Have questions before deciding on what product(s) to best suit my business needs

  • Unknown's avatar
    cfjernigan · Member ·

    I need to speak with a sales rep before upgrading and purchasing for my business. I am not sure how or even if WordPress offers what I will require. I have read the WordPress support section as well as two of the top WordPress books available. I can’t seem to find answers to the information that I need.
    I have a large amount of video productions to complete but have had to put a few on hold until I can get some answers. Is there an available phone number for contacting a sales rep?
    Thanks for any assistance.
    CJ

    The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

  • Unknown's avatar
    jackiedana · Member ·

    I’d be happy to assist you here.

    You might take a look at the following page:
    http://en.support.wordpress.com/making-a-business-website/

    You may not need the full Business upgrade, however, so if you can give me an idea of what you’re trying to achieve with your site, what kinds of content you’ll have, and so forth, I can help you decide if WordPress.com is the best solution for you, and if so, which upgrades you might need.

  • Unknown's avatar
    cfjernigan · Member ·

    Thanks so much for your assistance.
    My business will be offering art instruction eworkshops for a fee. I already have a separate website through a different host that doesn’t allow for large amounts of video uploads as a WordPress.com upgrade will.
    There will be a link on my website to my blog’s welcome static page. I want to upgrade my WordPress.com so that my students can view videos in an e-classroom type setting.

    WordPress.org hosting is not an option for me. I feel much more comfortable with the .com version.
    My blog will be listed as private. There will be at least 15 to 20 e-workshops available to start, each of which will be on a separate password protected page. The layout will be more of a website format. Comments may be allowed at a later time but not at the present.

    I want to personally assign each student a unique password to a workshop page verses having the same password given to many people taking that same password protected page (workshop). Students will be attending from all over the world and increasing in numbers, so for security reasons I can’t allow access to a class after the allowed time runs out should a person with the password register for a different class at a later time. So my questions are as follows:

    1. Do my students have to register with WordPress for a username and password if I send each “viewer” an “invitation” to my “private” blog?
    2. Is there a way that I can assign my viewers (students) a username and password of my own choosing if using a WordPress.com upgrade? If so, how?
    3. Is the limit of 10 invitations sent at one time the same if using an upgrade of WordPress.com?
    4. I can see both the username and password for a “contributor” but how do I see both for a “viewer”?
    5. Is the 1G video size limit the same if using a WordPress upgrade?
    6. Is there a limit to the number of files uploads per day as long as I don’t go over my allowed space.
    7. Is there a phone number that I can call for a sales rep?

    I couldn’t find these answers anywhere.
    I really love the WordPress software but am baffled with the idea that such a well know business/software has very limited customer support for possible customers. I was about to go elsewhere. I am sure this is happening everyday. I am familiar with the basics of WordPress but I really don’t have time to read over a thousand pages looking for a few answers while running a business at the same time. This is what I have been doing for several weeks now….very frustrating.

    Thank you again for your help. I hope to be doing business with WordPress in the near future.
    CJ

  • Unknown's avatar
    raincoaster · Member ·

    The short form is: what you have stated is simply not possible here.

    The longer form is: exactly what you have asked for shouldn’t be necessary at all. There are workarounds; I teach workshops online myself, and as you can see http://raincoastermedia.com is public, with no restricted areas. I arrange for workshops etc via email and do the video instructions via private Hangout. They are also recorded, so I can edit them together into an e-product I charge less for.

    If you insist on exactly what you have laid out here, you need WordPress.ORG, Drupal, or Joomla. And you can either build it yourself or lay out $700-$2000 for the building of it.

  • Unknown's avatar
    jackiedana · Member ·

    My blog will be listed as private. There will be at least 15 to 20 e-workshops available to start, each of which will be on a separate password protected page. The layout will be more of a website format. Comments may be allowed at a later time but not at the present.
    I want to personally assign each student a unique password to a workshop page verses having the same password given to many people taking that same password protected page (workshop).

    It would be possible to create password-protected pages, but it’s one password per page. You cannot create unique passwords for each person. You can however choose different passwords for different pages so each student can only access ones for which they have the password.

    1. Do my students have to register with WordPress for a username and password if I send each “viewer” an “invitation” to my “private” blog?

    In order to view a private blog as a viewer, they will need to have a WordPress.com account. You can invite them via your Dashboard > Settings > Reading page and that will in turn invite those without accounts to create one.

    2. Is there a way that I can assign my viewers (students) a username and password of my own choosing if using a WordPress.com upgrade? If so, how?

    If you want them to have accounts on WordPress.com then they will need to set those up themselves and will be the only ones with access to the password.

    3. Is the limit of 10 invitations sent at one time the same if using an upgrade of WordPress.com?

    We limit that for performance and security reasons. You will need to invite students in blocks of ten.

    4. I can see both the username and password for a “contributor” but how do I see both for a “viewer”?

    They will appear in your Settings > Reading area.

    5. Is the 1G video size limit the same if using a WordPress upgrade?

    You will need the VideoPress upgrade, which comes with both the Premium and Business bundles, should you choose to purchase one, or you can purchase it a la carte. You will likely also need a space upgrade. Right now we support uploads up to 1GB; it’s possible with a good connection you can successfully upload videos a bit larger.

    VideoPress

    6. Is there a limit to the number of files uploads per day as long as I don’t go over my allowed space.

    There is no limit on uploads, nor do we cap bandwidth, which can be important if you have a large number of video views.

    7. Is there a phone number that I can call for a sales rep?

    Currently our support is handled via support forums (such as this) and private tickets. If you prefer to continue via a private ticket, let me know.

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