Wordcamp 2012 riaan knoetze - how to hijack a themeshop
- 2. Background & History
● No formal web dev/design training
● Brief educational background
● What I'm NOT:
○ Programming Ninja
○ Marketing Guru
○ Graphic Designer
● What I AM:
○ Decent Front End Dev
○ Know what I like
○ Chaser of Passive Income
- 3. Premium Theme Market Issues
● Crowded
● High Barrier to Entry
○ Skills
○ Support Infrastructure
○ Cost to get help
● Getting feet to your website
- 5. What is a Child Theme?
● Wordpress hierarchy - how things fit together
● Opinion:
○ Childthemes = look & feel change
○ Plugins = adds / removes
functionality
○ Affects support requirements
● Why I chose child theme product
development? Skills
- 14. Hijack 101 - Tools / Skills / Knowledge
Resources
● Skills
● lynda.com
○ Basic PHP ● teamtreehouse.com
○ WP theme file hierarchy ●
●
Digging into Wordpress
Wordpress Tutsplus
○ HTML / CSS / jQuery ● Nettuts
● Web Design Tuts
● Tools ●
●
Themeforest
Code Canyon
○ Text Editor ● WP Codex
● PHP Novice to Ninja
○ Graphic Design thingamabob ● jQuery Novice to Ninja
○ A website to showcase (and sell) ●
●
Sublime Text 2
Notepad++
● Knowledge ●
●
Photoshop
Fireworks
○ What is happening in WP Market ● pixlr.com
○ Top tier themeshops
- 15. Hijack 101 - Pick a Target
● How to select a themeshop to hijack
○ Poor theme design
○ Poor theme functions Personal Experience
○ Poor theme support
○ Unanswered User Requests
○ Active user base / showcase
Research
○ Themeshops by Size
○ Themeshop support
- 16. Hijack 101 - Execute Your Plan
Resources
● The Legwork
● Designshack
○ Handcoding HTML/CSS/jQuery ● CSSWizardry
○ Use existing CSS files from parent ●
●
Supportpress
Github
○ Use CSS3 ● Google Docs
● Bugherd
○ Add spice to CORE theme features
○ Keeps things as modular as possible
○ Advanced: Learn Hooks / Filters
● Testing
○ Find trusted users with field experience
○ Bug logging system
○ Reward testers
- 17. Hijack 101 - Get Cash for your Stash
● Demo Setup (With Google Analytics) Remember
● Product Screenshots / Box Cover ●
●
Currency
Tax Laws
● Get a Marketplace
●
●
Privacy Policy
Terms & Conditions
○ Own Website
● Hosting & Bandwidth
○ Official Marketplace
○ 3rd Party Marketplace
● Start Marketing
○ Support forum / forum signature
○ Blog comments
○ Email Newsletters
○ Asking official recommendation
○ "Buy Now" links on demo's
○ Social Media stuff
○ Listen to / contact the experts
- 18. Hijack 202 - Aftersales Support
● Develop your own support system (e.g. forum /
ticket based / email)
● Why?
○ Key to future sales
○ Key to user driven marketing
- 19. Hijack 202 - Making it Legit
Hijackers (child theme developers)
● Getting themeshop backing
● Joining themeshop marketplace
○ Reduces infrastructure requirements
● Becoming certified partner
● Drawback: Revenue split
Hijackees (themeshops)
● Expanded product offering
● Passive income
● Employee screener
- 20. My Own Experience with AppThemes
● 1st premium child theme early 2011
● Marketing = Forum signatures
● AppThemes Stalker
● Currently 8 Products total
● Joined AppTheme marketplace in Aug 2012
- 21. Making it Official - Joining AppThemes
● Front End Developer
● Inside access to upcoming AppThemes products
● Still based in South Africa
● Still earning in USD = Passive Income