Testing something

Thanks.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Testing

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Testing

That said, if you plan to customize every category on your blog, I’d highly suggest switching to the Thesis platform. Why? Well, if you go to change blog layouts or designs in the future, you will have to re-create every single custom category template in the new theme. With Thesis, if you change the design, the hooks still remain. You do it once and don’t have to worry about it again.

For those of us already on the Thesis theme, adding the hooks to do the custom categories is fairly easy. However, please note that you need to be on Thesis 1.4 or higher for the instructions below to work. If you’re still using an older version of the theme, you need to upgrade. I’d also recommend reading hooks for dummies before attempting the below so you get an idea of how hooks work so the code below makes more sense.

Creating Custom Categories

Let’s say you want to add some custom text to the top of your “apples” category page, above where the listing of your posts in that category appear and different custom text to the top of your “oranges” category page.

Step 1: Open your custom_functions.php file (thesis > custom > custom_functions.php) in your favorite editor

Step 2: Underneath the example code already in the file, place the following code (this code assumes your blog is in the root):

/* Custom Categories */
function custom_archive_info() {
if (is_category('apples')) {
?>
<div class="post_box top intro_block">
<div class="headline_area">
<h1><?php single_cat_title(); ?></h1>
</div>
<div class="format_text">
<p>YOUR CUSTOM APPLES TEXT HERE</p>
</div>
</div>
<?php
}
elseif (is_category('oranges')) {
?>
<div class="post_box top intro_block">
<div class="headline_area">
<h1><?php single_cat_title(); ?></h1>
</div>
<div class="format_text">
<p>YOUR CUSTOM ORANGES TEXT HERE</p>
</div>
</div>
<?php
}
else
thesis_default_archive_info();
}
remove_action('thesis_hook_archive_info', 'thesis_default_archive_info');
add_action('thesis_hook_archive_info', 'custom_archive_info');

The /* Custom Categories */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance. This is not part of the actual “code”. The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. The custom_archive_info is what I decided to name that function.

The if (is_category(’apples’)) tells Thesis the category archive page you are looking to alter is the apples category. It goes by post slug of the category. So if the url of your category page is www.yourblog.com/category/learning-seo/ then you would use if (is_category(’learning-seo’)) in place of if (is_category(’apples’)). This line says IF the category is “apples” then insert the custom text below.

Now, the next portion of the code is an “else if” statement. If the category is apples, then it will insert the specified text outlined in (is_category(’apples’)) OR if (elseif) the category is oranges, it will insert the specified text outlined in (is_category(’oranges’)). The last portion of the code (else) basically says if it is anything else aside from the categories specified above, then use this default code (which happens to be the regular Thesis category page).

So you start with the initial “if” statement (the first category that you specify – choose any one you want) and then all subsequent categories would be “elseif” statements followed by the “default” “else” statement of what to use if you haven’t specified anything specific.

You can add more categories by simply adding more “elseif” statements:

elseif (is_category('yet-another-category')) {
?>
<div class="post_box top intro_block">
<div class="headline_area">
<h1><?php single_cat_title(); ?></h1>
</div>
<div class="format_text">
<p>YOUR CUSTOM TEXT FOR THIS CATEGORY HERE</p>
</div>
</div>
<?php
}

Between the first “elseif” statement and the “else” statement in the example above:

elseif (is_category('oranges')) {
?>
<div class="post_box top intro_block">
<div class="headline_area">
<h1><?php single_cat_title(); ?></h1>
</div>
<div class="format_text">
<p>YOUR CUSTOM ORANGES TEXT HERE</p>
</div>
</div>
<?php
}
ADD MORE ELSEIF STATEMENTS (AKA CATEGORIES) HERE
else
thesis_default_archive_info();
}

The last two lines of the initial code example above:

remove_action('thesis_hook_archive_info', 'thesis_default_archive_info');
add_action('thesis_hook_archive_info', 'custom_archive_info');

Basically tell Thesis you want to remove the “thesis_default_archive_info” function (the default category instructions) from the “thesis_hook_archive_info” and replace it with the “custom_archive_info” function (which contains the new category instructions you just made).

Creating Custom Tag Pages

If you use tags instead of (or in addition to) categories and would like to create custom pages for those as well, just replace:

(is_category('yet-another-category'))

with:

(is_tag('tag-slug'))

If you’re using the Thesis theme already and have read my other Thesis tutorials you’ll probably find this process pretty easy. If you haven’t made the switch to using Thesis yet, I’d highly recommend you read my review of the Thesis theme, as well as the tutorials to get a sense of why I am such a loud-mouthed and enthusiastic evangelist for this theme.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Creating Custom Categories

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Creating Custom Categories

While “You 404′d it. Gnarly, dude.” is a semi-custom page since it does keep with your theme and design, you may want to give it a little bit of your own personality and wording to make it truly “custom”. Below, I’ll show you how to do it.

Step 1: Open your custom_functions.php file (thesis > custom > custom_functions.php) in your favorite editor

Step 2: Underneath the example code already in the file, place the following code (this code assumes your blog is in the root):

/* Custom 404 Hooks */
function custom_thesis_404_title() {
?>
YOUR 404 PAGE HEADING HERE
<?
}

remove_action(’thesis_hook_404_title’, ’thesis_404_title’);
add_action(’thesis_hook_404_title’, ’custom_thesis_404_title’);

function custom_thesis_404_content() {
?>
<p>WHATEVER YOU WANT YOUR 404 PAGE TO SAY HERE</p>
<?
}

remove_action(’thesis_hook_404_content’, ’thesis_404_content’);
add_action(’thesis_hook_404_content’, ’custom_thesis_404_content’);

The /* Custom 404 Hooks */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance and is not part of the actual “code”. The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. The custom_thesis_404_title is what I decided to name that function.

You’ll notice this code has two functions. One controls the 404 page heading (custom_thesis_404_title) and one controls the 404 page content (custom_thesis_404_content).

The code is pretty self-explanatory on how to edit. The two lines underneath each function tell Thesis to remove it’s default thesis_404_title and thesis_404_content and replace each with the custom versions. (See hooks for dummies for a more detailed explanation of how this hook “works.”)

Custom 404 pages are your only chance to turn a lost visitor into a site user, so you want to make sure you serve up something that makes a good first impression. If you need some 404 inspiration, check out these 100 awesome and creative 404 error pages.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Customizing the 404 Page

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Customizing the 404 Page

Not only will I “show” you, but I’ll also teach you how to take advantage of it on your own personal or professional blog.

If you look at my site, you’ll notice I run a large graphical ad above the fold on the Sugarrae website:


Ok, big deal Rae… we already know Thesis can use more custom ad targeting than most themes and that you can specify specific ads on a page by page basis:

Imagine you own an SEO blog but get a lot of traffic from people searching for routers due to a one off post you did… with Thesis, you can change your advertising on that single page to be router related without forcing you to rely on webmaster welfare to do it for you. – Source

And it is one of my favorite features about Thesis. You didn’t need to pick one “sitewide ad”. But after implementing “post specific” ads heavily, I needed to change a “non converting” ad. The problem was that I had to change the ad on every individual post (and good luck on remembering exactly which pages have which ads if you have several hundred posts).

Additionally, there was no way to specify an ad on a specific category page. It always showed the “sitewide” ad by default. While my blogging category page would do well showing an ad for the Thesis theme, my affiliate marketing category page would likely do better showing an ad for Linkshare or Pepperjam.

What I wanted was the ability to:

• Specify a specific ad for each individual category page on my blog
• Have posts filed in each category show the “category ad” for its category by default
• Still be able to override the default ad on a single post if I choose

For example:

• I want to show an ad for Pepperjam on my affiliate marketing category page
• I want all posts filed in the affiliate marketing category to have that same Pepperjam ad by default
• I want to still be able to override that default Pepperjam ad on a single post with an ad for Linkshare if I choose

And by using hooks, I’m able to do all of the above. And now you can too.

Example: Specifying Custom Category Ads

Let’s say you want to show an ad for Acme Lightbulbs on the main page of your lightbulbs category and have that ad be the default ad for all single posts in the lightbulbs category. You also want to show an ad for Granny Apples in your apples category and have that ad be the default ad for single posts in the apples category. On all other site pages, you want to show an ad for Thesis.

Step 1: Upload the graphics you want to add to show up in your multimedia box to the custom images folder (thesis > custom > images > put your image here)

Step 2: Open your custom_functions.php file (thesis > custom > custom_functions.php) in your favorite editor

Step 3: Underneath the example code already in the file, place the following code (this code assumes your blog is in the root):

/* Multimedia Box */
function custom_ad_box() {
$categories = thesis_get_categories();

if ($categories) {
if (is_category('lightbulbs') || in_category($categories['lightbulbs']))
lightbulb_ad();
elseif (is_category('apples') || in_category($categories['apples']))
apples_ad();
else
generic_ad();
}
}

function thesis_get_categories() {
$raw_categories = &get_categories('type=post');

if ($raw_categories) {
$categories = array();

foreach ($raw_categories as $category)
$categories[$category - >slug] = $category - >cat_ID;

return $categories;
}
}

add_action('thesis_hook_multimedia_box', 'custom_ad_box');

The /* Stuff Inside Here */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance. This is not part of the actual “code”. The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. The custom_ad_box is what I decided to name that function.

The code underneath it basically says if that category is lightbulbs (the name you enter here is based on the “slug” of your category. So if your category url is www.domain.com/category-here/ then you would enter “category-here” without the quotes in place of “lightbulbs”) then the category should show the ad named “ad_lightbulb” (we’ll define how to create your ad next). – “if is_category”

If the category is not lightbulbs, then it will check to see if the category is apples and if it is, it will show the ad named “ad_apples”. – “elseif is_category”

If the category is not any of those defined in the code (in this case, lightbulbs and apples) then it will show the ad named “generic_ad”. – “else”

The second function in the above code, which is function thesis_get_categories is generic and should not be changed. The only changes you need to make are to the category names and names of the ads to be shown or adding additional “elseif is_category” lines.

The add_action('thesis_hook_multimedia_box', 'custom_ad_box'); line tells Thesis that you want it to add a function in the multimedia box and the function you want to add is the one we just created – the custom_ad_box function.

Now that Thesis knows what ad name to show on what categories, we need to define the ads themselves.

/* Custom Ads */
function lightbulbs_ad() {
?>
<a href="http://www.LINKLIGHTBULBADISLINKEDTOHERE.com/"><img src="THE-URL-OF-YOUR-LIGHTBULB-AD-IMAGE-GOES-HERE"></a>
<?php
}

function apples_ad() {
?>
<a href="http://www.LINKAPPLESADISLINKEDTOHERE.com/"><img src="THE-URL-OF-YOUR-APPLES-AD-IMAGE-GOES-HERE"></a>
<?php
}

function generic_ad() {
?>
<a href="http://www.LINKGENERICADISLINKEDTOHERE.com/"><img src="THE-URL-OF-YOUR-GENERIC-AD-IMAGE-GOES-HERE"></a>
<?php
}

As with before, the /* Stuff Inside Here */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance. This is not part of the actual “code”. The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. In this case, we’re defining three “functions” which are ads to be used in the custom_ad_box function we already defined above we decided to name lightbulbs_ad, apples_ad and generic_ad. Just put the HTML for whatever you want to appear in that ad slot there:

function name_of_ad() {
?>
HTML HERE
<?php
}

I first defined what ads should appear where and then defined the ads themselves underneath. However, if you find it easier, you can always define the ads first and then define where they should appear second. The order doesn’t matter as long as you both define the ads and in what categories they should appear.

That said, please note that if you were previously using the “custom code” option in the Thesis options panel, and there is code in there currently, you will need to remove the code and hit the big ass save button to see your new ad hooks display.

You can override the default ad shown for any category on a single post basis the same way as before:

I’m able to override the base choice I’ve made of what to show in that area for the majority of my site pages/posts in the Thesis control panel, all without ever having to touch a drop of code in the Wordpress templates by utilizing the custom key option on the specific page or post.

If you view the photo above, you’ll see I was able to select the “custom” key I defined in the Thesis control panel and “override it” and insert specific code to replace the normal “custom” key, only for this post.

If you’re still not using Thesis, get on board. This is the first of many cool tutorials I’ll have coming in the next few months that show why Thesis is quickly moving from being the “best theme choice” for a professional blog to being the “only choice”.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Advanced Ad Targeting

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Advanced Ad Targeting

When Chris Pearson announced the newest release of Thesis, it touted a bunch of great new features and fixed most of my previous gripes. Users who don’t know CSS or PHP have more control with the new thesis them than with any other theme I’ve ever seen.

It looked completely awesome until I downloaded it and saw that Thesis was now run completely on “hooks”. Not only did I not know what a hook was, the tutorials and discussions I saw about it scared the hell out of me.

My level of PHP knowledge (the code language WordPress is run on) is slight at best, thus why I was so thrilled in my earlier review:

You can do everything Thesis does without putting down any money buying the theme. Hell, you could also do this with wordpress if you knew how to (yes, no shit).

Now, you might be someone who can do all this without buying Thesis.

However, I am not. So I bought Thesis.

Now I suddenly was in need of “hooks” to do any “out of the ordinary” customizations (such as adding social bookmarking plugins). I opened up my index template and saw this (and ONLY this):

<?php thesis_html_framework(); ?>

The single post template was missing. The tutorials were in Japanese as far as I was concerned. Thesis was now either for the very basic or the very advanced… those of us hacking plugins into core files were out of luck. What the hell was I supposed to do now?

So I whined to told Pearson that I didn’t understand this or like this one bit. He assured me hooks were easy. He assured me once I learned them, I’d love them. He sent me a link to one of the tutorials. I suddenly realized how people who don’t know SEO must feel reading a document about latent semantic indexing. I also decided I was going to force Pearson to teach me how to do it so I could help non-programmers understand hooks the way Aaron helped the non technical understand LSI. Luckily for me (and hopefully you), he obliged.

The below is the completely “not technical” explanation of hooks, why you need them and how to make them (with examples you can then hack away with). It is chock full of incorrect terminology (I’m pretty sure “put this stuff here” is not part of any PHP instruction manual) and if you’re a programmer, you can go read the properly written tutorial here and spare me on showing me the size of your programming penis by pointing out how small mine is in the comments. ;-)

If you’re scared of that tutorial, confused and can’t follow these instructions:

1. construct a simple function to house your custom HTML
2. tell Thesis where to place your custom code by specifying the appropriate hook

Because you a. don’t know what a function is b. how to write one c. what a hook is or d. how to find “the appropriate” one, then you might want to check out the below.

How to Use Hooks without Learning Japanese

Hooks are basically each section of your theme separated into a single part as well as ways to define areas before and after those parts. Your header is controlled by one hook (thesis_hook_header) while you can use other hooks to put any code you choose before (thesis_hook_before_header) of after (thesis_hook_after_header). Every area has a hook and most areas also have hooks that will allow you to place things before or after them. Instead of the PHP code appearing on the actual page, only the call to the hook that says “put what’s in this hook here” does.

Hooks define where stuff appears and functions define what stuff appears.

A function is essentially code you can assign to a hook that should appear within a hook. For example:

function your_function_name() {
?>
YOUR RAW HTML
<?php
}

Hooks are basically the various parts of your blog, and functions are things that appear within them so to speak.

Now that you know what a hook is and what a function is, we’ll talk about how to add functions to your hooks to do things like add your own graphic into your header or add in social bookmarking buttons.

First things first, never change or edit existing hooks or functions. If you’re looking for the file that contains the core hooks or functions to change them, stop in your tracks. Unless you’re a programmer by trade, you will only risk messing something up by touching them. You never change existing hooks or functions in the core files – you simply add additional functions or replace existing functions with new ones.

Thesis will check your custom_functions.php for instructions and cross reference it so to speak with the core files. If you have removed a core hook or added an additional hook in the custom_functions.php file, then it will override the commands in its core files. (I’m no programmer folks and have already given you my disclaimer on using proper technical terminology to describe this above.)

The way I learned hooks was by example, so I am going to (attempt to) do the same here.

Thesis Hook Example 1: Changing your Header
Thesis Hook Example 2: Adding Social Bookmarking Icons
Thesis Hook Example 3: Changing the Thesis Footer
Thesis Hook Example 4: Adding the Social Profiles Plugin

Thesis Hook Example 1: Changing your Header

Let’s say you want to change your header to include a graphic or logo like my site does above.

Step 1: Upload the graphic you want to add to your header (if applicable) to the custom images folder (thesis > custom > images > put your image here)

Step 2: Open your custom_functions.php file (thesis > custom > custom_functions.php) in your favorite editor

Step 3: Underneath the example code already in the file, place the following code (this code assumes your blog is in the root):

/* Custom Header Image */
function add_header_image () {
echo "<a href=\"http://www.yourblogurl.com/\" title=\"Your Blog Title\">
<img src=\"THE-URL-OF-YOUR-LOGO-GOES-HERE\" alt=\"Your Blog Title\" height=\"170\" width=\"528\" style=\"border:0px\" />
</a>";
}
add_action('thesis_hook_after_title', 'add_header_image');

The /* Stuff Inside Here */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance. This is not part of the actual “code”. The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. The add_header_image is what I decided to name that function.

The http://www.yourblogurl.com tells Thesis where to link the blog header image to (usually the homepage) and the “Your Blog Title” tells it what the name of that link (hidden in code) should be. The link after img src is the address of where your logo is located, the alt is “Your Blog Title” (which will show in case the image doesn’t for some reason), the height and width of the image as well as whether or not to give the image a border are all defined next.

The add_action(’thesis_hook_after_title’, ‘add_header_image’); line tells Thesis that you want it to add a function after the Title and the function you want to add is the one we just created – the add_header_image function. This function utilizes PHP within it, which I don’t fully understand, so that’s about all I can explain folks.

The good news is, this is the most common hook people need to add and to me, is also the most complicated hook. If you can fake make your way through this, you’ll be fine.

Thesis Hook Example 2: Adding Social Bookmarking Icons

This hook will show you how to add some social bookmarking or social media buttons to the bottom of only your single post pages (the actual page your full, individual blog post lives on) like my site does.

Step 1: Upload the graphics you want to use to link to the social sites (if applicable) to the custom images folder (thesis > custom > images > put your images here)

Step 2: Open your custom_functions.php file (thesis > custom > custom_functions.php) in your favorite editor

Step 3: Underneath the example code already in the file, place the following code (this code assumes your blog is in the root and is to place Stumbleupon, Digg, Delicious and a link to your RSS at the bottom of each individual post on your blog):

/* Custom Social Media After Post Hook */
function add_social_media () {
if (is_single()) {
?>
<p><a href="http://www.stumbleupon.com/submit?url=<?php the_permalink() ?>"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_STUMBLE_GRAPHIC"></a><a href="http://digg.com/submit?phase=2&URL=<?php the_permalink() ?>"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_DIGG_GRAPHIC"></a><a href="http://del.icio.us/post?url=<?php the_permalink() ?>&title=<?php the_title(); ?>"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_DELICIOUS_GRAPHIC"></a><a href="http://www.linktoyourfeedhere.com"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_STUMBLE_GRAPHIC"></a></p>
<?php
   }
}
add_action('thesis_hook_after_post', 'add_social_media');

Same as before, the /* Stuff Inside Here */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance. This is not part of the actual “code”. The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. The add_social_media is what I decided to name that function.

The if (is_single()) is a conditional tag that basically tells Thesis to only use that function if the page is the single post page. If I changed it to be is_category() it would only run this function on category pages. You can find a full list of conditional tags here. If you wanted to change this to show the social bookmarking buttons on every page of the site, you’d remove the (is_single()) and the following { and later } like so:

/* Custom Social Media After Post Hook */
function add_social_media () {
?>
<p><a href="http://www.stumbleupon.com/submit?url=<?php the_permalink() ?>"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_STUMBLE_GRAPHIC"></a><a href="http://digg.com/submit?phase=2&URL=<?php the_permalink() ?>"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_DIGG_GRAPHIC"></a><a href="http://del.icio.us/post?url=<?php the_permalink() ?>&title=<?php the_title(); ?>"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_DELICIOUS_GRAPHIC"></a><a href="http://www.linktoyourfeedhere.com"><img src="THE_URL_OF_YOUR_STUMBLE_GRAPHIC"></a></p>
<?php
}
add_action('thesis_hook_after_post', 'add_social_media');

The rest of the code is the traditional HTML code you’d use to add those bookmarking buttons to your theme normally.

The add_action(’thesis_hook_after_post’, ‘add_social_media’); line tells Thesis that you want it to add a function after the post content and the function you want to add is the one we created – the add_social_media function.

Thesis Hook Example 3: Changing the Thesis Footer

A lot of times people want to customize their footer to add copyright notices or other information. The example below will show you how to change your Thesis footer link.

Step 1: Open your custom_functions.php file (thesis > custom > custom_functions.php) in your favorite editor

Step 2: Underneath the example code already in the file, place the following code:

/* Custom Footer Hook */
remove_action('thesis_hook_footer', 'thesis_attribution');
function add_custom_footer () {
?>
<p>© 2008 Ourblog.com – All rights reserved. – <a href="http://www.ourblog.com/privacy-policy/">Privacy Policy</a></p>
<p>No content on this site may be reused in any fashion without written permission from Ourblog.com or whatever you want your footer to include</p>
<?php
}
add_action('thesis_hook_footer', 'add_custom_footer');

Again, the /* Stuff Inside Here */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance. This is not part of the actual “code”. The remove_action(’thesis_hook_footer’, ‘thesis_attribution’); tell Thesis that you wish to remove the regular Thesis footer function (thesis_attribution which we know is the default function the hook uses) from the thesis_hook_footer (the hook we know generates the footer). The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. The add_custom_footer is what I decided to name that function.

The HTML for what I want to appear in the footer is added and then the add_action(’thesis_hook_footer’, ‘add_custom_footer’); line tells Thesis you want to add a function to the thesis_hook_footer (the hook that creates the footer) and the function you want to add is the one we created – add_custom_footer.

So, the code above essentially says “Hey Thesis, please remove the code (thesis_attribution) you put into the footer (thesis_hook_footer) by default and replace it with our code (add_custom_footer). You can do that with any hook function you’d like.

Thesis Hook Example 4: Adding the Social Profiles Plugin

If you’re using the Social Profiles plugin we created here at Sugarrae, the following code will show you how to get the plugin output to appear in your comments area in the same way they appear in mine (after the author’s name, the date, etc but before the comment).

Step 1: upload and activate the Social Profiles plugin

Step 2: Open your custom_functions.php file (thesis > custom > custom_functions.php) in your favorite editor

Step 3: Underneath the example code already in the file, place the following code:

/* Custom Social Profiles for Comments Addition */
function add_social_profiles () {
global $comment;
?>
<?php cyc2_show_profiles($comment->user_id); ?>
<?php
}
add_action('thesis_hook_after_comment_meta', 'add_social_profiles');

Per usual, the /* Stuff Inside Here */ is a label for the code below so you know what it is at a single glance. This is not part of the actual “code”. The word “function” tells Thesis you want it to do something. The add_social_profiles is what I decided to name that function.

The PHP code for the plugin is added and then the add_action(’thesis_hook_after_comment_meta’, ‘add_social_profiles’); line tells Thesis you want to add a function to the thesis_hook_after_comment_meta (the hook that creates the name, date, number, etc of commenters) and the function you want to add is the one we created – add_social_profiles.

Thesis Hooks are Easy

Above, I’ve shown you an example for changing the header (the most common customization you’d need to understand the hooks to do), how to add something to only one specific template (to a single page, to a category page, etc), how to add something to every page, how to remove a function from a hook and add a new one (the footer example) and how to add plugin code (in this case, by adding Social Profiles to the comments area as an example).

You’ll also find the following documentation (linked above in the examples) to be of use to you when using functions and hooks as well:

• The official hooks tutorial
• Thesis hook reference list
• Default hook usage in Thesis
• Listing of the conditional tags you can use with WordPress

If you’re using the Thesis Theme already, I hope you find this tutorial to be a help in customizing the new version. If you’ve been on the fence about Thesis, I hope this has shown you hooks aren’t anything to be afraid of and that you can still customize Thesis without being a PHP guru. If you’re ready to make the leap to Thesis, you can get your copy of Thesis here.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Hooks for Dummies

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Thesis Tutorial – Hooks for Dummies

After I calmed down from being attacked by a random sparrow (it was a really, REALLY big sparrow, ok?), the topic of conversation turned to Vanessa launching her new blog this week (uh, at least that’s the plan), Nine by Blue.

We were discussing proper and effective tactics to use for promoting new blogs and I made the mention that bloggers could take a lesson from actors, writers and musicians when they launch a new blog as far as promotional tactics. We discussed the similarities and while most are in tune with launching a brand new blog, most of these tactics can be effective for any website.

Promos and Trailers

Long before their newest album is complete or the movie is even 1/8 of the way to completing shooting, Studios and record labels are releasing movie trailers or plastering bookstores with posters advertising their impending release.

Bloggers can use this too by starting to “promo” a website before it’s fully completed. Add a blurb about your new site to the bottom of your latest blog post. Brian Clark was hyping people up to his impending launch of Lateral Action at the end of his Copyblogger posts (and possibly others) long before the website was launched.

Vanessa was using Nine by Blue branding on presentations with a link to her feed while the website was still in development. Lisa Barone let you know she might be blogging on her own domain before she ever even wrote a post.

Being in development certainly hasn’t stopped anyone from developing links and buzz in traditional media, and it shouldn’t stop webmasters either. Just be sure to remember that there is a difference between hype and buzz. You want to develop the latter and not the former.

Guest Appearances

Every time a starlet has a new movie at the box office or a band has a new album on the shelves, they start making the “guest appearances” rounds. And while they definitely aim for the highest exposure possible, like daytime television shows or late night TV, they don’t pass up radio appearances, autograph appearances and local newspaper or magazine interviews either.

Bloggers can get “guest appearances” by doing guest posts, offering interviews if their name or company name is recognizable, doing podcast or internet radio appearances and any other opportunity to put their new blog in front of people. Aim high but don’t overlook low hanging fruit either. When you’re just starting out, even a blog with only 100 people reading it offers you access to 100 people you’re not currently reaching.

For more established blogs, a general rule of thumb might be that anyone with more subscribers than you or a different, but related, market you’re not currently reaching is worth working to obtain a “guest appearance” on.

Sponsorships and Buzz Events

I’ve seen plenty of instances where video games or movies will sponsor larger events or create specific buzz events (many might call them launch parties) aimed at gaining interest. For instance, the video game “Gears of War 2″ recently sponsored UFC 91, whose fan base is heavily comprised of their target market.

Bloggers can do the same thing by stepping up to sponsor a contest in their target market – even if they’re completely new to the scene. Buzz events many times, to me anyway, can be correlated to “link bait”… if I’m going to launch a blog, I’m going to make sure I have a few really strong and very well done “buzz pieces” ready to go with the aim of getting social media attention and being put in front of potential readers.

The words “link bait” tend to have a negative connotation online, but I see no difference between a “buzz event” offline and a piece of “link bait” online. Both are lame when done wrong and can be amazingly effective when done right.

Street Teams

A “Street Team” is best defined by Wikipedia:

“In many cases, an influential teen referred to as a neighborhood “tastemaker” was sought out or pinpointed by a record label to be used as a conduit to their respective neighborhood, due to their stronger influence over other teens that looked to them for “what’s hot” or “what’s the next hot thing”. The tastemaker was directed to create a team on the streets to make an unsigned music artist more popular through word-of-mouth and hype.”

Replace “influential teen” with “popular or semi-popular bloggers” and you’ll quickly see that a Street Team is equivalent to an offline Linkerati. Instead of writing posts that are distributed to followers via an RSS reader, they create buzz about events by plastering the streets with posters and talking to everyone they come into contact with to promote the band.

“Usually unpaid, street teams for bands and artists are still often comprised of teenagers who are rewarded with free band merchandise or show access in exchange for a variety of actions.”

Street teams place stickers and posters in their communities while the Linkerati put up buttons and badges promoting your blog. Street teams bring friends to the shows while the Linkerati sends links of your first few initial kick ass posts to friends or in round up posts.

Street teams convince friends to buy band merchandise while the Linkerati convinces people to sign up for your blog RSS feed. Street teams phone your local radio station to request the band’s songs be played while the Linkerati submits your posts to social media websites and send around the link to friends they know have accounts.

Street teams bring vinyl and CDs to local DJs in the clubs where they work while the Linkerati link to your blog from larger websites they may do columns for. Street teams put up posters while the Linkerati showcases you and your blog via individual blog posts. Street teams post to band forums and bulletin boards online while the Linkerati do the same.

Street teams can make (or break) many bands and the Linkerati can do the same. Bloggers can rally the people they know love their content or their product offerings and organize them via personal emails to be their street team on the web. If you’re starting out with no contacts, then you might consider finding services that connect you with a “street team” (you’d just better be sure you have something worth promoting before you do).

If you have any other legit techniques for promoting a brand new blog, feel free to add to the list below. And if you liked this post, be a member of my street team and pass it on. ;-)

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

How to Promote a Brand New Blog

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

How to Promote a Brand New Blog

I wanted a way to give my community members more exposure than just a link to their website. I figured the best way was to give you the ability to showcase your profiles in addition to your website link at the social sites most common in my community. And we’ve made it a free plugin (once again though, donations never hurt) so you can do the same for your users.

The default ten social networks and forums currently included are Delicious, Digg, Flickr, Furl, MySpace, Newsvine, Reddit, Stumbleupon, Technorati and Twitter. The plugin admin panel allows you to show the networks of your choosing via text links or graphical links (your choice) and even has an option to add a nofollow attribute to the links generated by Social Profiles.

The plugin also comes with an include file (step by step details and examples for adding networks can be found in the customization section of the Social Profiles plugin page). the sky is the limit as long as the network/forum has a standard user profile link that only changes by username.

As an example, if you visit login to Sugarrae and visit your user profile page, you’ll see the option to fill out three new fields at the bottom underneath Social networking. On my site, the three networks I’ve chosen to showcase are Twitter, Sphinn and Webmasterworld – all commonly used sites by my readership. Twitter comes pre-configured in the Social Profiles plugin while Sphinn and Webmasterworld, because they were niche networks/forums, were added by myself via an include written specifically to allow you to add niche networks important to your site and your readership.

To see the plugin in action, check out the comments below. If a user hasn’t filled in the fields under the social networks heading, none will appear. If they only fill out some, but not all, only the ones they’ve added a username for will appear.

See the Social Profiles plugin page for full details. I hope you guys enjoy this plugin as much as Joost and I already are.

Edited to add:

TheMadHat suggested I add to this post that you can use both Social Profiles and CYC on your blog without *requiring* registration for all commenters.

WordPress gives you two options under Settings > General. One is to allow anyone to register, the other is to only allow comments from registered users. If you check allow anyone to register but do NOT check off registration being required to comment, then you can offer registration to those who wish to register and take advantage of listing their Social Profiles without requiring that ALL commenters be registered. The best of both worlds.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Introducing the Social Profiles Plugin

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Introducing the Social Profiles Plugin

It’s called Customize Your Community aka CYC. And, not only is this plugin kick ass, but it’s also free (though donations never hurt).

A while back, I moved this blog to allowing comments from registered users only. And because this meant users were now going to see the backend of my blog, I went around installing various plugins to limit what they could see in the dashboard as well as try and customize it as much as possible to match my site.

After a lot of searching, I finally found a plugin that themed the registration and login type pages and in combination with some other plugins, was able to limit what registered users could see in my dashboard. But I found absolutely nothing to customize the user profile page. Zip. Nada.

While I liked the fact that my login and registration pages were seamless with the rest of my site, that ugly non matching user profile page was driving me nuts. So I enlisted Joost’s programming skills to create something that will allow you to create a community on your blog that is branded you and not Wordpress (not that we don’t appreciate Wordpress).

See the CYC plugin page for full details of what this awesome plugin can do. Also, if your goal is to create “community”, I’d also recommend using the new user email setup plugin to create a personalized email for your community as well complete the effect.

Hope you guys find CYC as awesome as I do. And make sure you subscribe to the feed or the newsletter (see the right sidebar) because it won’t be long before I release my next plugin.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Introducing Customize Your Community

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Introducing Customize Your Community

When I upgraded my site to the Thesis theme, I wasn’t simply looking for a “new design” (my old one was awesome). I was looking more to “step up” my blog a bit in many aspects (as well as update things a bit… as great as it was, the previous theme was over two years old).

I’ve spent some time over the last week pimping the already fantastic Thesis and thought I’d share some of the things that I’ve done to this blog (which can really be done on any theme) in the past week, as well as over the last two years. These are things with a user focus and not an “SEO one” (Yoast wrote the book on that already).

1. Complete RSS
The full or partial feed debate is much like the chicken and egg debate. Everyone has their reasons… a lot of people are of the mindset that partial feeds drive higher click thru rates, even though the VP of Publishing Services at Feedburner says there is no evidence to support the theory. I’m of the mindset that full feeds mean people actually read more of my posts and the end result for me, my readers and my blog, is better. Since I use the “more tag” for SEO purposes, Complete RSS lets me have the best of both worlds.

2. User photo
This plugin allows you to display photos of post authors and users who comment. Now, there is also the Gravatar plugin, but the problem was, no matter what I did, I couldn’t get it to work the post author portion to work.

Because the avatars were being called from off site, they also slowed down loading time a tiny bit. So, I went the user photo plugin route, which allows me to host the user photos on my own site and works with the post author section.

Additionally, it also is needed to use tip #7 below. I personally feel the photos make it feel more personal around here and definitely makes me feel more connected to them then text alone does.

3. Themed login and register
There are other plugins that allow you to customize the Wordpress registration/login box, but this one actually lets you put the required fields right into your own template. It makes it seamless with my site.

I think this helps users who may not recognize what Wordpress is… preventing them from getting confused by being taken to a completely different looking site to register (and since registration is required to comment on my blog now, everyone who comments sees the registration screen). Additionally, it simply looks cool.

This plugin also will help you change and customize your new user registration email, however, since I was already using another plugin for that (see tip #5) I haven’t tried that feature of this particular plugin and cannot attest to it’s performance.

4. What would Seth Godin do
The first time you came to my site (or maybe this is your first time), you might have noticed a box at the top of the page that welcomed you to the site:

If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my feed or subscribe to me on Twitter, which is updated on a more frequent – and more meaningless – basis.

The point of this plugin, for me, is to try and convert a user from a casual drop by who might forget to come back again to a feed subscriber or a Twitter follower. You have the option to put the box before or after the post (I chose before, but have no testing behind that to say if it works better – play with it) as well as the option of how many times a visitor will be shown the box (I show it once, again, no testing behind it yet… see what works for you).

5. New user email setup
One of the problems i experienced when I went to registered comments only was that users weren’t being directed to fill out their profile upon signing up. So, I went in search of a way to customize the bland email sent to a user when they register and found this. Works like a charm. Now when people register for my site, they get the following email:

Subject: Thanks for Registering at Sugarrae.com

Thank you for registering as a member of the Sugarrae.com community. Please note your username and password below for future reference:

Username: [their username here]
Password: [their password here]

I’d also like to invite you to take the time to customize your profile at the Sugarrae.com website. To do so, simply log in here: [login url goes here] with the above username and password to add a link to your website, change the way your name shows on the site and add other contact information if you’d like. You can also upload a picture so it will display next to your name when you comment.

Please note that while we welcome you to link to your website, out of place keyword usage in the anchor/display name (think “designer shoes” as your “display name”) is not and we reserve the right to delete your user account in the event you abuse our comment policy which you can find here: http://www.sugarrae.com/commentpolicy/

Thanks for registering, and don’t forget to subscribe to the feed: http://feeds.sugarrae.com/sugarrae and follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/sugarrae

Thanks,
Rae

It seems more personal, lets users get more out of commenting on my site (links, they are more noticeable in a long string of comments, etc) and also serves to serve the same goals as tip #4.

6. iStockPhoto
Smart people have been touting the importance of and advantages to the use of images when blogging for quite a while now. And I’ve never skimped on the pictures when it comes to professional linkbait for my commercial sites. But, with Sugarrae and especially with “everyday posts”, I’ve been lazy. With the help of iStockPhoto, that stops here. Bottom line is, if the post isn’t worth spending a few bucks on a picture or two, I have no business writing it, publishing it or boring the shit out of you with it.

7. Guest post author box
Thanks to graywolf forwarding me his copy of the Yoast mailing list that I idiotically had not be subscribed to until then (severe mistake now corrected), I have a kick ass box that shows at the bottom of the posts on my blog done by guest posters (see the bottom of this post for an example) – and it shows up automatically.

I got one time permission from Joost (who has created most of the wordpress plugins i use for SEO reasons on this site) to post a hack he put in his newsletter, which you need to sign up for, right now, so you don’t miss further newsletter exclusive pimpage:

Template hack for guest posts
==
Sometimes you’ll want to allow guest posts on your blog, and one of
the reasons why people would want to guest post is because they can
gain some extra exposure. A cool way of doing this is using the
built-in author functions with some extra’s to add a “Guest post
by” block to your template. I’ve done this on yoast.com, and you
can find an example here.

How I did this? Well first, I installed the UserPhoto plugin.

This plugin allows users to upload a photo which is added to their
profile, and then adds template tags you can use. I then added the
following code to my theme, I’ve annotated all lines, you should be
able to copy paste and modify:

// If it’s not written by me, it’s a guest post, hence check for
that:
<?php
if (get_the_author_login() != “admin”) {
?>

// It’s a guest post, show the appropriate block
<div class=”guestauthor” id=”<?php the_author_login(); ?>”>

// If there’s a user photo that’s uploaded and has been approved,
show it:
<?php if ( function_exists(’userphoto_the_author_photo’) ) {
userphoto_the_author_photo(”, ”,
array(’style’ => ‘float:right; margin: 5px;’,
‘class’ => ‘guestauthorphoto’) );
} ?>

// Show the author’s information
<h3>Guest post by: <?php the_author(); ?></h3>
<p><?php the_author_description(); ?></p>
</div>
<?php
}
?>

The last thing is that, in order for HTML to be allowed in user
profiles, you need to add the following line to your theme’s
functions.php:

// Allow HTML in user profiles
remove_filter(’pre_user_description’, ‘wp_filter_kses’);

That’s it! You now have cool “Guest post by” blocks on your site!

See what you almost missed? Now, if you don’t want to miss any more FREE tips like this, I highly suggest you subscribe to his list. Thanks to this plugin, users can clearly see the post was written by a guest poster without them having to do an awkward intro in the actual post itself or constantly add (and format) their own bio line if they guest post often.

8. Samsarin PHP widget plugin
If you’re using a theme that doesn’t support PHP in its sidebar widgets (which would be most of them in my experience), you might find yourself in the situation that I did when I switched to the Thesis theme. I use the randomize plugin to rotate between certain pictures in my flickr account on my sidebar so that people can “caption” the photos for fun. The Thesis widgets didn’t support PHP, so it looked like I might have to go without that feature until someone commented on my blog (they didn’t leave a site link, or I would have linked to them) about the Samsarin plugin, which I added and made PHP work in my widgets like a charm. Now I get my sexy theme and my PHP, which I use to make the blog a little bit more interactive.

So there ya go… eight quick ways you can make your blog a bit more appealing, strictly from a human standpoint. And since I’ve now helped you make your blog hotter, head on over and vote for me in the hot blogger competition (long list, control +F Sugarrae). ;-)

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Pimping Your Wordpress Theme for Humans

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Pimping Your Wordpress Theme for Humans

I saw it, liked it, bought it, tweaked it and played with it. I like the theme… thus why I am using it, went back and bought a developers license so I can use it on other sites and you’re damn right I am linking to it with affiliate links.

Ok, with that out of the way, I really think thesis is the best “in the box” Wordpress theme I’ve ever come across, though I still have a few wants on my wish list for future upgrades.

For someone who doesn’t get a lot of php and hacks their way through Wordpress themes, Thesis will give them a lot of functionality they wouldn’t be able to obtain for themselves otherwise by being able to make changes via a simple control panel instead of having to alter any actual Wordpress code (click the images below to see larger versions).

You can tick a box that allows you to use either the default css theme or your own custom css file and you can also “tell Thesis” to replace all of the generic links to your rss feed in Wordpress with your Feedburner one (though I totally admit to hacking this in by hand myself because I am weird like that).

Thesis also allows you to pick and choose which “pages” you display instead of utilizing a code that simply displays anything you designate as a page. It also allows you to mix and match pages and blog categories in the top navigation header and even allows you to add links to outside sites. If you want to remove the author name or dates of your postings from the template, add tags to your template or anything else along those lines, you can simply un-tick the box. you can even insert your Google Analytics or Mint tracking code… all right from the control panel, complete with a “big ass save button” – no, really.

My favorite part of the Thesis theme is the Multimedia Box (see the top of this page where the 300X250 Thesis ad is), which you can change to rotate between pictures, embed video or even include custom code for all those folks that want to show advertising in that area.

Big deal… most themes have spots for advertisements. Yeah, but what made Thesis stand out to me is that I can change what appears in that area on a page by page basis if I want to. For example, you’ll notice my homepage has an ad for SEOBook.com, while this page has an ad for Thesis. Since my guide to small business SEO gets a lot of traffic from small business owners, that page shows an ad for Yahoo Search Marketing.

I’m able to override the base choice I’ve made of what to show in that area for the majority of my site pages/posts in the Thesis control panel, all without ever having to touch a drop of code in the Wordpress templates by utilizing the custom key option on the specific page or post.

If you view the photo above, you’ll see I was able to select the “custom” key I defined in the Thesis control panel and “override it”and insert specific code to replace the normal “custom” key, only for this post. This allows me to target my advertising on specific pages, especially higher traffic ones.

Imagine you own an SEO blog but get a lot of traffic from people searching for routers due to a one off post you did… with Thesis, you can change your advertising on that single page to be router related without forcing you to rely on webmaster welfare to do it for you.

Can you use custom fields without Thesis? But of course. You can do everything Thesis does without putting down any money buying the theme. Hell, you could also do this with wordpress if you knew how to (yes, no shit).

Now, you might be someone who can do all this without buying Thesis.

However, I am not. So I bought Thesis.

Now, is Thesis all unicorns and rainbows? No.

I have a few gripes and a wish list for future upgrades I’d like to see added to the theme, including:

1. The default template doesn’t include the category that the post was made in and doesn’t have a simple control panel check box to enable on. If a user lands on one of my Facebook posts from Google, I’d like them to be able to see the post is in a Facebook category so they can see all my Facebook posts should they choose (yes, I get that it is still in the sidebar, don’t care).

2. You can’t access the custom style sheet through the Wordpress theme editor. So, if you use the custom css (rather than the default one), which I’d imagine most professional bloggers would, you actually have to edit it offline and then ftp it back to the server to make any changes to it. I’d much rather edit it the same way I do everything else relating to the theme.

3. While the design and theme are very SEO friendly, and I might even go as far to say it is the most SEO friendly theme I’ve ever seen “in a box”, it is not perfect and it does lean a little heavy in implying it is doesn’t need anything “extra” in regards to plugins or the like for SEO reasons. So, if you do buy and use Thesis, I’d recommend the following “enhancements” (at minimum) to Thesis’s great base for SEO friendliness to turn it into SEO excellence:

• SEO title tag (Thesis lets you change post/page title tags without this plugin, but it doesn’t let you change titles of category pages)
• RSS footer
• Permalink redirect
• Custom query string
• Wordpress breadcrumbs
• SEO slugs
• Robots meta

4. I’d like to see an option to enable/show social media buttons in the Thesis control panel. I’d love to tick off Digg, Delicious and Stumbleupon boxes and have the graphics (or text links) show up nicely and properly coded to work. An option to check off a box to enable a div to make the Digg plugin (or something like it) nicely align with your text (like it does here) without having to actually touch the design template (installing a plugin and checking a box is so much easier).

5. The ability to create a nice contact form for yourself without actually having to know any code would also be awesome.

6. Adding things to the sidebar is a breeze since the theme is widget enabled. However, the widgets do not accept any php. So if you have something utilizing php in your sidebar, you’ll either have to hack the template in the code or go without it. I’d like to see this become a non-issue in the next release.

7. I’d like the ability to specify a specific advertisement to a category or archive page, not just individual posts and pages.

However, even with my gripes and wish list, I still think Thesis is the best out of the box solution I’ve seen in regards to a blog theme. Easy to use, pretty damn customizable and when you see them say over and over on the Thesis sales page that the support is awesome, they ain’t lyin’. And all future upgrades/releases of the theme are free.

So if you kick ass at php and can do all this customization yourself by utilizing your mad coding skillz, rock on. If you’re like me and well, can’t, then Thesis might be a solution. The ad targeting features alone for the professional (or semi-professional) blogger should easily make up the cost of buying the theme to begin with if you’re getting any decent traffic.

Edited to add: Let me know if you guys like the product reviews. I sometimes find good stuff (like Thesis) among all the flat out crap I try (and buy, sigh). I’ll share more of the good stuff if you’d like.

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

A Review of the Thesis Wordpress Theme

This post originated at the Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

A Review of the Thesis Wordpress Theme