At this year’s WordCamp Europe, some members of the WordPress.org support team brainstormed how we might be able to share support skills and strategies with the broader WordPress community. We decided to offer some workshops to share support knowledge, and the first one – by yours truly – has been announced. Details are below. Hope to see you there! The Developer’s Guide to Supporting Your Themes Providing support for your themes offers tremendous opportunities to educate WordPress users, from explaining how to make a child theme to offering simple CSS customizations. It also presents challenges, like figuring out how to help people who aren’t tech-savvy or need support beyond the scope of what you can provide. While many developers dread doing support, with some concrete strategies and techniques in hand, helping users doesn’t have to be a chore – and can even be fun! This session looks at how to make your themes’ users happy while feeling a sense of satisfaction from your own support efforts – a winning combination in the world of theme development.

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The Developer’s Guide to
SUPPORTING
YOUR THEMES

2. Kathryn Presner
Happiness Engineer/
Theme Whisperer
Automattic Theme Team
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4. Be Nice
empathetic, human, professional
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7. Be Patient
even with thread-hijackers
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10. Gauge Skill Level
beginner, expert, in between
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14. Think Outside
The Theme
plugins, other themes
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18. 18http://macmanx.com/2014/06/04/custom-fonts-without-plugins-for-wordpress-themes/

19. Offer Resources
Codex, tutorials, hire someone
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21. Foster Community
let volunteers help, acknowledge
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23. Provide Docs
FAQ, screenshots, screencasts
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26. Be Realistic
enhancements, bugs, older
browsers, uncommon devices
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30. Limit Channel-
Switching
different thread/forum/venue
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32. Refer Out
if better expertise elsewhere
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34. Best Practices
child themes, custom CSS
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37. Happy Users =
HappyYou
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39. What About You?
your biggest challenges?
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40. Where to find
Presentation
slideshare.net/zoonini
Fonts
Arvo & Lato
Kathryn Presner
Web: kpresner.com
WordPress.org: zoonini
Twitter: @zoonini
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