No more “read more”

The “read more” tag is one of the most heavily used features in WordPress. However, very few bloggers actually take the time to customize it to their benefit.

For the few blogging newbies reading this: the “read more” tag is a small snippet of code that you can use to show only excerpts of your posts in the front page of your blog. This is a very useful tool that serves two important purposes:

1) It keeps your blog’s home page neat and clean.
2) It entices your visitors to click through your to continue reading your post.

The problem is that while having the words “read more” repeated over and over in your blog’s front page may be fine for some people, I love to customize things as much as possible. So today, I’ll show you 3 neat and easy tricks to pimp your blog’s “read more” tags.

Method #1: Hardcoding a fixed message.

The first way to change your “read more” tags is by actually modifying your WordPress to display a different message. This is done by editing your theme’s home page (and any other pages where the tag appears).

Here is the code you need to look for:

<?php the_content('more_link_text', strip_teaser, 'more_file'); ?>

Once you’ve found the code, all you need to do is replace it with this:

<?php the_content(__('Your Message Here'));?>

(Of course, you must replace the words “Your Message Here” with whatever you want your new “more” tag to say. This method can be used to change the standard “read more” message to something more inviting like “Continue reading this post…” or “Click here to get the full scoop!”.

Method #2: Hardcoding a dynamic message.

You can also change the “read more” tag to include the title of your post. I like this method because the blog becomes a bit more dynamic (at least in appearance). The way to do it is by editing your theme’s home page (and any other pages where the tag appears).

Here is the code you need to look for:

<?php the_content('more_link_text', strip_teaser, 'more_file'); ?>

Once you’ve found the code, all you need to do is replace it with this:

<?php the_content("Keep reading: " . get_the_title('', '', false)); ?>

If you use this method, a post titled “5 Quick widget-cleaning tips” will have a read more tag that now says “Keep reading: 5 Quick widget-cleaning tips”.

Wanna hear the good news? I saved the best for last!

Method #3: Changing the “read more” tag in every post.

Out of the 3, this is my favorite method because it is the easiest one to implement. All you need to do is write the message you want to add “inside” the more tag. Here’s how:

Instead of using this:

<!--more-->

You use this:

<!--more Your Message Here-->

As an added benefit, this third method is great for SEO too because you can instantly add one more keyword-relevant link in your blog that instantly tells Google (et all) what the blog post is about.