We’re one-third of the way through the Workshop, and now that we have stat counters configured to capture our gains (or losses), we can advance into my favorite time of the Workshop… customizing the theme! Let’s start with our new logo.

Why the Logo Should ROCK!

As far as customization goes, I would spend a bit of time coming up with a fancy logo for your blog. I can usually crank one out in 15 minutes for a new site, but I have been looking at logo customization and design for a while now… so I have a small advantage here. Your blog’s logo will be one of the focal points for the website. And unless you have a crazy header (like the one on theNetFool), you will need something that stands out. Remember, whenever you run a contest, advertise or get press in any form… your site’s logo has to be the go-to way to get traffic to your website. That being said, a dull generic logo won’t cut it any more!

Making a Logo That Will Knock ‘Em Dead

Now that we’ve (over)exaggerated the benefit of having a great logo for your blog, let’s lay out the recipe to make it happen! First things first, here is a list of what I believe to be the top three essentials in any logo that you design or have designed:

1. Color Scheme – Your logo should consist of 2 or 3 colors, and fit your template
2. Relevance - You need to have some kind of graphic that “sums up” your niche
3. Web 2.0 – Keep your design fresh, simple and aesthetically-pleasing

There are essentially two ways that we can get our logo: make it ourselves or outsource the work to a professional/freelance artist. I usually do a combination of the two. For example, the header at Jimvesting.com was made by a freelance artist… but the text-logo “THE NET FOOL” was actually made by me! Before we get into the two methods, let’s see what I did over at Jimvesting.com:

You can see that I followed our three steps. First, it is based on two colors that fit with the rest of my theme. Second, it has a stock chart on it to represent making money as well as finance. Third, it is quite simple and “Web 2.0″, as was the original.How are your logos coming along? Post in the comments and you’ll be featured!

Great Ways to Make Your Logo

The first thing you need to do is find the old logo from the template that we installed. You should be able to find this in the “images” folder within the theme that you downloaded… and it will usually be something telltale like “logo.gif”. What we are looking for here is the proportions of the image; in my case, the logo was 274×52 pixels. Simply put, we are going to be making a new one, saving it as the same file name, and re-uploading our new version with our FTP clients (like we uploaded our template in the first place) to overwrite the old logo with the new!

Now, let’s assume that you cannot use the power of Adobe Photoshop to make your own logo. If you can, you probably don’t need my help on this one (however, if you need a second opinion… feel free to shoot me an email).

We need to look for a designer based on budget, so let’s cover some good low-mid-high budget providers:

Low Budget ($10-50): The best “bang for the buck” designer can be found through a design forum/message board. I recommend DigitalPoint Forums or Warrior Forum since they both have tons of great artist… you just need to look for them!

Mid Budget ($50-100): At the middle of the spectrum lies freelance designers. I’d recommend posting a job at GetAFreelancer.com or oDesk.com to get your design job filled quickly and efficiently.

High Budget ($100-$500): At the top, you can find the premium design shops that specialize in logo making. There are a ton of these, but some of my favorites are Eyepinch Design, SOS Factory and Logo Design Guru.

Get those logos ready or order up a customized version for an added bump-up on your blog’s reputation. Tomorrow, we’ll continue with the customizations at hand to really get the most out of our previously-default template.

-Jimvesting

How are you guys hanging in there? We are almost done the first 1/3 of the Workshop, and already we have a site up and running with a freshly configured Feedburner RSS feed account. Before we get any further, it’s about time we start analyzing who is coming to our website, how they ended up there and what they want!

Why Stat Counters Work!

Nowadays, there are tons of programs that you can install to run in the background of your blog and tell you everything from how many hits you are getting per day, to what percentage of your viewers are from Ireland. It is important to have the ability to analyze everything that you can get your arms around when it comes to your website. Perhaps the biggest advantage? Advertisers crave them! Users can fudge the numbers and say how popular their website is by tampering with their RSS feeds… but statistics never lie. Because of this, things like “unique visitors per day” are going standards in this industry… and if you don’t have the numbers on you, you won’t get any business!

The Top Stat-Serving Scripts for WordPress

I recommend that you install and use these three plugins on your website/blog and EVERY website/blog that you ever make from here on out!

1. Google Analytics
If you use nothing else, use Google Analytics. With Google’s new tracking device, you can literally see EVERYTHING that goes on in your website… things like search engine keywords and even a user’s city and state. It’s almost scary how much information Google Analytics gives you, but because of this dominance it has easily become the standard in stat tracking ability. You need to use Google Analytics!

2. Alexa.com Widget
Alexa is one of the biggest internet tracking services, and literally has a database of billions of websites all around the net. As much as people argue that the tracking is no good, advertisers use Alexa to get a quick reading of how popular a website really is. Because of this, we need to install the Alexa.com widget on our website to ensure that we are maximizing our reading from the Alexa.com servers. Yes, having this plugin installed on your blog does indeed (in my experience) yield a higher Alexa ranking!

3. Quantcast (Quantifier)
Another popular online stat tracking service, much like Alexa.com, is called QuantCast. This service is really built for those more established blogs, so you might not see much show up for your website when you first get started. However, installing their tracking script is very important if you hope to see their results as soon as you can. The “Quantcast Quantifier” plugin makes it easy for you to do this on a WordPress blog. Go ahead and download the plugin and install it through WordPress’ plugin area in your admin panel. If you don’t quite know how to do this, don’t you worry! We will be covering plugins shortly so you can keep this one downloaded and ready to go. Most bloggers wouldn’t recommend Quantcast, but it is a very nice tool for seeing things that you wouldn’t otherwise… such as your users’ income levels and education status.

I am not going to cover how to install each of these three tracking devices. Instead, I will give you links to good tutorials on how to do this in case you get stuck.

• Installing Google Analytics on WordPress
• Installing Alexa.com’s Plugin on WordPress
• Installing the Quantcast Quantifier on WordPress

Remember, if you need help… don’t hesitate to ask. We are using Google Analytics to track real-time stats like user hits, Alexa.com to bump our rankings and Quantcast to break into user demographics. The three together make for a powerful combination!

-Jimvesting

Welcome back to another day of the Net Fool’s Build-A-Blog Workshop. By now, we have a good looking website all built and ready to go, but don’t bother customizing because we will cover that soon. For now, we need to find a way to retain our members, and will be configuring our RSS feeds for maximum compatibility.

What is RSS, and Why Do I Need It?

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication.” Essentially, think of this as a way for a passerby to get a condensed version of what you are putting out every time you post in some kind of easy-to-use reminder (i.e. emailed or in an “RSS Reader”). It turns one-time viewers into daily readers, and it makes even the most dedicated fans that much more reflective in your blog’s production levels. Advertisers love to see those high RSS numbers, viewers see RSS as a sign of industry reputation, and it is overall a very positive tool for your blog.

Using Feedburner As Your RSS Mediator

The internet’s most popular RSS tool is called Feedburner, and was recently acquired by Google to bring all of their most premium services to you for FREE! While RSS feeds are technically meant to be manually put into your system in the form of an .xml file on your server every time you update, WordPress automates this to have your feed at a dedicated location that auto-updates every time you have a new post. We want to take this one step further so that our readers have the most flexibility to read your blog (outside of actually visiting it), and this is offered to us by Feedburner!

Let’s go ahead and set this up:

1. Find your blogs RSS feed URL
You can usually do this by simply visiting your blog and looking for a “subscribe” or “rss” link on the main website. Any basic template will have this option in plain sight, even the default, so you can simply locate this and copy down the link where it is.

2. Sign up to Feedburner and Claim Your Feed!
Now, simply go to Feedburner.com and create an account (same as your GMail account if you use GMail!). Then you can add any blog feed url like the one you just copied down in step one, and get your blog run through Feedburner after a few administrative steps. It couldn’t be any easier!

3. Install Feedburner “FeedSmith” Plugin on Your Blog
I’ve seen way too many bloggers fail to utilize this plugin that properly syncs your WordPress blog to Feedburner. Without it, you won’t see the full number of RSS subscribers you have… which is 100% essential to you as a blogger. Read the official directions on the Feedburner website.

It’s important to every successful blog that you get your RSS feed out there as a viable option to your readers. The most successful writers have a huge backlog of 1000s of RSS readers that get their “feed” every time they update it. This creates an opportunity for recurring traffic to your website, and can be a huge boost to the amount of sales that you bring in. Remember, advertisers want to see powerful numbers before they invest in any kind of advertising on your website.

Be sure to check out all of the options that Feedburner allows, and definitely enable “Email Subscriptions” as a way for your users to get in touch as these members will be your #1 cash cow in the future (we will cover later). Heck, everything is free… so we might as well do what we can!

-Jimvesting

Hopefully you’ve done your homework, and have been checking out WordPress themes left and right. We had a productive day yesterday in looking around for a solution to skin our new WordPress blog, and it is high time we put it into use! Finalize your decision on which theme you are going to buy… and let’s put some money down!

Buying Your First WordPress Theme

First things first, if you went with a free premium theme (which is perfectly fine), you can skip past this paragraph. If, however, you are going to pay for it out of pocket to own your own license… here is a quick tip: be your own affiliate! Most theme resellers nowadays have links around their website to encourage affiliates to broker their themes so that they get more exposure. Usually, you will get anywhere from 30% to 65% of the proceeds… which may be a considerable amount of money depending on how pricey the theme is. While I won’t flat out promote you doing this, as many affiliates would rather have you pay sticker price for their theme, you can knock off a good amount of your bill ($10-$40) buy selling the theme to yourself, effectively, through your own affiliate link. Remember to always search for the best deal!

After some due diligence, I have decided to use a theme called “Transgravita” from my good friend ChiQ at MP Theme Designer for Jimvesting.com.

How to Install a WordPress Theme

We’ve spoken to the FTP uploading technique on the day that we installed WordPress, so check out that tutorial if you are a bit fuzzy on the details. For a WordPress theme, this process is very simple. All you need to do is upload the entire folder containing your theme to /wp-content/themes/ in your website. If you have and problems with doing it, check out this great tutorial for a more in-depth look.

Once the folder is uploaded, WordPress will begin to recognize it in your system. Log into your WordPress backend (e.g. “/wp-admin/”), and go to the “Appearance” tab. It is very self explanitory from here, and you just need to get to the “Themes” section and activate the theme that you like best. For me, I simply went and found “Transgravita” in the Themes section, activated it, and now my blog looks like a legitimate website! It really is that easy.

-Jimvesting

NOTE: You can also use a plugin called “One Click” to install themes for you on the fly!

We’re almost through with our first week of posting, and already we have our website up and running on an awesome domain name. Just think: a week ago, you had nothing! Now, you have your entire future laid out in front of you.

On day 5, we installed the WordPress blogging platform to our servers. It’s nice to have the system in place, but now we are faced with a template (as pictured below) that looks… well… pretty darn bland.

Luckily for us, WordPress is a very flexible system.
Let’s see if we can’t make things look a little better, eh?

Why You Need To Customize WordPress

Remember when I told you that your domain name was the most important part of your blog? Well, I lied. In fact, I would argue that having a compelling design can really make or break any website. If you are using a generic template, you will NEVER be an industry professional. While a template is going to be the first step, we want to put a significant amount of time into improving the look of our blog. Need an example? Let’s check out the amount of customization I did on Jimvesting.com, even after purchasing the $50 premium theme!

Ask yourself this: which blog would YOU rather subscribe to?!
I thought so.

Finding an Awesome WordPress Theme for your Blog

I want all of you to do 30 minutes of recon work on finding that winning theme for your blog. Go ahead and open up your own text document where you can jot down your notes and findings (namely URLs of themes you like). This is an important step in the process, and I can only guide you to your final destination. Search Google for things like “Premium WordPress Themes” and check out the footers of blogs you like to see where they got their themes. You aren’t going to be buying anything today, but you need to cut out a solid 30 minutes to look into your future theme. A theme can really drive your traffic, so make sure you are getting what you want.

Remember, we will be customizing these later. Because of this, the true order of your preferences when browsing for themes should be the following IN THIS ORDER:

1. Layout (e.g. where things are on the page)
2. Advertising Locations (ads should be plentiful, but not detract from the look)
3. Aesthetics (how new and professional the actual design appears)

Notice how aesthetics are really the third qualifier of a good theme. Because we can change any awkward color combination to our liking, we need to focus more deeply on where things are, rather than what things are.

Places to Consider for Free and Premium Themes

First of all, let me reiterate that I am only going to fully back premium WordPress themes for your use. Simply put, having a free template… even if you modify the heck out of it… may detract from your reputation. So definitely be careful that you aren’t using one that thousands of others already are! If I’ve seen your theme before, I automatically register you in my head as an amateur! While you need to do your own detective work, I will give you a few resources on both accounts to get you started.

Free WordPress Theme Resources:

• WP Theme Designer (Recommended!)
• Smashing Magazine’s
  “100 Free Themes” List
• WP Zoom’s “45+ Free
  Premium Themes” List

Premium WordPress Theme Resources:

• WooThemes
• Premium WP
• WP Revolution
• Elegant Themes
• Theme Forest

Make that list of potential themes and you’ll be well on your way. Be sure to look thoroughly through your options, reminding yourself what you will put where in each template as you browse. Remember: it’s not the way it looks, but the way it could look.

-Jimvesting