Tailored WP

How To Add JavaScript to WordPress

Ricardo Nuñez — Thu, 19 Mar 2020 19:43:15 +0000

Whether is a piece of JavaScript or CSS code, there are couple of ways to add JavaScript to WordPress.

Be aware that although some themes have an option to add the scripts, I recommend using a plugin because that way if you change the theme, you will not forget to add those scripts back (believe me, it has happened many times).

To add a script to WordPress we are going to use a plugin. This will help us add the script without having to dig into the code.

Follow the following steps to install the plugin and add your script.

Add the Plugin

In your WordPress Dashboard go to Plugins Add New Plugin

Search for “Scripts” or “Header and Footer Scripts”

Install the Plugin

Click in Install Now

When the installation is complete,
click in Activate

How to Add JavaScript to WordPress

There are two ways of adding the sript.

Option 1 – Globally – Adding the Script to load across your whole website. Example: You do this for tracking scripts like Google Analytics.

Option 2 – Adding the script to a particular Page or Post

Option 1 – Add The Script Globally

After the Plugin is installed head over to:

Settings -> Header and Footer Scripts

Paste your script at the header or footer and click in Save settings

Option 2 – Add JavaScript to a WordPress Page or Post

When you Open your page, Scroll all the way down to the section:
Insert Script to

Paste your code and save your page.

That’s all. If you have any comments or questions, let me know.

Gutenberg: All About The New WordPress Editor!

Ricardo Nuñez — Sun, 09 Dec 2018 01:18:26 +0000

WordPress released a major update and it comes with an important change – the addition of a new editor. The developers called the project Gutenberg.

There has been a lot of talk about this new feature that has been under development for two years.

Not everybody is happy about it. Most developers have been complaining from the beginning of the development.

Some think that it is not 100% ready for the launch. Others think that they used the wrong approach for the development to begin with.

I have stayed on the sidelines without having an opinion on the matter for a few reasons.

Firstly, I have been using other builders like the Divi builder, Elementor and Beaver Builder. The change is not that painful for me. Some of the plugins I created are already up to date.

Secondly, one of the issues some people are experiencing is related to the technology used. This actually ended up in licensing issues with Facebook and some other things that do not matter as of now, so I’ve been indifferent about it but I understand their point.

So what is Gutenberg and why does it matters?

Gutenberg

Gutenberg adds a new way of writing, and designing posts and pages (not the website itself, for that you still need a theme).

The old WordPress editor called TinyMCE, allowed you to write in plain text and it was extended with plugins and shortcodes.

WordPress also used to use something called custom fields that allow developers to add features on each page and post.

What’s New

Starting is not much different, you still have the title and one text block. What comes next it depends in how you want to create it, that’s when blocks come to play.

Blocks

Gutenberg uses blocks to add features or parts to each posts. This makes creating posts modular.

Images, email boxes, lists, etc., can be added by using these blocks. Developers can create their own custom blocks to extend and add an infinite options.

When you look at the design in general, Gutenberg gives you more ways of designing the posts. you can use the columns block and it doesn’t rely on the theme alone or shortcodes to make the posts look better in comparison to the old editor.

The Image Block

Why are people complaining about it?

It is common knowledge that in general people do not need any reason at all to complain.

But all jokes aside, I have tried to use it a few times during the development phase and it was not that great.

And I am not only referring to bugs. It is the way it works. Since it was in a development phase it is quite hard to come up with a final conclusion about the whole thing.

I’m actually using on this post, and I still struggle but no bugs so far.

Gutenberg has some limitations based on the design, this is actually why some are complaining too.

The approach the Gutenberg developers took to create it was also contested.

I find The Divi Builder’s new improvements polished and sharp in comparison.It is just not as snappy as some of the other page builders.

Technology

On the technical side, they are using React JS. I already have been developing with it for a while, so no complains in my part, but I understand the pain.

So far, WordPress has been developed with PHP, jQuery and plain JavaScript. Those are the most used tools/languages on the internet, which make it easy to get started with WordPress.

Starting now, WordPress developers will need to learn a new set of skills, or find specialized help ie. ReactJS Developers that are specialized in WordPress.

Don’t want to use it?

If you don’t want to deal with the editor update at all, you will need to install the Classic Editor Plugin.

This will solve any issues and this way you can update WordPress and avoid any security holes you would run into with an outdated WordPress website.

What’s Next

I’ve been working on my new website for some time now and try using it for posts but didn’t like working with it. Since I used all the other builders mentioned, it may be the pain of learning a new thing or just because it is different.

As I mentioned, I’m trying it now, to learn how it works, to catch bugs and see what blocks I can develop for it.

I do get why the update. Web development has evolved. Things are a bit different and change is necessary to grow.

I’m sure making this decision was not easy. In the end, it doesn’t matter as much as people make it out to be though. There are solutions, just pick one or the other and move on. Overtime it will get better, that’s for sure.

Video Training

I’m working on a video to show you how Gutenberg works. You can try using it in one of your new posts if you like. After that, you can see for yourself if you like it and make up your mind.

As always, if your website breaks and you need help with it, send me an email. Should you have any questions let me know.

Ricardo Nuñez – @RicNunez

PS: If you like this post, please pin this image on Pinterest.

12 Tools and plugins to boost your WordPress website speed

Ricardo Nuñez — Thu, 19 May 2016 17:30:30 +0000

Las Update: 11/30/2016

Your WordPress website speed can have a major impact on your revenue. Raise your hand if you hate it when a website takes too long to load.

Pretty much everybody does. If you feel like that, your website visitors and customers probably feel the same about your website – which can make you lose a lot of money.

The impact of your WordPress website speed

Speed can help your website in so many ways like SEO, conversions and overall user experience. Whether it’s to make more sales, get you more leads or just to give your visitors a better interaction when they read your content, Website speed is very important.

It can also affect your advertising budget.

If you are running pay-per-click ads, and your website takes too long to load, people can close the window without even seeing your website properly.

Losing money just because your website is slow is a major concern and an issue you should tackle as soon as possible.

It’s one of the conclusions FT.com took; their website speed has an impact in user engagement and their subscription rates.

In this post, I try to teach you about all of the things that can slow your website down. From having too many plugins, loading up too many libraries, having pictures that are too large, having slow hosting and the overall configuration of your website.

I’m going to list the best tools and plugins I have found to have the best results. These plugins have helped me to boost my own WordPress website speed.

Attention: Before we jump into it the steps, don’t forget to back up your website and database before you make any changes to it. This is really important and should be done before you do anything else mentioned here!

Website Analysis

Because we need to know where we are before we know where we can go, let’s start with the tools you can use to analyze your own website.

Google Page Speed Insight

This is a free tool developed by Google that helps you analyze your website and find issues with it.

The tool will give you a grade and further tips based on your website’s performance. It creates a list of all the issues that you should fix, and some suggestions about other things not as important.

One tip I want to give you though is to not obsess about the given results. So far, I was able to get 100, but I don’t recommend it. Some of the suggestions like moving CSS to the footer I don’t recommend. I keep it at 80 on the mobile and a 86 on the desktop. There are some things you can’t control, especially if you need to use many plugins and a shared hosting for your website.

Tools.Pingdom.com

This is another great free tool that allows you to analyze your website for free. It will create a waterfall chart and a list in the order in which the assets (Images, JavaScript, CSS, etc.) load. It will also show you the time it takes to do that. This makes it easy to find out what exactly is dragging your website’s speed down.

Other great tools you can use are gtmetrix.com and webpagetest.org. You shouldn’t rely on one website alone to show you your website’s errors and these two work great and will display the data you need in different formats.

WordPress Optimization Plugins

Better WordPress Minify

This plugin combines and minify all your CSS files and JavaScript files to improve page loading time. It allows you to select where you want to move the files to – footer or header of your website. If you load the files at the footer, your website will load faster. Some people recommend loading JavaScript files at the footer and CSS at the header. This plugin makes this really easy.

Another great plugin that can help you with this is Autoptimize. I haven’t used it as much as BWM, but I’ve heard good things about it.

Although some of the cache plugins I mention later in this article offer a minification option, I have had better results using BWM.

Note: Some of the reviews say that it can make your links stop working, so if you are trying it out, be sure everything works fine in every browser.

Plugin Organizer

This plugin is simple but very helpful, especially if you need to use many plugins on your website.

It allows you to organize when the plugins will load and change the order in which the plugins load.

If a plugin isn’t used on a homepage or others pages, there’s no reason to load it everywhere. You can disable it and enable it, so that it will only be used on the page you actually need it.

Here’s an example: The contact form 7 plugin is only in use on the contact page. You can disable it everywhere else and load it only on that page in particular.

Remember this plugin will stop your plugins from loading. So if you don’t configure it properly you may lose some functionality, like breaking your contact form.

Cache Plugins

Using a cache plugin is always a good idea. Cache plugins will help you with the performance optimization of your website caching pages, database and in some cases it will also help you minify the files. Caching your website files will help you lower the server load and processing.

If you are using a cheaper shared hosting it’s the way to go. If you have server or VPS, you can do this at the server level.

Be aware that using the plugins will not show up much difference on the Google Page Speed rating.

Lazy Load

Lazy loading is a design pattern that allows you to load an image or other files when you need it. In WordPress it is usually used to load external libraries and images. When you visit a website it will load the content above the fold and load everything else only when needed, i.e. when you scroll down.

There are a few different lazy load plugins, I’ve tested A3 Lazy Load, and Advanced lazy load. They both worked well and so far I had no issues with either.

CloudFlare – Content Delivery Network (CDN)

CloudFlare’s main service is a CDN. It will distribute your content around the world, so it’s closer to your visitors which will make the website faster for them. It will also add an extra layer of security protecting your websites from DDoS attacks.

I started using their service two years ago and so far it has worked well. Every now and then I have had some hiccups with it, but it’s hard to pinpoint if the problem is my own server or their service. I’m doing some research about this. I hope to have an answer soon.

One tip about the service is to disable SmartErrors. Instead of loading your 404, CloudFlare will load their own page when they can’t load a request to your website. You want everybody to visit your website even if it’s to land on a missing page. Just customize your 404 page.

Server and Hosting

If you really want to try and improve your website speed, you need to start by finding a solid hosting company.

Consider a hosting company that uses SSD space. That’s what we use for our clients and the difference is noticeable.

The company we have been using and that has a great service is Inmotion hosting. Not only you can use them for shared hosting, but also for Virtual Private Servers (VPS).

Cache at the server level

You can use a cache plugin like I mentioned above or you can use it at the server level. For that you need check out varnish-cache.org (you will need a VPS to be able to use it).

Nginx

Most WordPress hosting providers use Apache for the HTTP server. I also use Nginx in some of my websites and combined with caching it has major performance improvements.

Conclusion

We covered all the tools, services and plugins that you can use now without taking too much of your time.

These are the tools I have tried and got the best results with trying to boost my WordPress website’s speed. There are many more technical things you can do to make your website faster, but the advice shared in this article will already give you a head start against your competitors.

In a future article I’ll talk about how I put everything together to make my own website faster.

Let me know of any other tools or plugins you would recommend in the comment section below.

Most common WordPress mistakes

Ricardo Nuñez — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 19:07:27 +0000

When you are creating your WordPress website there are a few no-no’s that you can avoid. In some cases these things may not create immediate impact, but in the long run they can make you lose money without even noticing.

The major thing I’m going to emphasize is website speed. Ever since Google started using website speed as an SEO factor, I became obsessed with it. It’s one of the biggest issues I notice every time somebody sends us a message and wants to work with us.

Alright, without further ado here is the list of things to avoid when you create your website using WordPress:

Not checking your WordPress website in every browser

If you have not checked your website in every browser, you may already be in trouble. Sometimes the issues are small like some misalignment of the content or a background color that doesn’t load properly. But many times over the issue can be bigger, like your contact form not working or part of the content is missing. Especially in Internet Explorer, things can go wrong pretty quickly.

Check your website in every browser possible, like Internet Explorer/Edge, Firefox, Chrome and Safari. You don’t have to install every browser to test it out. There are several tools, some of them are free or others have a free trial that are great for your testing purposes.

Here is a list of tools you can use:

Browser stack (free trial)
The Spoon
Ghostlab

In the worst case scenario you could just ask friends for help or share your website on social media websites and ask people if your website is working properly.

Not checking if your website works well on different mobile devices

This one is the continuation of the previous point. Recently I was on the go when I started browsing my phone, looking for restaurants in the area I was in. I landed on a website and as soon as I started looking at its content all of a sudden a popup overlay was blocking me from reading it. Since I couldn’t close it, I had to go back to the Google results and move on to the next one on the list. Small things like that can make you lose visitors and customers.

Make sure you test on different mobile devices. Some of the tools I mentioned above have the option to test it out. Also, ask your friends. Many times over testing things out in the wild using somebody’s phone is a lot better, especially in public places where connectivity speed varies drastically.

You have too many plugins

I’m actually guilty of this sometimes. Many times over you want to add something new to your website. Whether is a pricing table, a form, or a social media link, it doesn’t what it is, the quickest way is to go to the WordPress plugin directory and install a plugin that can solve the problem pretty quickly.

The issue with this is that when you setup 15 plugins, chances are that many of them will load external files and sometimes those files and the plugins are not well optimized.

So make sure the plugin has good reviews and it doesn’t affect your website speed or usability. Browse around your website pages after you install a plugin, you never know.

You are using too many images

Images are pretty; they enhance your website design and help you provide the visitor with a pleasant user experience. The problem is that many people upload too many pictures without worrying about the amount of pictures they are using. Also they upload pictures without checking the size and if they are optimized. This can impact your website performance especially in mobile devices, where like I said before, the connections are slower.

Here are few tools that are easy to use and that can help you optimize and scale your pictures:

Too many slides in the content slider

If you are using a content slider, avoid putting too many slides in it. Whether you are just rotating pictures or having animations on it, just avoid using too many. I’m not a big fan of content sliders, they tend to slow your website down and distract your visitors. When I use them for my websites, I try only using one slide with a call to action. There are some exceptions like news websites where you can use them to rotate news, but make sure you don’t have too many slides and that you are optimizing your images before you use them.

Changing post and page URLs

This is a simple but costly mistake. If you change the URLs of the pages or post of your website after you published them, you can trigger a bunch of errors in the Google webmaster tools. And if you have posted them in social media platforns, people click on a link and ,since you have changed the URL, they are going to be redirected to a 404 missing page error.

Here’s how you can avoid this problem. Obviously make sure you have the right URL before publishing it, but if you do change the URL, you can use something called 301 redirects.

301 redirects will redirect the old URL to the new URL and tell the search engines that the move is permanently.

You can use them by adding the following line at the bottom of your .htaccess

Redirect 301 /old-page-url http://yourwebsite.com/new-page-url

(Just replace to the right URLs).

You can also do that using the following plugins:

EPS 301 Redirects
Simple 301 Redirects

These plugins don’t affect the speed of your website.

Not Using Child Themes

Child themes are themes that use a regular theme as the base template. That way you can perform changes on the child theme without altering the main template. This is good because most themes have regular updates. If you made changes to the main template, you will lose them in each update.

Not only is this annoying, it can also be costly if you are paying somebody to do the changes every time an update is released. Usually any good developer will use them or make the suggestion for you to use them yourself.

Using Bad Hosting

Using a bad hosting company can be the biggest problem you can possibly have. There are a few companies that sell really cheap hosting and I mean cheap not when it comes to the price, but in the servicse provided. Sometimes your website doesn’t load fast, or it becomes unresponsive or it can’t handle more than a handful of visitors at the same time.

That’s why we we personally stopped recommending Go Daddy. We still have to deal with them while managing client’s websites, but it’s really painful to work with them when people are paying for their cheapest available service. It can slow down the website to a point of making it unresponsive or the website does not even load at all to begin with. This happens randomly, so you never know when it will fail you.

That’s one of the reasons we started providing hosting services for our clients. This way we are in control of things and if they are not running well we can work on improving them right away, instead of explaining to people why it pays of to pay more for a different server than the one they are currently using.

Backup Performing periodic backups

If you are not creating backups periodically, you are going to have a bad time.

If you are relying on your hosting company to create backups of your website, you are going to have bad time.

If you are backing up your website in the same server you are hosting it, you are going to have a bad time.

Jokes aside, the other day a friend told me how his website was down for a month because the hosting company was having problems and he didn’t have a recent copy of his website. The website was with user generated content and there were thousands of people visiting the website daily.

By the time the hosting company solved the problem, his website was having few hundred visits a day only, instead of thousands views as before the incident. Although he will hopefully get back to the top of the Google rankings, the impact on user experience was huge.

If he had created a copy of his website, he could have easily purchased another hosting account in another company and setup his website the same day as soon as the problem started and the impact could have been reduced to a minimum.

Create backups, people.

Not Securing Your Website

This one is obvious. If you don’t do your minimum security due diligence, you are exposing your website. Getting a WordPress website hacked is more common than you might think. Although is impossible to have a website 100% hacker proof, you can always cover the basics and at least protect yourself from hacker wannabees that only exploit basic problems.

I’m going to get into the specifics about security issues you can solve, but you can start by installing one of these plugins and start securing your website ASAP:

iThemes security
Bullet Proof Security

Ignoring WordPress and Plugin updates

Most of the WordPress updates are about bugs fixes and security. If you are ignoring them, you are putting your website at risk. Update your website periodically to avoid headaches in the future. Don’t forget to create backups before doing updates, if something goes wrong you can always go back to the older version.

Conclusion

Some of these problems can be solved quite easily, others require more work. Don’t let these things diminish your investment, and put some time on these common problems to solve them. If you don’t know how to do this, subscribe to our newsletter and we will share tips and tutorials with you. If you prefer for somebody else to do it for you, (shameless plug ;) ) just contact us and we will be happy to help you!

I hope you like this post. Avoid these common WordPress mistakes and save yourself some self-inflicted misery. If you have other mistakes people should avoid, leave us a comment below. We love to hear from you!

The best free apps for relaxation

Ricardo Nuñez — Tue, 21 Jul 2015 16:46:55 +0000

When life gets very hectic, it is even more important to find your work life balance. The more stressed out we are, the more we need to find ways to unwind, exercise, eat healthily and put our feet up after a long day in the office. A good way to destress is listening to music, an audio book or read on your way home from work. Try to leave your work behind, physically and mentally whenever possible so you can really focus on your life beyond work.

To help you relax, I have compiled this list with the best free apps for relaxation that will help you unwind after a long day.

Spotify, Pandora and Youtube for music

For this one the choices are pretty obvious. I love Spotify for music and Youtube for catching up on my subscriptions and just to relax to some of my playlists.

Of course no music app list would be complete without Pandora thrown into the mix.

White noise or Rain app

These two options are really calming. I completely trust in White noise apps whenever I am confronted with annoying noises that I have no control over. Like a neighbor using a drilling machine when you want to catch up on your reading. There are a lot of good options for White noise or Sound apps , one of them is this app.

If you don’t like White noise, try this Rain app. It includes a lot of sound options.

It really helps me to use sound apps, especially during commutes to or from work using public transportation to blind out all those noises around you.

Reading app of choice or audio book

These two are pretty self-explanatory. You can choose whatever you like. I prefer iBooks but the Kindle app does the trick, too. Maybe you prefer to listen to an audio book or podcast instead?

Meditation apps

Give it a shot, some people swear by it. If you are not a fan, just set a timer for fifteen or twenty minutes and enjoy some quiet time to relax with this Meditation timer app. There are also a lot of free guided meditations on a variety of subjects that you can access on this app.

Favorite magazine or Houzz

I love catching up with the online versions of my favorite magazines. If you are interested in architecture or interior design or plan to remodel your home, check Houzz out. You won’t regret it!

Game Quizup / Trivia crack app for fun

You can compete with others and show off your specialty knowledge. I especially enjoy the trivia questions about TV-shows in QuizUp but you can also work out your brain with more scientific questions if you prefer that. You can choose a niche you want to get tested in.

Trivia Crack has only six knowledge categories to offer that get selected at random but it is as addictive in its competitive nature.

Apps to block calls and notifications

I know it is tempting but sometimes it is great to just switch everything off for a while and take that nap or go for a walk without getting six Facebook notifications or a bunch spam calls. I just switch my phone off or mute the sound, but if you need extra help with that, I heard that for android phones Mr. Number is good for blocking spam calls, Motorola Assist has a Meeting option that helps you avoid interruptions and there are a lot of other apps with silence and selective silence options that will fit your needs.

Water tracking app

Hydration is key! We need to drink lots of water to stay healthy and this Water app reminds you of drinking enough even during your busiest days.

Pomodoro timer app

Schedule your breaks if you have to! This Pomodoro app lets you do exactly that.

Inspirational apps

If you find it difficult to stay positive or you feel you need inspiration, try to find an app to inspire you and that does the trick most of the time. Besides checking on my favorite inspiring blogs, I also find visually appealing, creative apps like Pinterest or Instagram very uplifting and refreshing for my creativity. With these two apps it is vital to follow the right accounts though, so you might want to spend a little bit of your time on these platforms to find the stuff you like best.

I hope sharing my recommendations was useful for you. And I’m curious: What are your favorite apps that helps you relax after a long day at work?

Cheap WordPress Hosting

Ricardo Nuñez — Mon, 10 Feb 2014 05:34:58 +0000

Last Update 05/05/2017

Looking for a cheap WordPress hosting service?

One of the most common emails I receive every month is people asking me advice about picking a reliable WordPress hosting company.

We get many clients that are new to WordPress and blogging and are looking for an affordable WordPress hosting service that allows them to have a website online without breaking their bank and also that’s a reliable service they can trust.

We have used all the major companies in the past and thanks to that, we have a pretty good idea of what service is reliable and what causes issues. What company has a good customer support and what really sucks.

Some of the largest and most famous companies have a services that are very disappointing, but some goes beyond that; slow and unresponsive hosting. Slow and bad customer service. No knowledge about WordPress whatsoever.

What to look in a hosting company

To start you only need a shared hosting. There’s no need to spend a lot of money when you are starting out and nobody knows about your website. Most websites only get no more than a few thousand visitors per month even after years of being online.

Unless you know you are going to have a huge following in the future, I don’t see why you should waste money right away.

Even if you don’t want to deal with the migration in the future, many reputable companies do it for you for free.

Here are some things you should look in a hosting company:

Reliability
You need to pick a company that doesn’t have reputation of being slow or unreliable. If you Google the name of the hosting company, a bunch of review websites will tell you if how they have been performing.

Speed

I have been recommending hosting that use SSD drives. The speed improvement in some cases is up to 300%. It used to be more expensive, but not anymore.

Great Customer Services
This is a must have. If your website goes down, you need a reliable customer service to help you. You can’t wait two days for an email response.

Cost
You should only concern about the price after you have found a good reliable service with good customer support. There are many cheap hosting companies, but not all of them a reliable or have a good customer service.

The Hosting Company We Recommend

One of the best companies we have used with a great service is Inmotion hosting.

We haven’t had any major issue or downtime, but we get quick and knowledgeable customer service when we contact them.

Some of the features:

They use SSD disk with unlimited space and unlimited data transfer.
Their pricing has a three different packages. The most affordable version is limited to 2 websites. I recommend the second tier.
Any of their hosting includes $250 of free advertising credits with Google, Bing and Yahoo.
90 Days Money-Back Guarantee.

Hosting Our Clients Websites

For those that don’t want to the hassle or the have the time or host their own website, we provide WordPress hosting.

Our service is included in our WordPress management service; it includes periodic backups, updates, troubleshooting, and support.

If you launch your website and want to focus in your business and leave the technical side to us just let us know.

Any questions you may have about hosting, our service or anything related WordPress let is know in the comments or send us an email.

Cheers

How to find the best WordPress Installation Service

Ricardo Nuñez — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 23:33:04 +0000

I started writing this guide a while back even before I started providing the service here, because I got asked so many questions about it.

A self-hosted WordPress solution will bring you many advantages if you are looking to build, grow and invest your time and money into a blog.

Some of those advantages that you will have are full control of the hosting, plus you will be able to customize your website or blog and you will not rely on a free service to protect your investment. You are going to be able to move to different companies at any time which gives you the freedom of making decisions about your blog, like having your customized design, by yourself.

Knowing that, there are certain points that you should consider about a company that provides a WordPress installation service.

These points will help you understand what types of services you need and what part of features you should focus on, instead of only making your decision based on your budget which is never the best idea.

With all that being said, let’s jump into the points.

What do you need?

Make a list of all the services that you want to offer or may want to have in the future. This will help you compare companies and make a budget plan.

Some of the things you should consider are:

What plugins do I want?
Do I want to host it myself or do I want for the company to host it for me?
Am I looking for monthly help (automatics backup, customization, support, disaster recovery) or am I looking for a simple installation only?

Security, Security, Security

I repeated this three times, because this is very important. Make sure the company you hire for your website is including security features. A company that doesn’t care about including security is probably not professional enough to provide you with a great service.

Ongoing service and support

You may want to maintain the website yourself, but if you don’t want to have the trouble in the future when the website grows, you will probably want to outsource that service. So, make sure that the company offers a monthly service. Some of the monthly services that you should look for are WordPress updates, plugin updates, automatic backups, support, and disaster recovery.

Hosted for you or hosting it by yourself?

To get started, hosting is not the most expensive feature. There are plenty of good hosting companies out there that provide a fine service. Although you can do the hosting yourself, try looking for a company that offers the service for you. Normally this will include support and can help you in the future when your website grows and hosting becomes more difficult.

What’s the level of expertise of the company? Which types of services do they offer?

Which services the company can offer you is important for the future of your website. Many times you will need help with troubleshooting, with customization and with questions you may have. Does the company have enough experience? Are you getting professional work? It is important that you look for a professional and dedicated company that has a tracked background and where the employees know what they do.
Getting somebody to watch your back in case things go wrong is always highly useful. Remember that bad things can happen and the only thing you can do is to be ready from the beginning so you won’t regret it later. This leads me to the next point.

What type of support

Support is a very important aspect. Is this company ready to provide great support? Or do they vanish after the launch and will not help you in case you need some extra help? Will you need to wait a month to edit a simple WordPress theme? Will they help you in a week or less? These are the details when it comes to support that will show you what you want from a company. You can get that answered by simple emailing the company your questions about their services. If they reply quickly, they answer your questions correctly and offer you help, you may have found a good company to work with.

Do you ‘speak’ WordPress?

Do you have a lot of WordPress knowledge? Are you willing to take the time to make things happen? If you know how to maintain a WordPress website and you are willing to do a lot of things by yourself already, then you should be looking for a simple solution that gets you off the ground. The installation price can go from one fee for the installation (normally around $50 to $200)to a more advanced custom solution for up to a few thousand dollars. It all depends on what you want.

To make a successful website it requires a lot of time and effort. For that reason you may want to outsource all the technical aspects from the WordPress installation to the maintenance. This will free up a lot of your time to work on marketing and writing more content.

Writing this kind of post made me think about you. I’d really like to know about your past experiences. Have you used a company to provide these services before? Or do you prefer to do the WordPress Installation yourself?
Also, what benefits and features would you look for in these types of services?

How to Delete WordPress Revisions

Ricardo Nuñez — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 21:21:25 +0000

When you own a small website keeping keeping tuned is not something people worry, we can’t say the same about running a website that’s has periodic updates, has hundreds of post and that was been online for few years. Your website starts eating more resources and the server suffers from it.

One thing about running a WordPress website (or any other website) is that you should be running periodic backups, specially before making any changes. You never know when you are going to mess things up. That backup can help you restore your website quickly and save you from some headaches.

Creating periodic backups and moving the database around can become annoying. The database can increase in size fairly quick specially if you have been adding content to your website. The things is when you are adding content to your website and writing pages and post, WordPress starts adding revisions of each post to the database, this revisions can increase the database size considerably.

WordPress Revisions

In WordPress 2.6 introduced as “WordPress revision”, this feature creates a copy of the previous version of your post while you edit it. When you have a small website it’s not big of a deal, but with older websites with hundreds of posts it can clutter your database. So I highly recommend to clean up the database every now and then.

How to delete WordPress revisions

There are couple of different methods to delete the post revisions. Many people try to delete WordPress revisions by running a MySQL query in the database using a tool like phpMyAdmin.

The problem with doing so is that it doesn’t solve the cluttering problem a hundred percent. WordPress stores information in two different locations in the database. One in which the post content is stored and two where WordPress stores the administrative information of each revised post.

With that script you only delete all the post revisions, but it doesn’t delete the administrative information.

I found a plugin that provides a simple an easy solution that with couple of clicks you can get your database clean.

Better Delete Revision

Better Delete Revision is the best plugin you can use to delete all the revisions of the database. It deletes not only the post but also all the meta information of each post. It’s really simple to use, with a couple of clicks you can clean up your database.

Revision Control

In case you don’t want to delete all the revisions, but only some of them or manage some older versions you can always use Revision Control to manage the revisions of your post manually.

WP-Optimize

I didn’t include WP-Optimize in the initial post because it does more than just delete WordPress revisions, but after Allie’s comment I decided to include it in the post. This plugin do a lot of different type of optimizations in the database including deleting revisions without the need of using phpMyAdmin.

Be careful

Remember every time you try to do something with your database that you need to backup the whole database first. You never know when things can go wrong. I’ll be writing a new post in the future how you can backup your blog in many different ways.