There is a lot of customization that can be done to WordPress using themes but there isn’t much that can be done without modifying a WordPress theme. There are other CMS systems which let you give a certain page a unique look without having to modify the theme. This is where the Impact Page Builder plugin comes it. It’s an advanced but easy to use template builder which allows users to customize the look of certain posts or pages on their website.

The plugin isn’t theme specific so what that means is, no matter which theme you are using, you can use Impact to create a custom look for any page or post on your website.

The Problem with Your Website

Your company’s website is full of static information. Sure, there may be updates to your products and services, or some new addition to your company’s wares, but, in general, your website says what your company does, how they do it and how to contact them. This isn’t information that is going to necessarily draw traffic to your site, especially after Internet users have already seen it once.

Blogging: The Solution

A quality blog is the solution. A blog gives you the opportunity to continually update your website with new and interesting information. This not only gives people a reason to visit, return and spend time on your site, it also makes your site more attractive to search engines. Everyone knows that better search engine ranking means more traffic and a better ability to meet your company’s goals for its website.

WordPress: The Hosting Solution

Once you understand the importance of a blog, you should consider using WorldPress. WordPress is an easy-to-use platform that has a number of advantages for bloggers, especially those who are just getting started.

One of the advantages of the WordPress platform is that it is free. You’ll still have to pay for the web hosting, but the actual platform you use to create the blog won’t cost you anything. You can get the web hosting for free as well with WordPress.com, but this is not recommended, as it will give your blog an amateurish feel.

Another benefit to the WordPress platform is that it is easy to use. It is designed for simplicity, and uses open-source code so anyone can add modifications or improvements to the software at anytime, which also benefits the user. If you’re starting your company’s first blog, then you should give serious thought to doing it through WordPress. You can go through web hosting search where some wordpress hosting packages are reviewed and listed.

You can view a demo of the theme here: Blue Mist Demo

And it can be downloaded from the following URL: Blue Mist Download

Please be sure to read the TOS before using the theme.

You can view a demo of the theme here: Golden Age Demo

And it can be downloaded from the following URL: Golden Age Download

Please be sure to read the TOS before using the theme.

Also, comments and kind words would be greatly appreciated.

Please share this post if you find it to be useful. Also, if you are interested in this list, make sure you visit often because I’ll be updating it regularly

Please note, all download URLs in the list point to a section on wordpress.org which is the official website of WordPress.

The script works client side which is the opposite of server side. In layman’s term, a server side script does the required processing on the server where as a client side scrpt does it on the local computer. So basically what happens is that, you will be adding a script generated by this tool and you’ll be pasting it somewhere on your site. And on that location, you’ll see a bunch of posts from your blog. Cool, isn’t it?

And you wouldn’t have to worry about search engines either. Nor about adding no-follow tags to everylink. Because JavaScript is client side, google nor any other related services parse the content. As far as they are concerned, there are no links from your blog on that site. Isn’t that cool?

This guide doesn’t even assume users to have experience working with PHP, FTP or MySQL databases. It covers everything. Yes, everything

If you are looking for a phpLD installation article that is well written and covers most if not all topics, then you should definitely read this. Hopefully, after reading that you won’t need to read another guide or article

Most people tend to think of WordPress as a software used only by blogs. That is far, far from the actual truth. WordPress per se is a very powerful Content Management System and not just a blogging software. If you want to create a site and you are looking for a Content Management System then its very likely WordPress will meet all your requirements. It’s well suited for most kinds of sites. Having being a WordPress developer from the past 3 years I have seen various websites of businesses and organizations being powered by it.

The main advantage of using WordPress is that it’s free to use and is released under the GPL so that means you can modify it to suit your needs. Other than that there are over 3,500 plugins available which can be used to extend its functionality. Examples of such plugins include Photo Gallery plugins, plugins to integrate a forum right into the website, Search Engine Optimization packs and more. And if you cannot find a plugin you are looking for or the ones you have found aren’t exactly what you are looking for, you still have an option of hiring a plugin developer to modify an existing plugin or create a new one from scratch. Another key factor of WordPress is its ease of use and the amount of documentation available for it. It offers superior built in features like a WYSIWYG editor, ability to upload and manage various types of media like Images, Video and Audio, assign multiple tags and categories to posts, widgetized sidebars, a plugin loader which lets you install any number of plugins, let’s your create users and assign permissions, let’s you automatically upgrade the version of the script you are currently using and many more. Also there are many companies and individuals who specialize in WordPress development.

Turning WordPress into a CMS

To make WordPress look like a CMS instead of a blog publishing software, the idea would be to remove the blog-related features of WordPress. This is not done by modifying the core files of WordPress. You will never find the need to modify any of WordPress core files even to extend its functionality. WordPress is an advanced system and lets its users extend its functionality using plugins. A plugin is independent of the core files used by WordPress. The look and feel of a WordPress site revolves a lot around the theme it uses. So basically to achieve what you want, you will need a theme created which changes the look of WordPress by removing elements like posts, comments etc. If your site will be publishing news then you can use the posts feature to maintain the news section and organize the posts into relevant categories.

By default WordPress displays your posts on the homepage but this can easily be changed from the administration panel. You can assign a static page as the Front page and if you want the posts to be shown on a different section, say under a page named Latest News, you can set the posts page to Latest News. This is done from Settings -> Reading. You’ll first need to select the radio button labeled “A static page” and then choose a page as the Front page and Posts page.

Conclusion

If you are considering about using a Content Management System for your website then it’s safe to consider WordPress as an excellent choice. There is no reason for you to spend hundreds of dollars getting a custom CMS developed. Using WordPress will save you a lot of money. All you need is a qualified professional who specializes in WordPress development so that he can create a theme for you which will transform WordPress into a CMS.

Links to pages of interest

http://wordpress.org – Home to WordPress
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/ – The official WordPress plugin repository
http://wordpress.org/extend/themes/ – The official WordPress theme repository. Let’s you preview and see a demo of a theme so that you can decide which one you like before downloading it
http://codex.wordpress.org/Theme_Development – Instructions on developing a WordPress theme. The best resource for those of you looking to develop a custom theme

It covers each and every thing that is required for installing WordPress viz. downloading and unpacking WordPress to setting up an FTP connection to your website, uploading WordPress to it, creating a MySQL Database and User. By the time you are done reading this guide, you’ll have a working installation of WordPress on your website.

I’ll be writing more guides like these for the MadMouse Blog so be sure to check this site often if they will be of interest to you. You can also subscribe to my RSS feed to receive updates automatically.