June 10, 2019 — Whether you work remotely or work with remote coworkers and partners, it’s becoming increasingly common to need to collaborate differently. In this session panelists, who are all remote workers, discuss their strategies for success and pitfalls to avoid when working remotely.

June 10, 2019 — When I started my business in 2011, I didn’t think I needed a business plan. I only needed clients, tons of clients. Even though my title was Web Designer, I took every job that came my way. I made WordPress websites, of course, but also did graphic design, print design, social media management, training — basically anything!

In less than eight months, I had to go back to work as an employee because I managed to spend way more money than I earned.
I kept freelancing on the side with no direction whatsoever and finally, I realised that I needed a plan.

It doesn’t matter what your financial goal is for the year or your mission for your small business. Having measurable goals and a clear strategy will allow you to do what you love and make a living out of it.

In this talk I will go over the basic sections of a business plan and show you some examples of how you can make one that represents you and your business.

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June 10, 2019 — ReactJS is changing how the web is built, including WordPress.

Take your existing development skills to the next level by learning the basics of ReactJS. We’ll explore things like components, state, props, and building interactive frontend applications for WordPress.

June 10, 2019 — WordPress 5.0 brings with it a new default theme called TwentyNineteen which is the first “official” theme to be distributed with full and native support for the new core block editing experience.

Using this theme as a guide, let’s take a deeper dive into:
– What customizations are available within each of the native blocks.
– Examples of other customizations that are possible with additional SASS/ CSS rules. (This includes a review of the new block-level classes.)
– Manipulating the position and layout of a block on the page using flexbox and CSS Grid.
– Where to find additional block collections and how to install them.
– Some possibilities of making additional custom blocks without code. (ACF, Carbon Fields and other generators.)

This talk is geared for those with beginning or intermediate web development skills. Ideal audience members will have some knowledge of WordPress and a willingness to make small alterations to a child theme’s CSS and functions.php files.

This talk is also NOT geared toward a discussion of how to create a “gutenblock” from scratch. (The topic has been covered quite a bit more in-depth by people much smarter than me. =-] )

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June 10, 2019 — The new WordPress editor (Gutenberg) is how all new content is to be created on WordPress. However with the way the data is stored, is that really the best way to power an application? I will walk through the drawbacks for how Gutenberg stores data, and how to easily change that to more easily power custom headless (and not) web applications.

June 10, 2019 — Did you know your website can rank better than #1 in Google? You’ve probably noticed answers to your searches appearing directly in Google. That’s called position zero. Learn how to leverage your content to rise above the competition and achieve position zero results. I’ll share a 4 step process you can apply to your content marketing efforts to leap to the top of Google.

Presentation Slides »

June 10, 2019 — With the release of WordPress 5.0, users now have default control over page-level design decisions. In this talk we will discuss the thought process that went into core Gutenberg architecture decisions, different strategies to achieve “smart” control: that balance between complete content freedom, and heavyhanded control. Jamie will present some options to create flexible content strategies for your clients in this new era.

June 10, 2019 — A mother with a wailing baby in her arms – maybe the baby has an ear infection. A trainer at the rec center who is overwhelmed with requests for team building exercises. A gifted data scientist who just. needs. to. focus. An executive with the future of a three billion dollar company on his shoulders.

These are all people who use the intranet web site my team builds. The code we write affects their daily lives, their work, their health, and the company we all work for.

The developer to end user relationship is very direct. We are in the perfect position to advocate for site users, and ensure that the site we build is compassionate in its design, because we write the code. We are the gatekeepers, and we have a both a responsibility and an opportunity to help, and not harm, the users of our site.

June 10, 2019 — It’s true that having a strong social media presence is important, but when your latest viral post drives them to your website, will your business be seen as credible? With a little planning, you can design a WordPress website that will create and leverage trust signals to gain the confidence of your site visitors.

Participants will learn how to do a “trust audit” of their website and leave with an actionable plan to improve the trustworthiness of their website.

June 10, 2019 — I will be talking about the best ways to setup and execute your WooCommerce stores along with tips and tricks that I have used to monetize my own websites using this powerful shopping cart plugin.