Every blogger knows how important it is to have a catchy blog title. In the Hubspot webinar on inbound marketing CEO Brian Halligan uses one of his employees post’s as an example, instead of something like: “Colleen’s Tuesday AM Thoughts” she names the post “8 Marketing Tips from an Olympic Gold Medalist” convenient if you happen to have a gold medal for those that don’t here’s what a good title is all about:

-Entices the Reader: Unfortunately I reached this conclusion while channel surfing. Digital Cable has made an art of catchy titles, after all “The Whale that Ate Jaws” is wayyyy more interesting than “Underwater Animal Footage.”

Yes, this is the actual video of a Killer Whale attacking a Great White Shark, the only thing scary about it is that it’s off the coast of California!!

-Piques Curiosity: Even if I’m not a marketing person I’m far more likely to read a post called “8 Marketing Tips from an Olympic Gold Medalist” than “Tuesday AM Thoughts.”  At this point the reader is probably wondering who the gold medalist is and what makes them knowledgeable in marketing.

- Reflects Search Terms: A great way of growing blog traffic is by reaching out to a wider audience. Think about what your post is trying to answer and then think what search terms you’d use to find that information. Online Marketing Connect’s latest post is titled: “Does Social Networking Threaten Journalistic Integrity.” Notice the title uses key words that potential readers are likely to search by.

In recent years, humans have become experts in screening everything to avoid the risk of wasting time on something they find unworthy. The essence of website descriptions on google search results, subject lines on emails and channel menus on digital cable is to convince you of parting with your precious time.

So let me know what you think of this title: Did it meet your expectations? Does it entice you into reading below? Is the title likely to match search terms for this topic?

I know some of us write to specific audiences. Some posts may be more general in nature, but the majority will be focused at your target and should have a title that will not only stop them, but will make them want to click for more info. That’s why the title is so important. You could be giving away chances for a million dollars inside your post, but no one would know if they didn’t open it.

I know when I have an idea for a post I put a working title in my blog when starting to write, but I make sure to review it after completing the post to make sure the title adequately reflects the content. I also look at past posts to see if any of the most popular ones have common threads that might be included. I try to keep the title simple and relate it to my audience and not to search engines.

I’ve come up with some things I do when reviewing titles and I recently read a post by Darren Rowse, 15 ways to rework your next blog title, that is worth your reading. Here are my 5 top things:

1. Personalize titles to your target audience. You’ll notice in this post I’m talking about Professional Tradesmen.
2. Lists and numbers. This is a proven method of getting people’s attention. Using this post as an example, the title could have been, “5 ways to improve your post titles in order to reach the professional tradesman.”
3. WIIFT. What’s in it for them (your target). I have found this gets my posts open more than anything else.
4. Ask a question. Again using this post as an example, I’ve used a question in the title.
5. Stir the pot. Create a debate or controversy on a timely topic. This will help get the blood pressure up as well as engagement. Obviously this can’t be used in every post, but is a good tactic to consider.

Those are my top lists of what I look at when doing a title. How about you…what tricks do you use?

If you’ve been blogging for a while, might I suggest you take the time to revisit some older posts to see if they can be updated and revised. In an ideal world, every one of our posts would be perfect, but let’s face it, we don’t live in an ideal world.

The information we used may be dated, there might be some wrong info in it or you’ve become  more of an expert on the subject. And if we’re honest with ourselves, some of our posts weren’t our best efforts.  Even changing a post title can dramatically increase traffic to a post.

All good reasons to rework, revise and update.

Here are 5 suggestions on how you might improve and update a post:

1. Post Title. This by far is the most important. If the title doesn’t get them hooked, you could be giving away a million dollars in the copy and they wouldn’t even see it.
2. Opening Paragraph. We need to remember that when writing blogs it’s different than writing ad or sell sheet copy. You need to answer the question (WIIFM) what’s in it for me. If the reader gets a sense upfront of what the post is about, you have a good chance of keeping them engaged. Newspaper writers are good examples; they lead with a strong headline, give the highlights in the first paragraph and then deliver the details. Go ahead and be a Clark Kent and you’ll see that you might turn into Superman!
3. Add more meat. Since your last post, either the industry has changed or you’ve become smarter, so put more meat on the bones.
4. Add more depth. Spend a few more minutes giving examples, sharing opinions or suggesting a book.
5. Call to action. After all, isn’t one of the purposes of a blog is to engage our readers? Ask a question, direct them to another site or give them some sort of next step.

I’m sure you could think of other steps as well. Darren Rowse has an interesting post, Updating old posts on your blog, that might be of interest to you .

Now we will going into the hard part. Index.php file is the core file in our theme file.

Hopefully your index.php will look like this. (Read Part 1 – The Layout )

1. .
   
2. <div id=”main”>
3. main
4. </div> <!– close main –>
5. .

Call Template Files

Now what we want to do is to call our header.php, sidebar.php and footer.php into our index.php file. To do this we need these functions.

<?php get_header(); ?> – This function will call our header.php file
<?php get_sidebar(); ?> – This function will call our sidebar.php file
<?php get_footer(); ?> – This function will call our footer.php file

Put <?php get_header(); ?> above main id and <?php get_sidebar(); ?> and <?php get_footer(); ?> below the main id like this.

1. .
   
2. <?php get_header(); ?>
3. <div id=”main”>
4. main
5. </div> <!– close main –>
6. <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
7. <?php get_footer(); ?>
8. .
   

The Loop

Ok whats next? Now we are going to dive into the WordPress loop. Yay…  This loop is use to display our posts on our website.

The loop start with this

<?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>

and will end with this. I will explain why we need “else:” later.

<?php endwhile; else: ?>

After the <?php endwhile; ?>, make sure to close the if with <?php endif; ?>.

Put all these functions in our main id and our index.php will be like this.

1. .
   
2. <div id=”main”>
3. .
4. <?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
5. main
6. <?php endwhile; else: ?>
7. .
8. <?php endif; ?>
9. </div> <!– close main –>
10. .

Now we will focus in the loop. In loop, we will make three div classes. This is use to put our post title, post content and post date, time, etc.

Remember, we are only focus in the loop. Put these div’s in the loop.

<div class=”post_title”>
post title here
</div> <!– close post title –>
<div class=”post_content”>
post content here
</div> <!– close post content –>
<div class=”post_tag”>
post tag here
</div> <!– close post tag –>

Our loop will look like this.

1. .
   
2. <?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
3. .
4. <div class=”post_title”>
5. post title here
6. </div> <!– close post title –>
7. <div class=”post_content”>
8. post content here
9. </div> <!– close post content –>
10. <div class=”post_tag”>
11. post tag here
12. </div> <!– close post tag –>
13. .
14. <?php endwhile; else: ?>
15. <?php endif; ?>
16. .

Post Title

For the post title, we use these tags.

<?php the_ID(); ?> – Call our post id to put in our post_title div as id
<?php the_permalink() ?> – Call our post url
<?php the_title(); ?> – The title of our post

In post_title class, we create our post title with link to the post. Here is the HTML + PHP code.

<a href=”<?php the_permalink() ?>” rel=”bookmark” title=”Permanent Link to <?php the_title(); ?>”><?php the_title(); ?></a>

And include the post id in our post_title div and it will look like this.

1. .
   
2. <div class=”post_title” id=”<?php the_ID(); ?>”>
3. .
4. <a href=”<?php the_permalink() ?>” rel=”bookmark” title=”Permanent Link to <?php the_title(); ?>”><?php the_title(); ?></a>
5. .
6. </div> <!– close post title –>
7. .

Post Content

In content, we only need one tag to call our post content. The tag that we will use is this.

<?php the_content(__(’Read more…’)); ?>

Note: You can change “Read more…” to something else.

1. .
   
2. <div class=”post_content”>
3. .
4. <?php the_content(__(‘Read more…’)); ?>
5. .
6. </div> <!– close post content –>
7. .

Post Tag

In post tag, I usually put date, time, category and link to the post comment. And I also put a link to edit the post (only viseable if login).
<?php the_time(’F dS, Y’) ?> – Call post date
<?php the_time(’h:i a’); ?> – Call post time
<?php the_category(’, ‘) ?> – Call post category
<?php comments_popup_link(’No Comments’, ‘1 Comment’, ‘% Comments’); ?> – Call the comment link
<?php edit_post_link(’Edit’,”,”); ?> – Call the post edit link
We put all these tags into our post_tag div.

1. .
   
2. <div class=”post_tag”>
3. .
4. <?php the_time(‘F dS, Y’) ?> | <?php the_time(‘h:i a’); ?> | <?php the_category(‘, ‘) ?> | <?php comments_popup_link(‘No Comments’, ‘1 Comment’, ‘% Comments’); ?> | <?php edit_post_link(‘Edit’,”,”); ?>
5. .
6. </div> <!– close post tag –>
7. .

Call the Comments

After we end with the post part, we need to call our comments (will be discussed in Part 4 – Comment). Use this

<?php comments_template(); ?>

and put it before the endwhile tag.

1. .
   
2. <?php comments_template(); ?>
3. <?php endwhile; else: ?>
4. .
   

If 404 Error

Maybe some of you wonder why I put “else:” after the endwhile. It is use to display an error text if the page/post is not available.

Just type in any text that you want to display after the else tag. I will type this.

Sorry, but you are looking for something that isn’t here.

And it will look like this.

1. .
   
2. <?php endwhile; else: ?>
3. .
   
4. Sorry, but you are looking for something that isn‘t here.
5. .
6. <?php endif; ?>
7. .

Finally your index.php hopefully will become like this.

1. .
   
2. <?php get_header(); ?>
3. <div id=”main”>
4. .
5. <?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
6. .
7. <div class=”post_title” id=”<?php the_ID(); ?>”>
8. .
   
9. <a href=”<?php the_permalink() ?>” rel=”bookmark” title=”Permanent Link to <?php the_title(); ?>”><?php the_title(); ?></a>
10. .
11. </div> <!– close post title –>
12. .
13. <div class=”post_content”>
14. .
15. <?php the_content(__(‘Read more…’)); ?>
16. .
17. </div> <!– close post content –>
18. .
19. <div class=”post_tag”>
20. .
21. <?php the_time(‘F dS, Y’) ?> | <?php the_time(‘h:i a’); ?> | <?php the_category(‘, ‘) ?> | <?php comments_popup_link(‘No Comments’, ‘1 Comment’, ‘% Comments’); ?> | <?php edit_post_link(‘Edit’,”,”); ?>
22. .
23. </div> <!– close post tag –>
24. .
25. <?php comments_template(); ?>
26. <?php endwhile; else: ?>
27. .
28. Sorry, but you are looking for something that isn‘t here.
29. .
30. <?php endif; ?>
31. .
32. </div> <!– close main –>
33. <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
34. <?php get_footer(); ?>
35. .

From : Cyberhack.net

Related Post :

Part 1 – Make your Own WordPress Theme

Part 2 – Header
Part 3 – Index
Part 4 – Comment
Part 5 – Sidebar
Part 6 – Footer
Part 7 – Finish!

LOL i just realized that was my first post title on my blog from last year lol!! Well anyways, I would like to say that summer was FAST! Yeah, so plz keep inviting!! I really want tons of hits!!

Ok to CP news:

So, as we all know, the new clothing catalog came out! The thing neat about it to me is the shoes that look like crocs! I also like the checkered shoes. So tell me what you think about the catalog! P.S. Check the backstage every once in a while…..

Lol away from my freaky moment… you know? I think I will just shut up now…. bye… BYE!

I spent the afternoon in a discussion with a coworker discussing the impact of adaptive learning in classrooms.  Originally it started with Higher Education but filtered down to the K-12 education.  How do you feel?  Should we be tailoring learning to the students or will students benefit more from having to learn to adapt on their own?

Hit me back…

Blog Title:  Does Wikipedia have Higher Standards then the Current Administration?

I was looking at an article (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080402-not-notable-enough-for-wikipedia-biographicon-wants-you.html) about Wikipedia deleting personal biographies because they didn’t meet the required “notability” requirement.  That made me laugh, until two seconds later when I noticed an article (http://blogs.computerworld.com/feds_lie_about_link_between_software_piracy_and_terrorism) about the Federal Government claiming that there is a link between software piracy and terrorism without providing any evidence at all.  All political motives aside and I’m sure you’ll figure out my affiliation eventually. Can Wikipedia actually have higher standards then the Federal government when it comes to presenting information?

You make the call and I can’t wait to hear the posts that stem from this one.

Rob