The name of the site

The DocOut Twenty Ten child theme, makes a major change to the entire site when we look at the Name of the site. The default Twenty Ten Theme has the Name of the Site as H1 header on the entire site. I’m sorry, but this is not true. Every page on the site is not about the name of your site. Using the Docout Child Theme the H1 Header on each page is what the Page is all about. In most cases its the title of the post! This is what the search engines want to know. What is this page all about, so I can put it in the results at the proper place. I don’t know if Zeak’s has seen any results yet from using out child theme, but it immediately (about two or three weeks) starts to get results.What I love is, you don’t have to go and change any titles on posts or pages!

The Title of the post or page

Here again, with the DocOut child theme, the title of the page or the post is now designated as the H1 element.

Use H2 headers whenever possible

When you are writing your post or page copy use the H2 headers as much as possile. This further tells the search engines what this page is about. Every new thought should use an H2 header. This is an excellent opportunity for you to let the search engines know in further detail what the page is all about. Did someone say “KEYWORDS”? Did I say that?

No Images

Yea, I know. You don’t have those nice images at the top of the pages. You want images? …..go ahead and add them. It would just be a matter of changing the header.php page. BUTT, and thats a BIG BUTT! Ha Ha! The images have nothing to do with what your writing about! All it is doing is misleading the search engines. If you want an image to tell about what your page is all about, then insert an image. Now your adding to the value of the web page! BUTT! and thats another BIG BUTT! If you place anything above the Title of the page or the Post you are placing your H1 heading furtherand further away from the boidy element in your code. This is something I don’t recommend. If you want to see a better search engine results child theme you could also scheck out my new SanStop Child Theme. I’m still develpoing the child theme, but you can see what is happening their!

Sidebar Headers

In the default wordpress twenty Ten theme the sidebar titles are all H3 headers. Guess what. In the document outline, since your post title of page title is H2 the search engines think every sidebar title belongs to the post you are writing! Further confusion. The Docout Child Theme Places a Heading on top of the sidebar that is H2. This heading lets the search engines know what the sidebar titles are all about.

Thanks Zeaks

Thanks for using the docout theme on your website. I hope you are getting better search engine results by using the child theme. I would love to hear your thoughts on the results you are getting.

The WordPress Install

The first step will be installing WordPress. Wait till you see how easy it is. Your going to love it. The default Theme that comes with WordPress is called Twenty Ten. It is a very good theme with all kinds of built in capabilities. This is not a choice, it comes bundled with the WordPress install.

Search Engine Results

In my opinion, the default WordPress Theme leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to getting search engine results. I designed Docout Twenty Ten to set up the default document outline for better search results. I highly recommend this as a start point for getting used to WordPress, or for your first install of WordPress. It is a fantastic FOUNDATION for your website.

DocOut Twenty Ten is a child theme

A child theme uses a theme as its base and makes some changes to the code. Like I said the Twenty Ten Theme has a lot of capabilities. It is very powerful. The DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme takes these capabilities and improves your chances of getting better search engine results. That’s a pretty powerful combination!

The Black DocOut Child Theme

YES! The DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme also comes in black!

How to install the child theme

Fact is you will probably want to install a new theme, or child theme anyways. Most people don’t use the Twenty Ten Theme as their final theme for their website. They end up selecting from the vast array of themes out there. Let me through a caution out. Be exstremely careful about the theme you add. This is going to be the foundation of your WordPress website. Make sure it has a good document outline. By this I mean make sure the page has a good hierarchy. This is one of the first things Google mentions to have in their webmaster guidelines. They might know a thing or two about search engine results and how to get them!

Child Themes need Parents installed

Getting back to installing child themes. Since the DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme is a child of the Twenty Ten theme, which is installed by default, half your work is already done. All you have to do is download the DocOut Twenty Ten Theme. Like I said, you will probably be doing this anyways. Once this is installed its just a matter of pointing to the child theme in your admin panel. It is soooooooo easy!

Plug-In recommendations

I also recommend the All-In-One Plug-In. It allows you to place a proper title and description for each page on your website.

Let us know if you install

Give us a shout if you do install the DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme. We will list your site and maybe review your site, for others to use as a guide.

Watch the progress

I gave you the address so you can watch how it evolves. I like what I see so far.

My Goal: Results for the Business

I want the business to get search engine results because they are in our directory. Most businesses have a domain name of their business name, like Joes.com. I say your domain name should be the name of the search you want to get found for, like Auto Repair, Philadelphia. I think my Directory is working towards that goal.

While your there, submit your site!

For now it’s free, and just looking for someone to use! Take advantage! You can see if I’m correct about search engine results! Remember, the site is only two days old. And yes, you can write an article inviting your readers to submit a listing. (Is that too much like begging?).

Don’t forget….

It’s all about the great Document Outline created by the DocOut Child Theme.

Results of adding any DocOut Theme

Whats your page all about?

Search Engine Optimization of a web page is all about letting the search engines know what is important on the page they are listing. In the image above you will see the results of our new Child Themes Directory installation. The results shown are for the BLOG page on the site.

Before the DocOut Theme is installed

Before the DocOut installation search engines would think the page is all about Child Themes Directory (the site name) because that is what is set as the H1 heading on the page. Fact is, the default wordpress theme sets every page on your site to have a H1 heading that says every page is all about the site name.

After the DocOut installation

As you can see search engines now know that this web page is all about the Blog for the Child Themes Directory. The site name at the top of the page has been changed to a heading of H2.

Improved Sidebar information

The blog has one article posted. The name of the article is “WordPress Themes”. Also on the blog page is sidebar information. The headings in the sidebar are listed as H3′s.

Before the DocOut installation

Notice how the sidebar headings are under the article. This is not what you want the search engines to think. Your sidebar information is not all about your article. The side bar information is all about your website.

After the DocOut install

The docout theme adds an H2 header above the sidebar. All of a sudden the search engines know the information listed in the sidebar is all about the website!

Better Search Engine Results

I hope this shows you why installing any of the DocOut WordPress Themes will improve you search engine results. I didn’t even get into improved strength for your keywords! Before you choose your next theme, maybe you should check out the document outline on the theme. You might be surprised at the results.

What is a WordPress Theme?

A theme is a completely new layout of a WordPress Installation. It uses the WordPress installation as a base and adds all kinds of presentation and format changes. Our DocOut WordPress Theme is such a theme.

What is a WordPress Child Theme?

A WordPress Child Theme would be a spin off of one of the WordPress Themes. A good example of a child theme is our DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme. It takes all the great capabilities and basic layouts of the Twenty Ten Theme and adds our capabilities, like a better document outline and better search engine optimization to the pages.

How about a child theme of a child theme?

DocOut Black is a child theme of Twenty Ten using all the details in the DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme. So it is basically a child theme of a child theme. I grandchild so to speak. Here is how I created the DocOut Black Theme.

Copy the DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme

This will give you a great base to work from.

Change the name of the Directory it is in

In this case, I would change the name of docout_twentyten to docout_black.

Make all my changes in this new directory

I can make all my changes now and then save it as a new child theme of Twenty Ten. Changes would include CSS changes and basic layout information, like font sizes and colors. If I was going to make major changes in the layout, I would create an entirely new theme base.

The DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme

This is what the DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme is all about. Take the DocOut Twenty Ten child theme and make your own child theme from that. All I ask is to give credit for everyones hard work. As an example: In the Docout Twenty Ten Child Theme, I have a link to the developer of the theme, and a link to the developer of the child theme. For a child of the child theme, I would have a link to the Twenty Ten Theme, a link to the Docout Child Theme, then a link to the Child of the DocOut Twenty Ten child theme. This is getting confusing! Not really, but this is the beauty of this entire child theme process.

Directory of Child Themes of our Child Theme

This is why we will have a directory of all these child themes and child themes of child theme (should I be calling them grandchild themes?). When you get listed in our DocOut directory you are letting everyone know, you have the proper document outline and have used the docout theme or docout twenty ten child theme. We also created the WordPress Child Theme Directory to list all child themes.

This is a one column page

All DocOut Themes and Child Themes come equipped with a one column template. I like using a one column page layout for power! Yes, I’m a power freak! Actually, I just think it’s better for power control to other parts of my website.

Just your standard Search Engine Optimization techniques

You might have noticed I’m all about SEO and getting better search rankings with your website. With the sidebar on the front page, I just think too much link love is going to too many unworthy pages. By using a one column page for the front page I have more control over where my link love goes.

DocOut Child Theme and One Column Index Page equals POWER!

Using our DocOut Twenty Ten Child Theme and the One Column Page template that is in the child theme we have a pretty good base for developing excellent websites that get results.

My opinion?

This is not my opinion. The very first thing mentioned in the Google Design and Content Guidelines portion of their webmaster guidelines is “Make a site with a clear hierarchy and text links”. Your first question might be, what is a hierarchy. Well, it’s a document outline.

Headers

The document outline on the web page usually follow the headers of the web page. The headers would be the h1, h2 etc. The most important being the h1 header. The h1 header tells the world what the web page is all about. The default wordpress set-up, has the name of the website as the h1. That means every page of the website is about one thing – The name of the website.

DocOut Headers

The Docout headers have the name of articles and the names of pages as the h1. This is exactly what each page is about. Secondary is the name of the site. Think about it. The title set on every page is what the web page is about! The titles on wordpress are derived from the article titles and page titles.

Developing Themes

If your going to be developing themes, do yourself a favor. Start out with the DocOut theme. Use it as a base, then add your design work to it.

New WordPress Themes

If your looking for a new theme to add to your website, do yourself a favor. Check the document outline before you use any theme. I did a very quick document outline check on the most popular themes being used and most, if not all, have their document outline setup wrong.

Document Outline

The document outline let’s the search engines know what is important on the page. As an example, the h1 element says “This page is all about – blah, blah,blah”. The default WordPress theme has the name of the site as what every page is about. I don’t want the search engines to think that every page on my website is about my name. I want the search engines to know what the subject is of every web page on my site, and then I want them to know it’s associated with my site. The DocOut WordPress Theme will accomplish this for me.

Child Themes

Who knows where this site will go, but I’m thinking all kinds of child themes will evolve from this docout theme. I will attempt to list every child theme developed here on this site.