This is the 9th episode of our "Thinking the Unthinkable" series and today's unpalatable thought is… WordPress is too expensive? We can dismiss this as insane ramblings straightway? It’s free! But, it can be expensive to do anything out of the ordinary, although Site Editing is changing that! Is WordPress a trap for the naive DIYer? Cheap start, but a longer term hidden costs in hosting and maintenance? Or is it still possible to build something decent but at a low cost? What about the freedoms that the GPL provides, and (dare I say it?) the websites that sell premium plugins for knock down prices? It's an interesting chat and we hope that you enjoy it!
It's the 7th in our “Thinking the Unthinkable” series where we attempt to rationalise controversial views on WordPress and web design? Today’s topic is… Designing in the browser is for amateurs. David thought this topic was about whether to use design software rather than jump in with a page builder or start amending a template. Nathan thought it was about how design tools are increasingly online and work in the browser leaving us not having to install software for our computer operating systems. We will cover both because more recently graphical tools that work in the browser are also capable of spitting out HTML code too. Please feel free to leave us a comment at the bottom of the post!
On the podcast today we have Fränk Klein, and he's here to discuss the important topic of making a career from using WordPress. Like any other career, in technology, there's really no replacement for knowledge. The more you know, the more likely you are to adapt to situations that arise. Some of those might be repetitive, but there's also the curve balls that life throws at you, and your knowledge can empower you when strange things happen. Fränk is all about acquiring new skills. Learning new things so that you can make yourself indispensable to the organisation that you work for. Fränk's premise is pretty simple… being better educated will give you a chance to earn more. We talk about how Fränk became a WordPress developer. What his framework is for moving through the software industry, what his current job market is like in the wider WordPress ecosystem. Essentially, the message from this podcast boils down to staying curious and keep learning as a priority.
Welcome to the 6th episode of our "Thinking the Unthinkable" series where we attempt to rationalise controversial views on WordPress and web design. Today’s topic is, "If you use more than 10 plugins on a site, you are a cad and a scoundrel!" This is WP Builds humour for a chat about plugin strategy! We are sure most listeners will know plugins are only a method to deliver additional functionality to WordPress. They can be as complex as WooCommerce or as simple as the Hello Dolly plugin. As silly as it is to count the numbers, most of us are fascinated by what others use and are always reviewing the situation. So is there a sweet spot in the number of plugins you should use, and do you try to reduce plugin usage where possible? Find out what we think on the podcast...
Welcome to the 5th episode of our "Thinking the Unthinkable" series, where we attempt to rationalise controversial views on WordPress and web design. Today’s topic is… Website Clients are Impossible! This could have been called "Web Designers are Impossible", as it’s about the sometimes tense relationship between those who commission websites and those who build them. Do we correctly set the expectations for our clients, or are we opening ourselves up to criticism because they're not at all clear on how our process works? Are we working with "the client always knows best" model, and does this really give them what they need? Should we rather explain to them we're the expert and they should jolly well listen every time we speak? It's a fun conversation and no doubt there's going to be a lot of food for thought!
This seems a little odd, 'Do we even need WordPress', given that we're a WordPress podcast. But, there's actually quite a lot to be said here. Both David and I have been using WordPress for years (David, quite a bit longer), and perhaps it's time to think about whether WordPress is always the right choice for our website building projects. If the site is a simple brochure site that's really never going to get updates, is WordPress really the right option? After all, you'll be needing to maintain the website, patch for security, update themes and plugins, when all that you really needed were a few lines of HTML, CSS as perhaps some JavaScript. David's been exploring taking his sites more in the 'static' direction lately, and whilst you can do this with WordPress and some plugins, David's finding the joys of writing his own HTML and getting back into what the w3c have to say. It's a fun chat and something that you might not have looked at closely, so go and have a listen and leave us a comment.
Welcome to the very first episode in our sparkling new series that we are calling "Thinking the Unthinkable", or TUTT for short, which I quite like! Here we challenge ourselves to answer (or at least rationalise) provocative statements or critical opinions of WordPress and our glorious website building profession. We are gently easing ourselves in with today’s topic, which is… "Website builders should be certified" (like - what proper professionals are)! By "certified" we mean officially recognised as possessing certain qualifications or meeting certain standards. Not legally declared insane and committed to a psychiatric institution. What might this look like? What should be included? Do we even need anything like this? Is there anything in WordPress trying to tackle this? Listen to the podcast and tell us what you think.
Welcome to the last episode (sigh) in our Business Bootcamp series. Over the last year, we have been attempting to question everything we know about building WordPress sites and running a web design businesses. We looked at the entire process, from meeting our first client to helping them to support their site. We’ve tried to contrast approaches by looking at the traditional project (waterfall) where we are hired to build the finished (website) "product", and an agile approach, where we will try to use online SEO and UX data gathered, to iteratively improve the site as an ongoing collaboration with the client. Here we have set ourselves a few questions in an attempt to sum up what we have learned over this series and, more generally, our time in the website building industry. It's been a fun ride!
Welcome to the penultimate episode in our Business Bootcamp series. Usually, this is where I write... "where we relearn everything we know about building WordPress sites and running a web design business from start to finish". But if you are joining us now, you probably need to go back a year to season one! We are on Season 5, which is the last in this Bootcamp series and is about what happens after the website build. This is episode 5. Today we are talking about Future Proofing (our tech based business and maybe our clients’ sites). We're supposed to be talking about Traditional (Waterfall) v Agile, but as you'll hear we get slightly derailed and go off piste for quite a bit of the podcast, which is fun! We cover: Reduce or embrace dependencies? Should we offer long term support? What kind of efforts do we put into making sure that we're keeping our knowledge and skills up to date? Check it out...
With all these no code options, do you find your clients are becoming experts and no longer needing you? We try (and fail) to talk about this today and end up going on about JAMStack instead! It's a serious point though. Page Builders and Gutenberg have opened up the website creation process to a whole new audience, and it brings into question what we do as WordPress web developers / builders that make us worthwhile. What can you say to the client to make you seem like value for money in a time when 'affordability' is more important than ever, and when many of the tasks that used to be 'out of scope' for non-technical users, is not possible in an easy-to-use interface? Go listen...
What happens when your client suddenly has new staff members that you need to interact with? It might be a really smooth transition with nothing to worry about, but it might not. Old relationships may need to be rebuilt, and common understandings and goals about the website might need to be reworked. It's even possible that your communications were not written down and you suddenly need to think about the entire project once more with new staff. What if you just don't get along? What can you do then to ensure that you don't lose the client? What can you do to keep things working for you both? We have some ideas for you on the podcast today. Go listen...
So the moment has arrived. You've busted a jut and got the website finished. It's 100% ready to roll. Now what? Well, you've got to launch it and let the world see the great work that you've done! So what's involved in that? What do you typically need to do to make that happen? This is the subject that we explore on the podcast today and it's one where David and Nathan have different approaches. David is going agile and is likely to ship it as soon as the first page is ready, whereas Nathan is waiting until the entire site is completed. What steps do you need to follow on our launch checklist, and what things can go wrong?
