1. WordPress
Mistakes I’ve Made13
Laura Eagin | WordCamp North Canton
May 4th 2013

2. I’m Laura Eagin
• Detroit Michigan
• Custom Theme Developer
• Volunteer and teach @ Girl Develop It
• Tweet @choolaura
• lauraeagin.com

3. What We’ll Cover
• Tips to go from Beginner to Intermediate
• Tips for site administrators and themers
• Custom Theme Development = a lot of CSS
• Get to know WordPress really well
• Say yes, and figure it out as you go

4. Fail Harder, Weiden + Kennedy, by Jerry Helm studiojelly.com

5. Jumped to the fun
part too soon.1

6. I like to theme it, theme it.

7. First I Should Have:
• Set permalinks
• Changed blog tagline
• Get rid of default posts, categories, links

8. I rushed when
uploading media.2

9. Input data in all of the
fields marked red.

10. I dated bad plugins
3

11. Bachelor #1
Bachelor #2
Bachelor #3

12. Few ratings
Hasn’t been updated
No documentation
Right name, wrong tool
Widget vs. Plugin
Slows down site
Warnings pop up
Breaks my site
Levels of Plugin Hell

13. Plugin Support is your friend, look at it.

14. I was cheap
4

15. Gravity Forms cured me of my cheapness. It’s worth it.

16. Don’t Forget to Get Client on Board
• Include price of plugins in contract
• Annual cost vs. one-time cost
• Or, roll cost into your maintenance fee
If this is your own site, think about the value of the plugin overtime. Consider
upgrading to Developer version so you can use on your site and others.

17. I edited code in the
appearances editor5

18. Oh snap!

19. Highlighted Syntax with Sublime Text 2
Much better!

20. Version Control
Bitbucket
GitHub
Work Locally
MAMP
WAMP

21. I didn’t use the
theme folder6

22. wp-content /themes/mytheme/images

23. I pretended to be
a system admin7

24. Just say no.
Refer them to an expert
Consider managed hosting providers ($)
Open support tickets early and often

25. One Click Install Is Your Friend

26. I didn’t set up a
staging/dev site8

27. Without a staging site

28. With a staging site

29. I forgot about
those robots9

30. When you are not ready to launch your site,
discourage search engines from indexing it.
Then, don’t forget to uncheck this setting when you
do launch the site. It’s easy to forget.

31. Plugin “Under Construction” sets up a nice
splash page to prevent anyone seeing the
site while you’re working on it.

32. Plugin “Under Construction” even allows you to
use your own HTML as a splash page.

33. I didn’t track
traffic from day 110

35. I didn’t hold
their hand.11

36. Tutorials and Resources
For your clients, because it’s their site after you launch it.
Wordpress.org “Getting Started with WP”
WordPress.tv
Meetup.com
Bonus: isitwp.com

37. Manage User Access
- Members Plugin
- Role Scoper Plugin
Hand holding (It’s necessary!)
+ Make it easy for them to log in
+ Walk them through it first, second time

38. I assumed client
would write.12

39. Content is difficult to get (oy!)
While the Theme is being designed & built,
the writing should also be happening.
This is a forever a struggle for me
with client sites... Any solutions?

40. Thank you!
... but wait, there’s more.
@choolaura

41. I didn’t get to
know all of you.13
Community is so important.
You’re at WordCamp...
So don’t leave this room without meeting at least one new person!