Create a Powerful Hub for your Online Presence using WordPress

WordPress W surrounded by social media icons inside a spoked wheel.
WordPress Hartford CT Meetup
September 16, 2024
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Watch Recording

Click below to watch our September 2024 meetup on YouTube, or visit
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02Me_WZXGM4

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Agenda

  • Speaker Introductions
  • Why Your Website Hub Is Important (Ray & Peter)
  • How To Build A Link Tree in WordPress (Peter)
  • Connecting Social Media Feeds With WordPress (Ray)
  • Showcasing Your Products, Services and Expertise (Ray)
  • Sharing Posts on Social Media (Peter)
  • Promoting Events on WordPress (Ray)
  • Wrap-Up
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Ray Michno

Cute Yellow Wapuu WordPress Mascot
ray@ctwebgeek.com
  • Hartford WordPress Co-Organizer
  • 25+ years in IT
  • Developer/Software Architect
  • Pratt & Whitney, Aetna, UnitedHealthGroup
  • 8+ years using WordPress
  • Self-employed – CTWebGeek
  • Married, No Kids, Lives in Newington, CT
  • Geek
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Peter Ingersoll

peter@ingersollinteractive.com
  • Hartford WordPress Co-Organizer
  • 25+ working on the Web
  • Marketing, communications, design, tech guy
  • Hartford Courant, logistics, agency
  • 10 years using WordPress
  • Self-employed – Ingersoll Interactive
  • Married, two adult kids, lives in South Windsor, CT
  • WordPress Admin and DIY Advocate
  • IngersollWP.com
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Create a Powerful Hub for your Online Presence using WordPress

WordPress W surrounded by social media icons inside a spoked wheel.
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Why Your Website “Hub” Is Important

  • Ownership of Your Data
  • Social Media platforms come and go (MySpace, Digg, Twitter?)
  • Exporting data from closed platforms is hard/impossible
  • Broader Discovery
  • Searching within “walled garden” platforms is difficult, especially for people who don’t use the platform
  • Social Media platforms push content based on THEIR rules (ex. Advertisers favored)
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Potential Risks of Social Media

  • Privacy Concerns
  • Limited control of what happens to your data and how it is shared
  • Difficult separation of business and personal data
  • Reputation Risks
  • Fake accounts
  • Controversial Social Media owners turn off visitors (ex. Elon Musk)
  • Difficult/impossible to get help from a person if an issue needs to be resolved (where is Facebook’s phone number??)
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Why Use WordPress as Your Hub

  • YOU are in control
  • WHAT you want to share
  • HOW you want to present your information
  • Personalized showcase vs. “cookie cutter”
  • Stable, findable content vs. fleeting and algorithm dependent
  • Enhanced metrics on visitors and ability to engage with them
  • Keep visitors FOCUSED on what you want vs. distracted by social media
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Linktree Options and Opportunities

Linktree2
  • Complete control over design & content
  • Create from scratch or start with a pattern
  • Not limited to just links
  • Can be used for Instagram “links in bio”
  • Many URL options
  • Home page of domain
  • Page within a site
  • URL shorteners
  • Lots of features for “free”
  • Availability of better metrics
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Common Elements of a Linktree-type Page

Linktree3
  • Easy URL recommended
  • Landing page style – no header navigation
  • Clean display on mobile
  • Photo or branding image
  • Short description
  • Links to pages / sites
  • Social media links
  • Extra information to highlight
  • Compact output of links to content featured in social media, i.e. Instagram “links in bio”
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The Standing WordPress Demo Reminder

Rubiks Wapuu
Your WordPress experience is defined by your theme, plugins, and custom code. WordPress environments can vary greatly!
Understanding concepts is more helpful than specifics.

Let’s Build a Link Tree

Wapuu Dev
It’s Demo Time!

Connecting Instagram to WordPress

  • Smash Balloon Plugin
  • Free and Paid versions available
  • Connects feeds from most popular social media platforms to WordPress
  • Each social media feed will have different API requirements and limitations
  • https://smashballoon.com/
Smash Balloons logo
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Connecting Instagram

Wapuu Dev
It’s Demo Time!

Showcasing Products, Services and Expertise

  • Business Products and Services
  • Expertise (ex. Resume, Projects)
  • Case Studies
  • Different Options
  • Blog Posts – simple built-in solution, leverage WordPress Tags and Categories, display using Archive page or Posts block
  • Gallery Block – good for visual offerings – ex. artwork, before/after pictures, etc.
  • Custom Post Type – gives most control, allows structure of your portfolio items, requires plugin or coding
  • Examples:
  • Project Gallery
  • Case Studies
  • Expertise
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Prep Posts for Social Media Sharing

  • Use SEO plugins to add Open Graph Meta Tags
  • View examples of SEO plugin screens
  • Write clear and compelling meta information
  • Title, excerpt, & description
  • Consider custom Open Graph & Twitter Card images for shared post thumbnails
  • Be sure to test – opengraph.xyz
  • Posts can be automatically shared
  • Plugins: Jetpack, Blog2Social, others
  • Services: Hootsuite, Buffer, Publer, etc.
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Open Graph Meta Tags

Wapuu Dev
It’s Demo Time!

Promoting Events

  • Eventbrite, Facebook Events, Meetup, etc. are popular platforms for promoting and monetizing events
  • The Events Calendar (pro version) allows you to integrate and manage event functionality in WordPress
  • Might be too pricey if you are only promoting a few events a year
  • https://theeventscalendar.com/bundles/event-promoter-bundle/
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Wrap Up & Q&A

Wapuu with laptop and cat
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