As presented to the 2009 Nonprofit Bar Camp on November 14th in Austin, Texas, this presentation outlines building a WordPress powered Website. WordPress can be used as a feature rich CMS to power your entire Website. And, since it has built in RSS technology and is widgetized, it can help you build both a search engine and social media optimized Website. This presentation demonstrates example WordPress powered Websites, the anatomy of a WordPress site, and outlines a best-practice plan for you to follow to build your own WordPress powered Website.

1. Building a WordPress Powered Website... Copyright 2009, Deltina Hay

2. With Deltina Hay of Dalton Publishing, Social Media Power, and PlumbSocial.com... Author of A Survival Guide to Social Media and Web 2.0 Optimization As presented for the Nonprofit Bar Camp on November 14, 2009 in Austin, Texas.

5. Usually programmed in php and use MySQL databases

8. Uses RSS technology so integrates easily with the rest of the Social Web

9. Widgetized, so easy to add widgets and badges from other Websites

10. Regular upgrades and security releases

11. Good support forums and network

12. Free!

13. Many themes and plugins available...

15. Since WordPress is open source, there are many developers creating plugins

16. Easy to install and set up

17. As simple as a comment spam filter

18. As complicated as a full-featured shopping cart...

19. What are plugins?

21. Very easy to install

22. Again, open source, so there are many free themes available

23. Most are easy to customize with new colors, headers, etc...

24. What are themes?

25. What are themes?

27. This is the case for some CMSs – but not for WordPress

28. The following slides depict a collection of sites that were built using WordPress as a CMS...

29. Diversity of WordPress powered Websites...

30. Diversity of WordPress powered Websites...

31. Diversity of WordPress powered Websites...

32. Diversity of WordPress powered Websites...

33. Diversity of WordPress powered Websites...

34. Diversity of WordPress powered Websites...

36. Navigation

37. Main body area

38. Sidebars

39. Footer

40. Sidebar widgets

41. Static pages

42. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (note header and footer on this one, along with sidebars)

43. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (static page that has no sidebars)

44. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (note that sidebars to not have to be on the “side” - there are three on the bottom here)

45. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (this one has a static home page - as opposed to blog posts on the home page)

46. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (blog page with a different sidebar as the static pages)

47. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (site with blog as home page)

48. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (static page)

49. Anatomy of a WordPress Website... (the header and footer are only images – and the navigation and sidebar are combined – only thing that changes is the main body area of each page)

51. Need some knowledge of how to install php on your server and how to install MySQL and create databases and tables

53. Plan the site (what functionalities does it need)

54. Choose and customize a theme based on your plan

55. Choose, install, and set up plugins to accomplish functionalities (including essential plugins for anti-spam, security, and SEO)

56. Set up sidebars (place standard and custom widgets)

57. Build static pages and populate blog

59. Ways for others to share your site (like to social bookmarking sites)

60. Widgets from other social sites like Facebook and Twitter

61. Image/Video Galleries

62. Shopping cart or donation features

63. Event listings or calendar widgets

64. Submission forms

65. Surveys or polls

66. Imported feeds from other sites

67. And so forth...

69. Make certain is has one more sidebar than you think you need (easier to delete than to add)

70. Is typically easy to change color schemes, headers, fonts and such – so choose based on look and feel

71. Choosing a theme:

72. Choosing a theme:

73. Choosing a theme:

75. Try not to install plugins “just because they are cool” - sometimes it is best to use existing functionality

76. Pay attention to the ratings, how many times a plugin has been downloaded, and that it has been tested for the latest version of WordPress

77. Go to the plugin & author's Website to make sure the plugin is being supported

78. A good rule of thumb when setting up a plugin is that if you can't do it in two tries, find another plugin to do the job (they should be pretty straightforward to set up)

79. Choosing plugins:

80. Choosing plugins:

81. Choosing plugins:

82. A look at the WordPress Backend (dashboard):

83. A look at the WordPress Backend (adding posts – adding pages is the same):

84. A look at the WordPress Backend (can change themes with one click, add them and customize them):

85. A look at the WordPress Backend (can maintain, add, and customize plugins):

86. A look at the WordPress Backend (once a plugin is installed, you can maintain its settings here – where applicable):

87. A look at the WordPress Backend (this is where you create and place your sidebar widgets):

88. A look at the WordPress Backend (shows the resulting sidebars from the previous slide):

91. Be careful if you have customized the code

93. Security plugins

94. SEO plugin

96. Burning your feed to FeedBurner.com

98. Making it easy for others to share, interact, and collaborate using tools like AddtoAny.com

99. Taking advantage of how your site can integrate with the rest of the Social Web...(that is a whole different session)

101. Links to other resources

102. Links to WordPress-friendly hosts

106. Questions... ?

108. Amazon

109. Indiebound

111. SocialMediaPower.com & PlumbSocial.com

112. [email_address]