Borrowed from a fellow work-at-home mom. Enjoy!
For the computer illiterate
Its good to know that Toshiba has all bases covered. This computer is made for everyone apparently. Even those who don’t know that a computer needs power to operate. lol
Yes, I am easily entertained.
Over 2 Dozen Ways to Modify WordPress Functions File
This is truly one of the most useful lists of tricks for features you can add to your WordPress Function .php file.
The list includes the tricks to:
Add Google Analytics Code (This is useful if you are using a child theme and can’t access the header file.)
Add a Favicon to Your Blog (that is the tiny little image that shows up next to the name of the page in the tab and address bar on your browser.)
Add a Custom Dashboard Logo (shows up on the dashboard, this can be useful when you are creating a theme for other to use or when you have multiple users who log in to your WordPress site.)
Change the Footer in WordPress Admin Panel (This may come in handy if you can’t find a simple method of changing your footer.)
Add Custom Dashboard Widgets (Ooo…this way you can add your own widgets that you have written that compliment your theme!)
Change the Default Gravatar (Simplifies the process of having a branded avatar when you post on other blogs instead of having the mystery man or the weird alien.)
Dynamic Copyright Date in Footer (Have you had your website since 2005 but your footer says “copyright 2011”? Well this handy little bit of code will let you show the world that you’ve been around a while. It will change it to “Copyright 2005-2011” by pulling the dates from your earliest and latest posts. Pretty cool!)
Control When Your Posts are Available via RSS (This one should come in handy for those of us who don’t always use the “draft” button as we should! It will put a delay of several minutes on your RSS feed so those notorious errors you see immediately after hitting “publish” can be corrected before the world gets to see them!)
Customize Excerpts (These tips give you more control over how your blog excerpts appear. You can change the … at the end and control the length of your excerpts.)
There is more, but those are the ones that I think you might find the most handy. To get all the directions and see the rest of the tips, check out the full post at WPBeginner.com: 25+ Extremely Useful Tricks for the WordPress Functions File.
Winter is leaving…Spring is on its way…
We have managed to miss the last several rounds of snow here is SouthWest Missouri. They have just not happened at all or have been rain when they have been here.
And now the temperature is hovering around 40 in the afternoons. Thats well below average for here…average being 56 according to the weather people.
But still, the sun has been warm, the birds are signing happy spring-time songs, and I have managed to spend a few hours outdoors a few days this week with my 3 year old.
There are flower bulbs growing in my backyard (our first spring in this house so I don’t know what they are)…some look like they will be daffodils and some like crocus.
The robins are back in large quantities now, entire flocks of them. Not just the one or two that were apparently confused a month ago.
The geese are flying north.
And yesterday, I had to get closer cause I thought my eyes deceived me. There it was…shining bright and full in the middle of the flower bulb sprouts…a DANDELION!!!!
It’s gonna be spring soon everyone!!!
–Kim
Tips to Build Your Business Online and Offline
Recently we attended an all day webinar through Virtual Rebarcamp and learned great information about building your business and marketing your business online and off. One of the sessions I attended was titled “The 7 A’s To Building Your Business Online & Offline” hosted by Darin Persinger. Because of his experience as a trainer and coach in the real estate industry, the session was very valuable.
Below are highlights of this great information. It outlines strategies to use when building your business.
- Audience – Know them! Who are they, where are they located? For example, if you are an agent in Manhattan, your blogs are probably not going to reference planting a garden in your fenced back yard. However this may be appropriate for the agent blogging in a small town in North Carolina.
- Availability – Make it easy for your audience to contact you. Make sure your phone number, email and office number are on each page of your website. Some agents have an area of the website where the user can click a button and immediately contact the agent. Even if the lead gets a voice mail, that is okay. As long as the call is promptly returned.
- Approachable – Does your audience feel like they can contact you? When you first obtain a potential client/lead, do you make it known they can call you any time and there are no ‘stupid questions’? Generally with potential clients, you will give more at first and expend more effort. Do not get discouraged if they don’t respond at first. Be friendly and cooperative. And most important, be patient.
- Acknowledge – EVERY email, every facebook interaction, every twitter @, every voicemail. Time is important to people. If they take the time to write or call, even if it is 120 characters on Facebook, acknowledge that.
- Appreciate – There are 9 billion web pages and 200 million blogs out there today. There are also 6 billion tweets. There are so many places your clients can go to get information, or referrals, or real estate agents. Appreciate your clients. Time is even more precious than money because it is non-renewable. How do you say “thanks” to your clients or to people that refer clients? How do you acknowledge them?
- Authority – People use the market leader. With so many options, they want someone that knows what they are doing and has their act together. Be confident. Learn it…share it!
- Authentic – Be you! Not everybody will click, so there is no point in spending time being disingenuous or being someone you are not. Get involved in social media like Facebook, and be yourself. Most people can see through insincerity. They want someone that is going to be genuine and honest.
Some of these tips are pretty useful and some are common sense. But still a great reminder. Hopefully you’ll find them helpful as well!