Updating your WordPress site is a common, yet simple, task that any business owner or other non-technical employee is able to take on.  Apptivo powered websites leverage the WordPress platform to provide an easy-to-use interface to make updates to just about any part of your website.  Miner Tech builds all of our websites in a similar manner so you can use this guide below to make updates to your own website.

Many clients choose to develop their website in “template” format, meaning we simply provide the frame of a website in which they can plug their content into.  We are going to walk through taking one of these “template” sites and start updating the content!  Although each site is set up slightly different, you can follow these rules to determine where you need to go in WordPress to make the changes.  This process will apply to both template websites receiving content for the first time, and users who already have a completed website, but just want to make some updates.

One of our clients, K & C Social Buzz, was gracious enough to let us use them as an example, so we will be working on adjusting their site in this post.

First Off…

Load up the website you want to modify, and locate the exact content that needs to be updated.  So for this example, I want to modify some text on the “About Us” page.

Next, we find this content in WordPress…

1. Log into your Apptivo account, and access the WordPress App.
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2. Now click the name of the website which you wish to edit
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4. We are now looking at the WordPress Administrator Dashboard, here is where you can control all of the different content on your website.
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6. Now, the first place to check is in the left hand column.  Click on the “Pages” link.  Now click “edit” on the appropriate page (ex. About Us).  When the “Edit Page” screen opens, you may have to move some of your widgets around to see everything easily.  You can click and drag the title bar of any widget on this screen to move it.
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7. Now, within the text editor on the “Edit Page” screen of the “About Us” page, you will see the content that we originally identified in the first screen.  From here, we can easily update with our own content using the text editor tools.
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8. If you are comfortable with HTML and want to take more precise control, you can click toggle between the “Visual” and “HTML” tabs of the text editor.  This will allow you to gain more precise control over the way your content is displayed.
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9. If you want to optimize your page for SEO, you can modify the keywords, page title, and description used by search engines on this page.
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10. Finally, once you are satisfied with the changes.  Go ahead and find the Publish widget, and click on the “Update” button.   You can also select “Preview Changes” to verify your updates before they are made public.
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11. And that’s it, you’ve successfully updated your website!
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Okay, so we’ve covered the most common method to update content.  But that doesn’t cover everything…

The next most common way that content is stored in your WordPress site is within Widgets.  Widgets are typically special units which do not conform into the standard format of the rest of your website.  For this example, the K & C Social Buzz website has three boxes of information on their homepage.

Here is how we go about changing the content stored within Widgets.

1. Log into your Apptivo account, and access the WordPress App.
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2. Now click the name of the website which you wish to edit
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4. We are now looking at the WordPress Administrator Dashboard again, look within the “Appearance” section of the left navigation, and select the “Widgets” link from the menu.
5. You will now see a series of widget areas in the right column, flip through these widget areas until you identify the proper widget.
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6. Now just carefully modify the text/html within this box.  The Miner Tech team will set up the framework you need, so if you aren’t familiar with HTML, just make sure to only modify the text in which you understand.  Once you are done, hit the “Save” button.
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7. The changes will be live as soon as you hit save, so just go ahead and double check your work!
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How to update your website’s blog…

1. Log into your Apptivo account, and access the WordPress App.
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2. Now click the name of the website which you wish to edit
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4. We are now looking at the WordPress Administrator Dashboard again, look within the “Posts” section of the left navigation, and select the “Add Post” link from the menu.
5. This is where you can enter the contents of your blog post.  You have complete control over the font size and color, numbering, or even the HTML of your post.  Just fill up the title and description of your post and locate the Publish button.
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6. You can insert images anywhere throughout the body of your post.  And, if you insert an image at the top of a post, it will appear directly on your blog homepage.  Just click on the little photo icon above the text editor controls.
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7. Now use the popup window to select the image you want to insert.  Once the image has uploaded, you will be able to define keywords for the image, select it’s alignment, and it’s size.  Once you are done, simply click the “Insert into Post” button.
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8. If you want to see how the post is going to look, click on the “Preview” button before publishing.
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9. Once you press the Publish button, the post will be made live on your website, WordPress will provide you with a link to see your new post.

How to Add/Update Testimonials…

1. Log into your Apptivo account, and access the WordPress App.
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2. Now click the name of the website which you wish to edit
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4. We are now looking at the WordPress Administrator Dashboard again, look within the “Testimonials” section of the left navigation, and select the “Testimonials” link from the menu.
5. Here you will see a list of any testimonials that already exist on your site.  You can edit or delete any of the testimonials from here.
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6. To create a new testimonial, simply fill out the information in the form at the bottom of the page.  Any fields left blank will be hidden from the page.
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7. That’s it, quite simple!