Using Sneak-Peek For Blog Posts

For Advanced Users Only

That means, if you read this post and don’t understand a word, then this is NOT for you.

For this to work, you must have already installed DAP WP LiveLinks.

Now, when someone comes to your wordpress blog, assuming you have already activated DAP LiveLinks, then none of the posts you have protected will even show up on the home page, or will show up if someone tries to visit them directly (say, from a bookmark or link in an email). Which means, as far as your visitor is concerned, those posts don’t even exist in your blog.

Now as powerful as this plugin is, from an SEO perspective, if your visitor (who is not a member, and one who is not logged in) can’t even see the post, then neither can Google. This means, if you do a blog-and-ping, when Google arrives at the permalink of your new post, because the post is protected, DAP will redirect Google to your login page. This means, you don’ get the benefit of SEO for your new post.

Also, from a “Curiosity” standpoint, if you protect all of the posts, then your visitor will only see a handful of non-protected blog posts.

So, giving them a “sneak-peek” of the post your home page as well as on the permalink, is a great way to get them excited about your content.

How to turn on Sneak-Peek

Go to DAP Admin > Config > WordPress Sneak-Peek

It is set to “N” (no) by default. Change this to “Y” and click on the “Update” button to save the change.

And then when they click on the “more” button to read the rest of the post, the full post is protected anyway, and they are presented with a login screen.

WARNING: VERY IMPORTANT IF YOU TURN ON SNEAK-PEEK

As soon as you turn on Sneak-Peek, DAP will show all content from your blog posts, but only up to the “More” tag. This means, if you don’t have a “More” tag in any of your content, then all of your blog posts will show to all users, regardless of whether they have access or not.

So, the most important thing here is this:

SNEAK-PEEK and MORE are INSEPARABLE.

If you do sneak-peek, you MUST include a “More” tag.

So when you create a WordPress blog post, split the post into two parts using the “More” tag. This creates a “public preview” portion of the actual post, that shows up on your blog’s home page and in the permalink when that post is displayed. To read the rest of the post, your visitor has to click on the “More” link, and that’s when depending on whether the user has access, the rest of the post will be displayed.

11 comments ↓

#1 Ben Thorndycraft on 12.22.09 at 10:39 am

After upgrading to 3.4 from 3.3 the “more” tag functionality no longer works. The whole page is protected even though i have added a “more” tag half way down my content. Is there anything that needs to be modified?

#2 Ravi Jayagopal on 01.07.10 at 4:50 pm

Ben,

Just make sure you download the latest version of DAP & LiveLinks. That bug was fixed during the beta.

Thanks,

- Ravi Jayagopal

#3 Trace Mayer on 01.12.10 at 8:46 pm

What is the syntax for a more tag? [more]??

#4 Ravi Jayagopal on 01.13.10 at 1:21 am

I think it is

- Ravi Jayagopal

#5 Trace Mayer on 01.13.10 at 1:29 am

Using did not work.

#6 Ravi Jayagopal on 01.13.10 at 1:40 am

Why bother using a tag when WP gives you an icon to do it?

- Ravi Jayagopal

#7 Trace Mayer on 01.13.10 at 1:51 am

Oh, that worked. Thanks. I have never used either the More icon or tags before. I suppose I like tags because they keep stuff clean.

Are there any other useful applications of the More tag?

#8 Ravi Jayagopal on 01.14.10 at 10:50 pm

Trace,

Actually everything is internally stored as tags. The icon just help us in not having to remember the actual tags, that’s all.

- Ravi Jayagopal

#9 Emma on 03.19.10 at 6:04 pm

Is there any way to customize the login graphic and text that appear? not sure if its wordpress’ standard or you control it, as the more tag as i know it usually shows up “more..”

thanks!

#10 Ravi Jayagopal on 03.19.10 at 11:20 pm

Emma,

Absolutely. You have full control over error message, every little aspect of it, starting version 3.7 which was just released to all paying DAP members (those who are past their free trial).

It should be available to everyone shortly.

- Ravi Jayagopal

#11 Emma on 03.20.10 at 7:57 am

thanks – we are paying members, where can we install this version and how to we customise this option? I have been looking in Config but cant see anything

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