WordPress Tip: Add your branding

Ed: This article is part of the 21 Days of WordPress Tips

While I love WordPress and every one of my clients know their site is running on an open source platform, it’s still nice to add your own branding to the back end so the client never forgets who did such a fabulous job building their website.

There ‘s a few things you can do to add your own flavor to an installation of WordPress.

1. Brand the login page

Since the login page is the first thing your client sees before working on their web site, it’s the first place you should start. Let’s change out the big WordPress logo for one of your own.

The plugin I use is BM Custom Login.

I love this plugin because it comes with a .psd file you can edit to add your logo and company name. It also has pretty decent instructions on how to make your own image and get it uploaded.

The one issue with this plugin is it’s only tested through v 2.5.1 of WordPress and it’ll take some CSS magic to upgrade it to work with v 2.7. To see the changes I made, check out my versions of the two CSS files that come with the plugin:

You can see my custom login screen here.

outthink

(plus, for an easy to remember WordPress login URL, check out this tutorial)

2. Add your logo to the header

Another way to add your branding is to change the WordPress logo in the header of the dashboard to your own.

I’ve whipped up this quick little plugin that will allow you to modify both the background color and the logo. Just change lines #16 and #19. Feel free to use and modify to your needs!

My Admin Logo (.zip)

adminlogo

3. Add your link/logo to the footer of the site

This is a pretty common approach, however it’s always a good reminder. Whenever you release a new theme, whether for a client or for public use, be sure to add your logo and link to the footer.php file. Keep it small and unobtrusive and I’ve never had a client have a problem with it.

Those are my three tips to add your own branding to an installation of WordPress. Enjoy!

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Владислав Says:
February 15th, 2009 at 7:50 am

Спасибо за статью, всегда рад почитать вас

Алиса Says:
February 20th, 2009 at 4:27 am

Вот именно с этой статьи начинаю читать Ваш блог. Плюс один подписчик

Granville J. Witt Says:
March 15th, 2009 at 8:01 am

Hi nice post, i have come across your site once before when searching for something so i was just wondering something. I love your theme, would it happen to be a free one i can download, or is it a custom one you had made? In a few weeks i will be launching my own site, i’m not great with designs but i really like the style of your site so it would be cool if i could find (or pay for) something with a similar look. Thanks!