What Is WordPress? – A New Blogger’s Guide

Those who have been looking for a blogging platform or online content management system may have heard other Internet users talk about WordPress; however, they may not know what this platform is, or how to effectively use it. To get the most out of WordPress, it is important to understand how it evolved, how it is currently used, and how it can benefit users.

The History of WordPress

In 2001, Michael Valdrighi created a blogging platform called B2/Cafe. Although B2/Cafe was relatively advanced compared to other platforms available at the time, it failed to gain widespread attention. As a result, it was shut down in 2003.

Shortly before the termination of the project, one of B2/Cafe´s users, Matt Mullenweg, began incorporating the platform´s codebase into his own folk software. Soon after, Valdrighi and Mike Little joined Mullenweg in his efforts to make blogging more accessible and user-friendly.

The team launched the first version of WordPress in May 2003. Over the next several years, the platform evolved quickly to keep pace with a dramatically increasing global interest in blogging. In 2005, the team added a hosting service designed for users who lacked the interest or knowledge to host their own blogs.

That same year, WordPress added a template system, which allowed users to customize the look and feel of their blogs by uploading design templates. Many of the early templates were generic and lacked advanced functionality; however, in later years, premium templates evolved that allowed users greater control over the presentation of their blogs.

WordPress is now the most popular blogging platform in the world. Its versatility and a huge range of plug-ins make it the number one choice for anyone looking to set up a professional looking website at low cost. To see an example of wordpress in action, why not visit our web design blog, where you can keep up to date with the latest web design news.

Website Hosting and the Basics for Customers

Web hosting packages often include a Web Content Management System , so the end-user doesn’t have to worry about the more technical aspects. These Web Content Management systems are great for the average person, but for those who want more control over their website design, this feature may not be adequate. Internet Web Hosting by Emerald is devoted to providing essential information on the best internet web hosting services they provide. Our main purpose has always been to help our clients to find low cost internet web hosting plans. Website Hosting is open to new customers who purchase Internet Web Hosting, which is offered for one, three, and twelve-month terms. At sign-up, customers choosing the three-month term will be billed for three months’ service, with the first three months charged at the low rate.

Web hosting is an internet storage service that gives individuals, organizations, and businesses the ability to publish web sites on the web. Internet web Hosting services provide space on their web servers that clients can “rent” and store personal web sites. Website hosting isn’t something you tend to think about every day. It’s something you purchase when you first get an idea for a site, you setup and then hopefully forget.

Shared hosting is a way for a web hosting company to offer low cost web hosting to their clients while having more users on one server and thus less overhead costs. Shared SSL should almost never be used, if you value the security of your server and that of your online clients. Your host should also allow you to use SSL at no additional purchase. Shared hosting means that on a server are hosted many web sites that all have a distinct quota of hard drive space and bandwidth. They all run at the same time and there can be from hundreds to thousands of web sites on the same server.

Website hosting can be low cost, but also reliable and fast. Our low cost website hosting plans come with full email pop3,smtp and imap support with email aliases and responders. Web hosting is the service that allows your website to be viewed on the World Wide Web. Such services will usually cost a low monthly fee, and may be included in the services provided by the web designer you’ve hired to create your website.

WordPress Websites – Create Amazing Websites With WordPress

Prehaps you are all geared up to generate a website but are un sure which layout would work best since there are so many systems available, then you could try using wordpress as a website. It is not simply utilized as a blogging community for which it is most used for, but it can have many uses too. WordPress can be utilized to create sites or Content Management System (CMS) which has quite a few inbuilt advantages over standard websites:

Making a WordPress site is quick specially if you have fantastico in their web hosting control panel with a few mouse clicks you’ll have your wordpress web site ready for the world to see. Your wordpress website can be easily setup if you do not have cpanel website hosting. This takes little more time but if you simply follow the instructions you should set-up in no time. If you rather you can always get a webmaster to do it for you. It won’t cost the earth to do have it done for you as it doesn’t take a long time for someone who has set-up a wordpress website before.

Refurbishing a web site created by someone else can be painful and pricey exercise for the new owner as you have to pay a web designer, wait for them to get back to you and wait patiently for the finished product. Using wordpress is by far a more user-friendly and simplier to come to terms with. All wordpress web site changes can be done in real time as you can revise your own web site quickly instead of waiting for the programmer to make time for you.

VideoPros Announces Beta Launch: Video search engine

VideoPros announced today the beta launch of its video search engine, VideoPros.com . VideoPros is a venue to find and contact video professionals. Featuring a sophisticated professional videographer search, VideoPros services individuals, small businesses, corporations and industries needing professional video production and online distribution. The website offers video professionals a powerful video search engine

 Video professionals and consumers from around the world can go to VideoPros.com and begin using the Web site. Video professionals can display demo reels host and stream professional content, and create custom video players. Consumers can search, request bids and contact local, national and international video professionals. “We’re excited to launch VideoPros.com to serve a professional, business-driven audience,” said Sean Murphy, Principal of VideoPros. “User generated content, social networking and Web 2.0 have delivered minimal ROI for businesses and video professionals. Launching VideoPros.com is a first step in delivering a solution to the professional segment of the online video community.”

The company announced VideoPros products and services are positioned to take advantage of several trends reported by research firms.

“Local online video ad revenue will reach $1.5 billion in four years. Video ads will account for 11.6 percent of the online advertising budgets of small and medium-sized business by 2012.” (The Kelsey Group, June, 2008)

“The online video market is expected to explode to record $4.5 billion in sales by 2012.” (In-Stat, July, 2008)

“As media companies change their business model, putting more and more professionally created video content online, the end user, and related revenue will increase dramatically.” (eMarketer, August, 2008)

“VideoPros brings together professional content producers and provides a tool-set to help them grow their business,” said Layne Solheim, Online Media Specialist for VideoPros. “Video professionals are demanding more sophisticated resources and ways to service their clients. Businesses of all sizes are demanding professional content and online distribution. VideoPros is where they come together. It’s the perfect storm of professional collaboration.”

VideoPros announced it has closed an initial round of funding from private investors The official terms of the funding are undisclosed.

The company announced it will undergo an official “Beta” period to resolve any technical complications associated with the launch. Users are encouraged to report any malfunctions or errors. VideoPros announced rapid development continues for the Web site. For more information, a development time-line can be viewed on the company’s official VideoPros Beta Storyboard.

About VideoPros
VideoPros is a privately-held company headquartered in Denver, CO, USA. The company is an online service for video professionals, individuals and corporations. The Web site is a venue for video professionals, consumers and businesses of all industries. VideoVine™, ProCertified™ and ProAPI™ are official products and services of the company. The website features a professional videographer search and video content management system. For more information, visit VideoPros.

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Joomla Content Management System For Your Business

I am a Singapore Web Designer and over the last 5 years I have developed many websites and worked with many different content management systems. The web industry is changing and get set up website faster and cheaper. One of the best open source content management systems for setting up website is Joomla and I will walk through the potential benefits that Joomla can provide for your business in this article.

Joomla is an award-winning, web based, Content Management System(CMS) that provides its users with the ability to add, edit and delete content. Content is the meat of a website, everything on the site, from page titles and images to text and placement on the page. It is simple for even non-technical users to add or edit content, update images, and to manage the vital data that makes your company run. Anybody with basic word processing skills can easily learn to manage a Joomla site.

Currently Joomla powers millions of websites Worldwide, from web portals to websites for small businesses. Joomla offers a versatility in how it can be used and who it can be used by. Of course for more complex jobs of modifying design and your own look and feel you might need to hire a Freelance Web Designer, however this task is made easier because Joomla is so popular. To find qualified website designers who have used Joomla in the past, it is very easy, a simple search on one of the many freelance designer for hire websites on the Internet.

With growing community of more than 40,000 users and developers it is quite easy to find information online. Using the simple, browser-based interface you will be able to easily add new news items, product images, and create an unlimited amount of sections or content pages on your website.

There is very little configuration to make a business website run. However for many people, the true power of Joomla lies in its ability to be modified with components and modules. There are literally hundreds & hundreds of Joomla extensions that add to the base Joomla website system framework so that it can be molded into suiting your business processes better. For example, there are extensions to add a photo gallery to your website. Joomla SEO is simply enabling the SEF URLs options.

In few short words it might be worthwhile exploring Joomla for your next website as it provides you with diverse flexibility and a level of control of your content not present 5 years ago.

Financial Budgeting For A New Business

Did you know that cash flow deficiencies are the main reason most companies go out of business?

If you are seriously interested in making your business a success, then managing your money effectively is critical to the security of your organisation. Whether you run a simple work at home business doing admin tasks, or manage a multinational company like Biffa who do glass recycling, well managed finance and particularly a healthy business cash flow are everything.

When starting a new company it might seem impossible to put together a budget without any financial history on which to base income and expenses. However a business plan, before you even start, with some idea of costs and revenues is essential to determining the viability of a business, even if you are just planning to setup a work at home business. It might seem like guesswork at the beginning, but a tentative budget can be established with some thought and projections of future business. From some past experience in renovating properties, I always say ‘think of a figure and double it’ and then you will be near the mark. I think this is true for other businesses, because it’s human nature to underestimate what we need to spend and over estimate what we will earn.

Businesses usually have two main categories, like my cms content management system company, income and expense. Under the expense category there can be several sub-categories often falling into two main areas of controllable expenses and uncontrollable. While many business owners claim they can control every expense involved in their business, they are simply kidding themselves, as some things such as utility cost, the amount of rent and other so-called fixed costs can, and do change, with the owner having no control. (Recent oil price increases are responsible for a number of small airline companies going out of business)

Other expenses such as payroll, transportation and advertising can be subject to a budget, but they are considered controllable expenses. If the business begins to fall off, you can control some of these expenses by laying-off employees and cutting back on advertising. However, living by a budget may help maintain profitability but could also turn against you in the long run.

Depending on the viability of your business it may be a better investment to bite the financial bullet on employee wages and still provide excellent customer service to the remaining customers until business picks up again. If no one takes care of the customers, it will not be long until there are no more customers to care for.

There are 2 ways to budget your business finance and these are through set dollar amounts or as a percentage of revenue. Many businesses will budget their controllable expenses by the dollar and non-controllable by percentage of income. Obviously a good part of the owner’s time is going to be based on bringing money into the business and how much they have to spend on controllable expenses will be in direct relation to income. With any increase in business the owner will probably need the extra help to take care of the business so a percentage of income will go to more wages, thus freeing the owner to focus on generating additional income.

There are many other expenses that fall into the payroll account such as worker’s compensation charges, Social Security tax paid by the employer and paid vacation time or other perks determined by the employer. These need to be calculated into costs when recruiting people into the business.

While you may think a budget is difficult to establish for a new business, it is essential to establish a healthy and sound financial footing on which success can be built for the future.

About the Author: Roger Davies, The Managing Director of Advanta a web site development company , has overseen the team that has created and published hundreds of websites. Don’t know how to build a website? No Problem! Don’t know how to advertise on line? No Problem! Roger and his team will build your site and promote it for you! Visit www.advantapro.com for details.

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Port your Business Online for Increased Sales

In the current economic climate as the recession bites harder, people will be turning more and more to the internet to source their purchases. Firstly they can look for the best bargains and then purchase on line without even having to leave their homes. This beats the hell out of having to drive miles, find parking space, queue for bargains and then carry the items home or wait for delivery of large products. If your company is still living in the dark ages, and you don’t have an online business then you are offering the competition sales on a plate. In order to stay competitive, businesses need to offer its services/products online, as well as doing business the traditional way. They need to communicate with potential customers who do business mostly online. Be smart and start today to get your business online and out in front.

When you run an online business you potentially have a world-wide audience. This means you can have 24 hour customer access. Automatic systems to respond to orders will be a vital part of the web design otherwise you will need staff available working unsociable hours. In this new world, the old ways of import/export will become obsolete.

When managing an online business you need to be a Jack of all trades. But communication is an essential part of all the different aspects of running a business. Email and instant messaging are efficient ways of communicating with employees, particularly when different time zones are a complication. Setting up an online conference room will save the need for physical space and travelling and will provide a forum for members to air their views, concerns and challenges.

The website index page is the first thing visitors see when visiting your site. To make a good impression you will need a good brand image, clear information and a user friendly process so that customer will find it easy to purchase their goods. (Don’t make it hard for your customers to find their way around the system and buy products, no matter how clever something may be.)

A CMS Content Management System will enable you to update your website whenever you want, so that any changes in pricing or items are current. Statistics reporting is another service which can give you valuable feedback on how many people are accessing the site, and from that information you can see if your services/goods are attracting the sales you want. If not then there is an opportunity to revamp your products or website to improve on visit/sales ratios.

For customer satisfaction make sure your business provides only the best quality products, efficient service, and an easy to use system. Where items are good value for money, customers will be happy to recommend your company to friends and family and sales will increase.

The growth of the internet gives a whole new meaning to the world of commerce. Millions of people are out there starting new online businesses, all wanting a piece of the action, all wanting to make their millions. So make sure your business is one of the forerunners and get yourself up there on the first page on Google. Don’t wait, get started now before your competitors leave you behind.

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