It’s that time of month. Ya know, the time where we go over things in the world of WordPress and beyond?
This month we will discuss the future of Rank Math, Dennis Dornon’s recent appearance on a podcast, twenty years of WordPress and much more.
Today we dish up a bowl of the MainWP Roundup.
Ready?
Let’s ride.
Rank Math acquired by group.one
Rank Math has changed ownership. group.one has acquired the longtime SEO Plugin to add to its portfolio.
In an article on May 30th, group.one said,
“group.one is taking its WordPress offering to a whole new level with the acquisition of WordPress Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) specialist Rank Math. With more than 2 million active users since its release in 2019, Rank Math is the fastest-growing WordPress SEO plugin.
group.one brands already includes WP Rocket, Imagify, and Hostnet.nl among others and is headquartered in Sweden with a revenue of €280+ million.
No word as to the price paid for the acquisition.
According to the article, Rank Math staff and founders will “continue to support, develop, and grow the business going forward.”
Are you a Rank Math user? What do you think of this acquisition?
SDM Show: Talking MainWP With Dennis Dornon
Dennis Dornon, co-founder of MainWP, appeared on the SDM Show with Rob Cairns.
Rob asks him and gets the answer about how and why Dennis and his business partner Chris started MainWP.
It’s worth a listen just to hear that story.
As he and Chris were looking for ways to update their website, they couldn’t find something that focused on privacy.
He explained that being in the affiliate marketing industry at the time, they were focused on privacy.
“We (Chris and I) both put in, you know, 50% of the money to get the developer to work on it. He worked on it for probably 6 to 8 months before we actually used it ourselves. And, as we used it, we enjoyed it and we had built up a pretty good relationship with other affiliates. So we started. And then they kind of started offering to buy it or join in and that’s really how we transitioned from affiliates to MainWP. And now, over the years, we’ve gone from focusing on affiliates to more focusing on solopreneurs and agencies.”
According to Dornon, the average MainWP has 60 websites. How does your business compare to that?
Dornon also explains why MainWP can still offer a Life Time Deal and still support the product.
Check out the podcast and hear what Dennis has to say.
Twenty Years of WordPress
Do you remember where you were when you learned about WordPress?
I have so many memories leading to this and I have shared them in various places.
One thing that is always interesting is to hear someone’s WordPress origin story.
For me, I needed to find a more efficient way to run my (American) college football blog. Does that sound similar to you?
Well, WordPress has hit 20 years this past month.
The community came up with various ways to celebrate the special milestone, including a series of WordPress Meetups across the globe.
Some fun facts about WordPress,
“Did you know: WordPress is seven years older than TikTok (2016), came four years before Tumblr (2007) and the first iPhone (2007), beat Facebook to market by about a year (2004), and is about five weeks older than Tesla (July 2003).”
Some Twenty years of WordPress tweets:
My talk from @WordCampPT #WCLisboa2023
20 Years. That's a Lot of WordPress Community https://t.co/rke78AfALg
— BobWP 🎙 🇵🇹 (@BobWP) June 1, 2023
Had a wonderful time speaking at WordPress Karachi Meetup, celebrating 20 Years of #WordPress. 🎉
Thank you @Cloudways, @wpexpertsio, @xubiant, and @Taimur_Hussain1 for organizing.#WP20 pic.twitter.com/vL5Mr3S9oz
— Mustaasam Saleem 🇵🇰🇩🇪🇵🇹🇳🇱🇧🇪🇫🇷🇹🇭🇬🇷 (@MustaasamSaleem) May 30, 2023
WordPress celebrates 20 years tomorrow. It's grown from a comment on a blog post to a web spanning phenomenon. Thanks to an outstanding community and the freedoms of Open Source. Happy Birthday, WordPress! #WP20 #WordPress pic.twitter.com/fght4XMJXb
— Mike Little (@mikelittlezed1) May 26, 2023
What are your best memories of using WordPress in the past 20 years?
Starter themes from WordPress Experts
If you are just looking to test out new themes, here are two you may be interested in. Bill Erickson has launched a block-based starter theme.
I used to read Erickson’s tutorials for the Genesis Framework back in my Genesis days. He was always helpful with those tutorials and a major player in the Genesis community.
Bill Erickson launches starter theme.
Speaking of Genesis, Brian Gardner has launched his Frost theme, also a blocked based theme, for free.
If you are looking to test out block based themes, learn more about how it works, download either of these and take them for a spin. Both themes are free!
WP Engine Releases Frost, A Free Block Theme for Website Builders
The Big ole LTD Page
Davinder Singh Kainth has created a massive LTD page on his WP Weekly website.
The database of deals includes 171 deals as of June 1, 2023.
Categories include Themes, Builders, Blocks, Dashboard, WooCommerce, Content, Media, Marketing and so much more.
You can sort through the database to find the deal you need.
Saving money can be crucial to keeping your company cash flow positive. Check out the LTD page today.
AI for content? I share my thoughts with the SDM Show.
By now you know I have played with ChatGPT and Bard. I have accounts with two AI writing tools, including Bertha.
For years now, I have used editing software which is based on — you guessed it — Artificial Intelligence.
Many are talking about using AI to write and I think there are a lot of positives you can use AI for in writing.
Recently, Rob Cairns asked me to come to his show to talk about copywriting and AI. Using AI is here to stay, so how can we use it efficiently and should we use it to write articles, copywriting?
I go over my thoughts about all of that in this podcast episode.
Wrapping it up
The acquisition train may have slowed down some, but it is still barreling down the tracks.
Have you heard the story of how MainWP started before? I always love hearing origin stories. I find it interesting that MainWP grew out of the affiliate marketing industry.
Did you take part in the Twenty Years of WordPress celebrations? What are your favorite WordPress memories?
Let us know your answers in the MainWP Facebook Users Group.
