Walk the Talk: Likoma Uses ThemeForest Theme

Aug 25, 2010 No Comments by Bradley Charbonneau

It’s only been about five years, but I’m finally moving on from my old look to an elegant, powerful, and downright snazzy look for Likoma.

Lauren Deane, News, Partners Read more

Lee Foster Travel Journalism Wins SATW Awards

Jul 20, 2010 No Comments by Bradley Charbonneau

Lee Foster won four awards in the Society of American Travel Writers recent writing competition for its Western Chapter. The awards were announced at the Boise, Idaho chapter meeting in July 2010. Two of the awards were for his website.

News, Press Read more

Good Looking Ideas

Jul 14, 2010 1 Comment by Bradley Charbonneau

Lauren Deane of Good Looking Ideas (goodlookingideas.com) wanted a site that she could update herself but didn’t sacrifice design style. In fact, she wanted a site that didn’t sacrifice anything.

Artists, Featured, Features, Lauren Deane, Partners, Photo Gallery, Portfolio, Post Icons, Professionals, Websites, What, Who Read more

Gayle Keck

Jul 03, 2010 No Comments

With the expert design work of Cathy Grisham, we built Gayle a site that’s customized to her style and useful so she can add her award-winning work to the site with ease.

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Highly Recommended Web Design and Advertising Specialists!

Jun 23, 2010 No Comments

I had the good fortune to win a bid at the Rooftop School auction for an item to design a website—offered by the team of Bradley Charbonneau of Likoma and Gil Zeimer of Zeimer’s Advertising Shoppe to assist with both the website design and marketing ideas.

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WordPress Tutorial | Simple Custom Field

Jun 07, 2010 2 Comments

WordPress custom fields can be very powerful. Here’s a quick example of how one custom field is used for automatic thumbnails on the home page.

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BNI Embarcadero Gets a Marketing Makeover

Jun 02, 2010 No Comments

BNI Embarcadero (bniembarcadero.com) was a nice-looking, functional site. Until Lauren Deane of Good Looking Ideas came along.

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Social Media Strategy for Writers

May 29, 2010 No Comments

Here’s an excellent To Do List for writers to help promote your books, your writing, and your platform, put together by social media guru Chris Brogan.

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Loïc Photography

May 25, 2010 No Comments

Loïc Nicolas (loicphoto.com) needed a site that he could add to on a regular basis easily–but with style.

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Simon Vance

May 17, 2010 No Comments

Why switch to a content management sysytem? Because even if you do know HTML and CSS, it’s still going to be easier to add content using a content management system like WordPress.

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Carolyn Tillie

May 11, 2010 No Comments

Together with Dio Luria and John Muldoon, we transformed Carolyn Tillie’s jewelry site into a lean, mean, e-commerce machine. We found the WPA theme on ThemeForest and it’s a beaut.

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Host Gator

May 07, 2010 4 Comments

I’ve been using Host Gator for quite some time and I have to say I’m liking it. cPanel, toll-free phone support, locals who answer the phone. Oh, did I mention speed? Go go Gator!

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Accountability Associates

May 03, 2010 No Comments

Barbara Attard wanted a site where she could update her portfolio of experience and services in the world of accountability systems and oversight.

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Chief Location Officer

Apr 24, 2010 No Comments

Rip Gerber needed a site for his corporate Chief Location Officer news (chieflocationofficer.com). Rip knows how to work WordPress so now he has another site that’s working for him.

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Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted

Apr 16, 2010 No Comments

Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted. This memory size error seems to come up now and again. I get it too occasionally. One fix is to deactivate all plugins and then try again (then reactivate all plugins). A longer term fix is to edit your wp-config.php file and adding this line …

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Rip Gerber

Apr 15, 2010 No Comments

Rip Gerber needed a site that went beyond one of his first books (pharmathriller.com) and pulled together all of his books. At ripgerber.com, Rip can now add all of his books, writing, accolades, book covers, blurbs, the whole caboodle.

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iStockPhoto

Mar 30, 2010 No Comments

I’ve been using (and loving) iStockPhoto for ages. It’s a great place to give your site that extra kick — if you choose the right images.

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San Quentin T.R.U.S.T.

Mar 18, 2010 1 Comment

Working together with John Muldoon of The Watermark Group, we set up a beautiful theme, added some customization, content, copy, and the site was live.

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Nature Nurture

Mar 15, 2010 No Comments

Laurie King is at it again! But the thing is, she’s become such a WordPress pro that all I need to do is install WordPress on the server, upload the theme she’s already picked out, configure a few settings and plugins, and she’s off to the races.

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Kim Brown Seely

Mar 09, 2010 6 Comments

Kim Brown Seely has a stunning new site to showcase her writing. We found an excellent theme at ThemeForest, customized a few bits, added her content and voila!

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WordPress Tutorial | Overview of Basic Publishing (2.9.2)

Mar 05, 2010 6 Comments

A brief overview of publishing a post (or a page) in WordPress 2.9.2. Adding text, images, categories, etc.

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All switched, no problems, thanks.

Feb 25, 2010 1 Comment

Quoting Rip Gerber (pharmathriller.com) after we switched his email from a Microsoft Exchange email system to Google Apps: All switched, no problems, thanks.

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WordPress Tutorial | WordPress E-Commerce Shortcodes

Feb 24, 2010 2 Comments

With shortcodes, you can add a quick Buy Now or Add to Cart button directly in a post/page on your site.

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WordPress Tutorial | Page Template and Recent Posts from Category

Feb 19, 2010 2 Comments

Rather than having code in your editor put it in a page template. Especially if the code is page specific. In this way, we clean up the page editing area and make it “unbreakable” for users who are in there adding content and don’t want to have to not watch out and break code. We [...]

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WordPress Auto Install on GoDaddy

Feb 19, 2010 No Comments

With GoDaddy’s Deluxe Hosting, you can set up an unlimited amount of websites. Using their auto installer for WordPress, you can have your WordPress site up in under ten minutes.

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Gaines-Jones Education Foundation

Feb 17, 2010 No Comments

The Gaines-Jones Education Foundation needed a website that they could add to on their own. They wanted to be able to add new content, new images, upload PDFs, maybe have some fading featured news on the home page. Ready for the answer? WordPress. What a surprise.

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Dead Love

Feb 14, 2010 1 Comment

Linda Watanabe McFerrin has a new book coming out: Dead Love (deadlovebook.com).

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Mexico 2010 San Francisco

Feb 12, 2010 No Comments

The Bicentennial Celebrations of Mexican Independence is in 2010 and the consulate needed a website to let people know about events, updates, and news. Mexico 2010 San Francisco (mexico2010sf.com) was a collaborative effort among the consulate, their design team, Gil Zeimer (copywriter) and Lauren Deane Evans (art director). The site allows the consulate staff easy [...]

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WordPress Tutorial Custom Post Background

Feb 04, 2010 2 Comments

Different backgrounds on different pages? Of course, but I didn’t know it’d be this easy.

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WordPress Tutorial: Photo Galleries

Jan 25, 2010 No Comments

WordPress has a few options built into the core that allow you to add a gallery of images. In this video screencast, I’ll walk through uploading images and adding them to a WordPress gallery.

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WordPress Tutorial: Adding Images in WP E-Commerce

Dec 18, 2009 7 Comments

The WordPress E-Commerce plugin is a powerful e-commerce/shopping cart plugin that works well and is easy to use. In this screencast, I walk through adding new products and adding images.

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SF Urban Community Housing Corporation

Dec 17, 2009 No Comments

SF Urban Community Housing Corporation (sfurbanchc.org) needed a system to update their site more easily and give the look a style upgrade.

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WordPress Tutorial: Uploading Large Files

Dec 11, 2009 7 Comments

Depending on your hosting environment, you may have run into time-outs or errors when trying to upload large files in WordPress. I used two plugins: myFTP and Add from Server to solve the problem.

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Speech Writing Pro

Nov 16, 2009 2 Comments

Kevin Ferguson wanted a new site for his professional speech writing blog. Step up to the mike: Speech Writing Pro.

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Absolute Control

Nov 13, 2009 No Comments

Seph Paul wanted a site for his professional organizer practice. We found him a beautiful layout, customized the banner to his liking and colors and voila: he’s up and running.

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Adults on the Autism Spectrum

Nov 12, 2009 No Comments

Nancy Perry wanted a platform to help promote her book, “Adults on the Autism Spectrum.” With design help from Tim Johnson, we created a clean, smart, and useful site for the author and her book.

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iThemes

Nov 10, 2009 1 Comment

I seem to almost go back to the drawing board every time I’m looking for a new theme (layout/design) for a client. Working together with Lauren Deane for a current client, we found a theme that the client was going to love.

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Living Abroad in Costa Rica Blog

Nov 09, 2009 4 Comments

Erin Van Rheenen needed a blog site to work alongside her main site so she could easily blog from the road. With Laurie King at the marketing and strategy helm, we did just that.

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Young’s Travel Services

Nov 06, 2009 No Comments

Ellen Young (youngstravelservices.com) needed a site for her travel services. Gil Zeimer, copywriter extraordinaire (zeimer.com) worked the copy and provided the far-away photos and Likoma put it all together with a one-way-ticket to WordPress.

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Todd Coaching

Nov 02, 2009 No Comments

Working together with The M-Line and Tim Johnson, we put together a beauty of a site for Todd Coaching (toddcoachingexcellence.com). From custom fields for thumbnails to pulling in certain categories pulled into a home page widget, this site has bells and whistles written all over it. But at first glance, you’re not overwhelmed with the bells or the whistles, you just get: professional and elegant.

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Collage Gallery

Oct 30, 2009 1 Comment

The Collage Gallery (collage-gallery.com) needed a site they could update easily but also show off the beauty of the work. Working together with John Muldoon (thewatermarkgroup.org), we gathered up Delisa’s best shots from her gallery, stapled on an easy-to-navigate framework, glued it all together with a bit of WordPress and we were open for business.

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Adding or removing members from Mailman mailing list software

Oct 21, 2009 1 Comment

Mailman (usually provided for free with a cPanel backend control panel on Unix hosting) does a good job with mailing lists. This is one-to-all email, not necessarily a newsletter that everyone in the group can use. Pretty simple software, but it works well. Here’s a quick video showing how to add a new member to a list or remover an existing member from a list.

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Manual WordPress install on cPanel

Oct 08, 2009 1 Comment

A how-to screencast on intstalling WordPress onto a UNIX server using cPanel. Set up the database, set up a user, add the user to the database, upload the zip file, unzip, go to the URL, done.

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Julie Gorton

Oct 02, 2009 1 Comment

Julie Gorton (juliegortonsart.com) needed a simple site to show a gallery of her work. WordPress + SimpleViewer and done. SimpleViewer creates a beautiful slide show of images that are easy to update. It does a nice job of using a simple backend to still create a Flash slide show.

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WordPress Tutorial (2.8.4) Statistics and Keywords

Sep 24, 2009 2 Comments

Overview of the dashboard stats and then deeper statistics provided by the wordpress.com stats plugin. Quickly go over the different areas of the stats (Referrers, Top Posts & Pages, Search Engine Terms, Clicks, and Incoming Links) and then a bit of analysis of the keywords. Finally, a very brief example of how to put those keywords to use in a particular post using the All-in-One SEO plugin.

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WordPress Tutorial (2.8.4) Lifestyle Theme, Adding Images, Thumbnails, etc.

Sep 23, 2009 9 Comments

A quick overview of Brian Gardner’s StudioPress Lifestyle theme. I walk through adding/changing the thumbnail images on the home page (resizing), adding text, image, and “featured text” to the Featured Content Gallery on the home page, editing some basic text formatting in a post and finally using the Random Quotes plugin.

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Adding Photos to PhotoNexus WordPress Theme

Sep 18, 2009 No Comments

In this WordPress tutorial, I’ll show you how to add photos to your galleries for the PhotoNexus theme for WordPress. I’ll also show you how to add a new gallery (category) and then sort the categories in the sidebar. Click image to left to view video.

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ME’DI.ATE

Sep 18, 2009 No Comments

Mediate needed a site that could let them easily post their video, have a smart design, and have a few content pages as well. They found the “Video” theme by Quommunication and we were on our way.

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Thesis WordPress Theme

Sep 17, 2009 2 Comments

The Thesis Theme for WordPress is a high-quality template system that you can use to improve your site immediately.

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Foster Travel Publishing

Sep 15, 2009 1 Comment

Lee Foster was looking to overhaul his travel writing and travel photography site. He had quite a complex set up with CNAME entries leading to custom URLs at PhotoShelter, a custom shopping cart that worked with PayPal, 250+ articles with loads of text, images, slideshows, and a blog at TypePad? Whew. Ready?

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WordPress Tutorial (2.8.4) Your Profile (and Extended Profile)

Sep 11, 2009 No Comments

Need to update your password, email address, phone number, business name or other contact information on your WordPress website? Here’s how.

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TheatreFIRST goes backstage for a makeover

Sep 10, 2009 No Comments

TheatreFIRST (theatrefirst.com) needed a fresh new look. Creative Mint took the design lead and Likoma teamed up with Tim Johnson Design to put all of the design goodness into action.

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Ugo Baldassari

Sep 02, 2009 No Comments

Ugo Baldassari needed a professional site for his real estate practice. With Paschal Sabatella at the creative design helm and WordPress in the engine room, we together came up with ugo4homes.com.

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How 2 Benefit

Aug 20, 2009 No Comments

Julianne Howard needed a rebranding of her MLH Training site and marketing materials. Together with Lauren Deane Evans, we put up a new logo, a new site, and new brochures.

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Straight To DVD Movies

Jul 30, 2009 No Comments

Straight To DVD Movies (www.straight2dvdmovies.com) needed some video, some “Featured Posts” and David knows what he’s doing, so he really just needed me to find a WordPress theme that was easy to use, looked great, and was flexible for the tons of content he’s going to be putting up there.

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Personal Checks with Your Own Photos

Jul 28, 2009 3 Comments

I needed some new checks (because I write at least 4 per year and I haven’t ordered in six years … ) but I went through the zillions of images of cute dogs and panoramic vistas and just couldn’t find anything I wanted on my checks.

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Sin and Syntax

Jul 14, 2009 No Comments

Constance Hale needed a site to help promote her book and classes. She also wanted to able to write a blog and edit the content of her site.

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Professional Photographers of the Greater Bay Area

Jun 04, 2009 3 Comments

The Professional Photographers of the Greater Bay Area (ppgba.org) needed a revamp because only a technical few could update the legacy backend software on the site.

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The M-Line Blog

May 29, 2009 1 Comment

The M-Line Branding wanted a blog to match their site. Together we matched up their header, customized the sidebars to show the latest posts from selected categories, and they now have a seamless blog to supplement their site.

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Law Office of Jeffrey A. Moss

May 25, 2009 No Comments

Jeffrey A. Moss needed a site for his law firm where he could add new information on a regular basis.

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Spencer Rosen

May 22, 2009 1 Comment

Spencer Rosen needed a professional, clean and lean site for his strategic consulting practice. He had his Table of Contents/Sitemap ready to go, a PowerPoint with some layout directions, add a generous helping of WordPress and we’re rolling.

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Bay Area Travel Writers

Apr 21, 2009 1 Comment

Bay Area Travel Writers had been using a custom-coded website for many years and worked very well … until the custom coder was too busy to help. Combining Memberclicks and WordPress, they’re back in action and just about anyone with a browser and a knowledge of cut and paste can add content.

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Northgate Chiropractic

Apr 12, 2009 7 Comments

Northgate Chiropractic (northgatechiro.com) wanted the same look, but needed the ability to update their site easily — or at all. With Gil Zeimer at the copywriting and project management helm, it was 1, 2, WordPress = done. Before After

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Moving WordPress from one sub-directory to another

Mar 18, 2009 14 Comments

I needed to move a site from the sub-directory /wordpress/to the new one /blog/. No worries: bit of an .htaccess file edit and I should be set, right? Not so fast.

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WordPress Tutorial: Adding a Hyperlink

Mar 17, 2009 5 Comments

Using the TinyMCE WYSIWYG editing in WordPress, it’s easy to add a link to your site’s page/post/content. Watch the screencast to see it magically done before your eyes.

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StudioPress Revolution WordPress Themes

Mar 07, 2009 10 Comments

Brian Gardner over at (what’s now called) StudioPress has a beautiful collection of professional WordPress themes for sale. He updates them regularly and has a broad collection with a variety of applications (real estate, photo galleries, etc.).

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Bob Cooper

Mar 07, 2009 1 Comment

Bob Cooper (bob-cooper.com) just wanted a “resume” site. Just a quick list of what he writes, some of his writing, and maybe a few articles posted here and there. Easy enough, right?

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Jewel and Stoneman

Feb 26, 2009 5 Comments

Jewel & Stoneman wanted to be able to update the content on their website. They liked the design of the site, but they couldn’t edit the content. Meet Likoma and WordPress.

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What’s Up Down Under

Feb 24, 2009 1 Comment

Laurie King is at it again. What’s Up Down Under is her latest site revival. Was an ancient HTML site, but we brought it back to life with WordPress — and WAY back to life.

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Erskine and Tulley

Feb 18, 2009 No Comments

For the longer-term strategy of future edits, additions, and general content control, we switched their site from a straight HTML site to a content management system using WordPress.

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Setting up an email group (or forwarder) in Google Apps

Feb 07, 2009 5 Comments

Google Apps (for email) used to have simple forwarders, but now they use Groups as forwarders so you can email to more than one person. Lots of options to work with.

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Setting up a new email address in Google Apps

Feb 06, 2009 8 Comments

You’re all set up with Google Apps, loving it, and want to add a new email address. Not just a forwarder, but a real account with POP access and webmail access etc. Here’s a step-by-step video to show you how.

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Jim Benning’s New Look

Feb 04, 2009 No Comments

Two years ago we did a site for Jim Benning and he wanted a new look for 2009: jimbenning.net. He had a site that he liked the look of in mind, sent me the URL and a few images, and we were off to the drawing board.

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An Erotic Alphabet

Feb 03, 2009 3 Comments

Laurie King needed yet another site (travelwritersnews.com, laurieking.com, hotflashessexystories.com, batw.org) so we whipped one into shape this afternoon: eroticalphabet.com.

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The Young People’s Teen Musical Theatre Company

Jan 30, 2009 No Comments

They had a site and had some information on it The Young People’s Teen Musical Theatre Company, but the people who were updating it didn’t have much time and only those people knew how to make updates. Sound familiar?

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Financial District Dental Care Gets a Cleaning

Jan 28, 2009 No Comments

Michael Hack’s Financial District Dental Care first had a site, then a WordPress site, then a custom PHP site, and is now back to WordPress with Likoma.

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“You won’t find a better site designer, regardless of your budget.”

Jan 23, 2009 No Comments

Bradley designed my site on a tight budget, completing it in record time and with a great deal of strategic long-term thinking.

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Prose Doctors

Jan 15, 2009 No Comments

“The Prose Doctors is a great group of editing professionals, and I’d trust my project to them for any procedure–from a basic check-up to a full colonoscopy.” — Jeff Greenwald

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Mental Floss

Jan 13, 2009 3 Comments

Together with copywriter Gil Zeimer, Likoma created a newsletter for Financial District Dental Care using Mail Chimp: Mental Floss!

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WordPress Tutorial: Cleaning Up Microsoft Word Formatting

Jan 13, 2009 8 Comments

If you paste content from Microsoft Word (or any formatted content) directly into the editing area of the WordPress backend, chances are a bunch of formatting code will come with it. Here’s a video to help clean up the mess.

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Mail Chimp

Jan 12, 2009 6 Comments

Great stats, easy-to-use editor to create your newsletter, love the backend interface, and, well, yeah, funny monkeys hanging around. Also, like Vertical Response, they don’t force you to do a monthly plan, but you can pay per recipient only when you send a newsletter.

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Erika Mailman writes new books, gets new website

Jan 07, 2009 2 Comments

Erika Mailman (erikamailman.com) had new books out and needed a fresh look.

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Redirection

Dec 27, 2008 2 Comments

As often happens, a client wants a link to an external site in a menu list. Sure, I could make a custom (manual) bullet list and make the page names and the links to them or the categories and their links and then just put the name and link to the external site in between. But that wouldn’t be pretty.

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Carbonite

Dec 22, 2008 5 Comments

I shied away from online backup because I have backup drives scattered around the house, the office, I make DVDs once in a while, I have portable backup drives, and ach, I’d only lose a few days’ work anyway, right? Well, yeah, as long as you really do back up regularly. And as long as your house or office don’t burn down or get robbed.

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Overnight Prints

Dec 18, 2008 3 Comments

I’ve been using Overnight Prints for years because of their thick business cards and high quality printing. Graphic designers I work with use Overnight Prints for business cards, clients have ordered business cards as well as postcards.

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WordPress 2.7 Arrives

Dec 11, 2008 2 Comments

Check out this preview video (suitable for all audiences) showing off some of the hot new features of WordPress 2.7.

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A New Coat of Paint for Brush Fire Painting Workshops

Dec 11, 2008 No Comments

Naomi Rifkin’s Brush Fire Painting Workshops (paintbrushfire.org) needed a fresh coat of paint since its life from Dreamweaver to MovableType to WordPress and now to a fresh new look (still in WordPress).

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Elegant WordPress Themes

Dec 10, 2008 2 Comments

You’d think, “Hey, Likoma, you’re a WordPress developer, why are you promoting other themes on your site?” Well, in a word: WOW.

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That 80′s Blog

Dec 09, 2008 No Comments

Kevin Smokler needed an outlet for his 80′s trivia (that80sblog.com). I’m proud to have weaned him from TypePad (at least for this site) and brought him across the aisle to WordPress.

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Paradiso Press

Nov 25, 2008 No Comments

Zander Sprague is at it again, this time with Paradiso Press (paradisopress.com). He needed a clean, simple site up and running for his new publishing company. Voila!

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10 Things You Need To Know About WordPress 2.7

Nov 19, 2008 6 Comments

Like WordPress 2.5, the bulk of the changes affect the WordPress admin. Unlike WordPress 2.5, however, this is not merely an update of the backend but a complete rebuilding.

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Fritz Cartoons

Oct 30, 2008 2 Comments

Marty Wall’s Fritz Cartoons needed a showcase for his fantastic cartoon work. He needed to be able to upload daily cartoons quickly, easily, and professionally. Meet WordPress.

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WordPress Tutorial: Simple Image Gallery with Captions

Oct 27, 2008 16 Comments

We wanted to get some images into WordPress side by side and with captions, but also in categories on the same page.

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San Francisco Delayed Exchange

Oct 24, 2008 1 Comment

John Kalayjian needed a site for his San Francisco Delayed Exchange site. We combined a sleek and clean logo (Red Letter Day Graphic Design) with smart copywriting (Zeimer’s Advertising Shoppe), and WordPress features to create a clean, easy-to-navigate, professional site.

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The Accidental Santera

Oct 20, 2008 1 Comment

Irete Lazo’s The Accidental Santera brings together the beauty of the book, its colors, its icons and shapes, and the feature-rich backend of WordPress.

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ThoughtCast

Sep 23, 2008 No Comments

Jenny Attiyeh’s ThoughtCast is a superb mix of media showing off the powers of WordPress.

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WordPress Tutorial: Creating a simple post (2.6.1)

Sep 07, 2008 6 Comments

Here’s a brief WordPress tutorial that covers adding a simple post to your site. I choose the category, give it a title, paste in some body text, publish, and voila!

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Browser Shots

Sep 06, 2008 2 Comments

A client said her site looked wonky in Internet Explorer 5.5. Of course, my first reaction is, “Internet Explorer 5.5? Well … ” But I was determined to see if it’d be an easy fix. Otherwise, I’d tell her that 0.00238% of the population uses that browser and … ” You get the idea. The [...]

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WordPress Tutorial: Uploading images and adding captions (2.6.1)

Sep 02, 2008 7 Comments

With WordPress 2.6 +, image captions are built into the core image/media manager so no more need for plugins! Also, the video directly below is using WP 2.6.1 and the new media manager, its upload, editing, alignment, and caption function — all built into the core now.

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