Steffan Antonas » Tutorials http://blog.steffanantonas.com A Blog on Community, Design and Technology Mon, 16 Aug 2010 13:51:02 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 The Power of “vs” metadata: How To Use Google To Quickly Find Competing Products and Services http://blog.steffanantonas.com/the-power-of-vs-metadata-how-to-use-google-to-quickly-find-competing-products-and-services.htm http://blog.steffanantonas.com/the-power-of-vs-metadata-how-to-use-google-to-quickly-find-competing-products-and-services.htm#comments Wed, 09 Jun 2010 18:28:45 +0000 Steffan Antonas http://blog.steffanantonas.com/?p=1955 This post was written by Steffan Antonas. Find more at blog.steffanantonas.com

The Power of “vs” metadata: How To Use Google To Quickly Find Competing Products and Services

]]> There’s a quick and dirty trick I’ve been using lately to do research on products and services. Whenever I’m about to make a big purchase or sign up for a new service, I like to know what my options are before I buy. So I go to Google’s home page and do a quick search on the product or service with “vs” attached. Before you click search, Google returns a list of the most searched on terms that include the the name of the product or service + vs. In under a second, you get a quick list of comparisons that others have made. It’s not a perfect solution, but you can often get a pretty good sense of what consumer shoppers doing their homework are comparing that product or service to. It’s a great way to use Google’s meta data to stumble on worthy competitors that you’ve never heard of that might be worth consideration…or even to find out who consumers think are YOUR biggest competitors. Like I said, it’s not a perfect solution, but it’s fast and serendipitous. The fact that the lists that Google is generating on the fly are based on search volume is great because it acts like a crowd-sourced vetting process, and it works often enough that it’s a useful place to begin your research.

Here are a couple of examples:

If you were considering LuLu.com to self publish a book, this might help. Did you know about CafePress or Blurb? Or that Amazon has self-publishing services?…

If you’re buying A Canon 7D DSLR (hint: big purchase), here’s a good approximation of most of the “worthy competitors” in the DLSR market that others are considering….

As with any Google search, the more specific you are, the better, and the less generic the name of the product or service, the better. ;-)

This post was written by Steffan Antonas. Find more at blog.steffanantonas.com

The Power of “vs” metadata: How To Use Google To Quickly Find Competing Products and Services

]]> http://blog.steffanantonas.com/the-power-of-vs-metadata-how-to-use-google-to-quickly-find-competing-products-and-services.htm/feed 0 How To Create A WordPress Theme From Scratch (Complete Video Series) http://blog.steffanantonas.com/how-to-create-a-wordpress-theme-from-scratch-complete-video-series.htm http://blog.steffanantonas.com/how-to-create-a-wordpress-theme-from-scratch-complete-video-series.htm#comments Thu, 22 Oct 2009 00:40:17 +0000 Steffan Antonas http://blog.steffanantonas.com/?p=1170 This post was written by Steffan Antonas. Find more at blog.steffanantonas.com

How To Create A WordPress Theme From Scratch (Complete Video Series)

]]> I recently found this video series on the theme forest community blog and thought it was so valuable that it was worth sharing with my readers. If you’re like me, you learn a heck of a lot better from being shown than from reading manuals and how-tos. This series of 7 videos put together by Drew from Themeforest.net is a great resource for visual learners looking to get into WordPress design. I just wish I had had it 2 years ago! Hat tip to Drew.

How To Install A WordPress Theme

Getting To Know The Admin Panel

Before diving straight in and developing a WordPress theme, it is vital to understand the basics and have a solid foundation to begin theme development. This video examines the WordPress admin panel and explores some of the key features.

How To Create A WordPress Theme From Scratch

Learn how to correctly set up your themes stylesheet and information, as well as create the index.php page. In addition, you’ll examine WordPress template tags, what they are, and how to use them properly.

How The WordPress Loop Works

Learn how to use the WordPress loop as well as some handy template tags to start pulling out and displaying content from our database.

How To Build Sidebars, Format Posts and How The WordPress Template Hierarchy Works

Learn how to split and call separate theme files and include them in your theme. Splitting theme code into different and organized files is a vital part of WordPress development. You’ll also learn some very helpful php functions and useful WordPress template tags to create a widgetized sidebar.

In this second video you’ll continue to split up your theme files in order to allow you more flexibilty when working with your theme. You’ll also learn more about the Wordpress template hierarchy. In addition, you will create and manage your single.php files, which will help you format your individual posts.

How To Widgetize Your WordPress Theme

In this tutorial, you’ll create a few more files from scratch and finish making your sidebar widget ready and have a look at what that means and how it works. Get your text editor and local server ready.

This post was written by Steffan Antonas. Find more at blog.steffanantonas.com

How To Create A WordPress Theme From Scratch (Complete Video Series)

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