Site backups are boring, until something goes wrong.

Implement a reliable backup service and sleep sound at night, knowing that your website is safe and secure.

There a four key things you need when it comes to selecting a backup..

• Backups should never fail
• Backups should not slow down your site
• Backups should be accessible when you need them
• Backups should be restored in minutes

In this video, I take you through each point and explain why BlogVault is a good choice when it comes to backups.

WordPress can get hacked. It’s just one of those things.

With the huge range of themes and plugins available its inevitable that security breaches happen.

The other week, when PopcornTheme.com got hacked, I was able to quickly clean and secure the site using the Malcare Plugin.

Malcare is a full security suite that not only can clean your website but protects it too.

Malcare is a free plugin, with premium plans available. that includes

• It has 7 layers of protection and has features like:
• Real-time Firewall
• Login Protection
• Bot Protection
• Daily Malware Scans
• Vulnerability Monitoring
• Instant Malware Removal

The clean up process was quick and easy.

How to clean your WordPress website with Malcare

Here’s how I did it:

Install the plugin

Add you sites URL and then you can install the plugin.

Either submit a WordPress login or download the plugin and install it manually.

Run a Scan

Once installed the plugin will run a full scan of your website.

Malcare will identify any malware or problems as well as secure your site so your protected from future threats.

Clean your site

Click the button to get your site clean.

You can reset your passwords and security keys here too.

And that’s it!

You can run a scan again to check that your site is clean.

Let me know in the comments if you were able to secure and clean your site with Malcare.

In this video, I explain how I created an AI website for my imaginary building firm, Eagle Builders.

The tool I used was the very useful ZipWP.

Take a look at the site—I’ve not edited it; it’s just what the AI created for me.

I think it’s a pretty decent starting point…

Here’s the process to create your own site or sites for local businesses using AI.

How to Create a Local Business Site with AI

1. Sign-up with ZipWP

You’ll need an account with ZipWP to get up and running.

They have a free plan, so you can test it all out without having to spend a penny.

Once you’re ready, you can upgrade to the right plan for your needs.

The sign-up process is really easy and only takes a minute or so.

2. Start the AI creation process

Once you’re signed up and logged in you can start to create a website with AI.

1. Click on Create New
2. Select Complete Website

The blank website option is useful if you want to play around and test out some WordPress stuff, like themes or plugins.

3. Enter the basics

On the next page you simply need to enter some basic information about the business you’re creating the website for.

1. Enter the business name
2. Select the type of business it is
3. Select the language you’d like

4. Enter a description of the business

Here you need to enter as much information as possible about the business. Remember to include the key services and some background stuff about the company.

You can use AI here to help you fill it out.

5. Enter the contact details

This section is straightforward.

Just enter all the contact details, including links to social media.

6. Upload your images or select some stock ones

Now it’s time for the images.

Ideally, you’ll want to upload your own images.

If you don’t have any right now, you can search for and select some stock photos.

7. Select the structure and layout

Based on the information you just provided, you’ll see loads of different designs for your new website.

Select the one you like by clicking on it.

You now need to upload your logo. You can always quickly design on in Canva.

Decide if you want to show the site title and adjust the width of your logo so it all looks sweet.

You can also select the fonts and colors you’d like to use on this page.

9. Select the final features

You’re almost done! Select if you want any final features added to your new website.

Then click start building!

You’ll see a confirmation screen.

Click start building again, and the AI will go to work on creating your website.

Step 10: It’s Ready

Once the website is ready, you’ll be given all the necessary information to make your customizations.

Make a note of the username and password now.

To make some changes, click on Customize Website, and you’ll be logged into WordPress.

It’s easy to make changes using the Spectra page builder with the block interface.

And that’s it. You’re all done.

We may earn a commission if you click on the links within this article. Learn more.

Why you shouldn’t use raw affiliate links

There are several reasons why copying and pasting affiliate links into your content isn’t great.

Reasons like:

• They look messy
• They’re hard to remember
• You can’t track the clicks in your website
• You can’t update them easily

That’s where a link management plugin comes in as it provides a solution to all these problems.

I’ve used plugins like PrettyLinks and Lasso before and they are both really good, however they are quite expensive.

Introducing ClickWhale

I was recently introduced to ClickWhale, and I’ve been really impressed with it as it’s far cheaper than those two while still providing excellent functionality.

ClickWhale

Super good value link management plugin

• Easy affiliate link management
• Link Pages
• Affiliate link statistics
• Tracking code functionality

Get ClickWhale

Here’s what you get with ClickWhale

Link Management

This is the main feature of the plugin.

Easily manage all your affiliate links in one place.

They’re super easy to add and edit and you get:

• Nice easy to remember URLs that you can set yourself
• An easy way to update your links if you need to
• You can organize them in categories
• You can set if they are no-follow and/or sponsored

Link Pages

A link page is a sweet-looking page that contains affiliate links.

You can choose which links go on here.

Maybe you’ll use it for your most popular or useful ones. It’s a bit like my essentials page.

They are really easy to set up and share. They also look great on mobile!

Statistics

ClickWhale tracks the clicks on your affiliate links and presents them to you in a really nice, visual way.

This is perfect for seeing which links are performing well or for double-checking that your affiliate links are tracking correctly.

Other Features

Clickwhale also has a number of other cool features:

• Tracking codes (easily embed code into your site)
• Import and Export functionality
• Migration from other plugins like PrettyLinks

You should check it out! I think you’ll really like it

My Essential WordPress Blocks

First off, you’ll need the free version of the Spectra plugin to get these blocks.

Specta is one my favorite free plugins and does more than just add blocks. You get things like a popup builder too!

Container

The container block is a fabulously flexible block that enables you to create some really cool layouts. Your only limitation is your imagination!

Icon List

Get rid of boring bullet points with the icon list block.

With loads of icons to choose from you can create styled lists based on the subject of your content.

Like this:

Call to action

You probably want your website visitor to take some action.

A call to action is a great way to encourage it and this block makes it easy to add one.

Here’s and example:

Star Rating

This one is great if you’re doing reviews on your site.

You can drop in a flexible star rating box wherever you need it.

Like this:

FAQ

Every website needs an FAQ page.

Maybe you also to add FAQs to your individual bits of content.

There is no problem with this FAQ block. And it even includes SEO schema, helping search engines recognize the question-and-answer format.

Spectra is a really cool page builder for WordPress.

The free version offers lots of features that make WordPress so much better, including extra blocks, templates and a popup builder.

The pro version adds extra functionality for the popup builder, more blocks, a loop builder, and dynamic content support.

Spectra Review Overview

• It doesn’t slow your site down
• Loads of amazing templates
• Really cool extra blocks
• Popup Builder
• Includes Forms

• Uses the block editor which can be confusing
• Quite a steep learning curve

Get Spectra Pro

What I like

It’s fast

I’ve criticized page builders in the past because they can have a negative effect on the performance of a website.

However, this isn’t the case with Spectra. After installation, the effect on performance is minimal.

If you use it with something like Airlift, you can still get green scores on Google Pagespeed without a problem.

Loads of cool templates

To help you create great looking pages and posts quickly and easily Spectra is loaded with templates.

You’ll find templates for sections as well as complete pages.

They’ve all been professionally designed, which makes working with Spectra a dream. You can create eye-catching layouts in minutes.

Extra blocks (lots of them!)

One of the best things that happens when you install Spectra is that you get lots of extra blocks you can use when crafting your content (don’t worry, you can turn off the ones you don’t need).

Having extra blocks gives you far more flexibility when you’re publishing posts and pages.

Some of my favorites are:

• FAQs
• Star Ratings
• Post Carousels
• Containers with Flex
• Forms
• Call to actions

The extra blocks are a good enough reason alone to install Spectra.

Popup Builder

A popup can be a good way to increase the conversion rate on your website.

Maybe you need to guide people to a certain product or encourage them to join your email list.

Spectra has a popup builder built-in so you can easily create one using the block editor.

No need for extra plugins.

You can find out more by watching my recent video where I created a really good-looking one (even if I do say so myself. )

Forms

Every website needs forms, right?

Spectra includes a form block so you can easily add simple forms.

It’s not for complex uses, for sure; for that, go for something like WPForms or Gravity, but it’s perfect for a basic contact form or similar.

What I don’t like

Spectra’s not perfect. Here’s a couple of things I spotted that could be a problem

It uses the block editor

This might not be a bad thing if you’ve got experience with creating sites with the WordPress block editor.

But for newcomers and those not familiar with WordPress it might be a problem.

Other page builders like Elementor and Divi are far more graphical and user-friendly with their interface.

A learning curve

There is a bit of a learning curve with Spectra.

Especially when using things like the container block and the popup builder.

It’s not too much of a problem as more and more tutorials are being published on YouTube and other places all the time.

With a bit of playing around and a few videos you’ll be creating some wonderful things with Spectra.

My new website is about ready to launch! At last!

A lot of you have been asking how I put it together.

In this video I take you through the site and show you how it’s all stitched together.

How I made Estepona.Life

The Theme

The site is, of course, running my own theme, Popcorn!

It’s based on the Travel demo, available to import when you set up the Popcorn Theme.

I’ve done a full tutorial on how it all works.

The Location Pages

The locations (bars, cafes, restaurants etc) are custom posts with some custom fields.

I’m using the ACF plugin to do this.

It gives me a bit of extra flexibility and makes it quicker to populate them, as I need to tick a few boxes, and it then pulls things straight into the template.

For example, the features of a place.

Are shown when I tick the relevant boxes…

The rest of the page is just made up of blocks.

The opening hours are a bunch of shortcodes from the Business Hours plugin.

The map is simply the embed code you can grab from Google Maps.

I have a video on how to do it.

The editor’s comments and pros and cons are standard Popcorn Theme patterns.

The Google Reviews section uses a plugin called Reviews Feed.

It’s really cool. It uses the Google API to pull in the latest reviews for a specific place on Google Maps. You can then style and lay them out as you choose.

I have a video on how it all works too.

The rest of the page is just a mixture of columns, headers, paragraphs, and image gallery blocks.

The Shop

Estepona.Life has a shop, so I can sell Estepona-inspired t-shirts.

It’s powered by Woocommerce.

I designed the t-shirts using Kittl, which is much better than Canva for T-shirt designs.

I’ve then created an account with Printify to get the t-shirts made.

It’s very easy to connect your Printify account to Woocommerce.

I’ve completed a test order, and the T-shirt has been delivered. I’m impressed with the quality (pic of me wearing it coming soon!)

The rest of the site

The rest of the posts and pages are nothing fancy. Just standard WordPress/Popcorn posts and pages with a few blocks here and there.

I am using the Spectra plugin to give me a few extra blocks over the usual.

To add the popup we’re going to use the Spectra Page builder plugin.

It’s a great addition to any WordPress website and includes an easy to use popup builder.

Here’s what to do. You’ll find more details in the video.

Add a Popup to WordPress

1. Install the Spectra Plugin

You can easily add the plugin from within the plugin section in the WordPress dashboard.

1. Click Add New
2. Search for ‘Spectra’
3. Click Install
4. Click Activate

2. Create your Popup

You’ll find the popup builder in the Spectra options down the left side.

1. Click on Popup Builder
2. Click Create Popup

3. Choose the Popup type

You have the option to create a simple bar across the top of your site, although you’ll probably want to go for the more traditional overlay style popup.

4. Create your Popup

You’re now ready to create your popup. The popup builder uses the block editor so it’s very easy to do.

You can drag and drop any blocks you like into the popup.

To see exactly how I create my beautiful popup, be sure to watch the video.

If you want extra options like the ability to set when and where the popup displays, I suggest you upgrade to Spectra Pro.

You’ll probably want to add a form like I have.

You can use any form plugin to do this, like Gravity Forms or WPForms as both of these can connect to a wide range of popular email marketing platforms, like Mailchimp.

In the video, I use WPForms.

Add a Form to your Popup

1. Install the WPForms plugin

Install the WPForms plugin in the usual way from the plugins sections.

1. Click on Add New Plugin
2. Search for ‘WPForms‘
3. Click Install
4. Click Activate

2. Create your form

Once activate you should be greated with a welcome screen. Click the big orange button to create your first form.

if you don’t see this page you can find the option in the WPForms section in the left side menu.

3. Choose a template

WPForms has loads of templates. The newsletter signup one is perfect for a popup.

Give it a click.

4. Customize and Configure your Form

You can now customize your form.

I like to do the following to give it a sweet look…

1. Make the field size large
2. Turn off the all the labels
3. Add some placeholder text

I do this on all the fields.

Click Save when you’re done.

5. Connect your form to your email platform

In the marketing sectiojn within WPForms you can connect your form to your email marketing platform.

If you’re not using constant contact you’ll need to upgrade to WPForms Pro.

6. Add your form to your Popup

Go backinto the Popup builder and edit your popup.

Insert a WPForm block to add the form.

For more flexibility, add the block inside a container block.

And that’s it. Make your final adjustments, and you should be ready to go.

Remember, there are more details on my exact process in the video above.

I’ve recently been playing around with a really good plugin that makes your WordPress website really fast without the hassle of ticking boxes and configuring a load of settings.

The plugin is called Airlift and is FREE!

Here’s how to get it setup.

Make your WordPress website FAST with Airlift

Step 1: Test your current website speed

You’ll want to know where you’re starting from.

Head over to the Google Pagespeed score and enter your URL.

It will let you know your score. If you’re not getting 100 or very close, move to Step 2.

Step 2: Signup for Airlift

Head over to Airlift and get yourself signed up.

It’s easy, enter your email address and password.

Step 3: Enter your site URL

Enter your URL (website address) into the box. Easy!

Step 4: Download and install the plugin

On the next page click on the big green button to download the plugin..

Once you’ve downloaded it to your computer, login to your website and install it.

You can do this by going to Plugins -> Add New -> Upload

Once it’s uploaded, click Activate.

Step 5: Connect Airlift to your website

To connect your website and test everything is working, click the Test Plugin Button.

Step 6: Wait 5 minutes, and you’re done!

Hopefully your plugin has connected successfully.

If it has, it will analyze your site and come back with an improvement on your Google pagespeed score.

This process can take up to 5 minutes.

I’d love to know what scores you’re now getting on your website.

Let me know in the comments!