve removed from the site, etc.
Regarding a topic list for upcoming lessons, I do have one, but i’m not posting it because I don’t want people to steal it 😉
But generally speaking we’ll be covering product creation, list building, traffic generation, product launches, and a few more things.
Thank you so much, Eric. This is exactly what I needed to know.
I can totally understand your reason for not wanting to post your specific topics. I’ll be “tuning” in often to view your lessons. You will, obviously, be covering everything we need to know to be successful.
Best regards,
Debbie
Wow, Eric, you are just too terrific! Thanks!!
Hi Eric,
I have been following your tutorial series about WordPress as CMS.
Great lessons.
It has been suggested that I use Joomla, what’s your opinion.
Is Joomla (also an open source CMS) an easer program to master and is it as versatile as WordPress .
Thanks again for your great lessons.
Hi Eric
You probably know that the server couldn’t handle the number of orders coming through so Mike eventually disabled the early bird order. He’s guaranteed a course to us all and I’m assuming I still go through your link, right?
Thanks
Neil
Oh yeah, I’m sure you guessed I’m talking about Mike Filsaime’s BFM giveaway. BTW, this time the response actually took Twitter down for a while lol.
Hi Eric,
Thank you for your prompt response to my ordering problem with Mike’s Butterfly Marketing 2.0 giveaway.
Nothing solved yet, but I did receive a reply back from Mike’s helpdesk that I would like to share with you and other Eric’s Tips readers who may be lost and confused due to the server crash last evening.
Hi,
PLEASE NOTE THAT WE ARE IN RECEIPT OF YOUR SUPPORT TICKET FOR BUTTERFLY MARKETING 2.0
We want you to know that we ARE WORKING FEVERISHLY TO RESOLVE EVERYONE’S CONCERNS. Due to the massive response to Mike’s Butterfly Marketing 2.0
offer, (triple what we were expecting) AND THE UNFORESEEN ISSUES CREATED BY OUR SERVER CRASHING it may take a little time to answer all your concerns
We are well aware of the concerns over whether or not your order actually was submitted, or if it was duplicated.
Please know…… it is impossible for duplicate orders to be submitted because we have safeguards in place to prevent that.
If your order did submit, you would have received a receipt from our payment processor.
IF YOU WERE WATCHING THE LIVE FEED YESTERDAY ON USTREAM YOU WOULD HAVE HEARD MIKE PUBLICLY PROMISE EVERYONE THAT THEY WILL RECEIVE A COPY OF BUTTERFLY MARKETING 2.0 SO THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO CONCERN YOURSELF AS TO WHETHER OR NOT YOUR ORDER WAS SUBMITTED AT THIS TIME.
Many of you also have issues with logging in to your new account. This issue is also feverishly being worked on and as soon as we have
everything resolved we will let you know.
For those of you who already have a subscription to the news magazine and want to order the Butterfly Marketing 2.0 without creating a new subscription,
we have placed a special order box in your 7 Figure Secrets or GetMySoftwareFree member area so you can do this and only pay for the shipping! Right now,
this special box is in your Profile (it may be moved to the main page later today), so be sure to go to your Profile and place your order.
We want everyone to know that no matter what, EVERYONE who wants a copy of Butterfly Marketing 2.0 WILL be given the chance to order and receive their package,
for a limited time.
Please realize that because of the nature of this offer ( a free five thousand dollar value of product) the demand created has superceded even our best estimates, therefore we request you remain patient and understanding and we will get through this together.
Thank you and prepare yourself for the best product that has ever been delivered to your front door !!
The Staff at Mike Filsaime’s Corporate Office
Long Island, New York
Eric, I’m still on Lesson #33. I’ve posted a new question there. Please help!!!
Hi Eric I am so glad I have found someone so willing to share knowledge and help people like me who have no idea but want to keep trying, you are great, Thank You
Eric,
Not related to wordpress but I seek your opinion.
Arbitrage conspiracy is coming to end. They recommend statjunky which is expensive.
I am using prosper202 now.
Want to use one more: I am thinking of two products: Affiliate Prophet and Adtrackz.
which one do you recommend?
Thanks.
Hi Eric, I have not really commented on any of the lessons thus far, just for the mere fact that I have been consumed by the extent of information you are getting out. For the past 12 months I have been trying to start this online business, after moving from one seminars, bootcamps to another. I have never come in contact with such an outstanding coaching like you are giving to us. May God almighty continue to enrich you and make you a blessing to others.
The value of information you are giving out is inestimable. Keep it up.
Sorry, just by the way. My lesson 36 has refused to open, this is the 1st time I am experiencing this. It could be due to a problem from my end. I will try again tomorrow and if it is still persisting I will let you know again.
God bless you.
Hi Eric,
First of all I want to thank you for this course, from which we newbies can learn a lot!
I have a question for you if you can spare few minutes:
If I run few sites on one account,like subdomains, can I have WP installed on all domains? Is there going to be any conflict with files?
I plan to reorganize mu sites, to put them all in WP.
Many thanks for your time.
All the best,
Nenad
Eric, I’m still waiting for help with Lesson 33. I know you are dealing with lots of people and questions, but I need to sort this out so I can continue on. Please help…
Yes, thanks.
I use Affiliate Prophet, and recommend it. Peter, the creator of it, is an Eric’s tips reader too 🙂
I do not think there will be any conflict between the files. However, if you want each domain to have its own installation of WordPress, then I would advise getting a hostgator reseller account so that each domain can have its own Cpanel. It will be easier and better for the long term.