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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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.

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!

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

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.

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 …

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.

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.

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.

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.

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!

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

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

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

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 [...]

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.

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.

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

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 [...]

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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?

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.).

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?

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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?

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.

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

“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

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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).

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

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.

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!

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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!

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 [...]

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.