Wordpress for rental sites review

[kevsboredagain]

I know many people come to this forum looking for information on how to develop a website using Wordpress but there is surprisingly little information to be found on LMH. Having had the opportunity during the last month to really get to grips with the platform, I thought I would offer some tips on the pro and cons of developing a rental site using Wordpress.

Wordpress was primarily a blogging platform but is now used as the tool behind millions of websites. It is a content management system which allows a site to be developed with no coding knowledge. However, it is not without its own learning curve and still may not be the best tool for everyone.

Most hosting companies allow a direct installation of Wordpress on your domain. If not, it’s easily installed using FTP. When you start, it is best to spend a few hours reading some online tutorials or watching Youtube videos as these few hours can make the difference between giving up or going on to produce some great websites.

The first question you may ask yourself, is should I use a template? I would say most definitely yes. A good template will cost around $60 and will contain a whole range of tools and features which you can use on your site. Think of the template as your tool box rather than how your site will look. How and where you use those tools is up to your imagination and the template should give you a consistent style on all pages of your new website. It is so easy to simply load up a template demo and replace a few pictures and text but this will lead to a site which simply looks like a template. Use your imagination and create your own look and content.

When using a theme, you should create, as a first step, a child theme. When you modify parts of the theme, you do so in the child. When the theme is updated in the future, you changes are not lost. It also reduces the risk of corrupting the main theme. For example you may want to define your own link colours. You do this in the child theme only and an update of your theme will not overwrite these settings.

Once you start making your site, you’ll soon discover features that would like but are not supplied by Wordpress or your template. Then you must enter the world of plugins. These are 3rd party developed components which add to the functionality of Wordpress. It may be a photo gallery or an email newsletter subscribing plugin you require. There are 1000a of plugins to choose from. Make sure you chose current and popular ones. Wordpress is continually being updated and you must ensure your plugins are the same. Finding the best plugin for your needs can be time consuming and not all are free. Occasionally plugins can clash with each other, for example you may have multiple plugins trying to provide an image lightbox function.

Do I need to code? In theory no, you can develop the whole site without coding. However, here lies one of the downsides of Wordpress. Sometimes the styles of components are not exactly as you would like. Perhaps the gap between two elements is much too large or you want that blog entry to be displayed with no time stamp. Then you have to start adding custom CSS. Wordpress makes this easy to do and CSS can be added to a custom CSS file. If you are using a popular theme, then you may find the author also runs a forum where you can find using tips on modifying the CSS. Sometimes, you may find you need to use some html tags in a section to force a URL to appear or the right heading style to be used. Having some basic HTML and CSS knowledge can be a huge advantage but you certainly don’t need to be an expert.

Rental calendars in Wordpress are a headache. I could not find anything worth using, which was free (or cheap) and responsive. I ended up by paying for a plugin which would allow a responsive iframe to be used and including a PHP coded calendar page. Not exactly an easy solution.

One of the advantages of Wordpress is that the site can be developed online and by multiple users. You can of course develop locally using a server like WAMP but I could see no advantage. During development it can be hidden from Google with a setting in Wordpress.

One last tip would be to make sure you have a backup solution and keep Wordpress and all plugin updated. There are some free backup plugins which can clone your whole site in case disaster strikes. Wordpress is a complex environment which uses a database to store all the content. It can go wrong and you could lose all your work.

Is Wordpress suitable for me? I would say if you can use programs such as Word or Excel fairly well and don’t struggle moving files around on your PC, then you’d be fine. It’s much easier than learning HTML but harder than an online tool such as Weebly. The good thing is, it’s free to try!

[greenbarn]

Kev, that summary would have been so useful when I built my Wordpress site. Really useful advice, and essential reading for anyone thinking of going down the WP route.

One particular point you made struck me - I developed my site locally on my desktop using MAMP (the Mac equivalent of WAMP) because that's what seemed to be suggested. When everything was working locally, the transfer from local desktop was very far from straightforward - due to the database structure and the need for all sorts of changes to be made; very different from building a "standard" html site and just using FTP to upload it. I struggled to succeed and eventually used an external backup service - Blogvault - to take care of the whole thing error free; I was going to use a backup service that was completely separate from my host anyway, so that made the decision (and as you rightly say, it's essential to have frequent backups that can be restored easily.)

It may be that with a slow connection, building the site on the server rather than locally would be a pain; I don't know because I didn't try it, but if it's workable I'd definitely do it that way if I was developing another site.

All my PIMS stuff including calendars integrates fine in Iframes.

On the subject of themes, some have really good support from developer and community, and it's well worth checking that out - as well as making sure it's responsive.
The theme I use introduced a visual editor a while back and I find myself using that more and more rather than diving into normal editing modes.

Again, thanks for the post!

[kevsboredagain]

When everything was working locally, the transfer from local desktop was very far from straightforward - due to the database structure and the need for all sorts of changes to be made; very different from building a "standard" html site and just using FTP to upload it. I struggled to succeed

Yes, transfer of the site from one domain to another was tricky. I tried eventually settled with one called Duplicator, which handled the complete transfer between 2 domains and changed all the links. I guess this would also work from localhost to a domain.

[French Cricket]

Thanks for that really useful post, kev. For the moment I'm happily settled with Weebly, especially now that I have a handle on customising and editing templates and some good contacts with external template and widget creators, but if it should all turn pear shaped at some point in the future it'll be WP that I'll turn to.

I'm right in the middle of creating 3 new sites on Weebly but maybe when I've got a minute (hah!) I'll do a similar write up for it.

[Vince]

Yes, transfer of the site from one domain to another was tricky. I tried eventually settled with one called Duplicator, which handled the complete transfer between 2 domains and changed all the links. I guess this would also work from localhost to a domain.

In the Joomla world we have a program called Akeeba, which for Joomla is free. There's a version for Wordpress but unfortunately it's not free.

This program is able to make a complete copy of your site which you can then download to work on WAMP/MAMP without damaging the live server with your experiments, or to upload your finished site to the live server.

I use it A LOT, in fact a copy of our (Joomla) demo server is created using it which our customers can then use to download a full, working installation of the product once they've purchased a license. It's really, really good.

I haven't used the Wordpress version, but if it's anything like the Joomla version it'll make the job very easy to do.

Rental calendars in Wordpress are a headache. I could not find anything worth using, which was free (or cheap) and responsive. I ended up by paying for a plugin which would allow a responsive iframe to be used and including a PHP coded calendar page. Not exactly an easy solution.

Were you looking just for calendars, or full booking systems?

[Nemo]

Great post kevsboredagain. I'll just add my experience from building my site last year, with the help of a designer.

I built it online, so no need to move files etc. You can easily create a draft page or post and not publish it until you're ready. I have an automated back up in Dropbox every week and have it set to keep the last 10 back ups, so as a new one saves, the oldest automatically gets removed.

As a PIMS user, I have my rate card, availability calendar and contact form integrated into the site. It requires some messing around with iframe sizing etc to make a suitable fit for my responsive site, when viewing on different devices, but I found a compromise I'm happy with.

I update my plugins about once a week manually. I now check to see if they are being kept up to date by the developer and that they remain compatible with the latest version of Wordpress. Sometimes that means waiting a week or two; if the plugin isn't compatible with the Wordpress version it may create problems. As a non techie, I try and avoid creating problems!

Most recently this meant changing a social button plug in to a different one as it hadn't been kept up to date.

I use a couple of programmes to reduce image size before uploading images, to ensure I'm keeping the file size as small as possible.

All in all I'm very pleased with my site. I did struggle to understand wordpress to begin with which held me back for a long time. Once a friend started talking me through the process, I learnt enough to take the plunge, but used my webguy for finding the right theme, recommending plug ins, doing all my redirects, background security and more. Building it, as it was my second site, meant I had very specific requirements and therefore the advice and background help I had was invaluable in reaching the end goal in a timely fashion.

[kevsboredagain]

Were you looking just for calendars, or full booking systems?

Just a plain but nice looking availability calendar which was responsive. ie. not an iframe with scroll bars

Interesting comment Nemo about PIMs and integration into a responsive site. I've seen PIMs embedded into responsive sites and the calendar itself was not responsive but instead scrollable, without scroll bars. I wouldn't have been happy with this, as on a phone it looks like the calendar is truncated and not even scrollable. I spoke to Richard a long time ago about this and hopefully the plans to upgrade are still at the back of his mind.

[Nemo]

Interesting comment Nemo about PIMs and integration into a responsive site. I've seen PIMs embedded into responsive sites and the calendar itself was not responsive but instead scrollable, without scroll bars. I wouldn't have been happy with this, as on a phone it looks like the calendar is truncated and not even scrollable. I spoke to Richard a long time ago about this and hopefully the plans to upgrade are still at the back of his mind.

Hence my comment that I found a compromise I was happy with. I've had to use larger frames that perhaps leave space, or change the format to how many months it displays etc and the multi property calendar doesn't work on small screens. I therefore provide a link back to the individual property calendar.

Not perfect, but good enough for me.

[JaneS]

I am commenting on this thread now as thanks to Kevsboredagain's informative post and the very nice website he created for, I think, Ladygaga, I decided to have a look at other themes and found one that is just what I wanted to achieve, but could not due to the limitation of my knowledge/acquired skills and my WYSIWYG provider. The catch is it is a Wordpress theme.

Thank you again to Kev as I also found tuts+ which has an excellent free course called Wordpress for beginners. it is broken down into a set of videos which I watched over the course of 2 days. This course shows the complete novice, i.e. me, exactly what I have to do and more importantly how to, it even covers how to upload Wordpress manually to an online server and all the software which is free that you need to do this.

Also, by lesson 4 Wordpress was dimystified for me and began to make sense. So I recommend this course for anyone who likes a Wordpress theme but is hesitant about using Wordpress.

With Wordpress you need to find a web hosting provider and for this I suggest a Google for PCmag which has an article called best web hosts 2015. This article also explains the difference between the shared, managed and dedicated packages which for someone like me is invaluable and if you click through to the sites there are discounts available.

I am now in the position of moving to the next stage which is signing up with a web hosting provider, installing Wordpress, buying the theme, transferring my domain, and doing the creative things for the website.

Why I am going to all this effort when I could get Kev to build a website for me? There are two reasons: first I like to know how the technical side works and secondly I like to do the creative side.

Thank you again Kev without your post I could not have gained the knowledge I now have re Wordpress nor the confidence to go and create a Wordpress website. I am sorry if my long presence on your website destroyed your analytics. I meant no harm, I just followed the clicks re themes. The websites you have created for people are excellent.

I would also add that by the time I have finished the website, I will probably have spent in excess of the price Kev charges for creating a website and that does not include cost of time. This may be of help to others who are weighing up the cost of creating a website for themselves or asking someone like Kev, who has the knowledge and software at his fingertips - sorry about the pun - and can produce ideas and drafts quickly.

I hope this post helps others as this forum has helped me a great deal recently.

JaneS

[kevsboredagain]

Thanks for the compliments JaneS. The site you mention though was not actually made with Wordpress at all but plain vanilla HTML in a text editor. (and is still waiting for more info to complete!)

The site I did help out with though and which prompted my review, was one where the owner was fairly good with Wordpress already but had corrupted the database and could proceed no further. My involvement after that point was more guidance and tutoring rather than design, which worked out well. We both learned a lot.

I have a lot of respect for people who are willing to sit down and study something with the aim of mastering it for themselves. I'm sure you'll have some headaches along the way but the end result will be very rewarding.