Launching a WordPress Product in Public: Session 12

Transcript ↓

In this episode, Cory Miller and Corey Maass discuss their experiences and opinions on the current state of WordPress. They delve into topics such as WordPress’ evolution over the years, its strengths and weaknesses, its place in the market compared to other website builders, and its potential future. Learn from their insights and advice for WordPress professionals on how to stay relevant and successful in the industry.

Top Takeaways:

• Adapt and Upskill. The WordPress ecosystem is vast and constantly evolving. This growth brings challenges, such as increased competition and the need for WordPress professionals to continuously adapt and upskill to stay relevant in the industry. Keeping up with the latest trends and technologies in the WordPress ecosystem is critical. This includes learning new programming languages and frameworks, as well as staying up-to-date on design trends and best practices.
• Engage the Community. The WordPress community is a supportive and collaborative group of individuals and organizations. WordPress professionals can benefit greatly from participating in the community, whether that’s by attending local WordPress meetups, contributing to open-source projects, or joining online communities like the WordPress subreddit or the WordPress Slack channel. By building a strong community around your WordPress website or business, you can establish yourself as a trusted authority in the WordPress space and create long-term relationships with your audience.
• Content is STILL King. When it comes to building a successful WordPress website, you need excellent, engaging content. To stand out in the crowded online marketplace, WordPress professionals need to create valuable, high-quality content that resonates with their audience.
• Security Should Be a Top Priority. Since WordPress is the most popular CMS in the world, it’s also a popular target for hackers. Ensuring you take all necessary security measures to protect your websites and your clients’ websites is essential.

Mentioned in the show:

• Crop.Express
• iThemes
• Liquid Web
• WP Engine
• GoDaddy
• Automattic
• Gravity Forms
• Zapier
• Slack
• Stripe
• WooCommerce
• Chris Lema
• Matt Mullenweg
• Jason Cohen
• Andrew Norcross
• Rebecca Gill
• Brad Touesnard
• Pippin Williamson
• Syed Balkhi
• Carl Hancock
• Jeff Chandler
• Brian Krogsgard
• Matt Medeiros
• Chris Coyier
• Kori Ashton
• Nathan Ingram
• Jennifer Bourn
• Troy Dean
• Adam Warner

You can follow Post Status and our guests on Twitter:

• Corey Maass
• Cory Miller (CEO, Post Status)
• Olivia Bisset (Intern, Post Status)

The Post Status Draft podcast is geared toward WordPress professionals, with interviews, news, and deep analysis.

Browse our archives, and don’t forget to subscribe via iTunes, Google Podcasts, YouTube, Stitcher, Simplecast, or RSS.

Transcript

Session 12 Corey & Cory Launch a WordPress Product Live

Corey Maass: [00:00:00] Or at least that's what it looks like behind you. Yeah, there you go. It gets weather, it gets windy in Switzerland.

Or at least that's what it looks like behind you. Yeah. 

Cory Miller: Well that's a good effect. 

Corey Maass: This is our backyard gets, weather gets windy in Switzerland. Yeah. 

Cory Miller: When I get you back out here, we'll, uh, you'll see the, 

Corey Maass: that'd be amazing. You have lots of echo. This is our back hair against wind Indian Switzer.

Okay. 

Cory Miller: Always fun going live. Uh, well, hey, it is, uh, session 12. We're talking about corn Corey on WordPress products. So Corey, forgive me for letting this slip off my calendar, but we're live, I'm outside enjoying the weather while the wind cooperates. If it gets too windy or [00:01:00] something, 

Corey Maass: I'll go inside. All right.

Makes sense. I should be outside. It's beautiful. But it is also windy here too. The dogs are starting to enjoy it anyway. 

Cory Miller: Well, um, you've been busy, man, working on the new product. 

Corey Maass: Yeah, so, uh, omg, I m G is coming along very well. Um, I, at this point we've got almost a working plugin. I think I'm down to, as we had talked about, um, the.

The goal for a first version is to be able to create an image and then save it as the open graph image for a site. Um, I'd already marched pretty far down the trail for making images for posts, and so using that as a starting point. [00:02:00] Uh, at this point you can edit images for posts, save them as the featured image, and then, um, I'm close to being able to save as the open graph image.

And then I, because the code is basically gonna be the same for if you're editing posts or like, it's, it's kind of like signing into Canva, which I think is our, um, analog, um, the, you sign in, you see projects, you click on a project, you edit a project, meaning an image, and then do something with it.

Download it. Save it as a featured image, save it as an open graph image. Um, so I abstracted that out so that there's basically an instance of, of the app, um, attached to a post or attached to the overall site. Um, and so now it's just a matter of like connecting the last, basically the last few wires to save an [00:03:00] image as the open graph image for a site, um, without, and initially without, uh, any assumptions about having Yost or all in one s e o or any of those installed.

Um, and then I will, uh, look into, like Yost has a, a really nice filter that makes it easy to overwrite the, their open graph image for the site. Um, and, and I, I'm hoping that the other s e o plugins do too. So at that point we're, we're off and running. Um, I also, uh, I don't remember why, um, but I, I think just cuz I needed something different to do but wanted to feel productive, I installed e D D on O M G I M G and so that's kind of, that's the basics are set up.

Oh cuz I wanted to [00:04:00] plug in, um, a bank account and stripe and stuff like that. So that's all ready to go. Um, there's nothing, I haven't, I haven't actually set up the plugin to, to use a license key yet, but that's, e d d makes it pretty easy. Um, they've got a class that just gets abstracted, so, um, so yeah, probably another week of hacking.

And, um, I mean we do need, we need a logo. I. We need, um, some decisions to, uh, we, I think we've, we've both sort of in the context of discussion, not decision. We both sort of have said that we, with this will in INI at least initially, will forego a free version in the repo. Um, and just, I always wanna say and just punt, but I've been told that that's an, uh, improper use of the, the sports analogy.

But anyway, we'll kick it down the road. Um, or we'll [00:05:00] just, we'll just go whatever. 

Cory Miller: Yeah, no punt works for me. Um, okay. So let me, let me get back and make sure I'm clear on what you said regarding where the work that you've done. Yes. So the site default open graph image is ready. Close. Close. And then you started working on the per post.

Corey Maass: Work. Uh, I mean, the other way around really the, because I, I had already gone down the trail of per post. Um, that one's actually more flushed out, but it was great because it was, it's easy, it's actually easier to attach images to a post than to attach images to a site, right? Because yeah, posts have featured images, sites don't, and so it's, it's a little more abstract.

Um, so yeah, posts. [00:06:00] Um, but then, uh, so the, so posts can now, so you can make an image and attach it to a post as a featured image, and then, uh, and then I'm looping back to essentially set the open graph image for either a single post or for an entire site. And that's what I think we can launch with.

Because the idea, the idea is like, you know, for most blogs, most WordPress websites, the homepage is a page. It might be an archive page, it might be a page page. Um, but there's no, there's no featured image attached. Uh, well, I guess there is sometimes for a page, but, um, you know, that's what, um, but you want an open graph image, right?

Like if I share the post status homepage, you know, that image has to come from somewhere. Um, but then if [00:07:00] you go into a blog post on post status and you share it, By default, it should be the same open graph image as the entire site. But you might, you might want to create a individual open graph image for that post.

So it's like, if you go to the post status homepage and share it, you see post status is awesome. But if you go to a blog post a, where you've interviewed Corey, this awesome developer, you want, and you share it, you want it to say, post status is awesome. Read about Corey. Yeah. Okay. 

Cory Miller: So I think I understand where you're at with all that.

Um, regarding the decisions, last thing you said there, what does, what do we need to make? So, sorry, I think I'm, I'm getting this, but for launch, I think what you're saying is for launch we'll have default site and host option.

Corey Maass: [00:08:00] Okay. Yeah. I think cuz it's, you know, we, we essentially, we have a builder. That.

Okay. You, you see a dashboard full of projects. You create a project where you say you select a channel, I'm calling it a channel. We'll have to come up with something better. Um, but a channel being like an Instagram host, so 10 80 by 10 80 or an open graph image, which is like 1300 by 60, 6 30 or something like that.

Um, and then we've got right now just a couple of templates, um, which is a layout. And so you've got a, you know, I showed you a couple of weeks ago, uh, a featured image background and a title in a footer. Um, or for the open graph, kind of what you'd mocked up on the on slides was a logo on the left and a title on the right.

Um, and so, you [00:09:00] know, using those as simple prototypes, like we will, we will spend the rest of eternity cranking out templates and refining templates, but I'm making it so that it's really easy for us to make templates and then also for, um, potential customers to make their own templates, which I think is really, I think a lot of developers are going to want to do that.

Um, you know. Yep. So anyway, so that's, that's all set up. Yep. Okay. Awesome. And we will, so sorry to finish the thread, we've, so we've, you've got a screen, so it's like from, um, you're editing a blog post. There's a button somewhere that says, you know, OG O O M G I M G, and you open it up and there's all the images that you can make or will make.

Associated with that post. Um, I've also added it as a link [00:10:00] in the, when you see the list of posts, you know, edit, delete, there's now a little om, G I m G link there for the sake of simplicity where you j it just throws you straight to the builder. Um, and then that's excellent. 

Cory Miller: Just wanna say that's a hundred thousand percent awesome.

Thank you. Uh, because for those people that have a lot of content to go back and create those easily, that's excellent. 

Corey Maass: Yep. Um, and then, uh, under media, in the WordPress admin, there's now a new, so it's, you know, media library add new, and there's now under there there's a menu item that's om G i mg, which is, you know, site media basically.

Um, and it, and again, when you click on it, it looks the same. So we may, we may wanna. Like it says Sitewide images versus the, the name of the post when you're in the, you know, our, our app. Um, [00:11:00] but it, it essentially looks the same. So we'll have to differentiate that a little bit somehow, but Okay. Um, but you go in and you say create, you know, create a new project, a new image, um, and then once you've made it look the way you want, you say save as OG image.

Um, and, and it's set. And somehow we'll, we'll denote that, that, you know, this project that you're looking at is currently set as the OG image, um, for your site. Thank you. Okay. 

Cory Miller: When we get this, I was trying to look at your screenshot Slack too. Um, when we get it where you're ready, I'd love to take a look and give comments there.

It's, I'm, yeah. Following along I think conceptually, and then when we see all that, um, when I get to see it, I think I'll have better. Better help on that. Yeah. Uh, okay. Because I, if I put my post status hot hat on as a customer, [00:12:00] easily create that o OG site image that displays by default and all those things, platforms.

And then as I'm creating the post, I can go in and create an OG image for that post that, that nails that basic value prop for me, right. Was my post dose. 

Corey Maass: Yeah. And, and to me it's, um, I mean as much because it was the easy, easier first option. Um, like you can save as featured image, but it's, to me, that's the, that was the first problem we identified, which was, um, you know, for every blog post you want, you want, you need a featured image, but you are in the co when you're looking at a blog post, the featured image is, you know, a bunch of people in a [00:13:00] boardroom or a handsome person typing on a laptop.

But when you share that, you see a person typing on a laptop and it has no context to, um, you know, to the blog post. Um, so that's where we said, okay, you know, we want, we want, if you share it, there's your OG image. But also, wouldn't it be nice if, frankly, if the featured image had more value, As well. So, you know, so you can, you can create one image and save, set it as the featured image, which might get pulled in as the OG image.

You can set it distinctly explicitly as the OG image. They could be two different things. Um, you know, and then down the road we will have things like copy, you know, so it's like you create an OG image that is just the title of the blog post, but you'll say copy, save it at, you know, save this one as the o as the featured image, and that one has the bullet points or whatever.

So you can, [00:14:00] you know, mix and match. Again, sort of following the, I, I don't want to keep saying Canva, but um, you know, where it's like easy to go in and, and create a new image and edit and create a new image and tweak it. And um, the other thing that I just added yesterday, which is pretty slick, is you can, um, Change channels.

Right? So, and this is where the responsiveness comes in that we've talked about. So it's like if you have an image that's, you know, wide 16, nine or something good for a featured image, good for an OG image, excuse me, changing it to Instagram, it makes it square, you know, and it might not be perfect, but it, you know, the left and right, stay on the left and right.

Or if you go to a mobile view, they go to top and bottom, um, in the same way that a website does. And all this seems to work. So. Okay, cool. 

Cory Miller: So I think when you get it, [00:15:00] um, beta ready, I want to put it on post-test and start using it, and I think that'll be really good data back. Just a note on that real quick is we're trying to switch, we've.

Switch your platform over and, um, I think by the time this is ready, I'll be able to put it on our new environment and, uh, and then give a lot of feedback and notes from, from using it. Uh, a lot of this I keep asking your you how this works because I think I put on this a piece of content. It's like, what is open graph and why should I care?

Mm-hmm. The marketing side, um, I, I tend to, in any project, try to embody the customer, but I am the customer here. Sure. Um, and so even as versus people might think I am on the web, I still have a ton of questions and I think that's gonna, so I, I'm writing some notes as we go about some of that content stuff [00:16:00] to say, you know, um, to help people understand and make, connect the dots to ogm and Gs.

This it's Scraper Oak Graph plus. Just want a nice image done fast for a piece of content. We got you. 

Corey Maass: Yeah. Yeah. And I, I mean, you, you asking these questions like I, I, we've talked a little bit about how I am a very intuitive product developer. Um, like things just occur to me as I'm ba bashing at my keyboard.

And so I'm, I'm adding things and I try to be a little disciplined about adding features and whatnot, but it's at, at the end of the day, You and also me, um, have to go forth and sell this and, you know, and, and as we've talked about early on, like I'm relying on you down the road to take the, the reins for setting up the marketing site and uh, marketing copy and all that kind of stuff.

So, you know, you asking questions. I mean, any, any good [00:17:00] salesman needs to know how it works, even if they're not, you know, explaining a, um, internal combustion engine to the, the, you know, the person trying to buy a car. They still, it helps to know how it works and be able to answer those questions because it also, it's gonna float to the top all of the actual value props that ultimately we're gonna talk about.

I mean, it's cuz we're, we're building a really neat image builder. Okay? And, and I think people are gonna go, wow, you know, whizbang, but at the end of the day, we're selling it. We're selling value, just like anything. And so that value needs to be clear. And if people don't know that how important it is for when sites get shared and that, how that relates to this thing called an open graph image.

And that's also part of why like, I think, um, you know, setting a good, creating a, a more valuable featured image, [00:18:00] which is something we had talked about early on too. Like, you know, just adding the title to a featured image. People don't realize how amazingly valuable that is because that usually is the image that gets sucked in as the default OG image if there isn't one explicitly set.

So, and all of these things I think are, these are, these to me are patterns. Thank you. You reminded me. I need to stand up. Um, I think all of these are patterns that we will unearth as we, as it gets used, right? Like, we're gonna find that a lot of people. Are setting images or are not setting images or don't know what, that these images should be set, you know?

And so we, there's gonna be some education, but it's also like we, we need to just speak their language. If, if they're not thinking about it this way. But they are all, I mean, anybody who's promoting a site is in fact concerned about shareability and that kind of thing. Like, we need to understand what language they're using.

Okay. 

Cory Miller: [00:19:00] Um, okay, so put, I'm gonna put on the post back, on the post set for a second. I'm the customer and for V1 launch, um, I go AMA post hit OG image to create the, the image. Um, then from that point, I've created that image. Yeah. And then I go to sh share on social. How does that work for me as customer? How, how do you it the nuts and bolts of like, Do I download image, go over to Facebook, whatever, my social platform.

Corey Maass: Okay. No, not at all. And that's, I mean, that's the nice thing about this. And, but also it's, it, it's the nice thing. Technically it's the bad thing humanly. Um, because it, it, it's one of those things that just works. It's like, you know, people logs have r s s feeds, right? Like there is this Yeah, this big, [00:20:00] there's a, a file of code, it's plain text and it's just gobbledy g to your average person.

Um, but that's how, uh, you know, an r s s feed used to be really popular for sharing blog posts, right? And that's still the backbone. I was, this is in my head, which is why I bring it up because I was setting up a podcast for a client this morning. Like that's still how podcasts work. But to most people, it's just magic, right?

Like, You know, but you can't, um, you don't just put a piece of audio on the internet and, and it's a podcast. Like there's these, you know, this magic tech stuff that happens behind the scenes. Um, offloaded. 

Cory Miller: Okay. So I've created my post, created my OG image publish. I take that link 

Corey Maass: and go. I'm sorry. So No, you do nothing.

You do nothing. So, um, if you, sorry, I was, I was talking analogously. [00:21:00] Um, in you, you know, if you look at any, if you look at the source of any website, um, then wait, 

Cory Miller: wait, sorry. I think I know where you're going there. Let me pause for just one second. So my, my workflow would be we create a post on post status, um, and then we want to go out and share it.

I would just do my normal thing and OG image is gonna display in Correct. Those social networks. Yeah. Okay. It's just, that's great news because I w I thought at some point, um, I was gonna have to download, go over here to, uh, tweet deck, whatever it is, or the social channel itself. Upload, put post link, get my update ready on my social post.

But that's all baked in. So like I just do my normal scheduling OG image is gonna appear naturally. 

Corey Maass: Yeah, it's, it, it's the same as if you, if you share a URL on Twitter, on Facebook, anywhere. Yeah. [00:22:00] And, and a, and a URL might or might not have any information in it, right? Like there's a, it's possible that a, you share a u r url that that is, yeah.

You know, post status.com/ 1 23. Yeah. Which means nothing to anybody. Yeah. But, um, but Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, everybody will, what they actually do behind the scenes is that, is that the computer goes and visits the website Yeah. And pulls metadata. The title tag, the metatags. So there's a description, there's a, and um, and if there isn't, and this is what, why the O OG images were created and all the O OG tags, open graph tags was Yeah.

Uh, by default. So it's like if you shared a U R L on Facebook, it would automatically suck in the first image it found. Well, a lot of the time, the first image it, um, it finds is a logo. Okay, fine. But if you're on a blog post and you wanna share the featured image, [00:23:00] you'd have to manually go inject that.

And so what you can do instead is you can explicitly set the open graph image, which is the image that, you know, when you paste a URL URL into Slack or into Twitter or any of it, that little preview comes up. It's sucking in that, that open graph info. Okay. Um, except for now, Twitter. Twitter sucks in a Twitter card info, but it's hidden to the average user.

Cory Miller: So for this part, you don't have to explain the plumbing necessarily, but workflow as a customer, I go, okay, I've installed O M G I M G, I probably go Okay, create my default, what I think of as like my website, business card, kind of online business card. Yep. Yep. And then behind the scenes doing all that awesome magic.

So then I've just helped got the previews, so like professional and visible and the search engines and all these other channels. Then post, it's doing that magic for me. I just go worry about [00:24:00] scheduling my link and content updates on the social platforms and these appear. So I would think as a customer, so post using Postes is our customer for a second.

Um, we do Twitter and LinkedIn. Those are our two primary channels. So probably somewhere we're setting OG images for all the networks, but you know for sure our output for those blog posts. When I do the schedule workflow, what I do, what we do, uh, we probably wanna make sure those, that builder section is okay, create your LinkedIn version, create or tweak whatever your Twitter version.

Yep. And then when I go to do my normal content promotion side on the socials, it's all displayed magically right there. Corey, you made it effortless for me. To do that as a customer. And I mean, there we go. Cuz I was writing some messaging on that, but I just wanted to con confirm that customer workflow, so like you're doing [00:25:00] all the magic behind the scenes with OG stuff, but for the user it's like you've just taken out huge amount of time, an effort that takes to go over to a canvas or fire up, Photoshop, whatever you're doing, and it's appropriately sized for each of your major channels.

Corey Maass: Yep. So, uh, like I said, I mean the, the most, most channels use the same, um, you know, same image. Right. Twitter now is, uh, is a little different, but yeah, the what's nice and it's, and, and from a, from a user workflow, there's sort of a, a trickle down, right? Like Yeah. The first thing we'll have you do is we'll set up a Sitewide OG image, a business card like you said.

So right there, no matter what, if your site, any a any page on your site is shared, there's at least something better showing, or at least something predictable and something you know, truly marketable showing. [00:26:00] And then you can, and then you can get better, right? Where you can go into specific pages or posts, create images that are specific to that page.

So then you are, you know, you're adding icing on top of icing. And then you can go even, even further where you are, um, copying the OG image. But, um, Or a specific post or something, but then you're, you're creating a version for Instagram, because Instagram doesn't pull in OG images, you have to upload an image.

But we just, what we just took a co uh, an image that you know you like that's shaped like this and, and Z made a square out of it with, with one click. And now you've, at again, you've at least got a basic image to share on Instagram that, you know, will be the right size and shape and has your, your marketing assets.

You might need to tweak the logo a little bit or something, but, um, 

Cory Miller: so if I put my mindset back in post status, we create, you know, weekly content, [00:27:00] um, and then we share on the socials. Um, I want to think for a second before I get access to the product. Um, I would want like LinkedIn and Twitter. Those are our two biggest channels.

Uh, I get your, you've set up the response on this, which is awesome. Yeah. Um, but what would I want? I'm, I'm asking myself as a post customer, what would I want a display there? So I'm really, I think I told you I'm leaning into LinkedIn and like when I was doing that with my ma, I showed you and thank you for your helping that.

Cause I was like, oh, this is a great use case right here. Um, so LinkedIn, I'd go to myself, like the, the default, some of the images that come up take way too much screen space in LinkedIn. Mm-hmm. Yep. Um, so I'd want to say, I'm gonna guess some kind of image featured image [00:28:00] that it's thematic to the content that I've pulled from other source.

Um, headline

maybe. Maybe that's it. 

Corey Maass: Like, well, and this is, this is what you decide, right? Like you Yeah. You know, when, when you and I were look, doing a bit of research on this, like we went and looked at WP Beginner, uh, we looked at Free's blog. We looked at just kind of let you know, let's Google some random things and see what comes up.

Um, and one of the ones that we liked, um, had, you know, essentially what was their featured image on the left and the title on the right, but the whole thing was an image. And so when you shared the story, that's the graphic that got used. It was a, an image that was relevant, but put in context because it included the title.

Um, and this is where again, like I'm trying to build this picture of, [00:29:00] um, Hmm, I don't know what you call it, but how, the way that users grow with a product, right? Like the first time you buy Photoshop, you open it and you, you know, take out the power lines and you're like, okay, great, I'm done. But you know, six months later you're adding layers and you're adding some text and then six months later you are, you know, tweaking the alpha channels and I'm trying to think of what other, using masks and embedded objects and all this stuff.

Like you, you grow with a product. And so for us, The immediate value people are gonna install this thing. We're gonna walk you through ba building a business card for your website and, and right there if nothing else, you know your, your website's gonna be represented better anytime that it's shared. And then you can, and then you can build business cards for specific posts and pages.

So it's getting more and more relevant and, and more and more valuable to be shared. And then past that you're going, okay, well I actually, every time I create a blog post, [00:30:00] I wanna, you know, I can, I can share this on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and it'll suck in that OG image, but I can't do that on Instagram.

I need a dedicated image. Yeah. So you'd say click copy, you know, change it from og, change the channel from OG Image to Instagram. Whoop, it's square. You download and you upload. Cuz you have to do it, you have to manually do it with Instagram. So, you know, but we've, we've, you are now, every time you create a post, There's a default OG image, then there's an OG image relevant to the post.

And then it's with a couple of clicks. You've got images that are specifically sized for other channels like Instagram. And then down the road you're like, like we talked about, we're like, oh, we want, you know, if I'm really pushing hard on a blog post, I want slides, I want numerous different images cuz I'm gonna tweet about this every day for a week.

And I don't want to keep using the same image. So I'm gonna copy, paste, copy or, or copy, copy, copy. And I'm gonna say, use these [00:31:00] three bullets on Monday. Use this pull quote on Tuesday, da, da, da. And download all of those five images. And so now it's like, again, as you grow with the product, you're gonna just bang, bang, bang, you're with any piece of content you create, like your blog post, you're gonna have five images, 10 images that all have specific purposes.

Um, and if you are just a site owner, if you're just one person, You do the basic, you do what you've got time for. But if you're like one of my clients that has a dedicated social media manager, they're going to own this tool. They're gonna become a pro with this tool, and they're gonna be generating a dozen images for every post because they're wheeling and dealing.

Cory Miller: And that part is what I was just trying to think, ask myself, okay, uh, I want this to show up. I've now, I've got an easy way to do it. And I was just trying to do a little bit of thought about what would be valuable to me when I am, I've done all this work, and now I want it to be an [00:32:00] image that kind of entices someone to come back to the content.

Um, at a base, I'd want to say, you know, there's an image, kind of some of those templates we saw, middle part logo, maybe the featured images in the background are like top five accessibility firms and WordPress, you know, and, um, with, with the brand. On this, on that image, I think would be the minimum things I'd want for any post that we did like.

So we do just kinda right side of this when we get to this for the template phases. Um, so we have two columns, basically three I guess business, tech and community. And you know, we do a tech every week and it's like, that's probably not a good example here, but, uh, something interesting in tech, I'll say it like this, maybe this is a good example.

We do a make word WordPress column every week that [00:33:00] summarizes links off to things happening on the project. So she always does a title on there. So it'd probably be series name this this week at Make WordPress. And her title, and it would just be like 6.2 campaign release, Gutenberg project updates or something actionable.

Yep. But it's branded as that this week column idea. I hadn't thought about that with this product, but I go, that's probably good. Like this week in pro, these three happens. And right there with the title, they're kind of going, okay, I ne I've already got value. I'm gonna click through and see what is in that post.

And then Michelle does a, a column me tweak. So, you know, might be whatever her column title is. Um, trying to think once you did last podcast, sequels community or something like that. So it'd be title, [00:34:00] category, title, this, it's her, her community section, whatever we call it. Then whatever her headline is, So they know like, click here.

This is the magic package to get more. So I think that's probably, I think that works. I was trying to test it out and just say, what would my minimum request be from, from you when you're building it. 

Corey Maass: Sure. So, you know, we haven't introduced, I haven't introduced like saving templates yet, but you'd, you'd, another way to approach this is you'd create a template that has the post status logo on the left and some piece of text on the right, right.

Yeah. And then you'd save that, um, for, as a, as an overall template. And so Michelle goes in and creates a community [00:35:00] post, let's say. Yeah. And so she says, use the standard template post status logo automatically on the left. It sucks in the title of her. Her post that week on the right. Okay. Corey, who's in charge of the tech at this point?

You, uh, yeah, me, I guess. Me. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um, you know, Corey goes in and creates a tech column this week. You know, use the standard, the standard, uh, template, post status image on the left, you know, this week in tech on the right. Um, now if you, uh, take this further, right, you could, um, automatically, you know, or, or Michelle creates a sort of a sub template that, so it says post status image, it says community, and then her title.

And week over week, the, the logo stays the same. The word community stays the same, but the title changes. You know, week, [00:36:00] the week of April 12th. In, in commu in WordPress community, the week of April 5th, WordPress community. The other one over here says Post status logo tech, and then your title, right? Um, so that's one per column.

You also put out a newsletter if that newsletter is a post. Essentially, it doesn't matter if you're putting out a newsletter. The newsletter has a make section, a text section, a community section. So every time you create a newsletter, you would create three images, you know, taking that original saved template and just say, copy paste, copy paste, copy paste, hashtag community, hashtag make hashtag tech.

Put in a few, you know, bullet points and then you download that as the okay. This week we put out our newsletter and then we also have three shareable images. And so as the newsletter comes out on Friday, on Monday you, [00:37:00] you tweet about the tech one and you use the tech image, you tweet about the, the, the make one and you use the make image.

And so it's just automat, you know, makes it very easy to over and over and over create a whole bunch of images that are used in whatever way makes sense for you. Yeah, okay.

Cory Miller: So I was trying to use that to think it through and I think it broadened it out a little bit. So I would want maybe like a series category thing.

I was trying to think this, cause I was like, next step I want to do some actual templates to mock this up a little bit. Mm-hmm. That'd be great. So up here that sets up like a top here. Lemme do this.

So if this is the card, I'd probably [00:38:00] want

do the make work, press something conceptually up here that's like, Hey, this is the category content. Like we have just like your magazine client has numerous topics, uh, categories. We would have something like that. Okay. And then headline. Um, I think an option to go.

Which might be the excerpt.[00:39:00] 

Yeah, I was thinking like, let me actually pull this. God. Oh my God. Okay, so you get it? Yeah.

While we're moving our hosting environment. This, come on. Okay. Anyway, so where am I at?

Just wanna work this through, cause I think this is, uh, So Gutenberg 6.2 candidates, uh, feedback needed. Trying to put it in an actual thing. I'm gonna remember. Okay. So series up here, like they're kind of having this expectation. This is a category, topical content. We could even create [00:40:00] different backgrounds like we do in our newsletter, different sections.

Tech has blue. I can't remember the colors offhand. Um, and then we'd probably want some kind of logo, branded logo. Yep.

I just put here Freeflow just because like maybe a lot of this is only the headline make it mm-hmm. Peeling to the headline. But if they wanted something like, you know,

Putting my content hat on here. Um, that would just give a free flow area join, you know? 

Corey Maass: Yeah. Join the conversation. Feedback needed. Join the conversation. And this is, and this is where, so you might create a template that says, um, that, that has, [00:41:00] has a hard coded title in the left serious title Make WP never gonna change, right?

So when you created this template, you'd go in and type that in. But in the middle is a variable, right? Is a placeholder. And so when any, anytime you created a new newsletter or a new whatever, you'd say, copy that template. And that placeholder automatically sucks in the name of the blog post and your free flowing text.

It might automatically suck in the excerpt from the blog post. Now you can then go in and, and edit it, overwrite it, change it, you know. But, but at, at the, the minimum, if you've created a template and then said, um, it's kind of like a page builder, right? Like, I use Beaver Builder, so I have a, I have page templates like use a, this, you know, header and content template [00:42:00] for any page that I create.

And so I create a new page and right away it has a header up here and the content down here. But then I say, well, I really want this two, this one page. I really want it two columns, or I want to add a form. Then I go in and I tweak it, you know, to be specific to that page. But when I've initially created the page, that template gets applied.

It sucks in the header, it sucks in the content. And right away I've got a branded page. You know, with no effort. I've, I've created that template once and now creating every subsequent page, just, it's just formatted the way I want it to be. Yeah. 

Cory Miller: I, I'm doing this not necessarily for marketing, but for more the template functionality, like, cause what I want to do is get these little things here.

Mm-hmm. Put in enough. Uh, sample content and have someone do a treatment, you know, create our templates because I know if this is [00:43:00] attractive, it's gonna like, in an impactful and useful, it's gonna be really different. But I could be like, okay, so designer for the template, you know, think of the background option.

We've already done some of this. Like we'd want to say, you know, tagline for us would be,

um, or something like that. We'd want the logo here to kind of brand that image. But primary thing is like, this happened, we connected to some topic that's of interest to our users. And like in that social update and LinkedIn, up here in the text copy is, you know, a summary. But right there they're like Gutenberg something that hits that category.

They see it's branded. We get some brand awareness with the logo, the business we're doing this for. Um,

yep, man, I like that. [00:44:00] Um, so that was for me more for the template side of things and just playing around this cuz I, if we nail this, um, people are gonna be like, how'd you do it? 

Corey Maass: I love that you're, you can't stop tweaking. You're like, logo on the left, no logo on the right. No logo on the center tagline.

Yeah, because I 

Cory Miller: know if we can get this looking really nice, people are gonna, how'd you do that? Well, it's this plugin called 

Corey Maass: Om, G I M G. Um, um, yeah, I mean, I think I, I, I think the, you know, the, these little mockups that you keep doing are great. I think you, instead of like, Instead of logo on the left, and then you move it, I think you duplicate the page and move the logo.

And then these are all templates that we will create, or, you know, we will, if, if most of them are similar or if, you know, three of them are similar, but you've got logo left, right, center, [00:45:00] then uh, you know, then I make that a little toggle that says, do you want your logo in the, you know, which corner do you want your logo in?

Or, or that kind of thing. Um, so we do need, do you have, do you have a designer that you work with? 

Cory Miller: Yeah. 

Corey Maass: Um, maybe. Sort of. Kinda. I do, I do. Um, well, just so we need, I mean, right now we find ourselves needing two things. One, we need a logo for this plugin overall. Um, and then, you know, so if, and then it would be great to have somebody, like you said, like if we give them essentially what you're doing as wire frames, um, and say, You know, here's what we need.

Do some, do some designs. And then I go and I actually h t mli HT mli them, you know, make them actual templates. Then, you know, and we start with three that are very distinct. You know, the dark theme, the [00:46:00] light theme, and the rainbow theme or whatever, um, you know, that use different fonts and different treatments.

And one is, you know, emphasizes the title and one emphasizes the logo and one emphasizes, you know, the business card or whatever. Then those could be the first three templates that we, we start with. Yeah. So that's kind of what I'm thinking. Yeah. 

Cory Miller: I like using this sample. Like we def I think we need something up above, whether it's centered, whatever, you know, the toggle button.

Yep. I kind of like, this is the topic. Um, See, I, I can give this right now to the designer. Like this is the headline. Yep. Um, freeflow. Yeah.[00:47:00] 

Yeah. See that's really big. See that? We got that. So we need something there like an upper. Mm-hmm. Can't remember what they called it in the newspapers, but it's the category name or just a generic text area 

Corey Maass: here. Right. The section of the newspaper. You're in news, you're in auto, you're in classifieds, you're in, I don't remember what it's called.

Yeah.

Cory Miller: Yeah. See, this is good too because, you know, they clipped that stuff and you do too much text. So like 

Corey Maass: Right. But they don't clip images, so that if that image had your, your headline, you know, and, and I mean, it's exactly what we're talking about. Like, you've got the image, you've got an image treatment. And so again, like if you create that once in om G I M G, which by the way, abbreviates to OI or ooi, [00:48:00] which I like, um, so, uh, in ooi, uh, or oi, um, nice.

Instead of ai, we are oi. Um, okay. But, uh, you know, there's that background image, right? That black and white faded into the back background image. So you know, that could automatically be your featured image. So every time you create a blog post, a featured image appears in the black, in the background in black and white.

You know, with, with a mostly black layer over the top of it. So you've got a text, essentially a textured background automatically generated, but from the featured image of every post. And then it has the headline in orange or white over the top and your logo in the top left done, essentially auto-generated for every blog post you create.

So, 

Cory Miller: like

I was trying to flesh this out for the design and whoever we hand this off [00:49:00] to. So this right here is an OG image, I guess, cuz it's pulling in this text. 

Corey Maass: Not necessarily The text is pulled in from, you know, either, either a meta description or an OG description tag cuz there's, you know, in, in old school html, there was a bunch of meta tags.

There's title description, there was a tags tag, so you used to put in keywords and you know, but people would, would abuse that. And so they took that out. And so again, now OG Open Graph has the similar tags where you've got author description image, so this, so here they, they could be pulled in from a couple of different things.

And then that image again is coming from, it's either the featured image or, yeah, it's the, it's the OG image. 

Cory Miller: Okay, so I get this, we got that. We're creating that with OMG here [00:50:00] though it just made me think like, what if we wanted, you know, Yost has its own SEO compliance stuff. This just made me think is like, I wonder, this could be downstream roadmap wise, but I'll let them tweak what the open graph is.

This text. 

Corey Maass: At that point we say install Yost. Like I don't, I, to me we wanna be a image generating plugin. Not an SEO plugin,

Cory Miller: but like when she posts whoever did this Yep. When she posts this link, um, here, it pulled in the image, cuz I know this is a created image. Yep. It's the featured image of the post. And this comes from Yost. Cause that's what we got on the site. 

Corey Maass: [00:51:00] Yep.

So at least to tweak that if she wanted to update it is in Yost. 

Cory Miller: So, okay. When we do the design, Templates. We need to factor in that. Like mo like LinkedIn for instance. I'm sure the others are gonna pull in this data. Yeah. That like really I need to tell the designer. Remember like LinkedIn, however else it shows, there's gonna be this pulled in.

So there might not be like I was doing tagline and everything, uh, on the image. Maybe it's just the logo. Like, like mm-hmm. She's got here. Um, and we don't worry about all that tagline stuff cuz like it's right here. Right.

Okay.[00:52:00] 

Right. Because I'm getting, I'm thinking, uh, I know how to clear that now.

Corey Maass: Um. 

Cory Miller: Okay, so for design we need the logo.

We need some basic, we need a single post. And then I'm just trying to flesh out what to get the designer so they know the elements they have to work with.

Like they just need to know that's the frame. [00:53:00] Yep.

So does Designwise, do you. Do you have somebody you wanna work with? I have somebody we can work with that I think would give us good start, give us a lot of variations. Mm-hmm. Options. Yeah. 

Corey Maass: I mean, I think, I don't have anybody offhand. Um, we can, you know, and, and I've created now two templates that are dead simple.

Um, but, you know, I, I'm conflicted. We d we need a logo. Um, and if that sets us up, like if we've got somebody that, that can, can, can get us one, great. Um, you know, I have no problem jumping on fiber. I've done that before many times. Um, and then ideally, yeah, we've got a. A relationship that we start to build because it's like we want, you [00:54:00] know, one or two templates to start with.

We could even start with like the post status template essentially, so that you're using it and then, and then you're like, well, we really, it would be great if we had a different version that was, you know, totally different. And it's like, okay, well then, you know, that's two. Um, but if somebody, if we're working with a designer who's got a sense of what can be done and what we're looking for, um, you know, then they can just start cranking them out.

Like once we're ready to do that, you know, cuz it's like, we want, we want 10 and then we want a hundred, and then we want, you know, different ones specifically for different channels, you know? Yeah. Instagram, square, whatever. Um, some are gonna be, you know, really only relevant to a sitewide and some are really only gonna be relevant to a specific post.

Um, You know, and then also along the way, like, we're I what I, what's that? [00:55:00] I was coughing, sorry. Oh, sorry. Um, what I'd benefit from is, um, somebody saying, basically showing me a bunch of different treatments by creating a number of different templates. And I'm gonna be like, oh, right, like a gradient, you know, coming up from the bottom that's black to transparent, so that when the text is on the bottom, it stands out more.

Or, um, you know, we add a little gradient builder and so people can design their own gradients to use as backgrounds or if we want, um, you know, if people want text that has, you've seen text that's like, uh, changes color, you know, like as a rainbow across the text. It's like, oh, right. I, you know, like, let's figure out how to do that treatment.

And so it's like we will benefit not only from very specific designs, but also just conceptually like, oh, here's a, a treatment that we can add to text or we can add to images that we hadn't thought of before. Let's look at ad, you [00:56:00] know, adding those as options.

Cory Miller: Okay, let me take Post Status as our base. And I think 

Corey Maass: that's the way to start.

Yeah. Work with 

Cory Miller: this stuff to, uh, with a designer to create some, show 'em back. You let them kind of like have a little bit of wildness just a little bit and then you go, okay, I need this better. I need that. What, what's this? Like, you know, you put us back in the container of what can be done. Mm-hmm. I think I have everything you need that I can do with post TEUs.

Uh, this comment here is just Emily's creating those in Canvas. So I want to just touch base with her before I talk to the designer. Like, Hey, as you create these, like she's, she does that all the time for content journey. Um, so let me take that and let me start on that. Work with designer. Um, give you those options back and you tell me n I need that, what about this?

And then I can go back and I [00:57:00] really think that's gonna be great. Where, cuz if we, like you said, if we do it for posts, why I kind of put this hat on, like really embodying, um, I want this to show up professional in some of the things you've seen. I've been trying to, in the next brand version of post test, make it a different, uh, design a little bit more lighter.

And so I just wanna connect those dots too. And then, um, I'll get those as soon as I can over to you to give feedback back what you need better. Oh, wrong proportions. Something like, whatever that is. Yeah, that's perfect. Thanks for letting me do that. Cause that was helping me flesh out what I need to go ask for.

Corey Maass: Yep. Yep. And I think if we start with yours, like there's no reason that that can't be, you know, at the end of the day, it's, it's not, it's unique because of the image treatment of, because of the orange on black. But if it was green on yellow, then that's somebody else's brand, and so it's still [00:58:00] all reusable.

Cory Miller: Okay. Last thing I didn't ask is ratios. 

Corey Maass: Yep. We need do, do, do, do, do. Where is it? How badly did I break this thing? Doesn't matter.

1200 by six 30.

Is that the default OG image? That's the default OG image. And it's, it's technically, it's not 16, nine. It's. 1.91 to one, but that doesn't matter. Just do 1200 by six 30. That's, that's the image we want.

Perfect.[00:59:00] 

Cory Miller: Okay. That's great. We'll walk on that.

Corey Maass: Um, now how many, how many thousands of dollars are we gonna charge for this? Is that one of the decisions you want? 10,000, a hundred thousand? Yep. Um, no, but I do think, I think we should start thinking about it. Um, we, you had been tasked with doing some, um, competitive analysis and so, um, I think start thinking about, we can either talk about it, um, we should probably wrap up here shortly, but you know, next call next week or another call in between, but start making those kinds of decisions.

Cuz I think if we are deciding that we are launching with a pro version, like I wanna already start plugging some of that stuff in. Um, it's just things I can get ahead of while we're, um, [01:00:00] you know, waiting on graphics or if I'm, um, stuck on something else, you know, because I'll plug in Ed D's class that manages licensing and then, and all that stuff and just get that set up prior to that.

So. Okay. Sorry I didn't discussion to a discussion to have a discussion. 

Cory Miller: Yeah, I didn't do the pricing cuz I was probably thinking to myself that's the faster conversation. But let me, let me go back and do that cause I'll try to hit you with that. I think we discussed some of that in Slack. So I'll, I'll review that and just kind of look at some of these other competitors.

Um, I'll get working on the post status templates. Um,

Corey Maass: cool. Yeah, I, I, I appreciate you talking all this stuff through. I know I'm throwing a lot of abstraction at you. [01:01:00] I'm, I'm, of course living in it, and, and then I'm dropping you into, in, into the barrel with me and, and going, you know, okay, here's how everything works. And, and you haven't actually really seen much yet.

So my expectation is, yeah, within the next week or something, you've actually got buttons to click on, you know, screens to look at, and, um, and it'll, I think it'll immediately become clear what's, what's missing, what's needed, what's gonna work, and what isn't. Okay. 

Cory Miller: And now vice versa. Uh, and I took some notes here.

Um, from my perspective, it's always user flow and messaging. Um, but today I really, the user flow was good for me to know. Now I understand what I need to go make at post at this. So I, I'll see Emily probably in the next hour anyway, and I'll, I'll talk her, I'll talk through this with her. Like [01:02:00] she's creating these all day, every day.

She can probably share some templates and then I'll reengage the designer. I'm thinking for this, that would give us some options. 

Corey Maass: That'd be great. And pricing. 

Cory Miller: Roger that, dude. Awesome. 

Corey Maass: I love it. This is awesome. Yeah. I'm, I'm psyched. Like the, the deeper I dig into this and the more I play with it, the more I'm like, you know, I'm still, uh, I'm still very much in the laboratory, but, you know, seeing, seeing, laying the groundwork, seeing how it's all wired together and seeing the potential for how we can build it out, I, and I'm really excited.

I think there's, there's a lot of amazing things we can do here. Cool. 

Cory Miller: I'll let you know how that session goes. I'm gonna co-work with them, the peop that my marketing assistant and content training that does all this type of work. So I get some intel back for us and, uh, rock on.

This article was published at Post Status — the community for WordPress professionals.