Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

Finding a plugin, extension or add-on for your WooCommerce shop can be an exhausting challenge. With more than 400 on WooCommerce.com alone, another 1,000+ on WordPress.org, and thousands scattered over cyberspace, where do you start and what exactly should you look for?

In episode 23, I talk with Joe Casabona, owner of WP in 1 Month, and tap into his experience as both a developer and a trainer who has some excellent strategies for planning and finding that perfect WooCommerce plugin.

We chatted about:

* The differences between a plugin, add-on and extension.

* Deciding between a free or premium plugin.

* Preparing yoursefl, both for the needs of your online store and your budget for purchasing premium WooCommerce extensions.

* Where to start looking for your plugins.

* Joe’s top three WooCommerce plugins or extensions.

Our Sponsor: WP in 1 Month

Transcript

You can also download the transcript of this show: Do the Woo Transcript July 25 2016.

Bob Dunn: Hey, everyone,  and welcome to Do the Woo, a Podcast for WooCommerce shop owners. Bob Dunn here, also known as Bob WP on the web. Today, we are going to dive into WooCommerce extensions and plugins. Did you know that there are more than 400 extensions now on WooCommerce.com? If you search for WooCommerce plugins on WordPress.org, you easily get well over 1,000 results. Hey, that’s the beauty of WooCommerce. Out of the box, it comes with a lot of essential features to get you started, but then you choose your extended functionality based on your own site’s needs. Where the heck do you start? How do you find the right plugin or extension? Today, my guest, and also my sponsor, Joe Casabona from WP in One Month, is going to give us some guidelines and tips on how to navigate this massive influx of WooCommerce goodness. Hey Joe, welcome to the show.

Joe Casabona: Hey Bob, thanks. Happy to be here.

Bob Dunn: I am so looking forward to this because one thing is, Joe is a trainer. He has training background. We both share a lot of interests and also a love for teaching. Before we get into that, let’s find out a little bit about how you got involved with WordPress and WooCommerce.

Joe Casabona: My WordPress story goes back to 2004. I was in college. I was learning how to make websites and I said to my friend, who I had a work-study job with, “I think I’m going to build my own content management system.” I was a college freshman, maybe a sophomore. I had no idea what I was doing and he’s like, “I thought about that but have you heard of WordPress?” I said, “No.” I checked it out and I was like, “Yeah, this is great.” I got WordPress. I did some things that I’m not proud of, as I’m sure a lot of us did in the early WordPress days, like put PHP, hard-coded PHP pages right into core. There were no pages in WordPress at the time.

I stuck with it and I’ve grown with WordPress and watched it evolve into what it is today. I’ve been on WordPress for a long time and I use it for just about everything. WooCommerce I’m actually relatively new to. We do some work … I’m a front-end developer at Crowd Favorite, we do commerce work there. With starting WP in One Month, there’s a few things that I wanted to sell and I’m changing directions of WP in One Month. WooCommerce is going to be a tremendous help there, especially one of the plugins that I’m sure we will talk about lat...

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

Building a WordPress site that keeps community members updated on breaking news while also offering deeper insights on the happenings around WordPress was Brian Krogsgard’s goal when he launched PostStatus.com. Listen in as he shares how WooCommerce powers his site and whether he used it out-of-the-box or had to do some customizations. We also talk about the importance of building a community with a subscription/membership. Lastly, Brian shares with us what he would like to see in the future in the WooCommerce core.

Our Sponsor: Conversio (formerly Receiptful)

Transcript Available

You can download it: Do the Woo Transcript July 20 2016

Bob Dunn: Hey, everyone, and welcome to episode twenty-two of Do the Woo, a podcast for WooCommerce shop owners. Bob Dunn here, also known as Bob WP on the web. Today we are talking with one of the prominent figures in the WordPress community. One of the main reasons is he keeps those WordPressers who design, develop—and do whatever else they choose to do— informed and updated on the nitty gritty of WordPress and the community. In fact, if you know these names, we might even call our guests the Woodward and Bernstein of WordPress. If you work with WordPress, you need to know Brian Krogsgard, publisher of Post Status. Hey Brian, welcome to the show.

Brian Krogsgard: Hey Bob. Thanks for having me. You’re too kind with your intro.

Bob Dunn: Are you the Woodward and Bernstein of WordPress? What do you think?

Brian Krogsgard: That’s about as high a compliment as someone could pay. I think I have a lot to do before I could live up to something like that.

Bob Dunn: Okay, well I may tweak that. You never know.

Brian Krogsgard: No Watergate.

Bob Dunn: No Watergate. Not yet, right? Well, before I get chatting with Brian, I want to thank our sponsor of today’s show. Receiptful.com, a product that started with a very simple question: Could store owners use their email receipts as a marketing opportunity? Two years ago, the team at Receiptful, led by Adii Pienaar, who co-founded WooThemes, built a product that has since allowed store owners to send almost twenty million receipts and generate almost thirty million in revenue. Since then, the product has evolved to help you supercharge all of your other customer interactions as well. I’ll be telling you more about what they can do for you later in the show and also how you can get 20% off your first three months of Receiptful Premium. Now, back to our guest.

I want to break this intro up into a couple of parts. First, I know that Brian has been immersed in WooCommerce in one way or another over time, and I’d love to hear about your background with WooCommerce.

Brian Krogsgard: Sure. I just actually looked up the date, because I’ve been paying attention to WooCommerce since it started and I see now that was almost exactly five years ago. I have been using WooCommerce in some form or fashion, really since just a couple of weeks after they announced the plugin. I was actually actively working on a client website. It was one of my first real websites I built for someone else that was an eCommerce website and I’d started it on Jigoshop. When the WooCommerce came out that they were forking Jigoshop and, more importantly, that Mike and Jay were moving over to the WooThemes team (they were the primary Jigoshop developers), I decided that I was going convert that build that I was working on to Woo Commerce. I had one of the earliest WooCommerce stores,

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

For all websites,  it is becoming more important all the time to make sure that your site is accessible to people with handicaps and disabilities. Designers and developers are paying more attention when designing sites— and the implications when they are not done right. When it comes to your online store, it can make or break a sale.

In episode 21 of the Do the Woo podcast, we are fortunate to have Devon Person from SimplyAccessible.com join us. Listen in as she gives us some insights into some of the challenges, as well as tips for making your site accessible to the world.

We talked about:

We had the chance to talk about accessibility is and what it means for all websites. Devon shared with us the strengths she sees in the websites they review and the weaknesses as well. We also talked about challenges store owners have when it comes to making their online shops accessible and touched on some creative ways that eCommerce sites have approached accessibility. In closing, we looked at the future of accessibility in eCommerce.

Our Sponsor: Conversio (formerly Receiptful)

Transcript Available

You can read the transcript in full here or download it: Do the Woo Transcript July 13 2016

Thanks to SimplyAccessible.com for providing the transcript for this show.

Bob Dunn: Hey everyone, welcome to episode 21 of Do the Woo, a podcast for WooCommerce shop owners. Bob Dunn here, also known as BobWP on the web. Today we are talking about a hot topic with just about every website on the internet needs to actually be a part of, and that is accessibility. In today’s show we’re digging a bit deeper into it, exploring how accessibility and your eCommerce site play such an important role now and in the future. To help us better understand this we are talking with Devon Persing from simplyaccessible.com. Welcome to the show, Devon.

Devon Persing: Thank you very much.

Bob Dunn: Before we dive into this hot topic, the sponsor of today’s show built a product that started with a very simple question: Could store owners use their email receipts as a marketing opportunity? 2 years ago the team Receiptful, led by Adii Pienaar, who co-founded WooThemes, built a product that has since allowed store owners to send almost 20 million receipts and generate almost 30 million in revenue. Wow, that’s pretty big. Since then the product has evolved to help you supercharge all of your other customer interactions as well. I’ll be telling you more about what they can do for you later in the show, and also how you can take 20% off your first 3 months at receiptful.com on their Receiptful premium service.

Now back to our guest. Over on simplyaccessible.com I see that their tagline is, “We believe in a digital world for everyone.” Devon, why don’t you tell us more about yourself, the site, and what Simple Accessible is.

Devon Persing: Sure. Pretty much what I do day to day is — and what we do with a company is — work with clients to make their websites more accessible, which very broadly just means … For us it means making websites—and mobile apps as well—that everyone can use. That includes people with disabilities. It’s really a people first way of thinking about imp...

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

In episode 20, we are talking with Nicole Kohler, who works at Automattic and is the Content Ninja for WooThemes.com. I had a chance to chat with her about how store owners can get the most out of blogging on their online shop. We all know that blogging is an incredible marketing tool, but also that it takes time. Nicole shared her own experience with managing a blog on an eCommerce site and also what she has learned from talking with WooCommerce users.

We chatted about:

* Why—or why not— every online shop should have a blog

* The biggest challenges shop owners have when starting a blog

* Whether, if you are concerned about content taking the attention away from customers buying your products, you should run your blog on a separate site

* What are the advantages to blogging for a small shop owner, as opposed to a big store

* How store owners can take advantage of storytelling

Transcript

You can also download the transcript of this show: Do the Woo Transcript June 29 2016 .

Bob Dunn: Hey, everyone. Welcome to Episode 20 of Do the Woo, a podcast for WooCommerce shop owners. Bob Dunn here, also known as BobWP on the web. Today, we have a special guest on the show, and I mean special because she is a content producer, and anyone who creates content like she does is near and dear to my heart. Nicole Kohler works at Automattic and is a master content creator over on WooCommerce.com. How are you doing today, Nicole, and welcome to the show.

Nicole Kohler: I’m great, Bob. Thanks for having me. How are you?

Bob Dunn: Good, good. How are things weather-wise?

Nicole Kohler: I’m in Pennsylvania. It’s pretty warm. We’ve been having some drizzles on and off, so … Not too hot yet, but another few weeks and I think we’ll be in the middle of summer, and then everyone will just be staying indoors.

Bob Dunn: Yeah. We moved to the Washington coast because I can’t handle heat and stuff, so we have nice, cool … It’s overcast, foggy. I had a snail crawling on my window this morning when I got into the office saying hi to me and stuff, so … A slug going across the window. That was always a fun thing to watch. Nice and slow.

Nicole Kohler: Yeah.

Bob Dunn: Anyway, so before I dive in with Nicole, I wanted to just go over a couple of things. First, we have moved our show back to one day a week on Wednesdays. This may change again in the future. It depends, so we’ll have to wait and see on that. Also, I just would like to let all you listeners know that we are always looking for sponsors for Do the Woo. If you have a service-themed plugin or extension that is WooCommerce-related and would be a good fit for our audience, we would love to have you join our already stellar lineup of past and future sponsors. You can find details on bobwp.com. Of course, if you have any questions, I am ready to answer them. Let’s get back to our guest. I know that Nicole has been blogging for some time and has direct experience with blogging on eCommerce sites, so I’m going to let her tell us a bit more about who she is and what she does.

Nicole Kohler: Sure. Currently, I am the content creator for WooThemes at Automattic. I joined Woo about six weeks before the acquisition, and I like to tell people that I woke up the morning of and just read the email and just was like, “Okay. This is happening.

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

In episode 19, we are talking with Chris Lema, membership site expert and blogger at ChrisLema.com. Chris is a software executive of 21 years and has worked with clients on some of the largest membership sites around. Chris brings his expertise to the show and shares his experiences with memberships on eCommerce and WooCommerce sites, while giving us some great tips on how we should plan to dive into this part of eCommerce.

We chatted about:

* How membership and subscription sites are mistakenly considered the same— and what the real difference is

* The most important considerations if you have an existing online store that you want to expand to include memberships

* What makes the WooCommerce membership extension so unique and powerful

* One of the largest mistakes that he sees online store owners making with membership sites

* Some of the coolest eCommerce sites that Chris has seen incorporate memberships

* An interesting product that has been recently released in the WooCommerce space

Our Podcast Sponsor: SkyVerge

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

In episode 18 we are doing a walk-through of the Zipping Zebra, the latest release of WooCommerce 2.6. I’ll tell you about the changes you will find scattered within the user interface. From on boarding additions, product data changes, order listings, simplifying payment gateways to shipping, you’ll find it all here.

I talked about:

* Easing the setup of payment gateways during the on boarding wizard

* Changes that will make your account page more manageable

* New and expanded endpoints

* On-hold emails and how they work

* The ease of deleting orders in fewer steps

* Shipping zones and small changes in the product data settings

* Front-end changes, including quicker refreshes for customers

Our Sponsor: coolblueweb

Other resources I shared:

Of course, when doing updated like this it’s always a good idea to do a backup of your site just in case something goes wonky, I always recommend BackupBuddy. And if you want to test your site with the update before even touching your live site, and don’t have staging available with your hosting, then check out my friends at WPStagecoach.

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

In episode 17, we are talking with Dave Lee, Travel Blogger and co-founder of TravelBlogSuccess.com. Dave has been blogging for 10 years and shares with us his experience of using WooCommerce for his site to sell online courses, as well as some tips for for people looking to get into travel blogging.

We chatted about:

* How long he has been using WooCommerce and, specifically, how he has used it for their site

* The most successful social platform he has used for selling his online courses

* If and how WooCommerce plays a role in teaching people to monetize their travel blogs

* The biggest challenge he has had with online courses

Our Podcast Sponsor: Postmatic

Transcript

You can also download the transcript of this show: Do the Woo Transcript June 13 2016.

Bob Dunn: Hey, everyone. Welcome to episode 17 of Do the Woo, a podcast for WooCommerce shop owners. Bob Dunn here, also known as Bob WP on the web. Today we are talking with someone that has not only made a career out of travel blogging, but now teaches others how to start it themselves. I know they’re going to be several listeners that would probably admit that their secret wish is that they can make a living from traveling, but I’m sure there’s a lot more to it than that. Today, Dave Lee from Travel Blog Success is going to share with us on how he has used WooCommerce to create his site and business. How are you doing today, Dave? Welcome to the show.

Dave Lee: Hey, Bob. Thanks for having me. I’m doing well.

Bob Dunn: Cool. The pleasure is all mine. I know I’m anxious to hear more about your experiences, but we do always have a sponsor. I’m going to introduce everybody to our sponsor before we get into the questions. Our sponsor today is Postmatic. They’re a WordPress engagement platform for publishers who understand the value of conversation and the power of email marketing. Postmatic will grow your list, power your subscriptions, including sending posts, automatic digests and newsletters, making it easy for your community to join the conversation on the web or right from their inbox. Postmatic features WordPress’s only reply-able email notifications for things like posts and comments, making commenting as simple as hitting reply. New on Postmatic is WooCommerce integration from mailing product announcements and managing reviews instantly via email, which I’ll talk about a little bit later. Postmatic is free and available now in the WordPress repository at gopostmatic.com.

Now I know everyone is anxious to learn about our guest and all that he does and the joys of travels. Dave, tell us about yourself and travelblogsuccess.com.

Dave Lee: Well, I’m in my 10th year of blogging on WordPress, about travel. I began in 2007, ahead of taking a one year trip around the world, which was my dream at the time. I wanted to, of course, document that experience, and also hopefully along the way, show other people how they could plan a similar long-term trip like that. I ended up traveling for 20 months. I started a second blog before I was done, when I found myself living in Medellín, Columbia. Then at the end of that experience, I had no money left. I was thinking, how can I supplement the income I was making from my travel blogs in order to get myself back to Columbia,

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

In episode 16, we are chatting with Chloë Miller, Marketing & Communications Director at ScoutBooks.com. I came across their story through our friends at Prospress, and just knew we had to learn more about them, how they use WooCommerce and how they survive—and thrive—in the online shop world. They are based on Portland, OR, and make it easy for people to produce and design their own books and notebooks—all of them sustainable and environment-friendly.

We chatted about:

* Whether WooCommerce was ScoutBooks’ first choice, and the challenges they encountered

* What makes their product sustainable and how does that appeal to their customers

* Whether—and to what extent—online advertising has worked for them

* What social platforms they use and which have been the most successful

* How creating non-digital products can affect an online business

* The challenges of keeping up a blog on an online store

Thanks To Our Sponsor: PootlePress.com

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

In episode 15, we are going through the tangled web of security with Neill Feather, President of SiteLock, a global leader in website security solutions. Although we touched on the importance of security with your online store, any website owner will benefit from this interview to get a better understanding of the security issues and needs around your website presence.

We chatted about:

* What malware scans do and how often you should run one on your site

* Web application firewalls and a breakdownof what they do for you and why they are important

* How content delivery networks (CDNs), can help your site

* Understanding what your hosting company is doing for your site’s security and how much they play a role in it

* The security issues that play a more specific role in eCommerce sites

Thanks To Our Podcast Sponsor: SiteLock

Originally from our series, Do the Woo.

In episode 14, I’m talking about 5 things I have learned while building sites with WooCommerce and consulting for clients. I share my thoughts on those pop-ups on eCommerce sites, choosing your theme, and making the decision to use WooCommerce, as well as a bit on hosting and expecting the unexpected. In other words, 5 random thoughts that don’t really relate to each other directly, but definitely impact success or failure in the world of Woo.

I chat about:

* Why you need to be careful with popups, including a recent experience I had

* How choosing the right theme can make or break your online store

* Making the decision about whether WooCommerce is right for you

* Preparing yourself for the unexpected

* Why hosting is an important as finding the right space for a physical store

Thanks to Our Podcast Sponsor: SiteGround