Is WordPress™ the Answer?
WordPress™ is a “free” blogging platform that can take your old website and turn it into a “fully-functional website on steroids.”
Orbit Design recommends that most of the web sites that we design be hosted as a WordPress™ site, which can be classified as a blog-web or integrated site. This means our web designs are still in html (or php), cascading style sheets (CSS – which provides consistent formatting) and flash movies but they are now further converted into the WordPress™ platform. Here is what we like about WordPress™:
- CMS (Content Management System) – WordPress™ CMS is comparable to the high-end custom programs that cost thousands of dollars to enable you to edit any page on your web without a perplexing HTML editing program. Is it perfect? No. But most people find it easier than Microsoft Word™ which is pretty clumsy with images. David Broudy, Orbit’s expert web-programmer, compares it to Facebook™ in ease of use and restrictions.
- Content Control – You can assign different levels of control, Administrator or Editor, so that your users do not go in and scramble up the formatting and content on your website. This prevents a common problem with HTML editors. You can control who is empowered to change different sections of your web. The main section of each static page, as well as your blog post, can be edited or expanded with words and images.
- SEO Advantage (Search Engine Optimization) – Integrating your blog with your website means the search engine spiders see all blog posts as updated web content and therefore the spiders view your web as highly active and likely to rank higher. In SEO, where content has and will always be king, the ease of blogging to develop content is an asset.
- Capability — A WordPress™ site can do anything a traditional site can do; this includes hosting imbedded Flash movies. A WordPress™ home page is indistinguishable from a traditionally hosted web site in messaging capability.
- Entrée to WordPress Multi-User™ – This extension to WordPress™ opens up a whole new world in content management. It allows you to develop subdomains, such as www.insertnamehere.wordpress.com. This is ideal for consultants, teachers, sales people, or anyone with content to share with their students, clients, and crowd. This extension allows multiple users to pose all under the company name. Admission is either open, password protected, or monetized.
- Protect Premium Content – You can easily put “premium content” (valuable to a certain crowd) on your site and admit existing clients only; members only; board members only; etc.
- Monetize Premium Content – Imagine selling a 3-day cookie that your client purchases to visit a protected part of your site where you have an expert discuss an important industry topic in real time chat. The client can participate in the chat, view, and then download the content. The content can be subsequently sold to other clients and become a permanent part of your web site’s searchable content – in this way you develop an income stream and bolster your SEO results at the same time.
We think websites are stepping it up to the next level, the level of Super Websites. Websites should be easy to update, easy to use, up-to-date with the SEO algorithms, and still be pleasing to the eyes of your customers. Building a blog-web integrated website gets you going on the pathway of building a Super Website.
Brand well and prosper!
Andy Cleary