WordPress as a CMS - The Plugin Approach

This is the original presentation I gave at the WordPress Houston Meetup on 6/27/2011 about using WordPress as a CMS with help from select plugins. I had been using WordPress at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston since 2009 for various projects and had plans to migrate the main UT Medical School website over to WordPress Multisite in late summer 2011.

Transcript

1. WORDPRESS AS A CMS: THE PLUGIN APPROACH
2. ABOUT ERIC RASCH My Lifestream EricRasch.com Office of Communications bit.ly/utooc This presentation @ SlideShare bit.ly/m9VQZG EricRasch since 2003
3. PLUGINS... BY THE NUMBERS 14,949 total plugins in the repository @ WordPress.org top 5 most popular... probably: All in One SEO Pack 8,081,370 downloads; seo Google XML Sitemaps 5,338,513 downloads; seo Akismet 6,974,351 downloads; security Contact Form 7 4,131,953 downloads; form NextGEN Gallery 3,415,754 times; media
4. SPEAKING OF NUMBERS... WORDPRESS SITES IN THE WORLD.
5. STARTING WITH A PLUGIN CORE SET (most of these make it into each site I develop) Akismet Analytics360 Broken Link Checker BulletProof Security DBC Backup Duplicate Post Enable Media Replace Google Analytics (Yoast) Google XML Sitemaps Gravity Forms + MailChimp Add-On + User Registration Jetpack More Fields More Taxonomies More Types Scissors Continued Search Everything Search Meter Secure WordPress SEO Ultimate W3 Total Cache WordPress SEO (Yoast) WordPress Ultimate Security WP-Optimize WP Smush.it for Multisite Google XML Sitemaps with Multisite support Remove /blog slug plugin for WPMU for Theme Development AskApache What Is This Convert Post Types Simply Show IDs Theme-Check
6. SO WHAT MAKES THESE WEBSITES TICK?
7. 98.6 DEGREES BLOG A blog? You lied! I know but it’s a great site. The killer thing about this site is it only took 30 minutes to train Dr. King (2 years ago) on how to keep it updated. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Broken Link Checker Google Analytics (Yoast) SEO Ultimate 14 plugins 19 Posts 8 Pages
8. DIAGNOSTIC IMAGING This site redesign needed a good scrubbing. Import HTML did the heavy lifting, WP handled the pretty permalinks (and a whole lot more), and AZIndex made the faculty list easy-peasy. top 3 plugins that made a difference: AZIndex Duplicate Post Import HTML 16 plugins 68 Posts 31 Pages
9. DII ONLINE CONSULT Gravity Forms really made this site pull together. With the User Registration and FreshBooks add-ons, GF provided a round-trip ordering experience for the user. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Gravity Forms + User Registration Add-On + FreshBooks Add-On 16 plugins 2 Posts 26 Pages
10. IBP RESERVATION SYSTEM The Department of Integrative Biology needed a way to register users, verify credentials, and reserve equipment rentals. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Booking Calendar BuddyPress Gravity Forms 30 plugins 1 Posts 9 Pages
11. ORL / ENT NEWSLETTERS Dr. Citardi publishes 2 email newsletters. He wanted an easy way to maintain the content types and signup users. MailChimp’s Analytics360 helped keep a close watch on the action. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Gravity Forms MailChimp Add-On Analytics360 More Types 38 plugins 202 Posts 4 Pages
12. ARC COURSE A simple site for giving potential attendees a way to get information, signup for newsletter updates, and register for upcoming courses. Gravity Forms to the rescue. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Gravity Forms PayPal Add-On Gravity Forms User Registration Add-On WordPress HTTPS 24 plugins 0 Posts 11 Pages
13. ORL FRONTIERS COURSE Dr. Citardi wanted to keep his course registrations websites separate, but still have the capabilities with a slightly different look. Child Themes made it a quick & easy turnaround. top 3 plugins that made a difference: CMS Tree Page View MapPress Easy Google Maps W3 Total Cache 24 plugins 0 Posts 8 Pages
14. UT PHYSICIANS Long before Custom Post Types, Magic Fields gave us a way customize profiles for our physicians. WP Custom Search gave us a way for them to be found. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Magic Fields WP Custom Search Redirection 41 plugins 930 Posts 35 Pages
15. UT MIST Another static site needing a cleanup with a strong way to maintain and enhance their current SEO efforts. WordPress provided a built- in way for multiple parties to keep the site rolling. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Import HTML WordPress SEO (Yoast) Viper's Video Quicktags 27 plugins 12 Posts 36 Pages
16. Pages Posts plugins JOHN RITTER RESEARCH Quick build, rapid turnaround, lasting results. Within 9 days we had this site launched and ready to spread-the-word. top 3 plugins that made a difference: Search Meter Gravity Forms MailChimp Add-On WP No Category Base 26 21 15
17. WHAT’S TO COME?
18. REBUILDING A MEDICAL SCHOOL 2011 will reveal big changes with the UT Med School’s websites, as we convert from static sites to Multisite. Types of sites... Departments/Offices/Centers Campaigns Newsletters Faculty profiles Labs Plugins to help... Duplicator Networks for WordPress Add Clone Sites for WPMU (batch) Site Creation Wizard Social Metrics Content Scheduler Post Revision Workflow
19. THANK YOU! This presentation @ SlideShare bit.ly/m9VQZG