Step 1 – Unzip the File

The file you downloaded can be unzipped with any standard unzip program (if you don’t have one already installed on your computer, Stuffit Expander is a popular option for PC or MAC users). When you unzip the file, you’ll end up with a folder named either wp-prolific-basic, wp-prolific-prem or wp-prolific-dev, depending upon which license you purchased. Within it are all the theme files along with the end user license agreement (please take a moment to read over the license agreement).

Step 2 – Upload the Theme Files to Your Wordpress Site

For this step, you’ll need an FTP (file transfer protocol) program. An FTP program allows you to transfer files between your computer and your web hosting account. There are several available, but I use SmartFTP. You’ll want to upload your theme folder to the /wp-content/themes folder in your Wordpress installation.

Step 3 – Activate WP-Prolific

Login into your Wordpress control panel, and click the Appearance tab. On the next page you’ll see all your available themes. Simply click on the WP-Prolific screenshot, then click the Activate link in the upper right-hand corner of the pop-up screen.

Step 4 – Set Up Your Featured Articles Section

If you don’t already have a “Featured” category, you’ll need to create one. Click the Post tab, then Categories on the sub-menu. Create a new category named “Featured.” Also, be sure the category slug is “featured.”

For the Featured Articles function to work correctly, you should modify your permalink structure. To do that, click the Settings tab, then Permalinks on the sub-menu. Just be sure that any option other than the default permalink structure is selected.

Finally, the only thing left to do is to place some of your posts/articles in the Featured category. By default, the theme is set up to display your 6 most recent Featured Articles in the featured article box on your home page. You can change that number on the WP-Prolific Theme Settings page if you like.

Step 5 – Install and Activate Plugins Supported by WP-Prolific

WP-Prolific has built-in support for the following plugins:

Recently Popular – Your Most Popular Posts will appear at the top of the right sidebar in the tabbed navigation box as seen on this site.

Get the Image – This is a sweet, little plugin from the very brilliant Justin Tadlock. It will make it easier for you to include post thumbnails for all your posts without using custom fields. More on that in another tutorial.

WP-PageNavi – This is a great little plugin by Lester Chan that will add page numbers in place of the “Older Posts” and “Newer Posts” links at the bottom of your pages.

Be sure you download the latest version of each plugin and upload them to your wp-content/plugins folder. Then activate them. The theme will do the rest.

Step 6 – Add Some Content to Your Sidebars

Click the Appearance tab, then Widgets, and drag some content into your sidebars. Be sure to click the “Save Changes” button when you’re done.

Step 7 – Be Sure To Visit the WP-Prolific Theme Settings Page

The link for this page is available under the Appearance tab. We’ve given you a whole slew of optional settings for the theme, so feel free to change a few of them, and see what sort of site you can create for yourself.

To add these images to your posts, you have 2 options …

Option 1 – Use the “Get The Image” Plugin

This plugin, created by a savvy WordPress developer named Justin Tadlock, will greatly simplify the task of placing your post thumbnail images right where they belong.

Download the plugin here. Installation is pretty simple …

1. Unzip the file.
2. Upload get-the-image.php file to your wp-content/plugins folder.
3. Activate the plugin on your Plugins page.

What this plugin will do:

1. It will look for any images that you’ve uploaded to your post.

2. If it finds one or more images, it will automatically place the 1st image – as a thumbnail – where it belongs on your site.

Note 1: If you have uploaded multiple images to your post, it will use the #1 image as set in the gallery section of your media uploader (click thumbnail to the right).

Note 2: If you don’t want the image to appear in the post content, just don’t insert it into the post. The plugin will still grab the 1st image you’ve uploaded to the post and place it correctly.

3. If it does not find any images (because you didn’t upload any) for the post, no image will appear for that post in the Featured Article section. As for the post thumbnails, it will place a default thumbnail unless you have deactivated that feature on your Theme Settings page.

Option 2 – Use Custom Fields

If, for whatever reason, you prefer not to use the plugin, you can simply use custom fields. With this method, you will need to scroll down to the Custom Fields section on the Write Post screen and fill in the appropriate data.

For post thumbnail images:

• Name = post_thumbnail
• Value = the URL for the image (get the image URL from the media uploader)

Step 1 – Upload a Generic 125×125 Banner

The image to the right is already located in the /images folder found in your theme folder, so you can use that if you like. The file name is banner125.gif.

Alternatively, you can use your own generic 125×125 banner; just be sure to name it banner125.gif and upload it to the /images folder within your theme folder (or change the file name used below to reflect the name of your own file).

Step 2 – Create a New Text Widget in Your Right Sidebar for the Banner Ads

Add a new text widget to your top right sidebar, give it a title if you like. Then copy and paste the following code into the widget box:

<ul id="banner125" class="clearfix">

<li class="ad1"><a href="http://www.link1.com"><img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-basic/images/banner125.gif" alt="banner ad" /></a></li>

<li class="ad2"><a href="http://www.link2.com"><img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-basic/images/banner125.gif" alt="banner ad" /></a></li>

<li class="ad3"><a href="http://www.link3.com"><img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-basic/images/banner125.gif" alt="banner ad" /></a></li>

<li class="ad4"><a href="http://www.link4.com"><img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-basic/images/banner125.gif" alt="banner ad" /></a></li>

</ul>

Note 1: In the above code, you’ll need to change mysite.com to your own site domain name.

Note 2: In the img src code above, you may need to change the /wp-prolific-basic/ part to reflect the actual name of your theme folder.

For WP-Prolific Basic version, the img src would be:
<img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-basic/images/banner125.gif" alt="banner ad" />

For WP-Prolific Premium version, the img src would be:
<img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-prem/images/banner125.gif" alt="banner ad" />

For WP-Prolific Developer version, the img src would be:
<img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-dev/images/banner125.gif" alt="banner ad" />

Step 3 – Replace the Generic Banners and Links With Real Ads

All you need to do is upload your 125×125 banner image(s) to the /images folder, and change the code above to reflect that.

For example, if you upload a new banner called ad125.gif, and you want to link that banner to www.solostream.com, you would simply change the code to this:

<li class="ad1"><a href="http://www.solostream.com"><img src="http://www.mysite.com/wp-content/themes/wp-prolific-basic/images/ad125.gif" alt="banner ad" /></a></li>

And that’s it. The Stylesheet is already set up to display the ads correctly.

Step 1 – Write a New Page

Just click the “Add New” link under the Pages tab in your Wordpress control panel. Be sure to give your page a page title by filling in the Title field. Other than that, you don’t need to write any content in the post editor box.

Step 2 – Assign the Site Map Page Template to your Page

To the right of the Write Page console, you’ll see a blue box title “Attributes.” From the Template drop-down list, select “Site Map,” and click the Publish button.

If you look at the home page of this demo site, you’ll see that all the posts – including the featured posts at the top – display a post introduction (or excerpt) rather than the full post itself. It’s the same on the category pages, archive pages and search results pages. Then, when you click through to the individual post, you get the full post content along with comments and other information.

There are 2 possible methods to create the post introduction or excerpt …

Set WP-Prolific to Use Post Excerpts, and Use the Excerpt Field

Go to your Theme Settings page, and click “Basic Post Settings.” You’ll see an option to use the Post Excerpts or Post Content (default value is Excerpts). You’ll want to leave it set to Post Excerpts.

Now that the theme is set up for excerpts, the trick is to tell WordPress how to create the excerpt the way you want it rather than it’s own way. Without any other instructions, WordPress will create the excerpt on it’s own. Here’s what it does …

Wordpress Codex: “If you do not provide an explicit excerpt to a post (in the post editor’s optional excerpt field), it will display a teaser which refers to the first 55 words of the post’s content. Also in the latter case, HTML tags and graphics are stripped from the excerpt’s content.”

So the solution is simple … Use the Excerpt field on the Write Post screen.

Whatever you place in the Excerpt field is what will be displayed as the post excerpt on your home page. And keep in mind, you will need to add some HTML to the Excerpt field if you want it to be used in the excerpt. Otherwise, WordPress strips out all code including HTML. For example, lets say you want your post excerpt to be displayed just like this:

This is the post introduction. I want to include a link to this site, and this site.

In that case, here’s exactly what you’d need to place in the Excerpt field:

This is the post introduction. I want to include a link to <a href="http://wp-prolific.solostreamsites.com">this site</a>, and <a href="http://wp-prolific.solostreamsites.com">this site</a>.

If you need some help with the HTML code, you can write your excerpt in the normal post editor, then click the HTML view tab, and simply copy the HTML code from there.

As a side note, some folks have inquired whether they can include video in there post excerpt. The answer is yes, you can … you just need to place the code for the video in the Excerpt field.

That’s all for this option. Lets move on to the second method you can use to create your post introduction/excerpt.

Set WP-Prolific to Use Post Content, and Use the More Tag

With this method, all you have to do is set WP-Prolific to use Content rather than Excerpts. Then, when you write your post, simply use the More tag to cut the post according to your preference. The benefit of using this method over the previous one is simplicity. You don’t have to remember to use the Excerpt field, and any HTML code will still show up in your post introduction/excerpt.

Note: If you use the Post Content option, you need to make sure you DO NOT place any images before the More tag … or else you may end up with double thumbnail images on your home page.

Simply open the file with your favorite text editor, such as Notepad, and find this line of code near the top:

timeout: 7000, // time before next slide appears (in ms)

If you want to completely turn off the autoscroll function, simply change “7000″ to “0″ (that’s a zero). If you want to lengthen the time between featured articles, simply increase the “7000″ (7 seconds) to a higher number, such as 10000, if you want there to be 10 seconds between featured articles.

Once you are done, save the file and upload to the /js directory within your theme folder.

Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra.

This is the H1 Heading

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra.

This is the H2 Heading

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Etiam non pede quis ante convallis convallis. Cras at tortor euismod leo molestie aliquet. Quisque posuere ornare nulla. Proin scelerisque dignissim erat. Donec dapibus euismod est. Nam molestie consequat lacus. Fusce euismod dignissim libero. Morbi laoreet dolor sed mi. Aenean urna diam, malesuada eu, tempor non, euismod sed, arcu. Nullam egestas nisi non nulla bibendum pharetra. Cras pellentesque nunc nec odio. Aliquam sed eros eu lectus congue rhoncus. Praesent accumsan nisl at leo. Sed enim. Integer nisl.

This is the H3 Heading

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Etiam non pede quis ante convallis convallis. Cras at tortor euismod leo molestie aliquet. Quisque posuere ornare nulla. Proin scelerisque dignissim erat. Donec dapibus euismod est. Nam molestie consequat lacus. Fusce euismod dignissim libero. Morbi laoreet dolor sed mi. Aenean urna diam, malesuada eu, tempor non, euismod sed, arcu. Nullam egestas nisi non nulla bibendum pharetra. Cras pellentesque nunc nec odio. Aliquam sed eros eu lectus congue rhoncus. Praesent accumsan nisl at leo. Sed enim. Integer nisl.

This is the H4 Heading

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Etiam non pede quis ante convallis convallis. Cras at tortor euismod leo molestie aliquet. Quisque posuere ornare nulla. Proin scelerisque dignissim erat. Donec dapibus euismod est. Nam molestie consequat lacus. Fusce euismod dignissim libero. Morbi laoreet dolor sed mi. Aenean urna diam, malesuada eu, tempor non, euismod sed, arcu. Nullam egestas nisi non nulla bibendum pharetra. Cras pellentesque nunc nec odio. Aliquam sed eros eu lectus congue rhoncus. Praesent accumsan nisl at leo. Sed enim. Integer nisl.

This is the H5 Heading

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Etiam non pede quis ante convallis convallis. Cras at tortor euismod leo molestie aliquet.

Here’s an unordered list.

• Proin lacinia nibh quis massa.
• Sed sed justo sodales justo scelerisque ultricies.
• Ut sodales pretium augue.
• Proin interdum, enim ut ullamcorper hendrerit, felis turpis malesuada risus, ac gravida nulla mauris et odio.

Here’s an ordered list.

1. Proin lacinia nibh quis massa.
2. Sed sed justo sodales justo scelerisque ultricies.
3. Ut sodales pretium augue.
4. Proin interdum, enim ut ullamcorper hendrerit, felis turpis malesuada risus, ac gravida nulla mauris et odio.

This is a Definition List

WordPress Themes

A WordPress Theme is not a “skin”. Though many young people call it one. The reality is that a WordPress Theme contains many files that come together in various ways to generate a WordPress web page. A “skin” simply changes the look, and rarely the results.

WordPress Plugins

WordPress Plugins add flexibility, features, and capabilities to your WordPress site. There are hundreds to choose from. Some add power and control like monitoring and busting comment spam and enhancing your adminstration features. Others add fun things like random elements and polling and rating systems.

Here’s a blockquote.

Phasellus scelerisque enim at elit. Nam molestie, ipsum et elementum facilisis, mauris elit pretium felis, vitae lobortis sapien neque quis dui. Sed in elit a lectus ullamcorper faucibus. Nullam suscipit massa a felis tempus scelerisque.

Here’s a Table

Here’s an image aligned to the left.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Etiam non pede quis ante convallis convallis. Cras at tortor euismod leo molestie aliquet. Quisque posuere ornare nulla. Proin scelerisque dignissim erat. Donec dapibus euismod est. Nam molestie consequat lacus. Fusce euismod dignissim libero. Morbi laoreet dolor sed mi. Aenean urna diam, malesuada eu, tempor non, euismod sed, arcu. Nullam egestas nisi non nulla bibendum pharetra. Cras pellentesque nunc nec odio. Aliquam sed eros eu lectus congue rhoncus. Praesent accumsan nisl at leo. Sed enim. Integer nisl.

Here’s an image centered.

Here’s an image aligned to the right.

Proin lacinia nibh quis massa. Sed sed justo sodales justo scelerisque ultricies. Ut sodales pretium augue. Proin interdum, enim ut ullamcorper hendrerit, felis turpis malesuada risus, ac gravida nulla mauris et odio. Nunc nonummy, quam sodales gravida dictum, turpis mauris egestas tellus, lacinia consectetuer sapien felis quis leo. Duis ligula erat, vehicula et, accumsan nec, aliquet bibendum, justo. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra.

Testing Font Looks – H3 Heading

You will need to test the looks of the different font styles, too. This is bold and THIS IS BOLD. This is italic and THIS IS ITALIC. This is bold and italic and THIS IS BOLD AND ITALIC.

This is code and THIS IS CODE.

This should be back to the normal paragraph style and we hope you have been paying attention to the margins and paddding around each element, including the paragraph, so you can position things appropriately to the rest of the content.

H3 Heading

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Morbi quis risus at nisl blandit feugiat. Ut vel orci quis sem dapibus iaculis. Aliquam ut nunc quis nisi tincidunt tincidunt. Pellentesque enim. Sed et leo nec augue mollis pharetra. Etiam non pede quis ante convallis convallis. Cras at tortor euismod leo molestie aliquet. Quisque posuere ornare nulla. Proin scelerisque dignissim erat. Donec dapibus euismod est. Nam molestie consequat lacus. Fusce euismod dignissim libero. Morbi laoreet dolor sed mi. Aenean urna diam, malesuada eu, tempor non, euismod sed, arcu. Nullam egestas nisi non nulla bibendum pharetra. Cras pellentesque nunc nec odio. Aliquam sed eros eu lectus congue rhoncus. Praesent accumsan nisl at leo. Sed enim. Integer nisl.

10 Tips for Writing Better Articles

Writing articles is a great way to create exposure for yourself and your business. In fact, I’d suggest it’s one of the best marketing tools you can use. Webmasters and newsletter publishers are always looking for good content. Further, aside from your time investment, it’s completely free advertising.

Here are 10 practical tips to ensure your articles get published and read by others.

1. Write to serve.
Before writing an article, ask yourself what problem it will help others solve. Some of the more common issues people deal with revolve around a lack of something, whether it’s time, money, self-confidence or just joy in life. How will your article help with these issues.

2. Grab their attention early.
If possible, intend to “hook” your reader right from the get-go. Ideally, your title should be the hook. When creating the title, ask yourself if it would make you want to read the article. Your first paragraph should also serve as a hook , as well as a general introduction to the article content.

3. Write to one person only.
Forget the fact your article will be read by many people and write to only one person, just like I’m doing with you now.

4. Keep the flow logical.
Don’t bounce around from one idea to the next. Each paragraph should logically follow the next. Although there may be different ideas expressed in each paragraph, they should dovetail off each other.

5. Use quotes to support your main idea.
Quotes from famous people are a great method to reinforce your ideas. They help you make your point and add credibility to your overall message. I use the quote library found at Motivation Mecca http://www.joshhinds.com or Uinspire at http://www.uinspire.com

6. Keep your paragraphs short.
Ideally, 4-6 lines per paragraph is what you want to shoot for. It looks and feels much more appealing to the reader to see “bite-sized” paragraphs.

7. Inspire action in your article.
If your article is, in fact, intended to solve a common problem, give people practical suggestions for taking action. Remember the formula “insight + action = growth.”

8. When possible, tie your message to everyday activities.
A good example of this is “life is like a box of chocolates.” Make it easy for your reader to relate to your ideas. That will also make it easier for your reader to apply your ideas in their life.

9. Summarize the article in the final 1-2 paragraphs.
Briefly summarize the main points of your article, how people can take action from the information and what results they can achieve.

10. Don’t forget the resource box.
Provide a brief resource box following your article. It should tell a little about you, your business, how you serve others and how to contact you. Be sure to include your URL and email address with an invitation to contact you or visit your site.

Using these 10 tips should help you write powerful articles that get published and read. Above all else, remember this. A writer writes. So – first – be a writer in your own mind.