I shot this video with my little flip camera, so I could quickly share this tip with you…

It’s a weekend, and you get an idea from something you see in the news, it sparks an idea in your brain, and you want to put it up on your website.   Well with WordPress, you can get that independence and freedom, and put up your web pages and posts even on the weekend!

Watch this video…

and share your thoughts below…

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After getting blown out of Kansas by a tornado of web technology, Dorothy wakes up in a strange land in today’s episode of “The WordPress of Oz”.

Watch now as Glinda the Good Witch of the North helps Dorothy discover the power of the WordPress Ruby Slippers and keeps the Wicked Webmaster of the West from taking over Dorothy’s website!

Oh and I am curious, have you ever had your website locked up by a wicked webmaster?

Tell me about it in the comments below…

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Poor little Dorothy, she’s so confused.

Confused by web technology, and what it takes to get a website up and running.

And frustrated at the hassle and expense of working with webmasters.

Watch this video, the first in a series, and see what happens to Dorothy when a storm of web technology blows in from across the Kansas plains…

Perhaps you feel like Dorothy too?

Well then please leave me a comment below. I’d love to hear your story…

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I cannot stress this enough: copywriting is the number one key to your website success. (just to be super clear, copywriting is simply the words on your webpage)

One of the great things about using WordPress as your website, is it makes it very easy for you to update/add/change your copy at any time.   This takes the burden off of you to be “perfect” the first time you put up a web page or a blog post.   If you are interested in learning more about copywriting, my colleague Lorrie Morgan-Ferrero did a great video on copywriting and collecting swipe files for  you to help you write your website copy.  Just watch the video below!

Note: there is a small delay before the video starts, so just click below and wait

If you are interested in learning about copwriting from a pro, Check out Lorrie’s Speed Copywriting System

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One of the things a business owner needs to be able to know (and see) on your computer are your file extensions.  File extensions are the little appendages  .xxx that go at the end of your filenames.  For example ‘myreport.doc’ could be the name of your report, with .doc being the extension.

Now this may seem simple and obvious to some, but to others this will be an eye opener. See the illustration below:

Some examples of file extensions are:

• photo.jpg
• icon.gif
• mytheme.zip
• report.doc
• report.pdf
• spreadsheet.xls
• presentation.ppt
• audio.mp3

It’s very Important to be able to see your file extensions

For example:

a Microsoft Word file has an extension of .doc as in ‘myessay.doc’.

An image file has an extension of .jpg for photos and .gif for graphics as in ‘myphoto.jpg’ or ‘mylogo.gif’

A PDF file has the extension .pdf

When using the program Notepad to write up small text files, it makes files called .txt

An Excel file has the extension .xls

An Audio file has the extension .mp3

And on and on….

When you buy a Windows Machine (PC) it comes, by default, with file extensions turned off.

If your file extensions view is turned off, much of Internet Marketing and creating your website with WordPress will not make sense to you!

So it’s important that when you go into one of your folders on your computer you see the little .doc, .jpg, .gif, .txt

Each computer may be different in how you set that.  Here is how I set mine:

On your PC desktop you go to a folder and open it.
Then you go to Tools –> Folder Options
Then you click on the ‘View’ Tab
Then you UNCHECK ‘Hide File Extensions for Known File Types’

See image below to show you how to do this on a PC

So look on your computer, and see if you can see your file extensions.  If you don’t then change them so you can see.

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Before you can have a successful online business, you need to find an avid market.  And one of the best ways to find an avid (aka “hungry”) market is to look at the magazine racks in the supermarket for specialized niches.

Well, on my trip to New York City, I stopped at my step sister’s house to visit,  and in her bathroom I saw a copy of “New York Runner” magazine.

I thought: “What a great niche!” This proves that if you are starting a website on running, specializing in a certain city would be a great idea.  If someone else has created a magazine for it, then that means there are readers for it.  And that means that there are advertisers for it.  And that means that YOU can make money at it.

So, if you are wondering what business you should go into, first find something that you are passionate about, then go see if someone has made a magazine out of that niche.

If so, then you know you have a passionate, viable, hungry market!

And if you are eager to get that website built for that passion you have, then I hope you will join me in the next Website Creation Workshop.  The fall semester starts next month.

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“Did you ask your boss for vacation leave?”

That’s a question an entrepreneur never hears.  Because an entrepreneur (small business owner)  is always in control of their own destiny.   With that thought in mind, I made this short video while at Sea World this past Monday with my family.  A Monday!

Enjoy the whale jumps, and leave your thoughts below!

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Before you go out and buy traffic to your site, read this short article, it could save you a lot of time and money (oh and if you are not familiar with the term “Traffic”, that just means getting exposure to your website so that humans come and visit it ).

There are different kinds of traffic: Organic Search Engine traffic, Pay Per Click traffic (i.e. Google Adwords), Banner Ad traffic, Social Media traffic, email marketing traffic, Adsense traffic, affiliate marketing traffic, word of mouth traffic, etc. The list goes on and on.

So pause, and think: What kind of product and/or service am I offering and what kind of traffic would be best suited for my biz?

Do you have an evergreen product that is for sale all the time on your site?
If so, then search engine, either paid or organic, would work well for you. And getting a steady consistent stream of folks is what you are looking for.

Do you sell a boot-camp that is event based, and when the event is over it’s not for sale anymore?
If so then affiliate traffic (that’s where people recommend your program to others and you pay them a commission) would work well for you because you need a surge in traffic to fill your bootcamp

Are you a coach or a consultant that sells your consulting services?
Well word of mouth traffic, would work well for you. In addition, search traffic for specific keywords would work well for you.

For example, let’s say you are a coach, you wouldn’t want to pay for Google Adwords on the word “coach” that woud not get you good traffic. But instead if you paid for the term “San Diego small business coach” that would give you a better stream of people who are looking for a specific kind of coach.

Also compare different types of traffic.  With social media traffic such as  Facebook and Twitter, people are  in “play -fun” mode.  They are looking at their friends and distracting themselves with “fun”.  Versus when people do a Google Search, they are looking for a solution to a problem they have.  And with email marketing traffic, you are sending traffic to your site from  people who already have a relationship with you.  That is very different from banner ad traffic where the person just saw a graphical ad and clicked, not knowing anything about you.

So think about it: What are you selling, and what kind of traffic would send you the kind of people you are looking for?

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As we head into the Holiday weekend, if you are like me, you probably don’t want to think about doing any work.  I know I don’t!  I want to head to the beach and read and do some big picture planning.

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Well I got a great book for you: “Rework” by Jason Fried of Basecamp It’s an easy fast read book for entrepreneurs who want to get stuff done without any ‘big company’ bureaucrat nonsense.  It cuts to the chase and gives you permission to not have a “business plan”, not be boring, and get your entrepreneurial life going with a virtual team and smart decision making.

I love Jason Fried because I’m a big fan of his Basecamp system: a simple easy to use project management tool that let’s me collaborate with my team anywhere in the world on any computer.  Basecamp makes doing projects fun and easy, and that’s what this book is about: making your entrepreneur life fun and easy (and profitable!)

For the internet lifestyle, this is a MUST! It reads like a novel and is a quick page turner.  Take it with you to the pool or beach.   You can pick it up a copy of  this book  on Amazon Here

If you got a good reading book suggestion for the summer, leave it below…

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One of the things that happens when you take the Website Creation Workshop, is that you start to build so many websites that you have a hard time keeping track of them.

Well I have created a short little video (under 9 min) for you to show you how to use Google Docs to keep track of your websites.

Watch this and share your thoughts below

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