If you want to place google ads in your posts, there are two ways to do it. One is to edit your theme and place your adsense codes right in the theme file. This requires a bit of php programming so I won’t really delve into this topic for this entry. The other option which I want to focus on for now is to install the exec-php plugin which can be downloaded here.

1. Download the extracted exec-php.zip file in your online installation using ftp in the wp-content/plugins/ folder

2. Activate the plug-in in your admin panel

3. Create a new entry to test the plugin

4. In the text editor, click the “code” tab right beside the “visual” tab

5. Copy your adsense code and paste it there (when you switch the editor to the visual editor, the adsense cannot be seen)

6. Publish the entry

7. Check if the adsense code displayed well in the front page

The plug-in actually disables the Wordpress feature that filters out the entries from programming language. This allows both php and javascript to be executed even in posts.

Note: Google adsense a maximum of four ads only within a page. This could cause the remaining adsense exceeding the number not to appear.

By doing so, a page break is automatically inserted. In HTML code, it would look like

< ! – - more – - >

which Wordpress interprets as simply, a page break.

Then, continue with the entry.

Upon publishing, the word “more..” (depending on the theme used) should be displayed right where you placed the page break.

Please note that this only works for non-single/non-permalink web page such as front page, archives, categories, and searches where the post is shown as an excerpt to the more point.

Choosing a Blog Niche

The reason why one should choose a blog niche is the reality that all of us are masters of something but no one is a master of everything. If you want to develop a blog that you think would be rich and interesting, it would be a good practice to select one for your blog. There are also other benefits aside from those mentioned above in limiting your blog to a certain interest like loyal readership, better credibility and profile and even more advertiser attractive. The following questions may help you in choosing one:

Does the topic interest you? If you want to do your blogging for a long time, you would have to talk about it over and over and over again. That means you would have to explore more and more into the intricacies of it. If there is interest, there is a natural curiosity for it. If there is curiosity for it, doing a more research about it will be far more enjoyable and fulfilling for you as a blogger.

Does the topic interest others? Finding what tickles readers is really a big thing in writing interesting posts. If there is one thing that readers have very little, it’s time so as a blogger, you must give them there time’s worth, giving them as close to what they need as possible.

Can you provide ample content? Creating blogs with niches require you not just to write about what you already know but also to more research on the topic you are talking about. The resources for such research must be readily available for yo. Consider not just data available on the web but more so on books and past readings.

Finding a Blog Hosting

When you have finally decided on what topic niche you’ll have, it is highly recommended that your domain name (or your url ) would include keywords that relate to your niche. For example, if you wish to talk about dogs, a good url would be http://dogs.wordpress.com or best would be http://dogs.com. Of course, those examples are already taken for sure but the point stands out. Search engines rank you higher for words that are within your url.

A huge issue in blog hosting is whether to create a blog in free hosting sites like blogger.com or wordpress.com or to purchase a domain and hosting for your site

If you decide to create a blog in free hosting sites

the advantages include:

• usually a user-friendly blog admin interface and blog themes that is readily available upon sign-up
• free of charge hosting (except your expense in surfing the web in case you pay it yourself)
• free technical support from hosting administrator and usually documented processes
• enjoying new features and plug-ins available.

The disadvantages however include:

• less freedom to customize site
• more difficulty in developing a domain name identity as you will be tagged along the hosting site address
• less probable to receive advertising offers, especially if you are hosted in really crowded hosting sites.

If you decide to buy your own domain name and hosting

the advantages include:

• fully customizing the site to your liking
• easier monitoring of your site statistics (for strategy development) as you can avail of free website stats services for web masters
• establishing your site’s domain name with your identity as a blogger

The disadvantages include:

• the requirement to learn a bit of coding and even programming unless you opt to pay someone to do it for you (this can be an advantage however if you eye on learning more in information technology)
• features available in free hosting sites must be done manually by you or your webmaster
• payment must be made for domain name and hosting renewal (usually annually).

Placing Entries in Your Blog

This is where the real meat of blogging comes in. You would have to create entries within your topic niche that’s really interesting and read-worth for your readers. You may use humor, poetry or some other writing skills. The choice is yours.

In any web site, the content is the most thing for readers, may it be articles, poetries or images. It is because of the content that people keep coming back to read from your blog so a huge effort in creating good ones must be taken.

I received an email from an online buddy Dave Aguila, asking me about how to send his newsletter to people who want to subscribe to it. If his newsletter is online, the thing that pops from my mind is the use of RSS feeds as medium of subscription and updates. Here it goes.

RSS which stands for Really Simple Syndication (previously called Rich Site Summary) is actually a page (an xml file) in your site that can display regularly changing web content. That “regularly changing web content” in your case is your blog’s content. Using RSS, you can keep your readers informed by letting them retrieve the latest content from your site. It saves time for you since you don’t need to email your subscribers anymore. It also saves time for your subscribers since they don’t need to visit your site anymore. Moreover, RSS ensures privacy in the part of the subscriber by not needing them to join your email newsletter.

Why the need for RSS Feed if you got the main page?

The reason I see for this is that, as your index page (main page) may vary in terms of actual html code (since blogs very in terms of design and layout), this rss file in your site follows a coding rule which is standard across the web. To illustrate this, click on this link: davao wordpresser rss feed and this link: hugsmiles free blog hosting rss feed . If you clicked both links, you will find two pages that look similar in terms of format. But, if you click their main sites’ pages : davao wordpresser and hugsmiles free blog hosting respectively, you can see that the two sites would look differently. In order for this dynamic content updates to be universal, it has to follow a certain standard format. That format is the file in XML format (*.xml) which is the RSS file included with many website platforms including Wordpress.

How do you allow people to subscribe to your feed

This is where you need an RSS Aggregator. An RSS Aggregator also known as a feed aggregator, feed reader, news reader or simply as an aggregator, is client software or a web application which aggregates (collects) syndicated web content such as news headlines, blogs (your blog in this case), podcasts, and video blogs in a single location for easy viewing. Examples of these online RSS Aggregators are Feedburner.com and Google Reader . As a publisher of your feed, you have to register to an RSS Aggregator of your choice. Depending on the aggregator, you usually register your RSS feed url (right click on your site’s Entries RSS or alternatively Comments RSS if you want them to subscribe to the latest comments on your blog; then copy link location or url) into your new account in the aggregator that you chose. Then, they can provide you details on placing a link in your blog. This link, when clicked by the reader who wants to subscribe, directs them to a page where they can subscribe to your feed.

Aside from subscriptions, RSS feed can also be used to

• Notify people of the arrival of new products in a store
• Weather and other alerts of changing conditions
• Notification of additions of new items to a database, new messages received or new members to a group

These are just some of the many ways an RSS can be used. Try to experiment a little. Who knows, you just might think of a very good use of RSS feeds for your website.

“Imagine that your website or blog is one of the television stations. Just as these stations earn from advertisings, so will you earn through your site.”

Please take note that from here onwards, I shall interchange the terms blog, blogsite, site or website. The term “Blog” which is actually derived from the words “Web Log” is just one of the different forms of a website.

The Dynamics of Your Site as a Channel

If you know a bit about marketing, you would agree that tv stations who have higher ratings are more likely to receive advertising offers. The same is true with your site as a channel or station. The higher your ratings, the higher offers you’ll get. ( I wonder not about fuzz over those tv ratings they are talking about, hehe). Kidding aside, the next question would be how to increase your site’s ratings. Or more importantly, how do you know your rating in the first place? Hold on to those questions as it opens us to a whole new topic springing from where we are right now.

One twist with our nutty explanation however is that, unlike television stations which do not really reach up to a thousand in number worldwide, there are millions of blogs readily open for business in the world wide web to date. So how does your eetsie bitsy tinny winny blog get recognized in the crowded blogosphere (a term used in the virtual environment where blogs interconnect with each other)? Through search engines. We’ll tackle that one too pretty soon. Just keep those ideas coming and those brains absorbing. I just really need to hit the sack.

But before that, let me tell you why I decided to create this new category. Recently, I have been asked by friends and those whom I meet online about how to earn through blogging. Some who know me personally were aware that I am earning online already. It could be by chance that they all come together in one time or maybe they saw Mel and Joey’s episode on “How to Make Money through Blogging” where, according to Abe Olandres (one of the professional bloggers featured in the segment) there was “Too much hype” about it, giving the impression that earning is too easy. I agree with Abe on this. Blogging is for everyone but earning through blogging is only for those who are willing to give all that they got for it – patience, hard work and a lot of time.

Anyway, as I was saying. With all these currently happening, I received a suggestion to blog about it. That way, I get too keep their questions recorded online so as not to miss any, especially the important ones. Thanks dear.

So here it is, launched is the category about earning online. I do not boast though of my earnings ( and i do not intend to) but I am just passionate in telling anybody who asks me that earning through the web, not just in blogging, is really possible.

Now, where do I start? Hmm…

This is one of the things that I think Wordpress webmasters are really satisfied about in WP – their online, fully documented, highly accessible, sincerely created and not to mention FREE support and updates. Many are thankful for the development of this open-source platform. I don’t mean to over do it, raising WP up my clouds. It’s just that I myself is a beneficiary of the efforts of the developers.

I have encountered quite a lot in terms of errors or customized features throughout my wordpress projects and the community seem to be there 24/7 available for consultation. Wordpressers do not also get behind the times as updates like these are very much announced to the world and to their community.

Summing it up, I am very grateful to have been learning Wordpress all along. To all the developers, kudos and more power!

The main difference between the two is that the regular, stand-alone Wordpress (WP) installation

1. Caters for single blogs (which can have multiple users but single administration panel)
2. Its theme can be customized online (using the theme editor)
3. The plug-ins can be edited

while Wordpress Multi-User (WP MU)

1. Is designed to cater from hundreds to thousands of blogs, each with own administration panel.
2. Its theme editor is disabled since one instance of a theme is shared among the users (which means what one gets from a theme is the same to all who uses the same theme)
3. Plugins cannot be edited.

These differences are some of the most obvious in the user side.

Here are points that explain WP MU features further

1. It is created based on WP. It is created as a “shell outside” a regular Wordpress installation. According to their website, 95%- 99% of the core of WP MU is WP.
2. WP MU can have multiple blogs in one installation which means smaller file size for the hosting. Imagine installing fifty (50) blogs using WP on one hosting and WP MU on the other. The savings in terms of size is huge, especially for a website owner.
3. The installation process is different.
4. The panel for the “super administrator” or the site owner can be hidden to regular users, depending on the restrictions.
5. There is a folder named “mu-plugins”. All plug-ins placed inside it are automatically enabled site wide.
6. It still has the folder “plugins” (which is also present in WP). All plugins placed inside it which can be enabled per blog by the specific blog owner (a.k.a. sub-administrator).
7. WP MU requires the site owner (or the web master) to know a bit of programming and coding. If you plan to use WPMU, it is recommended that you tinker with WP first.

Themes that are available online for download are generally working for both installations. The theme management system stayed mainly the same for both installations I guess.

There are issues on installing plug-ins however. Many plug-ins designed for WP do not run on WP MU mainly because there is a difference in accessing and creating tables in the database. Some common plug-ins (like Akismet) can work if this is placed on the “plug-ins” folder and not the “mu plug-ins” folder. A set of plug-ins compatible for Wordpress MU can be found here.

Some of my sites that uses WP MU include this Davao City web community, Tagadabaw.com as well as this online shop, Toinky.com.

To sum it up, if you plan to maintain like 20 to 30 blogs or so or offer a blog hosting (may it be free or for a minimum fee), Wordpress Multi User is for you. You just have to get ready to get your hands dirty with ample amounts of code and a bit of programming or you can hire one who can set it up for you and teach you how to manage it.

If you plan to maintain fewer than 20 blogs (this is a personal preference based on experience by the way), then I recommend the regular stand alone Wordpress installation.

That’s it for now. May the blogging force be with you.