Create a Video Blog with WordPress
July 30, 2009
This basically boils down to posting video clips on your website instead of (or in addition to) writing blog articles. These can be your own videos shot on your digital camera or relevant clips filmed by others and sourced from YouTube or similar sites.
See a Video Blog in action at www.schoolschoralfestival.co.nz;
Why Video Blog?
If a picture speaks a thousand words, then video speaks millions. Think of the time you could save…
- Instead of a detailed product manual, upload a video showing how to assemble or use your product
- Instead of writing about an event/gig, video it and post to your website
- Instead of descriptions and photos of a finished project, video it and post
- Instead of writing about how beautiful your local area is, video it and post
Use a Video-Friendly WordPress Theme
If you’re planning on posting many videos to your blog, this is the way to go. The best video-friendly theme I have found is Tubular Theme by Studio Press.
See Tubular theme in action at www.schoolschoralfestival.co.nz [Read more]
Plugin: List Posts on Pages
July 13, 2009
This fantastic plugin gives you yet another way to get your target audiences to the blog posts they are interested in quicker. On a standard WordPress blog, you have several ways of displaying your posts but all of these options keep your posts very separate from your pages.
The List Category Posts Plugin opens up a whole new set of layout options on a WordPress site combining static web pages and blog posts. It allows you to present your posts in a much more personal way rather than trying to appeal to everyone at once. Following are some ideas and examples of how to use the plugin to improve your WordPress blog.
Create Custom Pages for Each Target Audience
Using this plugin, create a new page for each blog category. Include a description at the top of what the posts in that category are about, who will benefit from reading them and a call to action. Eg. ‘Join our mailing list to receive future posts direct to your inbox’. You could also include a photo if appropriate and even a couple of downloadable files which compliment the category. Then insert the code to list posts in that category and you are away. (instructions below)
NOTE: If you have a lot of different categories, you may want these pages to be child pages appearing in a drop down under the parent category called “Blog” or similar. [Read more]
