Yes, you can use WordPress to create an ezine. An eZine is just another word for an online magazine. With the right theme design, and organizational structure with your taxonomies (like categories and tags), you can run your own ezine.
Being that WordPress is a content management system, it is fully capable to handle a task like ezines or online magazines.
In order to plan a ezine, you need to be familiar with the topics and place them in major categories… usually between 6 to 10. Use your tags to help with your site’s search. They are not keywords, but tags can often have the same name as your keywords.
Make each category design slightly different from the next. Here is an example of a popular online magazine utilizing this feature. Please note that the example below may not be using WordPress, but the same concept can be done in WordPress. These examples come from the Huffington Post.
Each section has its on template and css colors. With WordPress you could either use custom post types or use the WordPress multi-site plugin. Huffington Post is not built on WordPress, but you can definitely create a site much like it using WordPress as mentioned earlier in this post.
You can go further than the normal posts and categories by using custom post types for featured sections. In each of those custom post types, they can have their own categories and tags. 🙂
You can have multiple authors, install social share buttons, and integrate whatever dynamic functionality you need. Don’t worry if you start an ezine and have to change things around some as your site grow. You aren’t stuck because WordPress can help make that task easier.
Have you been wanting to start an ezine or online magazine? If you already have started one, what problems have you run into and what are some of your tips for newbies?
It is possible to create ezine using wordpress easily. WordPress has plugins which help in this.
Hi Nile,
just the other day I was looking at the magazine option in the Suffusion theme I use and was baffled what you can do with it.
So far I haven’t tried it yet, even though I am very curious about it.
Your post about custom post types really shows your expertise and I love the info you supply there.
Will comment on that one too.
Have you used the magazine layout?
Can you set it so it is not your front page?
Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and expertise.
Cheers,
Yorinda
I have seen few ecommerce websites which are running on WordPress, so in my opinion if you can create an ecommerce website on WordPress then you can even create online magazine as well.
I absolutely love WordPress. Its impressive options, and it’s so much easy to learn!
I always suggest to use it in any situation and of course an ezine is a perfect situation for WordPress.
Thanks for the post 🙂
Another thing I had no idea about… I have no use for it yet, but it is certainly something i will keep my mind open to in terms of my online learning, and future ‘to dos’!
There are lots of good ezine-like templates out there for WP. I’ve even come across a few blogger templates that looked decent although blogger is not the easiest to customize.
It’s not too bad to customize, but I prefer to get them converted over to WordPress…lol
Hi Nile,
I’ll tuck this away in the back of my mind. I don’t know if I’ll ever want to do an ezine. It looks like a LOT of work, but who knows.
Thanks for telling us all about it. I love WordPress – it let’s me manage my own site, which I really enjoy.
All the best,
Leslie
I think wordpress is perfect for creating a magazine, Thesis has a magazine child theme, which has been upgraded to their latest version also.
Hi Nile, I love wordpress and it has so many features I haven’t used yet. Thanks so much for explaining how to create a e-zine or online magazine using wordpress, it may be something I want to explore at a later date so I will have to bookmark your post if I decide to do one.
Hi Nile,
WordPress makes it possible to make anything from Blog to E-commerce site possible through intuitive plugins. Thanks for sharing this.
Hey, when people comment and say there are many plug-ins that do x, y or z, can you mention names (of the plugins)? Also Niles can you recommend a few? Saying there ARE plugins that do all this without suggestions leaves me going ?? What to even search for under Plugins… I don’t know.
Thanks!
Hey Nile, thanks for the ideas. Can you give some examples of WordPress themes that can be easily adapted for this purpose? Yorinda mentioned Suffusion, which is the theme I use, and Julieanne mentioned Thesis, but what are some other free themes?
Yes, it is totally possible to create a eZine with WordPress. I believe everything is nearly possible with powerful WordPress CMS, and most importantly the user-friendly settings of it. I have been running several eZine type websites with the help of WordPress.
This never crossed my mind Nile but I can see why bloggers would use WP to create an ezine. Powerful resource. I would be a little leery to set it up; too much tech 😉
WordPress can help us create great sites and really Huffington Post is a great example.
Ha! I think I’m already running an ezine although I haven’t maximized my layout for it. I previously had all my categories listed across the top but removed them because I wasn’t getting many clicks anyway and I thought it might look cleaner. I will mull this over. Really going for it could benefit all my writers and help circulation overall.
Thank you so much for the inspiration!
Huffington post is a great site but i never thought that it can be on WordPress.I think ezine can be created on WordPress.