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Rochelle
Adding a ‘contact us’ page to a site will add value by making it look more professional. Some people won’t visit a site if there is no way to contact the site’s owner. And, I can’t remember where I read this, but it is thought that Google shows a bit more love to sites that have ‘contact us’ links or pages on them.
Previously I wrote about how to add a ‘contact us’ form using the excellent mod created by BANS forum member, mistermickster. But, as was commented on quite a bit, there was no way to move the link out of the sidebar menu. If you didn’t like it there, too bad.
Well, along came Holly who kindly took the time to figure out how to hide this page and move it to the footer. Holly, thank you for sharing how to do this 
These instructions are only for those who have already added the ‘contact us’ mod.
My instructions to remove the ‘Contact Us’ form from your sidebar menu and add it to your footer: |
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Step One
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| Go to the .FrontControl.php file (click here if you don’t know how to do this) for your site. | |
| Save a copy of the original code (click here for instructions on how to do this). | |
| Search for the code from contactus01.htm and replace this code with the contents of contactus03.txt. | |
| Save changes and view site for errors. At this point you should no longer see the link to your ‘contact us’ page. | |
| Step Two | |
| Log in to your site’s Admin and click on the ‘Template‘ tab and ‘footer.php‘ link for the template you are using. | |
| Save a copy of the original code. | |
| Search for the line of copyright code. If you are using BANS version 1 or 2 then there will be little more than ‘Copyright‘ and a date. | |
| Copyright © 2008 </p> | |
| If you are using BANS version 3 or higher then your copyright code will look something like: | |
| Copyright © <?php echo date("Y");?> <a href="<?php print URL_PATH."/";?>"> <?php print SITENAME."";?></a><?=$front->powered();?> | |
| Note: Your code may not look exactly like the above examples, as you may have modified it at some point. | |
| Copy the contents of contactus04.htm and paste it AFTER your copyright code. | |
| Note: Change URL.com to your site’s URL. | |
| Save changes and view site for errors. | |
| . | |
You should now be able to see the link to your ‘contact us’ page in your footer. Click it to make sure it works.
If you wish to add other links to your footer you can add as many links as you want to the code found in contactus04.htm. You might want to separate them with the line at the beginning of this code (sorry, I don’t know what it is called). If you are adding links to pages that are currently found in your sidebar, such as your sitemap or privacy policy, you can hide the pages in your site’s Admin and have them show up only in your footer.
Rochelle
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Hi Rochelle,
You only had to ask and I would have told you sooner.
Lesson learned!
Hi Rochelle,
What if you haven’t done the mod yet? Is there an easy way of adding this without doing the mod first?
Thanks,
Mike
Hi Mike,
Follow the instructions to add a contact us form but ignore step three.
Then come back here and go straight to step two. Although you might want to add the following code instead of the contents of contactus04.htm
<a href="">Contact Us,Cheers,
Mick
Sorry Mike,
That didn’t come out correct, I tried using the code tag but it hasn’t worked.
Replace http://URL.com with
Cheers,
Mick
That hasn’t worked again Mike.
Let me have your email address and I’ll email you the code required.
Cheers,
Mick
Hi Mick,
Thanks for your help on this. I sent my email address to your contact page.
Mike
Hi Mike,
Unfortunately I haven’t received it, I think there is a problem with the sendmail function at my hosts.
Please send it again to the contact page on the current link.
Cheers,
Mick
Hello Again Mick,
I emailed you again through your link. Sorry for the delay, but I just checked back in and saw your message.
Mike
So much for that vacation away from the computer, eh Rochelle? =)
It’s all because my illness turned into pneumonia and I can’t go out and have fun with my family
Thanks Rochelle - very easy to follow instructions, as always.
Sherrin
Sherrins last blog post..Recommended BANS Blogs
Ah, here is an instance in which I would like to automate this process. What I would like to do is have this mod built into my raw-bans files and make use of something like the “SITENAME” code built into the (<”a href”…) code so that whatever domain name I use, the “Contact Us” link is automatically updated when I add the domain name to the setup page within BANS.
Does anyone know what code to use to make this happen?
-S
Ok, now I get what you want to do. That is something I never even considered. Good question! Unfortunately, I do not know of a way to automate the site name.
If you do find a way to do this please share. Also, if you have not already done so, try posting this question in the BANS forum. Someone there might know how to do this.
Rochelle