Top nice and professional themes

wpShow Themes 

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wpShow – multimedia and video theme for wordpress. wpShow is a video theme for your blog enables you to feature videos as posts alongside with the regular blog posts.

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WP FlexiShop - A Versatile WP E-Commerce Theme 

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This theme utilises Wordpress Ecommerce plugin to create a versatile and feature packed Wordpress powered shop, with 3 different layout options and unlimited color possibilities. Make this theme your own. Mix up content on the homepage with swappable content areas, and change between 2 different footer areas, or use both! A theme so versatile that you can re-brand it to suit your business by simply changing a few settings. Credit for photos sourced from CC Flickr users Panoramas, Maschinenraum, Art Comments.

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The Jewelry Shop - WordPress eCommerce 

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A Flexible, Plugin Free and Localized (Translation-Ready) eCommerce theme!

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Flashlight - fullscreen background portfolio theme 

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Flashlight is an elegant and flexible WordPress Portfolio and Photography Theme, suited for users with no coding knowledge as well as deverlopers. The theme comes with a plethora of options so you can modify layout, styling, colors and fonts directly from within the backend. 5 differen Gallery Types make sure that you can showcase your work they way it fits best for your project. The gallery managment is super easy and convenient. Just upload your images, select a gallery type and hit publish. Want to build a gallery with dozenz of images in less than 2 minutes? This theme makes it possible Check out the Video Tutorial Section if you want to see some short screencasts on how to setup your site

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Icarus Business eCommerce Theme 

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Icarus is the Premium Business eCommerce Theme built with latest Wordpress features and WP-eCommerce plugin

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Sommerce Shop - A Versatile E-commerce Theme 

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Sommerce is a fresh WordPress theme that utilises the powerful JigoShop and Woo Commerce plugins to create a versatile Wordpress powered shop, with unlimited layout options and unlimited skins. Make this theme your own. Mix up content on the homepage with widgets and shortcodes, set the layout full width or boxed style, choose your background color or set one of the 60+ custom backgrounds, set your header color or choose one of the 10 custom header, chose your navigation style and change the style of your products.. a theme so versatile that you can customize it to suit your business by simply changing a few settings. With Sommerce you can sell everything!

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Abundance eCommerce Business Theme 

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Abundance is an elegant and flexible WordPress eCommerce Theme, suited for users with no coding knowledge as well as deverlopers. The Theme is built on top of the fabulous woocommerce shop plugin It comes with a plethora of options so you can modify layout, styling, colors and fonts directly from within the backend. 5 Slideshows, 16 predefined skins (which are easy to modify from your backend), font and color options as well as dynamic template builder will help you create the Website you need in no time. Check out the Video Tutorial Section if you want to see some short screencasts on how to setup your site. SEO (Search engine optimization) The theme is built with SEO best practices in mind. It uses semantical valid HTML code and CSS so search engines can index the content of your site with ease. Important content is always placed before unimportent in your source code (eg: Blog Post content before Sidebar), Headlines are wrapped in heading tags (h1, h2, h3 etc) to signalise their importance to search engines. The site also uses heavy internal site linking, which is also of vital for search engines (related posts, breadcrumb navigation, primary and secondary navigation menus, footer navigation) With this Wordpress Template you are well equipped to get a high google ranking and attract visitors to sell them your fabulous products

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Mommy Blog - Premium WordPress Jigoshop Theme 

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Mommy Blog is a super cute WordPress theme suited to a children’s business or stay at home mothers website. The template features a large header on the home page and a smaller header on the inside pages. It has very nice content pages and a good blog layout. The sidebars are easy to configure and it comes with 8 widgets to help you make your website look lovely. Current Version: 1.4 – Dec 22nd 2011

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Propulsion - responsive business & eCommerce 

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Propulsion is a responsive WordPress Theme (try resizing your browser), suited for users who want to create a business, portfolio or eCommerce site. The Theme is built on top of the fabulous woocommerce shop plugin as well as the bbPress Forum plugin. It comes with a plethora of options so you can modify layout, styling, colors and fonts directly from within the backend. 3 Slideshows, 21 predefined skins (which are easy to modify from your backend), font and color options as well as dynamic template builder will help you create the Website you need in no time. SEO (Search engine optimization) The theme is built with SEO best practices in mind. It uses semantical valid HTML code and CSS so search engines can index the content of your site with ease. Important content is always placed before unimportent in your source code (eg: Blog Post content before Sidebar), Headlines are wrapped in heading tags (h1, h2, h3 etc) to signalise their importance to search engines. The site also uses heavy internal site linking, which is also of vital for search engines (related posts, primary and secondary navigation menus, footer navigation, etc) With this Wordpress Template you are well equipped to get a high google ranking and attract visitors to sell them your fabulous products

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WordPress \ eCommerce \ WP e-Commerce\ Mazine Wordpress Theme - A WP E-Commerce theme 

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Flexible e-commerce theme, with wp-e-commerce plugin, ajax contact form, animated sortable gallery and much much more.

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5 International Newspapers That Use WordPress

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• 5 International Newspapers That Use WordPress
• How to Plan Your WordPress Website
• Donate $1 to every free WordPress plugin you use
• Is Your WordPress Website Just Another Business Card?
• This Is Why iOS 6 Is Great News For WordPress
• Fundraising With WordPress: A Guide For Nonprofits
• Instagrate: An Easy Way to Integrate WordPress with Instagram
• How to Pick a Great Website Host for Your WordPress Blog
• WordPress login page not right for your site? Build your own sidebar login with member info!
• WordPress Code Snippets: Keep them Organized with this Plugin!

5 International Newspapers That Use WordPress Posted: 21 Jun 2012 11:00 AM PDT It's obvious that at WPMU.org we're WordPress crazy. We advocate the use of WordPress, and are delighted when large corporations decide to take advantage of the power and flexibility provided by WordPress. It may seem obvious that more and more media and news corporations are starting to use WordPress as their CMS given that more and more plugins, themes and developers have started to develop on this system, but there are still many big news corporations who use other CMS or proprietary systems. We will show you some European and Asian news corporations that are run either completely or partially on WordPress. My Telegraph My Telegraph is the social networking part of The Telegraph newspaper that operates in the UK. My Telegraph allows its users to start their own blog through The Telegraph's own installation of WordPress. Le Monde The French national newspaper Le Monde powers their blogs with WordPress. Le Monde has a blog for many of the hot topics that are occurring on a continuous basis around the world, with their reporters and analysts providing their own opinions on subjects that matter to them. TheJournal.ie TheJournal.ie is an Irish online-only news organisation run on WordPress. TheJournal.ie reports on Irish and international issues and have separate WordPress sites for their business, sports and light news sections. Dawn Dawn is one of Pakistan's most well-read English-language newspapers and is hosted by WordPress VIP. Their online section is run by WordPress and the website also has an Urdu version. Express and Star Express and Star is an English newspaper operating in Wolverhampton, England. Their readership reaches 100,000 people daily and most of their online operations run on WordPress. Featured image courtesy of NS Newsflash David Yip on Google+ Related posts: 5 Plugins for Magazines and Newspapers 5 plugins to style your newspaper and magazine articles.... Daily Tip: Bulk-Select Featured Images in WordPress Need to select a bunch of featured images all at... Daily Tip: Multisite Compatible Super Widgets Plugin Displays Featured Posts A great new plugin is available in the WordPress repository...

How to Plan Your WordPress Website Posted: 21 Jun 2012 10:00 AM PDT Your website is part of your business’s overall marketing strategy and needs to be treated with the same consideration as any other type of marketing materials. Working with WordPress templates helps you create beautiful looking and functional websites. How well they work for your business will depend in large measure on the thought you put into it  before you build it. If you want it to be successful, you better have a plan. (Note: My definition of a plan is something in writing. If it isn’t in writing, it isn’t a plan–it’s an idea for a plan.) 1. Why are you building a website for your business? Every website serves a purpose, whether that is to create awareness of your company or sell your business’s products. What purpose will yours serve? Knowing your site’s purpose will help you determine what features and functions the site will have. For example, if you plan to sell products through the site, you need a site that can display your inventory and handle sales, taxes and shipping. An e-commerce WordPress template may be a better choice than a standard corporate template. (For a great review of the most used WordPress templates, check out WordPress Themes: the Top 20 (as Used by the Top Million). Perhaps you need a site that can generate leads for your sales force. For this purpose, landing pages with forms that collect visitor information would be appropriate. You can search for WordPress templates by type on sites like themeforest.net, which offers a wide range of templates for different purposes, including , corporate, nonprofit, and many others. You may want a site that does more than one thing. If so, prioritizing the site will help you decide on what WordPress template to use and how to structure the site so that it meets the needs of different audiences, which leads us to… 2. Who do you want to visit your WordPress site? Who are your customers? Are they technically savvy? Are they comfortable shopping on the Web? How old are they? What percentage are male or female? Are they educated? Two of my favorite WordPress Themes from Themeforest.net Knowing your off-line customers can help you write for the online ones. It can be hard to be objective, so if you aren’t sure, ask one of your customers how they would identify themselves. You may need to ask more than one person to get the best picture. Why is this important? If you don’t know who you are talking to, you can’t possibly know how to talk to them. Your site needs to speak to your visitor in ways they understand and want to be spoken to. You certainly don’t want to drive potential customers away! From the tone of voice to the size of the fonts, knowing your audience is important to making sure your site is working for you and not against you. 3. What do you want people to do once they get to the site? The answer to this questions ties in directly to the first one. What’s the site’s purpose? If you want to drive online sales, you will want to make it easy for visitors to see your products and services and make their purchases. If your site is more informational, what information needs to go on the home page? What goes on the rest of the pages, and how should you link them all together? What’s Next? With the information you’ve now collected (and written down), you should be able to sketch out your basic site structure, i.e., what pages you want on your site and how they will be linked together. You will also have the basic outline for writing the site’s content. Related posts: Making The Most Of The WordPress.org Website You may not have paid much attention to it before,... 101 Essential Free WordPress Resources for Building Your WordPress Website Having a whole collection of resources in one place is... The Gift of WordPress: Surprise Your Loved Ones with a WordPress Website Hamper It's December. That means Christmas is coming. I love Christmas...

Donate $1 to every free WordPress plugin you use Posted: 21 Jun 2012 09:00 AM PDT Are you a WordPress “taker”, not a “giver”? Do you eat all the free donuts at church but never volunteer? If yes, I’m calling you out: Donate at least $1 to every free plugin you actually use. Alternatively, if the plugin author operates on a “freemium” business model, upgrade today, like you know you’ve always wanted to. Do you want to donate more than $1 to some? That’s fine. In fact, you could calculate your website or blog’s value and share some of your value with them. Or, if you have a patch for something broken but haven’t gotten around to sending it to the plugin author because you forgot about everyone else as soon as your own problems were fixed, send it to the plugin author. Do something to give back. Do it today. This isn’t new. In the past, Matt Mullenweg declared a Thank a Plugin Developer Day. Maybe you missed it. Today’s your own “Thank a Plugin Developer Day”. Today’s the day to say thank you with one dollar. Plugin Donation Options Here’s a list of Q&A’s to help you overcome your objections and just do it. You no longer have an excuse. Q1: Why should I donate? WordPress is free so plugins should be free too. You chump. WordPress doesn’t cost money to you, but it doesn’t magically appear out of thin air. It does cost time, money, blood, sweat, and tears. Same goes for extending WordPress with plugins. In fact, there’s an inverse relationship among those costs: the more time and money one has, the less blood, sweat, and tears expended. I don’t need to say anything more. Don’t have a chump’s opinion. Q2: How can I keep track of my favorites if I have more than one WordPress installation so I can get a list of the plugins I think are worth donating to? Matt Mullenweg recently wrote Plugin Directory Refreshed, an article highlighting some of the great changes to the WordPress.org Plugin Repository. One new feature is the “favorites” feature. Just login and click the “❤ Favorite” link underneath the Plugin’s download button. Then visit the “My Favorites” link at the top of the page, next to the “Log Out” link. Q3: How do I know where I should donate to? If it’s installed and activated on your WordPress website, it’s likely there’s a donate link somewhere in there. If not, check the plugin’s WordPress.org page (remember the My Favorites link) and see if there’s a “Donate to this plugin” link. Here’s an example from Contact Form 7‘s page: Q4: Is donating $1 really worth it to the plugin author? Let me ask you a question: If you had to do zero additional work, would you like to receive $0.67? It’ll automatically be sent to your personal checking account and there are no strings attached. How about 100 times over for $67? Um, yes. So spare a buck and share this post with others to encourage them to do the same. Q5: Won’t $1 be an insult, saying the plugin is only worth $1? Option 1: Donate more than $1. Yes, that’s allowed. Option 2: Stop using the plugin. No one wants that, not even the plugin author. So just donate $1 and write a nice note and link to this post in your PayPal message and they’ll know you mean well, really well. Q6: What if I have $0 to spare and just cannot donate money? Do you pay for web hosting? If yes, donate $1 per month to your top 12 plugins. You should also tell someone you know who has both WordPress and more than $12 about your favorite plugins. You could also blog about your favorites on your own site. Spreading the word about good plugins helps the author attract a wider user base, which helps in many ways, one of which is the potential for more donors. Q7: I use a bunch of plugins and this sounds like it will take a long time. Do I have to? Referencing item #1, above… Don’t be a chump. Is it quicker to click a “donate” link or to develop that plugin’s same functionality by writing the plugin yourself… and supporting others’ questions… and updating it for new versions of WordPress? You had time to read this article. Stop reading. Copy this link. Click to donate. Write sweet nothings and a link to this article in your donation message. Submit $1 or more. Sleep better at night. Brag about it to your friends. Summary Use the WordPress.org Plugin Repository’s “Favorites” feature. Use the “Donate to this plugin” link on each plugin’s page. If there’s no link there, check in your WordPress installation’s settings page for each plugin you have activated. Share this post with others to turn your $1 into $2, and $2 into $4. Why? Because you know you’ve wanted to and because it helps you by encouraging ongoing development, for both updates and new plugins. P.S. If you are a developer of free WordPress plugins, thank you. I invite you to add your own WordPress donation link. If you eat all the donuts, volunteer once, just once. Image Credit: thank you note for every language Clifford Paulick on Google+ Related posts: Reasons to, and not to, donate to Diaspora Diaspora is asking for donations, would you consider helping them... Daily Tip: Multisite Compatible Super Widgets Plugin Displays Featured Posts A great new plugin is available in the WordPress repository... Download Our WordPress PopUp Plugin For Free We recently made our fancy WordPress PopUp plugin available for...

Is Your WordPress Website Just Another Business Card? Posted: 21 Jun 2012 08:00 AM PDT Business and entrepreneurship have fascinated me since my early teenage years. Long before I learned the mechanics of what it takes to launch a successful business, it seemed as if it was an easy feat. I have witnessed many try their hand at entrepreneurship, starting what they believed was an actual business. They'd get a really awesome idea, come up with a clever name for it, and then RUSH to have business cards printed. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED! No marketing, planning, or additional thought was invested from that point on. It wasn't long after that those cool-looking business cards became excellent alternatives for toothpicks, or used alongside cheesy pick-up lines. Hey, here's my business card! Call me when you're lonely! While business cards are certainly not a thing of the past, WordPress websites have become equally, if not more important to a business' visibility. Unfortunately though, many take on the stigma of their printed predecessors. A cool domain name is registered and much time and effort is invested in the initial development of the website. But after that, it floats off into cyberspace and is soon forgotten. The dynamics are so similar that you'd think that misery really did love company. A business will not thrive without a strategy and plan for profit. This is true whether you have a business card, website, or both. But if you're willing to implement a true business system, your WordPress website is infused with operatives that can get you headed to online success! Optimizing Your WordPress Site to Work For Your Business Many have already discovered the art of using blog posts as company news and press releases. This is definitely the most basic way to engage with your audience and keep them supplied with fresh and organized content. But few ever consider duplicating their theme to support ad campaigns, sales events, and holidays. The difference between the themes may be as simple as adding secondary features to your official header. Easy tricks like this help to keep your WordPress website from becoming the equivalent of a plain ol’ static business card. As for usability, a search bar should always be included on your website. This can be thought of basic PR, as most users navigate the web by searching on Google, Yahoo, and Bing. You should also take advantage of social media networking. Plugins like Wordbooker (for Facebook) and Twitter Tools are excellent ways of integrating the most popular social networks into your WordPress website! To learn more about how WordPress can be used for business purposes, be sure to read 5 Innovative Uses of WordPress for Business Owners. Photo: Portrait of young business man isolated on white background from Flickr Thomas Hubbard on Google+ Related posts: 5 WordPress Plugins Every Local Business Website Needs These plugins make your site more user-friendly for your visitors.... Business Case Study: Ayedee.com Creator Finds a Powerhouse Solution In WordPress Multisite WPMU.org recently had the chance to interview James Aldersley of... Announcing the release of the Business Portfolio theme We’re on fire with the amount of theme releases this...

This Is Why iOS 6 Is Great News For WordPress Posted: 21 Jun 2012 07:19 AM PDT Two weeks ago Apple announced iOS 6 at WWDC. For those of you who doesn't know what WWDC is, just use Google or be satisfied with the fact that it is a developer focused Apple conference, where a ton of consumer products are often unveiled. So maybe it is more of a media spectacle then? I'm not sure I can be bothered to know anymore. Oh, and iOS is the operating system your iPhone, iPad and iPod touch runs on. It is not the same as OS X though. Some think the two will merge, which is highly unlikely in the near future at least. Speaking of the Mac, no doubt you've seen the retina MacBook Pro by now? If not, here's how Apple's selling it in video form: It'll set you back a bundle, but you can enjoy the retina web anyway, because chances are you own “the new iPad”, or iPad 3 if you will. If you do, you have no doubt tried blogging with it, something I've touched before. Well, good news for you (and me), because iOS 6 brings image uploads to the Mobile Safari web browser! Yes, someone wrote this here before. That’s the problem with scheduled post column thingies. It stands to be repeated though, so here we go. Why is this great, you ask? Well, for starters this means that you can upload images from within the WordPress admin interface! A slightly revamped admin interface, and the iPad could become the publishing tool almost everyone wants it to be. Until then, do give both the official WordPress app a go, as well as Blogsy which is pretty good too. Or install the iOS 6 beta if you prefer to live on the edge. Either way, things are looking good for mobile blogging. Oh, and this was written on an iPad, first using iA Writer and then the official WordPress app. The image is uploaded using the app, I had to ask a friend for the YouTube embed code because you can’t get that from the YouTube app and all YouTube videos revert to that, and finally I had to go to the admin interface to select the featured image used on the front page. I could’ve sorted all of that stuff out using Blogsy though, which supports image uploads, featured images, and you can drag and drop YouTube videos from their built-in browser. “The iPad is for consumption” my ass. Photo by A Silly Person (CC) Related posts: The WordPress Community Summit Is A Great Idea In which I give a standing ovation to the WordPress... The Great Plugin Backwards Compatibility Debate It's a question most plugin developers ponder - how hard... Daily Tip: Free Online Magazine and News Theme for WordPress Need a free theme that lets you feature lots of...

Fundraising With WordPress: A Guide For Nonprofits Posted: 21 Jun 2012 07:00 AM PDT There are several plugins which allow nonprofits to take donations and even more web services that provide similar functionality, but none of them can match the level of integration and ease of use offered by the WPMU DEV Fundraising Plugin. This video and text walk-through will discuss the main features of the plugin and how you can get your nonprofit up and running quickly taking donations right on your website. All the videos were shot in HD so remember to select that option in the video display panel by clicking on the gear icon at bottom right of each video window. Main Features of the Fundraising Plugin The Fundraising plugin allows you to create dedicated events, called fundraisers, through which a nonprofit can solicit donations for that event or for the organization in general. The plugin tracks number of donors, amounts given, and can even display the percentage of your donation goals achieved. It also gives you the ability to create your own Kickstarter type functionality, and take pledges for specific events without charging those donors until the entire goal amount has been met. Donors can be tracked inside the actual fundraising event post. (click to enlarge) But the Fundraising plugin is more than just a simple donation tracker because the system itself can be easily customized to fit your specific nonprofit needs. For example, you might not call your "donors" by that name; you might call them "supporters" or "backers" or something else entirely. Instead of having rigid rules that don't allow for customization (like most proprietary donation systems), Fundraising allows you to change the internal settings of the plugin to name your "donors" whatever you like. Events can have custom names too. Don't like the word "fundraiser?" That's just fine – you can call them "galas", "walk-a-thons", or anything else your heart (or organization) desires!  This level of customization makes the plugin more deeply integrated with your website and the nonprofit's persona. The Fundraising plugin lets you track donations right inside your WordPress admin panel too. You can see the number of donors, the transaction settings, amount donated, the progress toward your ultimate fundraising goal, and much more.   General Settings The Fundraising plugin is easy to set up and customize. It features a step by step guide to configuring the system which displays as soon as you activate the plugin. There are three areas that must be setup for the plugin to function correctly: Payments – This area is for detailed payment information. Your location, currency type, and the types of donations you'll take – simple or crowd funded. Presentation – This setting area controls how your donation plugin looks. You can change how the plugin appears in your admin menu panel and all of the associated names for donors and events. You can also change the way the donation buttons display inside the fundraising posts/pages on your website. Essentially, this section of settings allows you to customize the look of the plugin for both the admin interface and the end-user. Other – This area allows you to add a general fundraisers page to your website menu bar by which viewers can see all your currently published fundraisers. The following video walks you through setting up the Fundraising plugin, and configuring the general settings so you can get up and running taking donations quickly.   Setting up PayPal Fundraising integrates natively with PayPal standard processing. Anyone can set up a PayPal account and get started taking donations right away, provided PayPal is set up as a business account. PayPal business accounts are free to register and are one of the most widely used payment processors for nonprofits for several reasons: PayPal is a trusted name PayPal features a very secure transaction portal PayPal can accept credit and debit cards or a standard PayPal account – currently used by millions of members PayPal checkout is very fast – only a few pieces of information are required to complete your transaction PayPal can process recurring donations – one of the best ways a nonprofit can generate residual income and not have to rely so much on grant funding The only downside to processing donations through PayPal is you are taken briefly off your own website to actually process the transaction through PayPal. This negative is mitigated by the security the PayPal processor   Creating a Fundraiser Upon installation, the plugin creates a custom post type to handle all fundraising activities. You can choose to set up specific events, general donations, and to monitor donation activities and donors directly in your WordPress admin panel. You can also setup suggested donation levels to encourage your supporters to give certain amounts of money. Another advantage of the Fundraising plugin is that is works through the native WordPress custom post type functionality. It does not work with complex plugin settings or a proprietary data storage method. This means you can export your fundraising data using WordPress' export XML features and takes that data with you when you change sites or upgrade to a different theme. All the data is stored in your standard WordPress database. Whether you choose to allow for simple donations or crowd funded events the fundraiser creation process is simple and familiar. Using the WordPress post editor to create donations allows you to add text, images, videos, and any html code you desire. This gives your donation page a custom-feel and much more functionality than most stand-alone systems which only offer a few stock customization methods. The Fundraising Plugin from WPMU DEV allows the following donation types: Simple Donations This option will get you up and running quickly. It allows you to take simple donations by which the donor can choose an amount and donate that amount to you either once or on a recurring basis. The donation post will display the number of donors who have given money, the total amount of money raised by your organization through this event/post, and the donor will be charged via PayPal as soon as he or she makes that donation. Advanced Crowd Funding This is similar to what you would see on a site like Kickstarter, where you create a special event with a specific goal in mind. Donors aren't actually charged until that goal is reached. For example, if you have an event like a building fund by which you plan to solicit funds to build a new home for your nonprofit, you might use the advanced crowd funding option. That home might cost $10,000 but if you can't raise the entire amount you will not move forward with the project. The crowd funding option will show the number of donors and total amount donated just like the simple donation option, it will also show a progress bar denoting the percentage of that goal currently raised. It will also show how many days are left in the fundraising event. This is a great piece of functionality because it creates a time-based needs statement and encourages donors to act quickly. Rewards Another impressive feature of the Fundraising plugin is the ability to give awards to donors. This is often seen with public radio and television funding drives by which donors receive a gift for a certain level of donation. If you are partnering with a corporate sponsor for your event you could offer gifts to your donors. For instance, you might have a goal set to raise $25,000 during one event, and you could offer donors who give at the $1,000 level a free t-shirt, CD, DVD, or some other donated item. Rewards are a great way to entice donations and to encourage donors or small amounts to increase their donation size to receive a bundled gift. The video below shows how simple it can be to add a fundraiser to your nonprofit website.   Widgets Just when you thought you’ve seen some great functionality, the plugin goes even further and allows you to include fundraiser information in widgets on your sidebar or any widgetized area your theme might include. With Fundraiser widgets you can feature certain events to draw the eyes of your viewers. You can also display a list of recent donors and even a panel which displays current progress from particular fundraising events. By taking this information out of the single fundraising post and also displaying it site-wide you will draw more traffic to your fundraising events and make them easy to find from every corner, post, and page of your website. Conclusion The WPMU DEV Fundraising plugin is a feature rich donation plugin that offers your nonprofit unparalleled fundraising ability and seamless integration with any WordPress installation. It also allows your nonprofit to keep payment processor costs low by avoiding the need for an expensive merchant account. The videos take extra time to walk you through the plugin features, but there's no reason you couldn't be up and running with your own fundraiser and taking donations in fewer than 10 minutes, provided you have a valid PayPal account and some knowledge of WordPress settings. Of course, to get more familiar with the latter, you're at the right place: WPMU.org. Craig Grella on Google+ No related posts.

Instagrate: An Easy Way to Integrate WordPress with Instagram Posted: 21 Jun 2012 06:30 AM PDT Earlier this year we introduced you to Instagrate, a free WordPress plugin that brings your Instagram images into WordPress. Since that time Polevaultweb has released a Pro version of the plugin in order to maintain the support and development of the free plugin. Instagrate Pro is aiming to be the best plugin to integrate Instagram images with WordPress. Instagrate Pro has a number of powerful new features: Unlimited Instagram accounts Scheduled posting Hashtag posting of any photo Hashtag filtering on own and feed photos Posting of multiple images in a single post Gallery support of multiple images Hashtags converted to post tags Custom post type support Google Map integration for locations Full plugin support Whether you’re serious about your mobile photography, an Instagram fanatic, or simply need a tool to display Instagram galleries neatly, this plugin provides the easiest way to integrate your photos with your WordPress site. It also works great for automatically backing up your Instagram account using WordPress. Instagrate allows you to set the post type for where the image will be created. The default is post, but you can also select to use pages or custom post types. The plugin’s options panel is very easy to use and allows you to configure virtually every aspect of how it works, including hashtag filtering, scheduling, posts titles, debugging, and more. Instagrate Pro is priced at just $35, which is a steal, considering all the options built into the plugin and its continual development and professional support. Check out the plugin in action with some demos and grab your copy today. Sarah Gooding on Google+ Related posts: Daily Tip: Automatically Post Instagram Photos to WordPress Want to automatically post each of your Instagram photos to... Daily Tip: English Version of Easy WP CMS Plugin Now Available The Easy WP plugin we featured this week is now... Sticky Clicky Star Plugin Makes it Easy to Manage WordPress Sticky Posts Sticky Clicky Star sounds like a band name, doesn’t it?...

How to Pick a Great Website Host for Your WordPress Blog Posted: 21 Jun 2012 06:00 AM PDT WordPress Recommends… First, as a matter of due diligence, I feel I should direct you to what WordPress.org has to say about this topic.  Here are the hosts that they most strongly recommend (and the minimum requirements that they set) for a WordPress.org site: Dreamhost Bluehost Media Temple Laughing Squid If that is all the information that you need to make a decision, then you can stop reading right now. But… You might still want to take some time to think your way through the decision.  Here are the questions I would recommend you ask of yourself and of any potential host. How Much Do Your Really Need? A Penny To Host Your Thoughts? Even the cheapest hosting plan will usually offer 10 to 20GBs of storage.  Do you need 20GBs of storage?  Well, if your website is anything like the normal website, your average webpage is probably around 1MB.  That’s right, MB not GB.  Hosts will try to rope you in by offering you much more capacity than you really need or will use.  Don’t let the “Economy” in the plan fool you, you aren’t shortchanging yourself. What Is The Right Price For You? There are options to suit pretty much any budget.  If your budget is nothing, well, there are some options.  If you really don’t need to do much customization, you can always just stick with a WordPress.com blog.  There are even some new plans to accommodate the user who only wants to pay for something once. How Easy Is It To Use? How Easy Is It to Install WordPress? Easier Than Apple Pie? There are plenty of things to worry about when you are launching a blog: the content, the graphics, the SEO, the audience reaction, etc.  Do you really want your hosting and WordPress installation to be another of those things?  Make life easy on yourself and go with a host that is known for a user-friendly UI and reliable operations. Are You Trying to Do Something Interesting? If you are trying to run a specific utility, function, or piece of software, you might want to check with the producers to see what they recommend.  For example if you are trying to set up a pretty serious WordPress multisite, you might want to ask our guys. Friendliness of Support At some point, your site will crash and you will be on, or across, the verge of tears.  When it does, how sweet will you want the tech support person to be?  It might not seem like an issue beforehand, but just wait a bit. Quality of Support Can Your Site Get Bigger In a Heartbeat? Even the friendliest voice on the other side of the phone can’t make up for faulty support.  Poor technical support can leave you with serious site-wide issues.  Also make sure that the web host does not have a reputation for fraudulent up-selling or straight-up fraud. Scalability Your site needs may change over time.  Are you going to need a larger infrastructure in the future, or do you anticipate your needs remaining constant?  Check with the hosting service to see how easy and cheap (or hard and costly) it would be to increase your storage or bandwidth. Is The Host a Good Internet Citizen? This may not matter to you at all.  You are a hard-edge business(wo)man with an eye for the bottom-line and little time for such mealy-mouthed flimflam.  But if you are completely stuck and cannot otherwise see a hair’s width of difference between one provider and another, then maybe their record for keeping the internet an open, safe, and innovative environment could help to tip the balance.   No related posts.

WordPress login page not right for your site? Build your own sidebar login with member info! Posted: 21 Jun 2012 05:30 AM PDT We all know and love the WordPress login page, and many of us have tried to customize the heck out of it at some point or another. But even if we get it looking and working more or less the way we want, it’s not always a good fit for the type of site we’re running. In many instances, a sidebar login seems to be a more appropriate choice. For one thing, a sidebar login is always there, enticing your visitors to connect and to engage with other users. That can be especially true if you’re running a niche community network with Buddypress. Not using Buddypress? This tutorial will guide you through all the steps needed to replace the WordPress login page with a custom sidebar login and logged-in user info/links for a Buddypress-enabled site. However, with a little tweak here and there, it will serve just fine for a site without Buddypress. Promise. :-) Want both the WordPress login page and a members area? If you have already set up the WordPress login page to your liking and want to keep it, but also want a logged-in members area with a bunch of cool stuff in it for your users, see the end of this post for specific instructions. So, a sidebar login/members area it is. If all you need is a sidebar login, you really don’t need this tutorial. You can find a bunch of quite satisfactory plugins in the WordPress repository. But what if you want to include some custom stuff, or display different stuff to visitors and logged-in users? Stuff like: links to the logged-in Buddypress user profile private messaging inbox custom components Or maybe to content that has nothing at all to do with the Buddypress part of your site: links to private WordPress dashboard areas they may have access to some members-only content perhaps help pages In the above cases, neither the standard WordPress login page nor a simple sidebar login will cut it. So today, we’re going to build ourselves a sidebar login with all the made-to measure goodies we want in it. We’re also going to do it without editing any files, or uploading anything via FTP. We’re gonna git ‘er done with a marvelous plugin I highlighted in a previous post: Shortcode Exec PHP. No template edits, no file changes, no FTP required 1 – First things first: download Shortcode Exec PHP and activate it. Got the plugin installed and activated on your site? Good. In the plugin admin panel, be sure you have checked either “Make shortcodes global”, or “Execute shortcodes in (sidebar) widgets”. Either one will enable you to use the shortcodes we’re about to create in widgets. Oh, and no need to insert opening and closing php tags in any shortcode you create; they will be automatically wrapped by the plugin. 2 – The login form Let’s begin by getting a standard WordPress login form up and running for your visitors and users. This part is easy ‘cuz there’s already a function predefined in WordPress for it. We just need to call that function in our shortcode. Copy the code below to an empty code box in the plugin admin panel, and name it anything you like, maybe “mylogin”. (For more on the wp_login_form function, see http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/wp_login_form) if (!is_user_logged_in()): echo wp_login_form(); endif; Now go to “Appearance” > “Widgets” in your WordPress admin and drag a new text widget to your sidebar. If you don’t want your new sidebar login to have a title (it appears whether the user is logged-in or not), don’t give it one. Add your new shortcode to the widget content area, wrapped in square brackets like below: [mylogin] You should now see a login form display in your sidebar when you logout of your site. Got it? Good, now it gets fun! Log back in to your site (using your new form to make sure it works). 3 – The fun stuff Now let’s get the logged-in user’s avatar to display. In order to call certain elements like the avatar, we need to first tell our shortcode that we want info for the current logged-in user (global $current_user and get_currentuserinfo). In the snippet you just added to the code box, insert else: just after the call to the login form, then the current user function calls, and finally the call for the user’s avatar. Your code will now look like this: if (!is_user_logged_in()): echo wp_login_form(); else: global $current_user; get_currentuserinfo(); echo get_avatar( $current_user->ID, 80 ); endif; If you check your sidebar again, you should now see your own avatar displayed in your widget. Do you find it too big, or too small, for your site? You can change the size simply by changing the value (80) that appears at the end of the get_avatar function (80 = 80px wide x 80px high). Oh but wait, the avatar doesn’t link to anything, does it? Let’s link it to the current logged-in user Buddypress profile, shall we? To do that, we simply wrap the get_avatar portion of the code in the existing BP function that creates the link we need. We’re also going to enclose the avatar in a div container, and float that div to the left with a bit of inline CSS (I told you: no file edits. If you prefer to add the CSS to your stylesheet though, go right ahead). By the way, the float is not required to get the avatar on the left; rather, it ensures that the text links we’ll be adding soon line up to the right of the avatar instead of beneath it. Replace the line that reads echo get_avatar with this: echo '<div style="float:left;margin:0 2em 1em 0;"><a href="'; echo (bp_loggedin_user_domain()); echo '">'; echo get_avatar( $current_user->ID, 80 ); echo '</a></div>'; Next, let’s insert the logged-in username with a “Welcome” message, and link the username to the profile too. Add the following snippet just below the get_currentuserinfo line (above the get_avatar code you just added). If you prefer a smaller or larger heading, go right ahead and change the <h3> to whatever suits your theme. echo '<h3>Welcome <a href="'; echo (bp_loggedin_user_domain()); echo '">'; echo bp_loggedin_user_fullname(); echo '</h3></a>'; If everything has gone according to plan, your logged-in widget should look much like the image to the right. Also, the avatar and username should link to the logged-in user profile. So far, so good? Do you miss the WordPress login page yet? Next up: all our custom links and buttons… the really fun stuff! 4 – The really fun stuff It’s time to include all our custom logged-in links and/or buttons. For the purpose of this tutorial, we’ll add some basic Buddypress profile stuff. Go ahead and modify what we add to better suit your own niche. Let’s begin with a link to the logged-in user’s profile edit page. You want them to keep their profile info up-to-date, right? Add the following snippet just before the closing endif; tag in your code. echo '<a href="'; echo (bp_loggedin_user_domain() . "profile" . "/" . "edit"); echo '">Update your Profile</a>'; Note how the second line in the snippet you just added builds the URL to your-site.com/members/username/profile/edit. The bp_loggedin_user_domain function outputs your-site.com/members/username/ The 2nd element in the string (profile) points to the top-level nav item in the user’s profile. The 3rd element points to the subnav item. These examples should make it easy for you to add whatever custom stuff you need. Just be sure to separate each item in the string with dots and slashes like in the example code. Now let’s add a link to the user’s Activity Stream so they can quickly update their status. Add the following just before the endif; tag: echo '<a href="'; echo (bp_loggedin_user_domain()) . "activity" . "/"; echo '">Update your Status</a>'; And finally, a link to their message inbox: echo '<a href="'; echo (bp_loggedin_user_domain()) . "messages" . "/"; echo '">Check your Inbox</a>'; To change the text in any of the above link examples (or the button examples below), simply edit the 3rd line. Now you go ahead and add a fourth link yourself. Finally, let’s liven up the presentation by adding a few buttons in a single row along the bottom of our logged-in member’s widget. We’ll start with the “Logout” button. Add the following just before the closing endif; tag: echo '<br class="clear"><a class="button" title="Logout" href="'; echo wp_logout_url( get_permalink() ); echo '">Logout</a> '; The <br class=”clear”> is required to ensure that the buttons appear below everything else. Also note the class=”button” in the link part of the code. That ensures the link will be styled like other buttons in your theme (hopefully). If your users are authorized to use your WordPress admin dashboard, you can add a handy button to that here too: echo '<a class="button" title="Dashboard" href="'; echo admin_url(); echo '">Dashboard</a>'; You can add other buttons too if you like. Say to a specific page on your site with some handy help references for your users. Simply change the URL in the example below to the actual URL of the page you want to link to: echo '<a class="button" title="Help" href="http://your-site.com/your-help-page/">Help</a>'; Your custom logged-in/logged-out widget and members area should look a lot like the image to the right by now. If I may say so myself, it’s a very nice alternative to the WordPress login page! 5 – I want the WordPress login page and this really cool widget! Surprise! That’s real easy. Simply change the 2nd line of your shortcode to this: echo 'Please <a href="'; echo wp_login_url(); echo '" title="Login">login</a> or <a href="'; echo (site_url()) . "/" . "register" . "/"; echo '">create an account</a>.'; The snippet of code above will output a line that looks like this: Please login or create an account. The login link will redirect to your WordPress login page, and the create an account link will redirect to your Buddypress register page. If you have changed the name of your register page, be sure to change “register” to the correct URL on line 4 of the above snippet. I hope you enjoyed and find use for this tutorial. If you get messed up and need a hand with any part of it, leave a comment below, and I’ll try to get you going right! Photo credit: Keys 1 by Brenda Starr Patrick Cohen on Google+ No related posts.

WordPress Code Snippets: Keep them Organized with this Plugin! Posted: 21 Jun 2012 03:24 AM PDT You love code snippets. Why wouldn’t you? They’re like mini plugins – all the functionality, none of the bloat. You can cherry pick the key features that you need and keep your site lean and mean. However, code snippets aren’t perfect. Before long, your functions.php file can start to get rather packed and messy. It can be difficult to remember what snippets you have, and why. It’s not quite as straightforward as your plugins list, is it? At least you can easily spot a no longer needed plugin and do away with it – it’s not so easy when it comes to code snippets. But now it can be. Introducing the Code Snippets Plugin As the developer rather succinctly puts it, Code Snippets is a easy, clean and simple way to add code snippets to your site. It makes creating and managing code snippets a piece of cake. You can add new code snippets by pasting them into the code box: As you can see from the above screen shot, you can name the snippet, as well as give it a description. All of the code snippets you add are easily managed in much the same way as you do with plugins: If you’re a heavy (or even moderate) user of code snippets, this plugin is a must-have addition to your site. To be quite honest, I think it would make a lot of sense for this to be added to WordPress by default. Code snippets are widely-used, and perhaps it is about time that a GUI such as that in Code Snippets was developed as part of a future WordPress update. Download Code Snippets here. Tom Ewer on Google+ No related posts.

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