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How to Set Up Your WordPress Public Profile

You need to configure your personal settings for your public profile to individualize your WordPress blog and tell the world a little more about yourself. This blog is, after all, about you, and this is your opportunity to brag and promote!

To get started telling the world about yourself, follow these steps:

  1. Hover your mouse pointer over the Users menu item in the navigation menu.

  2. Click the My Profile link on the Users menu.

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You can adjust all sorts of personal settings to let your visitors get to know you better. You can be liberal with the information you share, or be as stingy as you want. It’s your blog, after all.

Choose carefully the information you share on your blog, especially if you have a public blog on WordPress — public blogs can (and are) viewed by a worldwide audience!

If you don’t want people to know your real name, use a nickname. If you don’t want to share a picture of yourself for fear of shattering computer monitors worldwide, you can choose not to upload any picture at all or to upload a picture of something that reflects the essence of you. (You can post a picture of a book if you’re an avid reader, a picture of a camera if you’re a photographer, and so on.)

Basic Details section of the My Public Profile page

In the first section of the My Public Profile page, you can see seven settings for your blog, only six of which you can change:

  • Username: This displays your current username; you can change your username by clicking the nearby Change link.

  • First Name: Type your first name in the text box provided.

  • Last Name: Type your last name in the text box provided.

  • Full Name: Type your full name in the text box provided.

  • Display Name Publicly As: Type in the name you would like displayed publicly.

  • Location: Type your location in the text box provided.

  • About You: In this section, you can provide a little biography, as well as change the password for your blog. Figure 3-11 shows this section in detail.

Contacts section of the My Public Profile page

In the Contacts section of the My Public Profile page, you can add different types of contact information and make them public on your profile. Followers of the blog use this information to keep in touch with you and ask you questions. Here’s what’s included (you don’t need to fill in all this information):

  • Home Phone, Work Phone, Mobile Phone: Type these phone numbers if you so desire.

  • Public Email: Type your e-mail address in the text box.

  • AIM, Live Messenger, Yahoo!, ICQ, Jabber: If you want to share this information, enter your identities in the appropriate text boxes.

  • GTalk and Skype: Type your Google Talk and Skype names in the text boxes if you’d like to share them.

Photos for your profile

To include several different photographs on your WordPress.com profile, click the Add Photo Through Gravatar button to upload photos from your computer. Any photos you add in this section will be displayed on your Profile page on WordPress.

Links listed on your Profile page

Add any links to websites that you’d like to have listed on your Profile page. For example, if you have several different websites other than the one you’re creating on WordPress, you can add the links to those websites here so that they appear on your public profile for people to visit.

To add links, simply type the link URL in the URL text box, and the name of the page in the Title text box. Then click the Add Link button. You can edit and delete links in this area of the My Public Profile page anytime you want.

Verified external services

Verified external services are online services such as social networking and social bookmarking sites that you use in addition to your WordPress blog. WordPress wants you to include your online identities with these services because, in the words of WordPress, “they help people to confirm that you are in fact who you say you are.” Your verified external services will be listed on your public profile.

The different types of external services available in this section include

Current Gravatar section of the My Public Profile page

Want to show the world your pretty picture? In the Current Gravatar section of the My Public Profile page, you can upload a picture of yourself or an image that represents you. This image is called a gravatar. This section is located on the right side of the My Public Profile page.

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