What does “Reading The Startup Tea Leaves” Mean?

I have to say that there really is a pattern to startups in terms of success and/or failure and this is all in the data… You have to look through the real information, not the ones in your mind that can confuse you because you love an idea to death and are willing to go down with the ship on it, but rather the ideas that bring on real customers, real growth and real income. 

How Do We Get There?

So, like a person who can read tea leaves, you have to sift through your tests and find out if there really is a market for your product or service.  For a direct selling service like creating a gas station, there is no question of success, especially if there is a gas station across the street or 2 or 3 gas stations.  This is an early sign of success, even if you have not taken action.

Other Signs Of Possible Success

So our current startup comes from tests we were not even aware of.  In fact, until we had a company say to us, hey how are you doing this, taking your event businesses national?  We really did not know there was a product there. First they asked, and then we presented.  When we started presenting, we got lots of feedback about wanting our service in their backend.  So, from this we began the process of producing a product.  No hocus pocus or risk taking involved.  This was simply listening and sorting through the info and taking a risk.

Astrologers Are Not Right, Most Of The Time

So, how do you get it right?  It is not easy, because just one customer can say that there is a problem.  Is that enough to start a business?  Not really.  You need more customers, more analysis, more pro formas and a complete analysis of branding and the market to really understand the opportunity.  Finally you take a chance, but at this point you have done your homework, have a few potential customers and are ready to go.

Testing Is Everything

You can get lucky.  But you can also just work hard and learn.  No need to throw away everything with a potential loss. Early on test, test in ways you have not thought of.  Call customers, ask their opinion.  Seek more advice from them.  Get things started and get your product out there.  I have been through this a dozen times and have made my mistakes, but I think eventually I will get it right.

My initial running of the install did not have any problems, and if anything I am noticing that WP 3.0 is running faster than it used to, at least on WordPress 2.9.2, along with some improvement in the UI look and feel that is really not too noticeable.   In fact, if you are not interested in the Multi-Site part of this install, you would actually not experience much of anything.  The basic upgrade like previous versions of WordPress went smoothly and I did not notice anything too different.

The WordPress 3.0 Multi-Site

If you have no interest in having a thousand blogs on one install, then this is not too important to you.  What is Multi-Site?  It is the ability to generate as many WordPress sites on one account as you can put on there.  This is even true of a shared environment.  There are several issues with how do the implementation, for instance if you are www.strategicpoints.com, you can easily offer bob.strategicpoints.com and dan.strategicpoints.com with their own blog, but if you want to add www.gudema.com to that site, well, you can do it, but you will have to use .htaccess and mod rewrite to get it to work properly… 

Who wants to offer dozens of blogs to people? 

Not me.  I just want all my blogs to be under one install, so I don’t have to upgrade a dozen sites.  Like for instance, I will be upgrading this install of wordpress under strategicpoints.com when I already did gudema.com.  This is just a pain in the butt.  Well, they have just made it easier.

Where is it?

If you did the WordPress 3.0 upgrade/install and you are not seeing anything different, you are not alone.  There is no remnant of WordPress Multi-Site (previously WordPress MU) anywhere, until you place this special line into the wp-config.php file:

define(’WP_ALLOW_MULTISITE’, true);

After that, suddenly things start to change on the site.  You will notice, when you log back into WordPress, under Tools there is a new menu item called Network. This Network controls the setting up of WordPress Multi-Site.  And then there are a series of things you will need to add to the wp-config.php in addition to get to work.  You can grab these from the Network page.  Also found a couple of good links out there about this already such as http://wptheming.com/2010/03/wordpress-3-0-enable-network/.  All of this is old news to the WordPress Dev community apparently.  I am just catching up as I and thousands, (I mean thousands and thousands or millions upgrade).

How does WordPress Multi-Site it work?

It appears that there are shared resources, new kinds of users and websites.  Once you have set everything up you can create these users and websites.  This means you have added to your wp-config.php a whole bunch of stuff you found in the Tools/Network page, switched the information in your .htaccess file and relogged onto WordPress, and wholla you will find a new menu item called Super Admin. 

Word Press Super Admin

Super Admin seems to be the place where all the Multi-Site Action happens.  This is a new menu item on the top of the WordPress menu with Multi-Site turned on.  This is where you configure your multi-site capabilities and create new sites.  One of the unique features of this multi-site system is the ability to allow your customers to create their own blog sites on the fly.  This means that every version of WP has the ability to be a generator of blog sites.  Nice.   Also you have the ability to create a library of themes, that your users can choose from.  Also, not sure of this one yet, but wouldn’t it be nice to not have to add plugins to all of your blog sites and keep them all in one place.  Not sure if this works this way, but maybe the WordPress gods will make it so.

One Click Updates to Plugins, Themes, etc.

Also noticed that the download and update feature of plugins went really smooth under 3.0.  Not sure if I am just imagining this, but it looks like your ability to update an individual plugin with a new version just got easier.

So that is it for now.  Not much time for WordPress for me these days as I head into the world of startups again…

Since I wrote my last blog entry, Start-up Rules For Real People, I have had some meetings, some epiphanies, some conincidences that were quite ironic, that I have to write an addendum for those who read my first article about these start-up rules.  Basically almost every other day, somebody talks with me about an internet start-up idea.  Most are internal to my own start-ups and I can handle about 2 new start-up discussions a week.  This brings me to how many times I repeated myself in the past 2 weeks, going over these rules.

Business Love, Get Emotionally Detached Now!

For instance, the rule about not being emotionally attached to your web project.  I refer to this as “Love”.  Just like romantic love, people fall in love with an idea and can not emotionally detach from the idea.  One way of looking at this, is you have to separate the technology behind an internet startup and the business model. There has to be a firewall between these two areas of your business, or business plan.  Once you have lost your emotional attachment (often to a technology) and can look at the market clearly or with real evidence, you can make a decision on your business model.  Only a few brilliant (often 19-21 year olds) will get this right, right out the gate. 

Old Dogs Can Learn New Tricks Sometimes

Most of us are actually too familiar with old patterns of working.  This is kind of like the Can’t Teach An Old Dog New Tricks idea.  But it is actually the opposite.  You can teach an old dog new tricks, but that requires the old dog letting down their guard.  When I worked for abc distributing, before they sold off the farm, we used to refer this to the dr (MBA) asking the patient (exec) to take his shirt off for the examination, and he flatly would refuse, but yet would ask for a diagnosis… Huh. 

Finding The Hidden Trends

The concept of looking for new trends came up a few times, because that is where you recognize the opportunities in life.  You have to be a detective about finding new trends.  Looking at the front page of the new york times or wall street journal will give you clues, because honestly they are better at it, than your local palm beach post, but by the time it reaches the front of the paper, the trend is usually too late to join, but maybe not too late.  Trends have to be identified and measured for their location in the sequence of the trend.  A good example is the “Auction Mania” trend of 1999.  I remember it well, like it was Tulipmania.  The first couple of auction sites like Ebay hit it big and the trend was growing.  Suddenly there were a 100 want to be Ebay sites and 10,000 so called Ebay hanger-oners (none of them will own up to it now).  These hanger-oners are like band groupies.  They jump on the band wagon, often too late, and just flounder about telling you how they are making money off of it.  This was obviously satirized in the 40 year old virgin.  I will probably write a whole blog entry about just these trend manias and how to find them, join them and avoid them.  All depends on the timing of the trend.

This Time Is Different, Or Not!

I have had several conversations about the concept of time, time management, “what am I doing with my life”, commute time, time spent on high level things, low level things and everything in between.  It is important to “value your time”.  Hopefully the people I mentioned this to, understand it.  Well, don’t really think anybody misunderstands this.  Somehow they just ignor it, and go about their lives, throwing hours under the bus, when they could better use it.  Not to say that I am saying what is a better use of our time, but our ability to get things done and efficiency depends on the better use.  So, when I was stuck at jobs where there was literally nothing to do over the years, I had something always, always learning, getting my MBA, my certificate, my knowledge, my score, and always being the life time learner.  So it is not a bad idea to keep a good read on your desk for this reason.

Anyway, those are my comments since writing the first group of rules.  If you want to read them again, go to New Start-up Rules For Real People here.

This is not a comprehensive list, nor will you have to get your pen out.  These are just the rules that I have noticed.

Now, first off, I am not the start-up guy from the ground up historically, meaning, I have worked in the corporate environment, worked the day and night job, sold off a start-up and/or some software over the years, gotten an MBA as well, and still go back to start-ups for more pain (or gain).  This is a work in progress, so I am going to add to this blog entry as I see fit.  It is just an opinion, and I probably will borrow a few points (especially from Guy Kawasaki), so sorry about some of the plagiarism.

Rule 1
Less Can Be More, And More Can Be Less

One of my old MBA professors used to have a quiz about entrepreneurs.   It was a multiple choice question.  Is the Entrepreneur’s motivation best described by 1. Wanting To Be Rich, 2. Independent of Others  3. Brilliant And Be Recognized or 4. Lazy.  Now take a moment to think about this question, because I have yet to have a person answer this correctly, especially if they have not been in the trenches of a start-up.  This first off, is a subjective question, and I got it wrong.  My old MBA professor surprised us by saying lazy.  Why lazy?  Because the first thing an Entrepreneur needs in his arsenal to be successful, is the desire to get others to do the things that he can’t, leveraging the world of skills around them, so they can lay back and think at a higher level or go golfing.  Every Entrepreneur dreams of the day they will be on their boat or taking time off, because the trenches may be fun in the beginning, but eventually it wears away at you, especially if you don’t have the freedoms of 9-5 guys.  Hence, why I spent many years in corporate America.  Quite frankly its easier.

The whole concept of doing more with less is what you have to get used to as an Entrepreneur, as you have to figure out a maze of choices and decisions.

Rule 2
Value Your Time

A few years ago, I was considering start-ups as I drove to work in New Jersey.  It never happened there.  Why?  Because back then I did not value my time.  And in New Jersey, there is little time for a start-up if you want to survive financially.  You need to put a price on your time, where ever you use it.  You don’t need to think about it all the time, but you have to have a price per hour.  Whether it is $25, $50, $100, or $500 an hour, it is worth something.  So, when you take a full-time job with a 60 mile commute each way, you have to add up the hours.  If it takes 3 hours to commute each day, and you are worth $150 an hour (consulting), you have just blown $450 every day of time you could be using for a start-up, walking the dog, playing with your kids, etc.  Take that money back and give yourself a chance by taking a job with less pay that is closer to home.   Also, I know a certain entrepreneur that goes to work 20 hours a day on his new venture, bulldozing his way towards success.   Trust me, this technique may sound smart, but smart is sitting back and making sure you are putting your time towards the tasks that are at your value level, and moving all the tasks smartly to others…

Rule 3
Separate From Your Emotional Brain

This one took me a long time to communicate, but a long time to have the guts to discuss this with people.  It is bottom line thinking.  I am not traditionally a bottom line guy, but you have to get to it quickly in your start-up, otherwise you will find yourself on the wrong path.  You have to separate your emotional involvement with the product or service.  This is not easy to do.  Entrepreneurs are passionate, but that does not mean the business model will work.  I have seen about 50% of start-ups fail simply because they have not thought out the business model, which could mean they are in love with their idea.  You know what it is like when you are in love,  you just can’t get it out of your mind.  The idea bugs you night and day.  But trust me, a little voice of reason should be applied.  Now I have failed, trust me miserably, in getting others to separate from their emotional brain and look at things objectively.   For instance, you go into a business because you think, without any serious research or confirmation by others, that the business will make money.  Or you go into a business helping people, and somehow you will make money.   For some reason I have seen this repeating pattern over the years and could not steer these people clear of this pitfall.  I will give you a clue.  If you are creating a non-profit related business, it is unlikely you will find a profitable model, and therefor your chances of financial success are diminished.  Financial success is still the most important end result.  Trust me on that.

Rule 4
Find Ideas In Everyday Things

You think a great idea has to be sophisticated.  Not really.  The only time I needed to find a sophisticated concept, is when I wanted to win a business plan contest, but that was not about reality…  You just need to look around and find something that solves a problem.  It could be a simple product or a simple service.  I am a web developer, so the web is big time for me.  Online you have no limits, complete unlimited freedom to solve some small problem with a small idea and put it into action.   And most of these successful start-ups solved the most mundane thing, not the most complicated.  Like for instance I remember a start-up Yoga accessories website, I wondered if they were onto something, and they were.  And I also visited a guy in south florida who was running an iPod accessories business out of his garage in the early days of the iPod around 2000, and he has been successful ever since.  I believe his company is called ExtremeMac.  Just look around and find the simple things to solve, not reinvent the world or have it so complicated the customers can’t understand what you do.

Rule 5
Discover Hidden Trends, Not Ones On The Front Page

I am always looking for a trend, and when I see a new one, that has not been discovered yet (by the masses of asses), I know that is something important.  For instance, recently I have seen a possible new trend of online services that serve us in a way we have not yet been served before, way beyond personalization.  I call it Super-Customization.  It is the concept of applying a concierge service to anything online and going way beyond the competitors to serve a niche of customers who want to either pay more or experience things at a higher level.  Now what is the problem with trends on the front page of the New York Times… The problem is that this is typically when the trend is oversold.  I have seen it happen with a dozen trends from creating a search engine, Websites in a box,  Online Dating Sites, Speed Dating, Ebay mania, Social Networking Sites, personalization, RSS, iPhone development and others.  If you are jumping on the train speeding by with a trend already in motion, you probably will end up on the tracks with the train speeding by crushing you to death.  You need to find a niche, you believe will survive or prosper and keep your head down and not get caught up in the lack of reality train.

Rule 6
Use Technology Effectively

A lot of people jump into an online venture and find out after spending a lot of time, money and energy that they are not using technology the way it should be used.  The opportunities to use the internet for video phone (Skype), for project management, for sophisticated email services and a host of other technologies are what will make or break your business these days.  Effective use of Search Engine Optimization and having a website that gets found is a good example.  This is a bit tricky, because if you are a novice, it is possible that you will flounder here.  Find a local expert who can give you assistance in this area.

Rule 7
Family And Friends Does Not Mean Family And Friends

I picked this one up recently from Jack Karabees.  Basically don’t expect your family and friends to be your investors.  When they say family and friends they are not talking literally.  These family and friends should be more of acquaintances, or you will find yourself in hot water with your mother, brother, friend.

Rule 8
More Education Is Always More Important

On Yahoo business a few years ago a woman wrote an article about why you don’t need an MBA.  On the most part, she was right.  I have one and it is no panacea for the business world, especially when starting up a business.  But I found her article completely misguided.  You don’t need an MBA, but trust me on this, every start-up person would love to have one.  More education is always more important.  I wish I had a PHD.  The more info in your brain, the more you have to draw from in starting a business.  Now there is a down side, in that the typically over educated person may apply things to business that are not practical.  This comes from their institutional experience,  not from the degree.  You can always use more education and do not toss this aside lightly.  More education is always better.  Don’t toss it aside unless you are in the middle of a start-up.  Got time off between start-ups.  Go back and get a degree…  Even after finishing my MBA, I went on to get a certificate from the CED, the Center for Entrepreneurial Development about tech start-ups.  It was worth it!

Rule 9
Learn Timeless Things, Not Trendy Stuff

This is a bit of a non-sequiter, but this is important to understand as you grow as an entrepreneur.  There are certain things in life that are useful over and over again, and then there are things that are gone in a blink of eye.  As we learn things, try to find the things that are consistently the same over time or over time periods.  For instance, Excel has been the same for 20 years for me, as has Linux.  If I had learned Lotus and early Windows versions only, or just DOS, I would have lost my knowledge. Learning a P&L, Cashflow and Balance Sheet is timeless…  Learn the things that you can use again and again and discard things that are just for the moment…  Sometimes we have to learn technology that is fleeting, but find the consistent stuff and you will succeed more often.

Rule 10
Know When To Get Out

I would have never believed the story of the Genie and 3 Wishes would be a general truth, like a Twilight Zone Episode, where the guy wishes for something and gets what they deserve in the end.  And once again this is something I have seen and will continue to see over and over.  You just have to go through this one time in your life to learn this lesson, hopefully.  I have seen it a dozen times over the years.  A person builds up a modest business and has an opportunity to exit, relatively early, but does not take it, because they believe they can and will do better.  It is a gamble like everything in life.  A good example is of a this, is a small ISP I was writing business plans for in 1999.  The owner came to me and told me a man showed up with an open offer to buy the company.  An open offer means that they wanted you to put a price on a contract and sign it…  Crazy now that I think about it.  But things were crazy in 1999 with the Internet.  This was a million dollar a  year revenue business, an ISP, and the owner felt it was too early to exit.  I wish I knew then what I know now.  The trust about life, is things will and do change, like, the economy, our health, 911, wars, volcanoes, meteors, presidents, who knows.  Life just throws a curve ball at us when we least expect it.  So, when we got a chance to sell my first start-up in 2004 for a little less, we took the money and were happy for it.  Every time I hear an entrepreneur tell me that they are going to hold out, I cringe.  If you are successful enough to get an offer, 90% of the time, the first offer is the best…

Don’t fret.  The process can be boiled down to a few critical elements, many of which you will easily find examples throughout the web and in a book at your local Barnes & Noble.  So, first, before we do anything, this blog entry is just about the initial steps you should take before going ahead and doing this.

One first step, if you are not a programmer, is to get familiar with PHP.  If you are not fluent in the PHP programming language, this will be a challenge, not a challenge you can’t necessarily overcome, but a challenge none the less.   Along with getting familiar with PHP is getting familiar with WordPress.  If you have just begun the process of learning both PHP and WordPress, you may want to put this design conversion off for a bit, till you are ready.

The next step is to get your design.  Now, you may already be a designer or you have hired a designer and you are getting closer to the point of wanting this design in WordPress.  If you already are using this design (see I am giving you some ideas here) on another site and just want to convert it over, for instance, so your blog looks the same as your main website, you will have to free your design from that site and have it handy in your page editor.

Remember to get a program like Textpad or Homesite or Visual Studio, or whatever editing tool you use, especially one that can hold many files at the same time.  That is why I use Textpad, since it is a basic program and its free.

You should also be familiar with HTML, CSS and possibly javascript.  Also, we will encounter Flash and other technologies, most of which are ready for you to integrate with your design.  So, sign up for this blog and come back when I have the next in this series ready.

Michelle is now associated with this website and can be contacted through this site.  Michelle’s experience and background is listed below:

Greater New York City Area

Michelle Gudema & Strategic Points in Greater New York City Area
Marketing Operations Consultant

Michelle Gudema is an executive with extensive Operations, e-Commerce, Internet Marketing and Customer Care experience focused on rapid sales growth while improving operating efficiencies, increasing customer satisfaction and lowering costs.  Proven leader, innovative problem-solver, and strategic visionary that can execute and deliver an organization’s next level of success.

Specialties:

Integrated Marketing Operations, Email Operations, Email Deliverability, Business Process Improvement, Project Management, CRM Solutions, Database Management and Marketing, Loyalty Program Management, Customer Care, Integrations, E-Commerce Technology, Outsourcing, Change Management, Vendor Management, Process Engineering, Marketing Technology

• Robots.txt
  Robots.txt needs to be different in each level of DEV, QA and PROD.  If you are using SVN this can be a challenge.  If you don’t know what SVN or CVS are, then don’t worry about this one.  Basically as you copy the site from DEV to QA to PROD, you end up with the same robots.txt.  This can’t happen from a technical perspective, since you really want robots.txt to block the search engine bots on DEV and QA, and not on PROD.
• wp-config.php
  wp-config.php, the settings file for WordPress, needs to be modified if you are spanning the code across DEV, QA and PROD.  Simple answer for this, use the old PHP switch statement and change the site based on server name with case statements.  The variable to use for this is $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'].    A good example is below:

  // ** MySQL settings – You can get this info from your web host ** //
  switch( $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] )
  {
  case “dev.strategicpoints.com”:
  define(’DB_NAME’, ‘dbname’);
  define(’DB_USER’, ‘dbuser’);
  define(’DB_PASSWORD’, ‘dbpassword’);
  define(’DB_HOST’, ‘localhost or SERVER NAME’);
  break;

  case “qa.strategicpoints.com”:
  define(’DB_NAME’, ‘dbname’);
  define(’DB_USER’, ‘dbuser’);
  define(’DB_PASSWORD’, ‘dbpassword’);
  define(’DB_HOST’, ‘localhost or SERVER NAME’);
  break;

  case “www.strategicpoints.com”:
  case “strategicpoints.com”:
  define(’DB_NAME’, ‘dbname’);
  define(’DB_USER’, ‘dbuser’);
  define(’DB_PASSWORD’, ‘dbpassword’);
  define(’DB_HOST’, ‘localhost or SERVER NAME’);
  break;
  }
  

• Server Name in Mysql
  It is important to make 2 changes in each DB when migrating MYSQL between DEV, QA and PROD.  These are in the wp_options table, and if you have been through this drill before they are pretty explanatory.  The option names you have to change are “siteurl” and “home” to the full path of the site such as http://www.strategicpoints.com.

To solve some of these incompatibilities between the DEV, QA and PROD there are plugins and other things that need to be put in place in order to keep these versions in sync.  This is a major challenge.  As I solve each one of these issue or more issues, I am going to update this blog post.

Load Balancing, Why Do It?

• Redundancy
  If one of your servers crashes, hangs ups or experiences a hiccup, you have another hot one ready to serve pages.
• Server Speed
  If you are overloading one server, obviously a second server will resolve some of the speed issues if you are having IO issues.  This is only if you are TechCrunch or Huffington Post.
• HTML Loading Issues
  If you are far away from the server, yes it could take a long time to view a page.  Ever wonder how long it takes to reach your website from Buenos Aires.  If you wanted to know, look at a service like Gomez or Keynote.  Not sure of any free services out there to tell you this, and if you find one definitely let me know the URL!

WordPress On Multiple Servers

I am sure Automattic has been doing this for the larger clients at a fee, and that is where some of their revenue is coming from, because this is where the pain kicks in, while implementing WordPress.  If you have two servers that need to split the WordPress traffic load, this will work fine, as long as you can call them both the same name, with separate IP addresses.  This is where the loadbalancer does its job.  Not an expert at loadbalancing, but I have heard of an F4.  Basically, it splits the load and sends web traffic either round robin or on some algorithm to each site.  It can be tweaked if one box is acting up or doing something wrong.  If there is extremely high volume of traffic, you could go to many boxes, but then you may want to look at cloud computing.

Load Balancing Across Multiple Locations

Now this is where the bigger issues come into play.  For instance, if you were to creating multiple load balanced servers in different data center, including different international locations, you will have to deal with the issue of syncing of files and of syncing of either DB latency issues or distributed DBs.

The MySQL Database Issues

Sudden MySQL and pretty much every DB becomes an issue when you are running a site in mutiple locations.  You can do it, and we are going to be running WordPress in a multi server environment soon, so we can experience the latency first hand.  By latency, we are referring to a site in one city, let’s say Houston, and the DB in Los Angeles.  That would mean every DB query would have to cross the country and there would be some delay in the query result arriving.   This would also mean that there is a chance the site will be worse off than before the new remote servers go online, and what would be the point of that.

Solutions For The WordPress MySQL DB Issue

First solution to consider is Caching of content.  Looking at wp-cache 2, and Super Cache, it is possible to have the individual sites create their own cache locally after one DB hit, or the first one after the cache times out locally.  This would only make sense if you have a website with little dynamic content.  This is good for web pages, but for rapidly changing blog comments or forums, it does not work, because it would mean it never will update proper.  However, experimenting with this is a good thing, and will help.

The second solution is to come up with a way for the MySQL DBs to be sync’d on a regular basis, preferably offline.  Possibly one way would be every hour or 5 minutes a script would kick off and check for any changes.  The changes would be sync’d to the other DBs in the distributed network and you would be able to keep all the sites local MySQL and speedy.  Good luck on this one.  Maybe a plugin to do this, is the answer.

How Does Evernote Work?

Basically Evernote is pretty simple in what it accomplishes and that is creating virtual notes.  I have annotated this in another article.  Simply put  you can store your bits of information like a postit, except virtually online.  You can pull up these notes by tagging (a kind of categorization) and view them like square notes or by Detailed view.  You can store HTML based notes (like URLS of websites) or you can store images or audio.  And of course you can access this from an iPhone and I believe several other phones, which is the killer app part of it.  Is it rocket science?  No, in the complicated world we live in. Does it do the job well?  Yes.  That is all that matters.

How have I used it so far?

Personal Notes At Conferences
Personal Notes About Events
Personal Notes About What I have to do
Personally What I Have Done
Where I Need To Go
Website Addresses (so I can easly copy and paste them)
Comments About Websites
Pictures of homes that I am considering buying
Notes about homes that I am considering buying
Insurance numbers for the next hurricaine
Insurance numbers for the doctor
Some login info for obscure sites I don’t visit often
pictures of friends that I want to keep in a safe place, not just on the phone
Gifts that I want to remember to buy people
my wedding anniversary
my sons birthday
my sons friends names
tasks for my businesses
EINs and other business numbers, accounts
phone numbers
stocks I am researching or want to buy
Big Reminders

I guess Evernote suits me well because I don’t actually do well with the conventional calendaring that I also have in Outlook and in Google.  Also not a replacement for Google Bookmarks…  If you are a free spririt and use the physical notes that are all around you PC, then this is the place for you.

What’s The Point Of Creating Categories?

Well, actually Categories are content, and content is used by Search Engines to find you.  So like many things on your website, Categories can really drive traffic if you figure out the proper wording, this may take some simple research, and you just fill out all the fields in the category management in WordPress.  One other thing to note is the Hovering over categories will typically show the user the content of the category description.  This means increased usability.  In the end, for most of us, its about driving traffic, and categories in WordPress is one of the not so complicated ways to drive that traffic.

Where Are Categories In WordPress?

There are categories in 2 places in the basic WordPress Implementation.  These places are Posts and Links.  So if you have not yet managed these well, take note and spend a little extra time to get them up to date.

Can I Manage Categories While Creating A Post?

When creating a post you can create and mange new categories in the bottom right of the screen. Don’t forget to do this while you are creating a post.  I typically do it at the very end of the process.   Most important is checking the little boxes and adding the post to a category.  Luckily WordPress has created the + Add New Category function at the bottom of the right sidebar.  Just click the link and you will notice the ability to create a Parent category (top) and a lower hierarchy category right there as you write your post.

Why Create Hierarchies of Categories?

Hierarchies of categories help your customers find articles and information that is relevant. The hierarchies are typically used by your theme to show the category information in a useful way on your site.    From an SEO perspective you are creating more content, more specific content and getting this indexed!

Need An Idea For A Category Name

If you are looking for good category names, then the best place is Google.  Start by determining what you know is a good search term.  Then go to google.com and enter this good search term(s) into the google search.   I searched for “WordPress Categories” .  Then click on the link +Show Options, right below the search box.  Not sure if you ever noticed that little link there.  Once it opens, the side bar has a link called Related Searches and Wonder Wheel. I use the WordPress Wheel to give me an idea of what people are searching for that is similar are more relevant, such as  I see the words “WordPress Categories List”.  So I actually am going to create a new category with that term for this article beneath Wordpress  and WordPress Categories…

Slugs And Permalinks

Slugs are used by categories for the url permalink at the top of the page for SEO purposes.  Most of the time you would just let the WordPress category automatically becoming the URL.  For Instance for this site the category we created above would be /wordpress-categories-list/.   The actual link will be http://www.strategicpoints.com/category/wordpress/wordpress-categories/wordpress-categories-list/.   Lots of typing involved here but great stuff for the search engines.  If you want to change the actual slug, you go to Posts and then Categories and you can edit that URL, so I am going to switch it to http://www.strategicpoints.com/category/wordpress/wordpress-categories/wordpress-categories-lists/ no problem.  I just added an s at the end…  You have total control over this.  Notice how the URLs show all the hierarchies of the categories when you click on the categories.

Category Descriptions

Lots of time we don’t fill this out, because it is not created during the time of post creation.  This requires going back and editing the categories directly.  For both posts and pages this means going to the link on the left and clicking on the “categories” link below post or page.  Once in there, adding a nice description is a good thing for SEO and usability and it will pay off in the end if you fill it out.  But like everything this takes a little time and energy.  I am going to put a follow up post on this and let you see the results of the categories created for this article…and show you how they showed up on Google, and typically within 24 hours of the post.  Now that is power!  Nice!

Link Categories

Link categories, which are just as important work a little differently that posts.   You will find them listed right below Links.  The important difference is that you have to be careful creating link categories, because most templates do not display them as hierarchies.  They are groups of links.  This means that if you want only one groups of links called “Links”, then you delete the “blogroll” link category and create a “Links” category.  Then you would make sure all the links are associated with the Links category.  If you wanted 3 groups of  links on your site, you would create 3 link categories.  Just like posts, managing the links category slugs and descriptions is important as well.

Summary

Like everything in life, filling out your categories is work.  If you blog for a living, this has to be done properly and you should be an expert already.  Just take time to organize and fill out the descriptions and make sure everything is in place and you should be good on the search engines.  If you want more and there is a lot more, then start looking at a variety of Categorization Improvement Plugins.  There are at least 20 out there.  I am going to review them in a my next article about WordPress For SEO – Categories update.