Tag Archives: Wordpress

Teach Yourself PHP

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One of the many aspects involved with setting up a website or amending a website is dealing with files that have the .php extension.  The term “php” stands for  PHP: hypertext preprocessor.  I have found that more and more files that I deal with are php files and that HTML (hypertext markup language) files are not the dominant type of file format as they one were.  PHP and HTML are both programming languages that use there own programming formats.  Over the course of time and depending upon your website development desires, it may become necessary to familiarize yourself with how to develop and write files in one or both languages.  For the purpose of this post, I will be dealing with how to teach yourself PHP.

The PHP logo displaying the Handel Gothic font.

Image via Wikipedia

Now what is the purpose of PHP?  PHP is a scripting language that assists in the development of websites and it can be incorporated into HTML.  Outside of that, I will have to admit that I don’t know much about it.  Click on the following link to get a more in-depth explanation from Wikipedia that describes PHP:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PHP

What got me to write this post was that I was recently involved with some editing to some .php files on one of my WordPress blogs.  I ended up basically having to compare an initial php file with an identical file that I wanted to edit (I wanted to omit the author name and dates from the blog posts) and basically change various sections of the file on a hit and miss basis.  Now granted there were plenty of “tips” available on how to do this but I found that various WordPress themes had different formats for the variables that I was interested in changing.

So this whole experiment that consisted of “try-this” then “try-that” got me to think more about learning about the PHP language.  I consider myself a bit dangerous with HTML so I thought “why not teach yourself php” as well?  Now with my current schedule, I don’t have any time to take night classes and I am not in the mindset right now to buy a software program that is loaded with tutorials on how to learn php.

So lo and behold I perused through the pages on a membership site that I belong to and came across an ebook titled “PHP for Beginners.”  I thought “great!,” I can start learning more about PHP and I decided that I would offer it to my readers as well.  Not only that, I am going to offer it Gratis and it will come with sales pages and Master Resell Rights.  That way I will not only provide you with a gift, you can turn around and promote this yourself if you are so inclined.

So in closing, if you are in the newbie stage when it comes to php, I highly encourage you to download this eBook and check it out.  Add your knowledge of this scripting language to your entrepeurial repertoire.  Take advantage of this opportunity to teach yourself php and embrace what it has to offer.  Who knows, what you learn may be just what it takes for you to surpass any online competition.  To download your copy of PHP for Beginners, click on the following link:  Teach Yourself PHP.  Note: This is a large file and may take a while to load based upon your Internet connection.  After you have had a chance to go through this eBook, please come back and leave a comment.  I would very much appreciate knowing how this works out for you.

As always………..

Best Wishes and here’s to you “Making It Happen!”


 

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The Importance of Your Blog Theme

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The need to give due consideration to your blog theme is important because it presents an initial impression to those who decide to stop and look at your blog.

Now there are all types of blogs and well as a wide plethora of blog themes to go along with it.  The available layouts on each theme vary but you should choose a theme that will not only convey a degree of relevance to your blog but of course you want it to be appealing to your readers as well.  The types of header images you select, the sizes and variety of fonts that you use, the colors for the various theme component such as links, borders, etc., come into play when you are selecting a blog theme.

The themes that are already provided by WordPress when you initially setup your blog are fine if you only want to put together some blog posts as well as adsense ads but when you want to incorporate a specialized element into your blog (such as affiliate marketing) you will want to give some extra thought for the theme you want to use.

Two affiliate marketing oriented themes that I came across this year are Alvin Phang’s “Atomic Blogging Theme” and Matt Carter’s “WordPress Affiliate Theme“.  These are both easy to install and come with a wide variety of features that you can use to custom tailor your theme design.  Click on the links up above to find out more.

So when you are deciding upon a theme to choose, pick something that you feel has something to say about you.  Also, your blog layout wants to present a good image to those who read your blog.  Ask yourself this; is your blog something that catches your own eye and makes you want to read it as well?  This is an important consideration for you the online marketer because you want to put on a good presentation for your potential customers.  If you are promoting products that deal with sporting goods, you don’t want your blog theme to have a layout that suggests it is advertising for fancy baked goods.  Keep it to the point and relevant.

So if you are new on the blogging scene, by all means take some time and see what types are themes are available to you.  If you have some different themes to experiment with, get some feedback from someone you trust and see what they think.  Put your best theme forward!

Best Wishes and Here’s To You “Making It Happen!”

 

 

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"Blogging Emergency, Blogging Emergency"!

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Oh my goodness!   Do I have a humdinger of a post for you!  Some of you may say ” Awww, that’s nothin! An easy fix”! But for those who would not have thought of this, you may thank me later.   What happened to me earlier this evening was that I had just finished installing a new blog on one of my domains (www.taoofonlinemarketing.com) and I decided I would log in and start making some modifications and additions.  Well……….the password was not working.   To make matters worse, when I tried to have a reset sent to my email, the email was not picking it up.

What to do? What to do?   So I called GoDaddy.com and they recommended that I try to access the blog database (via PhpMyadmin) and attempt to find the password.   The representative said that he would not be able to show me how to do this and I would have to refer to a WordPress forum.   What I ended up doing was typing “how to access a WordPress password from the database” in Google and came up with a very handy reference page.    This showed me how to access the proper location of the database and then I found out the password itself was encrypted (it was described as an “MD5 hash”) so I had to learn how to transfer a new password into the MD5 hash format but that proved to be very easy.   The following links below will give you access to the pages that I got my guidance from so that I could solve my predicament.

Reset a WordPress Password from phpMyAdmin | Devlounge

Free online md5 hash calculator based on php script

So once I was done making the necessary changes, I tested everything and things were working just fine!   As for why the original confirmation link did not go to my email address, I have no answer.   Hopefully this article will prove of use should you ever come across a situation such as this.   Being as how a blog can be a very necessary part of one’s online business, being able to get the blog restored is of vital importance.


Take ownership for what you offer!

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After having some experiences with a one certain affiliate product that no one seemed to really know anything about as well as reading an excerpt from a post in a network that I belong to, I felt it necessary to generate the following content for this post.
The affiliate product that I downloaded following purchase is a WordPress plugin that for the longest time I have not been able to get to work.  I sent numerous emails to those who promoted the product concerning my questions and the only honest answer that I received was “I’m clueless about its features.”  At least I did get a response back and the person who provided me said response was an individual who promptly gave me a refund following a non related issue.

This leads me on to my main point.  Earlier this month I decided to promote some eBooks that I obtained with PLR resell rights.  Now granted it is not an affiliate product but the following information still applies.  I decided to review each book for content and to see what I could do to add to the quality of the material.  After finding numerous punctuation and grammatical errors on the first book, I decided to review and edit the other eBooks as well.  After about 3 weeks of effort, I ended up editing all four of the eBooks that were provided and I reformatted them to included page numbers as well.  In addition, I page checked the table of contents to ensure that the page numbers listed did in fact match up to the appropriate topics.  I also ended up including links to various relevant websites that dealt with the content and made some material additions myself.

Upon completion of this work, I listed my name as author of the revised edition and out of respect for the original author, I included his name in acknowledgement of supplying the initial content.  My main point is that if you decide to market something to the public, do become familiar with the product features  instead of just putting it up on your sales page in the hopes that someone will just go ahead and purchase it.  That way, if a customer does have a concern about one of your affiliate product items, you can at least provide some measure of support to get their problems addressed.  If for some reason you are not able to become thoroughly familiar with an affiliate product that you are offering, make sure your customers know that you are standing behind your offers with a money back guarantee.  This will potentially pave the way to future sales in addition to establishing a good reputation for you as an affiliate marketer.

So whatever affiliate product or products you choose to promote, make an effort to become familiar with it and give your customers a feeling of receiving value after having bought from you.

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