A couple days ago, we talked about the power of the “How-to” post and the fact that you are an expert. Now it’s time to take this one step further! Now it’s time for you to start hosting webinars.

The thought of hosting your own webinar can be pretty daunting, but it’s really not as bad as it sounds. And it’s a great way to get yourself out there.

Here are a couple tips on getting started:

• Just do it already - The hardest part is getting started. So just go ahead and schedule your first webinar, like now!
• Be prepared - Plan out your content and how you are going to present it.
• Be flexible – Just because you’re prepared doesn’t mean things will happen exactly as you planned. Be ready to adapt.
• Record your webinars - We’ve seen it happen. You have 100 people signed up for your webinar, but only 20 show. Or maybe no one shows. Go ahead with your webinar as planned and record it. This way you can still share your knowledge with your audience at a time that is more convenient for them.

Want more advice before you start your own webinars?

Be sure to check out the iThemes Publishing page for our newest eBook, 15 Best Practices for Rockin’ Webinars, out now!

This week’s Spring Cleaning posts have covered planning and optimizing content creation for your site’s blog and social media platforms. While this week hasn’t included as many cleaning “tasks,” we felt that content creation is important enough to devote an entire week to helping you evaluate your current content strategy — and to make sure you have a content strategy in place.

When it comes to content creation at WebDesign.com, collaboration and repurposing content across multiple platforms has been key for us.

With multiple team members writing blog posts and (our newest pursuit) organizing information from webinars into eBooks for the iThemes eBook library, we’ve found a few workflow tools that are crucial to our content creation process (and team collaboration).

1. Basecamp

We’re recent converts, but we’re firm believers in 37 Signal’s online project management system, Basecamp. The UI was recently updated, making the system incredibly easy (and even fun) to use. It just makes sense.

Basecamp has definitely streamlined our workflow and helps us keep multiple projects organized. Because we have team members working on multiple projects (each with different tasks) in different physical locations, Basecamp has become an excellent collaboration tool for our team.

When it comes to content creation, we use Basecamp specifically to keep a birds-eye-view of our schedule of content (in Basecamp’s great calendar feature) and to assign posts to different members — all based on larger on-going projects. Since projects have multiple to-do list options, we always know where we are in the process of creating content and new resources.

Tip: Not working on a team? Use Basecamp for client work and sharing updates on projects.

2. iChat (or Google Chat)

IM’ing is a way of life at iThemes and WebDesign.com. Because of the nature of development, staying focused and keeping our environment quiet is an office priority. Because we’re constantly sharing updates, links, and screenshots, chat is far superior (and faster) than emailing back and forth.

Most of us use iChat (since we’re Mac users), synced with our Google accounts. Here’s a great tutorial for configuring iChat for Google Talk.

Tip: Offer your Google Chat contact info when working with clients for speedier interactions and collaborations.

3. Awesome Screenshot

We take a LOT of screenshots and share them on our team. You always have the option of using your system’s built-in screenshot operation, but adding the Awesome Screenshot add-on to your browser give a bit more flexibility – with options for capturing the entire web page, built-in cropping to get the right dimensions and more.

Tip: Screenshots are an important element to the “how-to” tutorial post. Using Awesome Screenshot makes it easy to get the right screenshot, every time.

4. Cloud App

As mentioned above, we share files and screenshots like crazy. We recommend CloudApp (over Droplr, mostly for dependability reasons), a Mac app that makes sharing files a breeze. Drag and drop files into the “cloud” in your toolbar – and you get an instant (shortened) HTML link for sharing with others in iChat or via emails.

5. Tweet Deck

We’re always working to connect and share content via social media, and TweetDeck has been awesome for monitoring Twitter activity over multiple brands. Use it to schedule tweets, see real-tip updates from people you follow and to see what people are saying about certain Twitter handles, hashtags and keywords.

6. Clear App

Clear App, a “list app” for iPhone, got a lot of much-deserved positive attention several months ago for its innovativeness in the design of the user interface. It’s brilliant.

We use it to keep ideas for blog posts, eBooks and webinars — whenever they pop up “on the go.” It’s well worth the $2.99.

Have any other tools you’ve found helpful for content collaboration and workflow? We know there’s a ton, so share them in the comments below and how they’ve been helpful to you.

Also, make sure to check out all of this week’s posts on the Spring Cleaning page for ideas on the types of content everyone can manage – from sharable, interesting content, to powerful tutorials, and finally to webinars (just stay tuned for tomorrow’s post!).

This week’s Spring Cleaning focus has been on planning your content and more about looking ahead than about looking back. If you’ve never written one before, the How-to post is a great tool to add to your arsenal. The How-to allows you to share your knowledge, experience and expertise with your users and is a good way to draw people into or back to your site.

Don’t think you’re qualified to write a How-to?  You’re wrong!

The fact is that in some field, you are an expert. As Cory has been heard to say many times, “An expert is anyone who knows more than somebody else.”

You are an expert!

Are you a freelancer who is good at attracting clients? You can write posts on how-to:

• Get clients
• How to keep clients
• The best ways to bill clients
• Just the general best practices you’ve found on how to run your own business.

Not in the web field? You can still attract great traffic with a blog! If you’re a plumber, create posts on simple things people can do around the house, such as how-to replace a leaky shower head, unclog a stubborn drain or how to handle a backed up septic tank (okay, that one is probably beyond a diy-er, but you get the point).

And don’t forget about blogging avenues beyond writing. Writing may not be your strongest skill, but creating a simple how-to video and posting it to your blog via YouTube is a pretty easy process. And is a great way to really teach your user.

Spring cleaning is about clearing the cobwebs from your site and making it the best it can be. But it’s also about keeping it fresh and clean. Adding the how-to post to your repartee is a great way to do that!

There are many “experts” out there who say you must never update software until you make sure other people who update their versions figure out whether there are any issues or problems with the software update. While I’m not going to say this is a good or bad thing, I will point out that most of these “experts” are talking about enterprise-level software applications… and even operating systems.

When it comes to WordPress, this mindset of “waiting to see what happens” is just flat wrong and a very bad practice. I’ve run into so many site owners who are having a problem with their site only to find out they haven’t updated WordPress, a theme, or plugins in almost two years… because they were “waiting to see if something was bad with an update”. Let’s take a look at why waiting to update is a very bad practice.

We probably need to start by asking the question, why are there updates? The most common answer to this question is that most updates are released (for themes, plugins, and core WordPress) because a fix to a bug or a security issue needs to be patched. So by not updating, you are leaving your sites buggy and open to being hacked. It is extremely easy to do a little Google search to find a site that has not been updated and therefore ripe for the hacking. This goes especially true for plugins. Plugins seem to be a greater source of security holes than WordPress itself… so if you are only updating WordPress but not wanting to update your plugins, you are moving yourself to the front of the line for hackers looking to cause trouble.

Now you might be saying what does it matter if I get hacked… I’ll just fix/restore my site.. While it might be true you can “restore” your site, you might not realize the damage done to your site. Not only does the hacker know your site is vulnerable because of an outdated plugin, but now Google knows about your issues. A hacked site can lose position on search engine rankings. Google will even de-list and de-index your site because it finds malicious code that the outdated plugin let outsiders leave on your site. And now you have to ask yourself, what good is a website if no one can find it on the internet (through search).

Most people who don’t update their themes and plugins probably fall into the category of being afraid you’ll break your site. While this is a valid concern, it should NEVER stop you from updating a plugin or theme or WordPress… Why? Because there are so many easy ways to backup your site so that if something happens during the upgrade process you can easily roll-back the update and restore your site and do a little more focused work on making sure the upgrade takes place. Using BackupBuddy can be your security blanket to give you the courage to update as soon as you see an update is available. Here’s a quick 1-2-3 to help you update your plugins, themes, and core WordPress.

1. As soon as you see an update is available, press the one-click button to perform a backup of your site using BackupBuddy.
2. Go to WordPress’ update screen and update everything that needs to be updated.
3. If everything went well… you’re done. If anything didn’t work out, just use BackupBuddy’s restore capability to roll your site back to before the update.

There’s another reason to make sure you are updating your plugins and themes that has nothing to do with security. (This is a real example.) WordPress recently changed the way the media uploader handled the uploading and management of images in the admin area of WordPress. If you had a plugin or theme that uploaded images as part of a feature… guess what happens if you choose NOT to update your plugin… Your plugin now fails to work because WordPress changed the way images are uploaded.

The great thing about being involved in an open-source project (WordPress.org is an open-source project) is that thousands of developers are banging on the code and constantly moving the project forward. This means things will change over time. And to take advantage of the expanded capabilities, you MUST keep all your code up-to-date.

If this post was too long and you really didn’t want to read it (TL:DR), here is the summary. Always update your plugins, themes, and core WordPress otherwise you are shooting yourself in the foot!