Tag podcast

162 – Information Overload

162 - Information Overload - WP Builds Weekly WordPress Podcast

You know how this goes... You have an inbox and it's overflowing. You have almost no time in the day to deal with nonsense, but you do read your emails... some of your emails. But which ones? Which emails make the cut and get opened and which ones fall by the wayside, their only purpose in life was just to add a tiny amount to the carbon footprint? Building WordPress websites, you need to advise your clients about ways that they can interact with their customers or audience. They need to have a little understanding in terms of how they can market to the world. Perhaps you're not the person to teach them all of this, and yes, there might be people out there who are heaps better at marketing than you are (this is certainly true for myself and David), but that should not stop you thinking about this subject and offer your clients some thoughts as to what might work, and certainly what does not work anymore. Check out the podcast to hear our thoughts on this...

161 – Why don’t you believe in us?

161 - Why don't you believe in us? - WP Builds Weekly WordPress Podcast

Why should your WordPress website clients have any confidence in your ability to actually build and deploy their website? After all there are so many competitors to choose from. Is there any way that you can turn disbelief into belief? In another exploration of the 'Watertight Marketing' book we discuss this subject. Perhaps you've been using testimonials and turning them into case studies. These are easy to do, and no doubt quite effective, but how on earth do you actually get your clients to give up their precious time to provide then to you? Are you best just asking them directly or should you have them on some kind of 'website launch' sequence which guides them towards this? Are you going to tell them what to say or just leave it up to them, knowing that they'll miss out most of the things that you really need. It's a really difficult subject and one that both David and I feel that we need some help with!

160 – Running contests in WordPress with RafflePress

Running contests in WordPress with RafflePress - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

Have you ever wanted to increase your email list? My guess is that in most cases, the answer is yes! It can be a hard thing to do though right? One way that's becoming popular is to offer some kind of prize(s) and raffle them off. The intention is to incentivise your audience to share the contest far and wide and create some kind of viral loop in which people keep coming back and adding new entrants to the contest through their (not your) endeavours. It's a simple but highly effective idea if the conditions are right... the prize, the audience, the perceived value etc. Many SaaS platforms exist to do these kind of contests, but RafflePress is different in that it's all happening in your WordPress website, and it's got a mighty set of features too! Join the founder of the plugin, John Turner, as we talk about how to use RafflePress and what makes it the unique.

159 – My nephew makes websites too

159 - My nephew makes websites too - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

What do you do when your WordPress website client says that they are talking to other people about the site that you're building... my girlfriend's nephew! How do we manage this?
Do you just roll with the punches and assume that all will be well. Perhaps you need to ask who these people and what makes them qualified to offer their opinions. You could also put processes in place to make sure that the client has clear boundaries about who can suggest what.
In this episode of the WP Builds WordPress podcast we talk this through. Guided by the Watertight Marketing book by Bryony Thomas. I'm sure that you've been through situations like this yourself, perhaps our ideas align with yours? Anyway, it's a fascinating subject which is the cause of so much wasted time and energy!

158 – Keeping WordPress secure with Ryan Dewhurst from WPScan

158 - Keeping WordPress secure with Ryan Dewhurst from WPScan - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

Who wants a hacked website. Anyone... anyone... Bueller! No? It's something that nobody wants, to wake up to discover that your WordPress website(s) have been breached and that unexpected things are now happening. Perhaps it's benign, but it might be serious. Data has been downloaded and you've got to spend time ameliorating the situation. Ryan Dewhurst is on the podcast today to chat through the WordPress security landscape. What people hack, what they gain and how the good guys are fighting back and trying to provide useful information to help us all stay safe. Ryan is behind WPScan, the WPScan Vulnerability Database and WPScan.io, all tools which enable you to stay up-to-date with the latest information about WordPress security. It's been a labour of love for a long time, and he's dedicated many, many hours so that you and I can sleep well at night. Great guy and a great episode...

157 – Honey traps for website clients

157 - Honey traps for website clients - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

How do your WordPress website clients 'try before they buy'? What can we do to trust our services and try them out before they part with their money. We share some ideas about that. Because, in the real world, we want to try out all-the-things before we buy them. Shoes, clothes, phones... most things. But was can't allow customers to try out the finished website before they are to sign the contract... we'd be broke. But perhaps there are some other ways that we can build up the trust that they need to have in us, ways that won't break the bank for us, but offer meaningful value to the clients and slowly, but surely edge them closer to the ultimate goal... the building of their new WordPress website. Join David and Nathan as they discuss what might be possible...

156 – WordPress forms is a crowded space, so we launched WPForms

WordPress forms is a crowded space, so we launched WP Forms - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

Some things are universal. Something about death and taxes. Another universal is that you will put some kind of contact form on every site that you build. You will though, won't you?
WP Forms entered a crowded marketplace a few years ago with a simple idea... can we make it faster for users to create their forms, and I think that the answer is a yes!
Join Jared Atchison, the founder of WP Forms, as we discuss what makes WP Forms different, how they got started, and where they are headed.
Even if you're entirely happy with your current WordPress forms solution, this is still worth a listen to see how you can enter a saturated market, and still make an impact.

155 – Are we boring?

Are we boring? - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

This discussion is another based on the book Watertight Marketing by Bryony Thomas which gives us 13 areas where we (or our clients) could be leaking potential business. With this series, we are working our way up an imaginary funnel starting first with our existing customers (Leak #1), then our on-boarding for leads (Leak #2) Now we are looking at Leak #3 – No emotional connection - Your brand or reputation – what kind of people are you? All of the elements above come together to really sum up what your company is about. It’s what will determine how it feels to be a customer of yours. It is what builds your company's reputation. This happens over time, but there are some foundations you need to lay. And those are what your company looks and sounds like.

154 – Because online privacy matters, we need people like Heather Burns

Because online privacy matters, we need people like Heather Burns - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Once in a while you attend an event and the speaker is so eloquent, so immersed in their talk, that you listen with an intensity that it out of the ordinary. Such was a talk given by the guest of the podcast today, Heather Burns. It was at WordCamp London in 2017, and I was in the audience. It was about online privacy, an area that she's an expert in. Today we discuss what online privacy actually is and how you need to be mindful about it as you build your WordPress websites. It's becoming more important year by year as we're now realising that we're often sacrificing our data and it might be used in ways that we're really not comfortable with. Join me as I discuss where you can make a difference and how WordPress is positioning itself with regards to privacy.

153 – Losing clients before you even get them

Losing clients before you even get them - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

This is a little mini-series based upon the book 'Watertight Marketing' by Bryony Thomas. This is about that time in the client / project lifecycle when they (the client) have made some kind of commitment to use your products or services, they might even have signed a contract, but you've not delivered anything yet. It's a time when they can still 'get away' from you. Yes, you might have a contract in place whereby you can insist that they are obliged to give you this or that, but honestly, have you ever enforced this, or is it better to just let them walk away and save yourself the legal fees and headache of trying to get them to pay up what they owe you? David calls this 'The Welcome Window'. You think that you have them as a client, but it's still possible for things to go wrong...

151 – Are we leaking clients?

151 - Are we leaking clients? - The WP Builds WordPress podcast

This episode is really about keeping the WordPress clients that you already have. What's the old phrase? Don't leave money on the table? Well, that's certainly the case for many of us. This is another episode in our mini series and it's all about trying to get as much value from and to the clients that you already have. Perhaps you build sites and then just move on not making use of the rapport and connections that you've made. Surely though, our existing clients are the ones that know us and what we do best. They have trust in you and what you're able to offer. So today we explore what we've done to foster these client relationships and David has some great ideas about what he's doing with his own agency. Well worth a listen...

150 – Kinsta hosting on Google’s Cloud with Brian Jackson

Kinsta hosting on GoCloud with Brian Jackson - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Today we have a chat with Brian Jackson from Kinsta. Kinsta are a managed WordPress hosting company who have grow rapidly since their inception in 2013. When they started managed WordPress hosting was not the giant business that it was today. In those days we were still opting for shared hosting and VPS hosting. But with the advent of cloud platforms such as Amazon's AWS and Google Cloud, there came an opportunity for people with the skills to leverage those platforms and repurpose them as WordPress specific hosting solutions. Find out how Kinsta works and see if they are a good fit for your next WordPress project.

149 – Marketing funnels don’t exist!

Marketing funnels don’t exist! - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

This discussion is about marketing, and it has a very click-bait title! It’s probably safe to say that we are not experts in marketing and certainly not marketing funnels. Nevertheless we thought we would chat about this and why we might need to get better a digital marketing for ourselves and clients and where WordPress could help with that. What's different about this discussion is that really is an introduction to a series of discussions we will have based on a book called Watertight Marketing by Bryony Thomas. Listen to this episode to find out more...

148 – Spinning up a WordPress optimised server in minutes with Spinup WP

Spinning up a WordPress optimised server in minutes with Spinup WP - WP Builds WordPress podcast

This is a little bit different. Today we talk to Brad Touesnard from Delicious Brains about Spinup WP their new service which aims to make it trivially simple to get your WordPress website up and running on a cloud hosting provider - in fact just about anywhere. You login to their platform, fill out a few form fields and then go and grab a coffee. By the time that you're done your WordPress optimised server will be ready and just waiting to get WordPress installed on it. This all sounds so simple, but there is a very large amount of heavy lifting going on in the background, heavy lifting that you'd have to learn and do your self. If you've ever wanted to install WordPress on a cloud provider, then check this podcast out...

147 – What does it mean to fail?

What does it mean to fail? - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Do you think that you're a success as a WordPress professional? Have you got everything sorted out and working just how you like it? Perhaps yes, but possibly no! What exactly do we mean by failure? Is it a measure of how much we earn, the kind of work that we are able to do? Perhaps it's the amount of free time that our work allows us to have at our disposal. Failure is not so easy to pin down. Can we prevent it and plan ahead, put cash aside for a rainy day. Maybe failure is out of our control - the bad boss or the slowing economy. We chat through this whole topic and see what it is that we strive for and how we've approached these problems in the past.

146 – Refining our website building process with James and Martin Coates

Refining our website building process with James and Martin Coates - WP Builds WordPress podcast

What to know how a growing WordPress website agency manages their projects? Well this is the podcast for you. Today we hear from James and Martin Coates from Impact Media. They tell us about the tools that they use to make their agency as efficient as possible. Wireframes to video creation, image manipulation to automated testing we learn it all. We also chat about their preferred plugins for particular tasks. It's a great chat and will give you some insights into processes that, no doubt are part of your business, but perhaps you'll see a new way or a new tool that you might be able to use. Go have a listen on the WP Builds WordPress podcast...

145 – Should we use templates more?

Should we use templates more? - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Times have changed... It used to be that creating websites was really tedious. It took hours to get anything to go where you wanted it. Along came WordPress themes and life got a little easier, well sometimes, and then we got Page Builders with their rows and modules. Now you can get templates for just about anything and can have sites built in a matter of hours, but should we do it this way? Should we be using other people's templates or should we be doing all this from the group up? Perhaps there is a middle way? Tweaking what you find so that the internet does not all look the same! Join us to find out what we think...

144 – Get paid with likes… the Like Coin with Kin Ko

Get paid with likes... the Like Coin with Kin Ko - WP Builds WordPress podcast

If you create content you know that it's nice to be rewarded for that. The Like Coin is a Block Chain idea which might make this possible. People click a button, you get paid! The internet came along and suddenly everything was free, free news, free magazines, free books. But authors of content need to get paid and paywalls, donations are not working. What if you could click a button and pay someone, literally do nothing else... click a button. Like Coin is trying to build this...

143 – Only doing what you’re good at

Only doing what you're good at - WP Builds WordPress podcast

So we all build websites. Perhaps we don't. Perhaps we're just involved with WordPress as a marketing expert, or a graphic designer. WordPress is useful to a whole slew of different job types which is great, but can also be a burden. What I mean by that is that there are so many hats that you can wear in the WordPress space, so many jobs that are needed to get a website up, running and maintained, that it can be hard to keep up. How do we do that...

142 – Easy life… store your layouts in the cloud with Andrew Palmer

Easy life... store your layouts in the cloud with Andrew Palmer - WP Builds WordPress podcast

You've been using a Page Builder to design your WordPress websites and life is great. But it could be better. The Page Builder Cloud plugin allows you to save your layouts to the cloud and reuse them on whatever website you want. So you can start to build your own library of layouts and they're right there, waiting to be deployed and save you a heap of time. The plugin is also going to be able to convert layouts from one Page Builder to another, but this is not ready just yet. Check it out...

141 – Feeling insecure about security (Part 2)

Feeling insecure about security (Part 2) - WP Builds WordPress podcast

This is the second episode about WordPress security. In this podcast we talk about the range of security plugins that we've heard of. It's by no means an exhaustive list, bit we cover some of the main options that you've heard of. We discuss these WordPress security plugins; what options do they offer, do we understand what they're doing and how do we pass on the responsibility for security to our WordPress website clients? Have a listen and post your comments...

140 – Feeling insecure about security (Part 1)

Feeling insecure about security (Part 1) - WP Builds WordPress podcast

This is the first in a two part podcast about WordPress and security. In this episode we go over all of the potential problems that you might encounter with your WordPress website. There's the usual things such as uptime monitoring, backups and implementing a firewall, but there's also some other, more unusual topics. Do you make sure that you're keeping your client data safe? Are you expunging backups and SSH keys that you no longer require in case your system is compromised...

139 – A better way to manage your media library with Stuart Brameld

A better way to manage your media library with Stuart Brameld - WP Builds WordPress podcast

If you've been using WordPress any length of time, you'll have run into the frustrations that the Media Library can present. It's a pretty decent UI, but it's not as good as services that we're using such as Google Drive or Dropbox. WP Media Manager aims to fix that. Not only does it look great but it stores all of your assets in Amazon S3 or Microsoft Azure with all of the benefits that this brings... highly scalable, secure, permissions based. I think that this plugin is certainly worth a look... PS... Sorry about the poor audio this week!

138 – Are we happy with how we manage tasks?

Are we happy with how we manage tasks? - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Today, the podcast talks about tasks. Not so much the tasks themselves, but more the way that we approach them. We discuss the way that different people have the ability to move happily from task to task, whilst other people need to complete one task before they can move onto another one. I guess that there's no 'right' way to accomplish tasks, but it's interesting to see whether or not we think that other people's approaches are batter than our own. It's a fun episode for sure!

137 – Make your WordPress website load faster with Jan Koch

Make your WordPress website load faster with Jan Koch - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Today we learn about how how to make your WordPress website load as fast as possible. On the face of it, this is easy to do, but there's quite a lot going on when a website loads, and so there are many steps that you need to take a look at if you want to squeeze every ounce of speed out of it. Jan Koch talks us through the work that he's done trying to do all of that. There's likely some new content in here even if you're a seasoned optimiser, so stay tuned and I hope that you enjoy this episode.

136 – Standing up to clients

Standing up to clients - WP Builds WordPress podcast

In this episode David and I talk about the interactions which we have with clients. Most of the time (I hope) we have good relations with our clients. They want to work with you and you want to work with them... but this does not mean that you're always going to see eye to eye with them. From time to time you're going to have to face up to a client who is not wanting to work with your processes and it not willing to be flexible. What do we do...?

135 – How to run successful paid ad campaigns to increase conversions with Daniel Daines-Hutt

How to run successful paid ad campaigns to increase conversions with Daniel Daines-Hutt - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Have you ever wanted to get into paid ad campaigns using Facebook or Google, but did not know where start? This podcast episode explains how you can get started and what some of the pitfalls are. There's so much to learn that it's good to have an expert on hand and Daniel Daines-Hutt is that man. Get your content seen by more people whilst targeting those people who you really value thereby saving on your ad campaigns. Check out this episode to see how you can do that...

133 – Helping coders run successful businesses with Hahna Kane Latonick

Helping coders run successful businesses with Hahna Kane Latonick - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

In this episode of the WP Builds WordPress podcast we chat to Hahna Kane Latonick. She has a background as a software engineer but decided some time ago that what she really wanted to do was to help coders and developers to run their businesses more successfully. We all know that running a business is not the same thing as being a great developer and so Hahna is here to give you the guidance and support that you might need to both at the same time.

132 – Working when there are other things to do

Working when there are other things to do - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

So this episode is a little bit of a departure for us, in that it's much more personal than usual, and has very little to do with WordPress, so forgive us! When we decided to cover this topic, I (Nathan) was thinking that we'd be talking about the things in life my non-work life that I have to do, sometimes in opposition to my work life.

131 – Stroke and poke your clients to keep you sane with Hannah Smith

Stroke the poke your clients to keep you sane with Hannah Smith - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

If you've work with WordPress websites for client you'll know that one of the hardest parts of the job is successfully communicating with clients. Today, Hannah Smith talks about her approach for doing just that. It's a really interesting take on how you can try to keep your clients happy all the time, but that's realistically possible and there's going to be times when you need to push back and say "no". It's an interesting talk with some fresh perspectives in this important business area.

130 – Personality types – finding the right client for you

- Personality types - finding the right client for you - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

Have you ever thought about the fact that your personality has a direct impact upon how successful you are? Your personality type might make you better at some tasks that others and if you're building WordPress websites for your clients, it might also affect the way that you interact with them too, and have a real impact upon their success and failure. Join us as we discuss this topic; we're not experts and are just scratching the surface, but it's really interesting what we uncover.

129 – How Beaver Team can speed up your Beaver Builder WordPress website builds

How Beaver Team can speed up your Beaver Builder WordPress website builds - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

If you're a Beaver Builder users then you'll know that there are some tasks that you have to perform over and over again when building a website for a client. It's perfectly okay, but Tom Carless thought that it would be better if there was a way to make repetitive tasks go away, so he built Beaver Team Pro. Want to update all those reds to green in one click, yes, want to make all specific button have an icon, yes! It's a great plugin that will save you (and your agency) heaps of time and money...

128 – Getting content from clients

Getting content from clients - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

Do you struggle getting content from your clients when you're building them a WordPress website? Well, you're not alone. We all do. There are so many things that you need from them and so many ways that miscommunication can result. Even if your processes are battle hardened, chances are that they still tested from time to time. So how do you get images, copy and all the rest of it from your clients. Nathan and David discuss it, but don't expect any perfect solution from us...

127 – The importance of keeping logs from your WordPress websites with Robert Abela

The importance of keeping logs from your WordPress websites with Robert Abela - WP Builds WordPress Podcast

Have you ever had a problem with your WordPress website that you could not figure out. Something appears to have been deleted, something suspicious appears to be happening but your cannot really be sure. WP Security Audit Log is a WordPress plugin that creates logs for just about everything on your site. It will enable you to work out exactly what went wrong and hopefully give you a let up in getting the site back up and running in the least time possible.

126 – Is web design dead?

Is web design dead? - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Web design is dead. There's no doubt about it. The tools that we have now are so easy to use, there's literally zero barrier to entry. Within a week, you can a great website up and running even if you've never used the internet before. Mmm... You're the expert, these tools are only easy to you because you've worked hard at getting to know them. Then there's marketing, funnels, hosting updates. You know what, perhaps we're safe after all. This stuff is actually quite hard you know!

125 – Making your WordPress website multilingual with Amir Helzer from WPML

Making your WordPress website multilingual with Amir Helzer from WPML - WP Builds WordPress podcast

In this day and age where websites are collections of content in a database, there is no reason at all that this content cannot be translated into other languages and presented to people who speak those languages. In fact, I'd be able to make a fair compelling argument that it's a really good idea to translate your website into a variety of languages if there's a market outside of your first language to do so. WPML allows you to do that quickly and easily...

124 – How do we put our prices up?

How do we put our prices up? - WP Builds WordPress podcast

In this episode David and I talk about the subject of pricing and in particular the thorny subject of putting prices up. We get started with a chat about what systems we use to actually receive payments from clients, PayPal, Stripe and good old fashioned bank transfers. We then move on to discuss what we've done in the past to up our rates. It turns out that maybe we need your help with this as there are so many areas where we're not sure what to do...

123 – Creating WordPress courses with Joe Casabona

123 - Creating WordPress courses with Joe Casabona - WP Builds WordPress podcast

Joe has been in the WordPress space for years and years. Working as a freelancer at the start, then as a member of a large agency. All of that is now behind him and he's got a whole heap of different things that he's doing. He's a podcaster, a creator of videos for himself and for third parties, but perhaps most importantly he's a creator of online courses in the WordPress space. If you want to find out why he's so successful then listen to this episode...

122 – Is our marketing all wrong?

Is our marketing all wrong? - WP Builds WordPress podcast

When you sell your WordPress websites to your clients, do you push the logical or the emotional? Do you talk about technical details or how easy and beautiful it will be? It's so easy to go down the route of the technical details, the SEO and caching that you'll put in place - this will all be good, but maybe your clients want to hear about cool it's going to look and how it's going to make people stop and marvel at the design. David has a problem and we try to solve it...

121 – Automate your social postings using Social Web Suite with Tina Todorovic

Automate your social postings using Social Web Suite with Tina Todorovic - WordPress podcast

Do you post your content to multiple social platforms? If you do, I'm almost certain that this task is a little bit on the dull side. Is it isn't it? It takes time and is repetitive. Social Web Suite is a WordPress plugin that hooks into your social media accounts just waiting for your to publish something. As soon as you do, it gets to work making the social media posting nightmare evaporate - it does it all for you. Check it out.

120 – Have you got WordPress plugin fatigue?

Have you got WordPress plugin fatigue - WP Builds WordPress podcast

If you're a WordPress user then you've used heaps of plugins in the past. They enable WordPress to do anything don't they? That's WordPress' greatest strength and it's largest curse! There are so many to choose from, and all that choice leads to plugin fatigue. You never quite know if the plugin that you're using is 'the best' and so you're constantly on the look out for a newer, shinier plugin. The problem is that this cycle does not have an end...

119 – Using Groundhogg to self host your email marketing with Adrian Tobey

Using Groundhogg to self host your email marketing with Adrian Tobey - WP Builds

Email marketing is usually the domain of expensive SaaS apps. Well, not any more. With the Groundhogg WordPress plugin you can automate all-the-things from inside your website! It's got lots of customisation options and works with a visual builder, just like the services that you're currently using. Adrian comes on to tell us about how it all got started and how the plugin works and what scenarios it might be useful for...

118 – We know nothing about website pricing

We know nothing about website pricing - WP Builds WordPress podcast

There are so many ways you can get paid for building WordPress websites, and if you've been in this industry for any length of time, then you've perhaps tried a few out? Do you charge on-off fees or use a model which judges the value that you add to the client's business? Perhaps you perfer to work on the basis that the website is an ongoing cost and the recurring revenue is really where you should be getting paid? We have no idea which is best, but it's fun chatting it all though...

117 – Using WordPress to run your online course with Chris Badgett from Lifter LMS

Using WordPress to run your online course with Chris Badgett from Lifter LMS

It's all the rage isn't it? Set up an online course and teach the world about the things you know! You've seen the Facebook ads. You've sat down and thought about all the great content they you'll teach to your students, made some videos, created some handouts, even devised some tests that the students will have to complete to graduate. But then the daunting question arises... how do I actually get this online? Lifter LMS might be the answer...

116 – How to secure your WordPress website with Oliver Sild from WebARX

116 - How to secure your WordPress website with Oliver Sild from WebARX

Do you glaze over when someone talks about internet security? Well, you're not alone - it's quite a difficult subject to understand. Thank heavens then that there's people like Oliver Sild who will understand it all for you. His company, WebARX has built a product which get all of your WordPress websites secured. They have one central dashboard which shows you all of the activity on your sites. Their firewall will drop suspicious traffic and keep you safe.

115 – The client is always right, we just need anger management

115 - The client is always right, we just need anger management

Are you the type of person who always does what your clients ask of you, or do you get angry with them? It's hardly a binary answer is it, but it certainly feels like it is sometimes! We've all been there... you've worked really hard on their WordPress website and you think that you've done everything right, but then the client comes back to you with a difficult email and your serenity is blown out of the water! What should you do...?

114 – Introducing Split Hero for split testing with Adam Lacey

114 - Introducing Split Hero for split testing with Adam Lacey

Adam has been on the podcast before, but on that occasion he was talking about his life as a freelancer, not as the owner of a SaaS app! He's founded a company called 'Split Hero' which is laser focussed upon one thing - split testing your WordPress website pages and gain meaningful data back about which one wins! Hang on a minute though... what is a 'split test'? Well, I'm glad you asked...

113 – Should we give our clients telephone support?

Should we give our clients telephone support - WP Builds Podcast

Should we be available on the phone to deal with client issues for our WordPress website business? I have had this conversation so many times in the past with so many people! We all know that, in the right hands, a phone can be one of the best ways to engage with your clients. But, in the wrong hands, the phone can be a scary thing that wastes your time and causes you stress and anxiety. See what we think...

112 – How to do SEO right with Phil Singleton

How to do SEO right with Phil Singleton - WP Builds

Phil Singleton is one of those guys who seems to do 15 things all at once, and doing them really well. His background, like many of us is not web design and development. He started in finance and insurance and hated it. Now he's an SEO specialist with a projects under his belt. We chat about the fact that SEO has changed over the years and what strategies you can employ with your WordPress website clients to ensure that their sites rank well, as well as being able to pitch SEO as one of your services.

110 – A WordPress intranet solution from WOffice

110 - A WordPress intranet solution from WOffice

Today we have not one but two people on the podcast. Baptiste Debever and Francois Forest are WordPress plugin and theme developers based in France. During this podcast we discuss two of their products, a WordPress theme called WOffice and a SaaS app called Feedier. They both do completely different things, one is a WordPress intranet and the other is a feedback SaaS app... so let's get started...

109 – What changed in 2018 and what is coming in 2019

109 - What changed in 2018 and what is coming in 2019

Happy New Year 2019! In this episode of the WP Builds WordPress podcast we take a bit of a look back at some of the things that we thought we important in 2018. Now I don't mean to imply that David and myself have any special insight here, it's just what occurred to us as important for 2018 and the way that we use WordPress. Some of this might not seem all that important to you, and undoubtedly we've missed a whole bunch of stuff out, but hey, you never came here for expertise did you!

108 – Make your blog posts work harder for you with Ben Dell from Missinglettr

108 - Make your blog posts work harder for you with Ben Dell from Missinglettr

Today we have an episode that deals with something very dear to my heart, writing blog posts - like this one! One of the problems that I have is that I write a post like this in WordPress and then publish it. It goes onto the website and I hope that people like you will read it and listen to the podcast episode. However, we're all busy people these days and it might be that you miss this post. I could roll over and accept that you've missed my wonderful content, or I could try to make sure that you see it at some point in the future. That's what Ben Dell's SaaS app, Missinglettr, does...

107 – The top 5 reasons why we are web designers

107 - The top 5 reasons why we are web designers

This episode is a little bit of a departure for us as it was inspired by the people in the WP Builds Facebook group (which you should join BTW). It is all based upon a in which David asked the simple question, "What's the one thing you love about building client websites?" Well, I think that both of us thought that this might get one or two comments, but in fact they poured in - 119 of them at the last count. It was really wonderful to read all of the varied things that you love about the work that we all do. We've got a lot to be grateful for, woking as we do building websites with WordPress.

105 – Rebecca Gill and her amazing life; flourishing from adversity

105 - Rebecca Gill and her amazing life

This is a little bit of a departure for us today because we take a deep dive into the life of our guest - Rebecca Gill. Typically on the podcast we chat about plugins and themes and talk to developers about their ideas and their code. Not today, well not just that today! Today we listen to the story of how life has shaped Rebecca, and I can tell you that so much has happened to her that it's amazing that she's still able to get up in the morning. Many people faced with a poor start never recover from it, but others seem to be able to rise above it, they have a tenacity that enables them to keep going, to take charge of their own destiny and to flourish. Rebecca chose to flourish. Find out how...

104 – UX… What on earth is it?

104 - UX... What on earth is it?

We talk to Paul Lacey and discuss with him what UI is. Both David and I work as independent freelancers and this means that we have a process that has worked for us over time. Paul however is part of a growing agency called DickieBirds and this means that he has to think about all this more than we do. It's a wide ranging discussion which might resonate with you if you are working with WordPress to create client sites. We know that other people who are really successful follow a whole bunch of processes which makes their life easier. I don't, but Paul does, so listen in...

103 – Adam Preiser talks about making eCommerce easy with CartFlows

103 - Adam Preiser talks about making eCommerce easy with CartFlows

This week on the podcast we have a man that I have no doubt that you've seen before? He's got a very popular YouTube channel called WP Crafter. It's a channel in which Adam creates videos explaining how WordPress plugins and themes work. It's really popular, like really popular. Okay so that's why you've heard of him, but it's not why he's on the podcast today. The reason that he's on is because of a new and interesting plugin that he's selling called CartFlows which is going to change the way that you do eCommerce. Find out more...

102 – It’s time for us to quit

WP Builds Podcast - Episode 101 - It's time for us to quit

We all have things in our lives that we want to quit, but we're limiting this conversation to your work as a WordPress professional and the moments in the day when you start to do things that you know that you shouldn't! Perhaps it's too much Facebook. You've set up email notifications to appear, and appear they do, with alarming regularity. Several time an hour you get pinged and go to read what you hope will be something of weight and importance. We're all guilty of it, as Mark Zuckerberg's accountant can testify. Or perhaps it's trying to keep up with the latest trends, or time wasting, or office hour or podcasting!

101 – Matt Mullenweg… Why Gutenberg? And why now?

Matt Mullenweg - WP Builds Podcast - Episode 101

Today we welcome Matt Mullenweg on to the WP Builds podcast. Matt has been using WordPress as long as anyone else, with one exception! He is the co-founder of WordPress along with Mike Little, so he knows a thing or two. We talk about Gutenberg, why Matt thinks that we need it, and why we need it now. We go on to chat about how it's divided the WordPress community, especially from the perspective of users with accessibility needs. We finish with a discussion about how the community can reunite after this 'schism' and what Matt thinks of the recent ClassicPress fork of WordPress.

100 – The LIVE (disaster) podcast!

WP Builds - Webinar - Episode 100 Live

In this LIVE Webinar we celebrate the 100th episode of the WP Builds podcast! It was a bit of a technological disaster! David Waumsley and I both got kicked out of the webinar before it had started and then we in a webinar all alone for 28 minutes as the webinar tech support worked out what went wrong. Jim and David McCan held the fort until we returned - very cool! We discussed what we think are the things that will happen in WordPress over the next two years or so. It's a bit of a ramble, but I can promise you that next week we'll be back to normal!!! Who'd have thought that we'd get this far? Who cares that we did anyway! Thanks for sticking with us!

99 – Help your clients to help you with a Client Portal – Laura Elizabeth explains

99 - Help your clients to help you with a Client Portal - Laura Elizabeth explains

Today, we get to meet Laura Elizabeth. She’s a designer turned plugin creator that has some good ideas for you! Like I say, she’s a designer and her latest product, Client Portal, is a great way to help you and your clients to stay on the same page. If you build WordPress websites for clients, then I think that you’ll know this problem… you get out of sync with your clients and all the communication seems to go all over the place. Some people want you to send them email, others would rather that you use Slack or Dropbox or Google Drive or some other system that you’ve never heard of! The long and the short of it is that you’ve got many clients all needing you to communicate with them in a variety of ways and Client Portal makes that process much easier!

98 – Carrie Dils talks about why she loves WordPress and how you can use it

98 - Carrie Dils talks about why she loves WordPress and how you can use it

There are some people that you're drawn towards aren't there? People that you like to listen to, people that you like to read about. When I started to use WordPress a few years ago, I was constantly on the lookout for people who were producing great content that I could consume to further my understanding of how WordPress worked and of how I could make it do what I wanted it to do.I'm sure that you have your list of people who fill this criteria, the people that you want to listen to and read about? Carrie Dils is one of those people for me. She's be creating content in the WordPress space for ages and not just that, she's been producing a whole load of different forms of content.

97 – What is cold calling and should I be doing it with Jim Galiano?

97 - What is cold calling and should I be doing it?

I don't know you, but I know for an absolute fact that I'm hopeless at marketing. I'm not very good at it and it find it really hard to do, or to get excited about. It's a something that I've struggled with for a long time. I'm lucky in that I have enough work (right now) to keep me going and it comes my way largely through word of mouth. Because I'm a study in mediocrity, this is fine by me; I have not needed to market too much to keep my head above the water. But I'm hoping that you're not as satisfied with mediocre, as I am - you're a get-up-and-got type aren't you? You want more out of life than I do? Well guess what, you're going to have to market yourself in order to get, because you can be sure that competitors will.

96 – Show me my data! Query Wrangler with Jonathan Daggerhart

96 - Show me my data! Query Wrangler with Jonathan Daggerhart

If you’re a regular listener to the podcast then you’ll know that I was once a heavy user of Drupal. The reason for this is simple, Drupal is really rather awesome. I know that this is a WordPress podcast, but there’s just no denying it; Drupal does heaps and heaps of stuff really well, and dare I say it… sometimes better than WordPress does! Okay, now you can put those pitchforks away, ‘cos I’m not trying to convert you over to Drupal, because, after all, I left and don’t use it anymore. Drupal has a module (aka plugin) called Views, and I’m not exaggerating to say that it’s very very very cool indeed. When I came to WordPress, I could not understand why there was nothing like Views. Something that you could point, and click at and get data out. Until I discovered Query Wrangler by Jonathan Daggerhart...

95 – What we do when a client asks for something we’ve never done before

95 - What we do when a client asks for something we've never done before

In this episode, we return to the ‘good old days’ in which David and myself just used to drone on and on! We decided that we had not done nearly enough droning recently, and so… I give you episode 95! We go over our thoughts about how we cope when a client asks us to do something that is completely new to us. I’m guessing that we’ve all been in that meeting, or been on that call when you realise that the client is asking for something that you don’t know that you can pull out of that WordPress hat that you’ve been wearing. Perhaps it’s something that you know can be done, but you know that you’re not able to do it. Or maybe it’s something that you simply cannot understand and don’t even know where to start.

94 – How to use WP Ultimo to create your own Multisite network with Arindo Duque

94 - How to use WP Ultimo to create your own Multisite network with Arindo Duque

I've often pondered the idea of setting up some kind of SaaS product, something that I could build and then turn it over to the public and they would be able to purchase it from me on a monthly basis. I think that when people do this with WordPress it's called WaaS. Is that right? Well, one of the things that I've always wanted to do was to set up a system where clients could sign up to a monthly / annual website plan, pick a theme that they liked, pay and it would all be automated - done for them (and me) as if by magic. Arindo Duque has built such a thing and, honestly, it's a little gem that you ought to explore if this idea has ever tempted you too.

93 – What makes a successful proposal with Adam Hempenstall

93 - What makes a successful proposal with Adam Hempenstall

I’m not that keen on writing. It’s one of the things that we all have to do, but it’s not my greatest strength as you can tell if you are reading this. What I dislike more than just writing though is writing proposals for prospective clients. I don’t like it because I’m not very good at getting my points across all that succinctly and I find it hard to get into the ‘style’ that I need to adopt to make it have a fighting chance of being read and accepted. Well, don’t you love living in the age of the internet where there is an online service for just about everything that you could possibly need in life? Adam Hempenstall discovered that there were people like me all over the planet; people who needed to hand writing their proposals.

92 – Do higher prices mean better clients?

92 - Do higher prices mean better clients?

We have a 'special guest' called Paul Lacey from Dickie Birds to discuss the always relevant subject of pricing, and more specifically do better paying clients mean 'better' clients? We all know that the answer is, annoyingly, sometimes, it all depends and maybe! Ha! There's no guarantee that, just because someone has deep pockets, they are going to fun to work with. Sometimes the fact that a client is paying more for your WordPress products and services means that you have more 'bandwidth' to absorb the many problems that arise during your website build, but equally, clients that have very tight budgets can be very demanding of your time and have expectations far above what their wallet will realistically allow!

91 – FacetWP filtering for your site with Matt Gibbs

91 - Gutenberg - FacetWP filtering for your site with Matt Gibbs

Right, so we know that WordPress is pretty cool don't we? Glad that we got that straight. It does heaps of things really, really well, but honestly, it's got limitations! That's why we have plugins! A few years ago I needed to build a site for an estate agent (realtor for you folk over in North America I think). This site needed the ability to show a list of properties on the market, but the client wanted the users of the site to be able to filter the list of properties so that only the ones that matched their criteria were shown to them. So... houses under £300k, with a garage.... Well, trying to pull that off in WordPress is jolly hard, but thankfully Matt Gibbs got there before you! He's created a plugin called Facet WP which is the answer to all your filtering prayers (you do have filtering prayers don't you)!

90 – Gutenberg – Let’s have a Block Party with Eric Debelak

90 - Gutenberg - Let's have a Block Party with Eric Debelak

This week we have Eric Debelak on the podcast talking about... what else... Gutenberg! Eric is a bit of a fan of Gutenberg. So much so in fact that he's spent quite a bit of time working on a project specifically for Gutenberg. It's called WPBlocks.Party! Seeing as how the WordPress community is full of clever people, those same clever people (like Eric) decided that it would be very nice to have more than just the standard set of blocks that Gutenberg comes with. We need more than just text and images and videos in a modern platform don't we?

89 – How to really connect with your clients with Erin Flynn

89 - How to really connect with your clients with Erin Flynn

I'm not very good in the real world! Get me away from my little office and my screens and I'm all 'out-at-sea'! I have to suddenly communicate with people and interact; I cannot click a button and get an expected response from other people. People, unlike code, are just so darn unpredictable. They do what they want and have hidden thoughts and expectations. If you've been building websites for clients for any length of time, you'll know that your clients can be your best friend and your worse nightmare. They want things they didn't communicate to you. So it goes! Erin Flynn is here to help you sort this mess out.

88 – Lightening fast static WordPress hosting with Daniel Olson

88 - Lightening fast static WordPress hosting with Daniel Olson

I really like it when you talk to someone that has done a variety of things in the internet / WordPress space. Daniel Olson is a man that fits that description, as you're about to find out! He's got a whole heap of fin stuff going on which we talk about in depth, but the 'long story short' is that he's an AWS (Amazon Web Services) expert. If you did not know, AWS is the ridiculously large suite of tools that Amazon has built to make anything possible on the internet. Daniel leverages all that AWS goodness to build products that you might want to use for your WordPress business. For a start he has not one, but two hosting products that you might want to check out, Aminoto and Shifter...

85 – Create a turnkey website business with WordPress… Matthew Rodela did

85 - Create a turnkey website business with WordPress... Matthew Rodela did

We've all had that dream... Create a platform that you can set free unto the world. A platform that will allow you to gather new customers who would like to use your product, even though they've never talked to you before. A platform that will automate all the things so that you can sit on a beach drinking expensive cocktails and... erm... you get the (somewhat exaggerated) idea! Seriously though. How many times have you thought about leveraging WordPress so that it could be used a platform that could automate your website building business? I know that I have. Unlike you and I, Matthew Rodela stuck at it and has managed to create a business which pretty much automates the creation of websites and his customer base. He's leveraging that well known but under explored feature of WordPress - Multisite.

84 – Build 48 websites in a weekend for good causes with Adam Walker

84 - Build 48 websites in a weekend for good causes with Adam Walker

We do have some cool guests on this podcast don't we? Yes we do, and this week is no different. It's not about a plugin or a theme, or how to run your business. No... this is about philanthropy and doing nice things for people who need nice things to be done for them. It's about 48in48.org. Adam Walker is the man behind it all and so he's on to tell you about it and hopefully get you involved. The idea is really very simple... there's a whole load of deserving people out there who are trying to be good. They do good things with their time and make the world a better place. Sadly though, many of these good things don't make a lot of money and so they cannot afford to have websites built for them. Adam thought, I should try to solve that, and solve it he did!

83 – Brizy Page Builder – Dimitrie Baitanciuc tells us all about it

83 - Brizy Page Builder - Dimitrie Baitanciuc tells us all about it

Brizy Page Builder... This episode feels like it's timed at right moment because, if like me, you are always hunting around WordPress communities for news, then you cannot have failed to hear about the new Page Builder on the block - Brizy. We've become used to Page Builders now haven't we? Well, many of us have anyway! They cut a huge amount of time and effort out of creating pages in your WordPress site and they're also getting more and more capable of taking on the task of creating headers, footers, archive pages. In short, they're getting too sophisticated to ignore. There are a bunch of Page Builders that we know and love, so why should the Brizy developers have launched into a market that already has some major incumbent players? Why indeed?

82 – Properly supporting our wonderful WordPress community with Dan Maby

Properly supporting our wonderful WordPress community with Dan Maby

One of the best things about doing this podcast is getting to meet people that I might not otherwise have had the chance to talk to. Often those people are doing amazing things in the WordPress space. Dan Maby is one such person. He’s doing really amazing things, and I loved chatting with him. Dan appears to be on a mission to set up WordPress meetups all over the UK, and this is no trivial task. Dan however runs many of them, all over the UK. So what might have been a part-time job suddenly becomes multiple full-time jobs. I honestly don’t know where he gets all the energy and enthusiasm from.

81 – WordPress security and what you need to know about it with David Hayes

WordPress security and what you need to know about it with David Hayes

This week on the podcast we talk about something that is very dear to my heart… WordPress security! I have literally no idea why this subject fascinates me as much as it does, but for some reason, I cannot help myself, I just love it! I am interested in WordPress / internet security from the 10,000 mile high perspective. I’m not the kind of person to delve into the math of Elliptic Curves or Diffie Helmann symmetric keys. You need to be clever to actually understand this stuff, and as we all know, cleverness is not something that I possess too much of! David Hayes on the other hand is a clever person; the kind of man who understands the code behind WordPress security.

80 – Gutenberg’s design lead, Tammie Lister, explains what it’s all about

Gutenberg's design lead, Tammie Lister, explains what it's all about

Ever heard of Gutenberg? Nah, nobody in the WordPress community has mentioned it at all this year have they?! It's the most talked about thing in WordPress right now, and for good reason. When WordPress 5.0 ships at some point in 2018, Gutenberg will be along for the ride too, and it's going to change WordPress in a pretty significant way. Now, I'm not too sure exactly what it will look like and exactly how it will behave, because it's going through some serious iterations at the moment. It's come a really, really long way over the past year and recent updates have seen it change even more quickly.

79 – Keep educating yourself about WordPress / JavaScript / Gutenberg with Zac Gordon

Keep educating yourself about WordPress / JavaScript / Gutenberg with Zac Gordon

I really like Zac Gordon. He's one of those effervescent people who just exude warmth and thoughtfulness. I recently watched his talk at WordCamp London 2018 and he was such a great public speaker; able to chat to the room and not talk at them. His talk was about Gutenberg... because, well, you know... it's coming! He really knows his stuff too! What's that saying...? "If you can teach someone a subject, it shows that you really understand it", well, something like that anyway! Zac has been in the WordPress education space for years, teaching many, many people the in's and out's of WordPress. He's worked for companies like Treehouse as well as offering courses which he manages himself. Courses like his "Learn Vanilla JavaScript Deeply Course", and The "Gutenberg Development Course", there's so much great content that he's produced over the years.

78 – Amir Helzer explains Toolset relationships and Gutenberg support

78 - Amir Helzer explains Toolset relationships and Gutenberg support

Quite a while ago now, we had a chat with Amir Helzer, the CEO of onTheGoSystems, the people behind the popular WPML and Toolset plugins. Well, time and tide wait for no website, and developers need to keep innovating and updating their products to keep them relevant. Amir is on the show this week to chat through some of the important updates that they've been busy with. We talk quite a lot about some great new features that have been added to Toolset, such as the ability to create complex relationships for your WordPress Custom Post Types. He tells us what relationships are, and why you might want them.

77 – UI That Rocks / Understanding Gestalt design principles with Piccia Neri

77 - UI That Rocks / Understanding Gestalt design principles with Piccia Neri

I don’t know much about design. I’m one of those people who knows what they like when they see it. So I’m basically your worst client! Luckily there are people out there who do understand design. They think about it deeply and understand why some combinations of colours and shapes work well (good designers) and others don’t (me and turnips). Piccia Neri is one such person; she’s good at design and understanding design. Coming from a background in art history she moved over to the web and has been applying her knowledge to web design ever since.

76 – How to build and manage a successful plugin business with Sujay Pawar

76 - How to build and manage a successful plugin business with Sujay Pawar

In this episode we get to chat to Sujay Pawar, somewhat of a rising star of the WordPress world. I think that it’s quite likely that you’ve heard of some of the products that his company (Brainstorm Force) have created over the years. Shall I just list them out for you, so that you can say, “Yes, I’ve heard of those,” at the end? The Astra Theme, Ultimate Addons for Beaver Builder, Ultimate Addons for Elementor, Convert Pro, Schema Pro, WP Portfolio and actually there were a few more along the way too! There, I told you that you’d heard of them! Is that enough for you!? Listen to the episode to find out more.

75 – ACF… Elliot Condon tells us all about his enormously cool plugin

75 - ACF... Elliot Condon tells us all about his enormously cool plugin

You discovered WordPress a while back and you thought, "this is great, but I need more fields". Admit it, that's exactly what you said isn't it? Well Elliot Condon heard your cry and went out and built ACF (Advanced Custom Fields) for you. It's about the most useful thing that you could add to WordPress other than, say, the Pro version of ACF, which is even better! You get heaps of new fields to play with and turn WordPress into something that is more CMS than blog platform! We find out all about ACF; it's past, present and future, and we also find out about Elliot and what kind of a nice chap he is.

71 – How to be authentic and produce lots and lots of content with BobWP (Bob Dunn)

How to be authentic and produce lots and lots of content with BobWP (Bob Dunn)

Let me introduce you to Bob Dunn (a.k.a. BobWP), ha, like that’s a sentence that you’re going to be able to say! We all know about Bob don’t we? We’ve read his many blogs and listened to his many podcasts and he’s taught us all a great deal. So this one was a great one for me to do as I have a huge amount of respect for Bob and all that he does for WordPress. What, I think, makes Bob unique is the sheer amount of quality content that he produces, it’s prodigious and it’s hard to know how he manages to create it all.

43 – Running a large Facebook group with Dave Toomey

Running a large Facebook group with Dave Toomey

This week we get to meet the man behind the Beaver Builder Facebook group - Dave Toomey. Many of you will know that there is a 8,000 strong group out there, but perhaps you didn’t know that it was not started by the folk over at Beaver Builder, but by a lone Irish fella called Dave Toomey. Turns out that running a large Facebook group involves quite a bit of work.

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