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Question from Felicia: I have a blog that I’ve been posting on three times a week since November 2015.
I’m really happy with the success I’m having with it and now I want to try my hand at podcasting to supplement the blog posts.
Can you recommend a good podcast-quality microphone that’s affordable?
Question from Clara: I’ve been writing a WordPress blog that discusses a variety of family issues for over two years now.
I recently installed an update to a plugin that completely broke my blog, and since I couldn’t log in to my WordPress account I couldn’t remove the bad plugin.
I searched for a solution on Google for three days and I finally found your excellent blog post explaining how to disable the bad plugin using an FTP program, and it saved me. Thank you for that!!
Now, my question: I heard that it’s possible to install WordPress on my local PC so I can test new plugins and updates without having to chance breaking my real blog again. Can you tell me how to do that?
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
If you have a blog or website you’re surely aware of the importance of “white-hat” Search Engine Optimization (aka SEO).
After all, Google is a primary source of targeted traffic, which is the life-blood of any successful website.
Technical optimization (technical SEO) of a WordPress site is a term that perhaps isn’t used very often, but it’s very important. And if done properly, it can bring you very good results.
This term essentially represents various techniques that aim to increase the speed, stability, and responsiveness of the website, which ultimately leads to better Google rank, more traffic and better satisfied visitors.
If you’re a blogger you probably know that securing your blog with SSL encryption is now a must if you want your blog to succeed, for these reasons:
1 – Google has now started giving preference to SSL secure https pages in their search results.
That means all other things being equal, pages that have URLs that begin with https will rank higher than pages that begin with http.
Google has also begun displaying the URL’s of encrypted pages in their search results. That means it won’t be long before many searchers will simply skip over non-secure pages and visit the next available secure page instead. [Read more…]
Question from Blake V.: Hi Rick. I have a WordPress question if you don’t mind.
I blog about Bluegrass music.
I have categories for new CD releases, show dates, equipment reviews…you name it.
If it pertains to Bluegrass music, I write about it.
I’ve had several people ask me if I could create an RSS feed just for the “Show Dates” category because that’s the only thing those particular people come to my blog to see.
Is there a setting I can change or maybe a plugin I can use to create an RSS feed just for that one category?
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]