If it's about blogging and blogging tools we'll talk about it! But watch out we may yack a bit about programming too!
Recently, I did a presentation a the Web414 June Meet Up, which is a group of developers, designers, programmers, publishers and webpreneurs in the greater Milwaukee area here in Wisconsin. They invited me to speak on a topic I love and am passionate about: WordPress. I got to pick my own topic – which is never easy when it comes to WordPress, because there is just so MUCH that can be talked about when it comes to WordPress, isn’t there?
Pick just one topic and keep it down to about 30 minutes, or so. It’s a challenge!
In the end, the topic I chose is one that is of particular interest to designers and themers of WordPress. I talked about different ways to put your content on display in a more creative way, than just your typical blog layout.
This is otherwise known as: WordPress Magazine Themes. The popularity of which cannot be denied.
WordPress Magazine Themes take the focus away from presenting your content in a chronological fashion into a more categorized, topical way. This type of theme turns the front page of your site into a grand portal of the content contained within, allowing you to bring forward content that may not have, normally, remained on your front page for very long.
My presentation is available for download – just click the image in this post and it will take you right to it, and it contains the code and template tags you would need to accomplish such a layout.
In my presentation, I took a look at four different elements in this type of layout:
What does it take to create a Magazine-type layout?
The code provided in my presentation is code that I use in the Main Index template of the theme. This functions as the front page of the site – with other templates used for the internal pages (ie: Single Post template, Archives, Default Page, etc)
Leading Articles
Back in the day, I might have used a plugin like WP Sticky to accomplish this. Using that plugin, I could ‘stick’ a certain post at the top of my display of chronological posts on my site to keep it on top for a longer period of time, so it didn’t get ‘pushed’ down and lost in the river of the other posts on my site.
Using a Magazine Theme layout, I can stick the Leading Article (or story, or post..whatever your flavor) in a styled container at the top of my site, maybe in a prime top left position, and use custom fields to add some imagery to draw more attention to it.
An example of this can be seen at Kevin’s site: Pointless Banter – - at the top left of his site, you’ll see one article under the “Today’s Banter” tab. That is the article he has chosen for the day, or the week, to highlight over all the others.
Featured Articles
Used much in the same way as the Leading Article, described above, I can use the Featured Articles code (provided in my presentation) to provide a listing, teasers (excerpts) of articles I consider to be ‘Leading’ articles – - posts that I want to keep circulating to my readers eyes on the front page.
Adding images to the display of those posts, by using custom fields, will spice ‘em up a bit and bring more attention to them.
Keeping with the example of Kevin’s site, above, he has an area down the left called “Featured Crap of the Week” where he categorizes his posts to be featured on the front page.
Topical Snippets
In my presentation, I mention that these category snippets, or teasers, can be used to pull the last most recent post from each category into and area of your site where you would like to display topical listings.
In Kevin’s example at Pointless Banter – he has such an area on his front page that displays the most recent posts from several of his categories, and uses custom fields to provide small icons to dress up the display:
Along with these three different sections – Kevin also has his page navigation at the top of the site along with other content presented in the tabbed container at the top: Recent Video Posts, Popular Posts and Recent Comments left on his site. Also, his Featured Video container at the top right of his site allows him to feature his most recent, most favored or most popular video. This isn’t accomplished through the use of any plugin, it’s simply a text widget that he changes out the video embed in when he is so moved to do so.
His Magazine-style theme also leaves plenty of room in the right sidebar for his advertisers and sponsors, and any other type of information he wants to present in that right side area of his site.
You can see the different applications for a site with this kind of functionality. Sites that do music reviews can nicely display featured artists, music reviews, Leading articles with polls – jazzing it all up with custom fields to display icons and images. Or a news site can neatly categorize their front page and bring forward different articles with news in categories like politics, entertainment, finance, etc.
The idea, really, is to get rid of that long, chronological display of posts that causes visitors to your site to scroll endlessly down and down to read them all – - and packaging those posts into neat little snippets and teasers on your front door that invites them inside to consume even more of what you offer.
If you missed the link to my presentation at the top of his post – you can also find it here: De-constructing WordPress Magazine Themes. It contains:
Online Video provided by Ustream
Many thanks to David for asking me to post on his site this week. I’m honored to have been asked and hope you find the information presented a bit helpful!
Lisa Sabin-Wilson is the author of WordPress For Dummies, designer/owner of E.Webscapes and occasionally blogs on her own, personal blog.
Related posts:
I’m a fan of wordpress magazine themes – I think they look sharp. However, I am content with the theme I currently have but I see a magazine theme in my future.
Lisa,
Thanks so much for this information. Although more complex (or is it?) than what I’m currently using it definitely appears worth learning. I’m going to dig right in!
I love magazine themes. They are becoming so much more popular because they are laid out in a way that makes it easy to browse.
Okay, now I am off to learn how to set this up. I just love WP and use it almost everywhere. Thanks.
Happy to help – - and hopes it helps in the creation of your own themes by adding this great functionality to your site.
As I said above thanks for this, but being a newbie to php I have a tiny bit of advice. You have to watch what template you put this into. I ended up with a while statement inside another while statement and took a while to figure out the problem. Working great now though. Thanks again.
This is so awesome. After struggling for Drupal for a week I decided I didn’t want to use a CMS for my project. I started searching about magazine themes for WP I found this. Between the video and the powerpoint I have all I need to get going on this. Thanks for the excellent presentation, and thanks for posting it all here!
As a thank you, I am going to go out and buy WordPress for Dummies today! Look for your royalty check in the mail.
@Leslie – happy to hear this is helpful.. glad to hear it is working and you’ve got it figure out
@Craig – thanks, glad you enjoyed the video, presentation and the info presented! good luck in putting it all together
Lisas last blog post..SmartLife – Decision Making Process on Outsourcing Design
[...] My guest blog post on MyBlogit.net on WordPress Magazine Themes [...]
[...] Source: myblogit.net/2008, WordPress Magazine Themes – Quick Anatomy Lesson. [...]
[...] Source: myblogit.net/2008, WordPress Magazine Themes – Quick Anatomy Lesson. [...]
Nice site, chock full of a lot of information.
Ms Recipes last blog post..Savory Pork Chops
hi buddy , I was searching wordpress magazine themes for my collection and visited your page . you have a nice blog . I have also collected few of them , i hope you will like them too .
The magazine theme is really famous and favorite by lot of bloggers.
Armands last blog post..Hiding Installed Plugins For Security Reason
Thanks for this very informative article! I’ve been considering switching to a magazine theme, and this was very helpful in laying out some of the components and things to consider. Thanks!
Adventurous Wenchs last blog post..Costa Rica coffee growers bail out Starbucks?