Have you created and use custom post types for your wordpress website?

[content]

I am just now exploring the possibilities of creating and using custom post types, and I am wondering if others on here have created and use custom post types on Wordpress.

If you're not familiar, I'll explain. On a fresh install of wordpress, not counting pages(idk if you would count that or not), posts are the only post type, so blog posts. And for example, if you were making an ecommerce website, installing woocommerce would give the the "products" custom post type. So that way, the types of content are seperated, searchable a categorized separately, and can be displayed to appear differently.

I've created quite a few websites with Mercury theme the past two years, and know a lot of others here use it as well. If you use that, or a similar theme, you're already familiar with custom post types(built into the mercury theme are Casinos, Games, and Bonuses custom post types, with their own custom fields for taxonomies).

Useful as are configured for their specific purposes, and can be displayed on any page with shortcodes individually, grouped, or as an archive page similar to blog posts. Anyway, I'm sure most wordpress users on here may be more advanced than me and already familiar with this.

It only just recently occurred to me that I could use a plugin to create my own post types, rather than solely relying on themes or plugins which create them. Which, for the most part, really is more practical and all you need, so just asking to see if anyone here actually creates and uses their own as curious about whether people think it's a good idea and have found it beneficial.

Hypothetically, if you were adventurous and up for the challenge you could create a casino review website without a casino theme and build your own casino review page formats and modules to display them on other pages from scratch and create your own taxonomies too. Personally, I am not going to attempt to do that, as starting with a theme is much easier and I do not have the skills for CSS and what not to style modules.

However, while not going to create my own custom post type for casino reviews - and use whats built in, I am going to try to add custom post types to a new site I am working on and see how it goes. Why? Well just an example, a custom post type someone might want to make is Game Providers, and have a library of those. While that is a taxonomy of casinos on mercury theme, some people may want their own post type, with more detailed pages for each(and for example could then display the games post type below on those pages), and could have separate taxonomies like "Live Dealer Game Providers" or something like that. Not what I'm going to use it for, just an example, though could use it for all types of things.

Anyway, just wondering if anyone here actively uses custom post types that you created yourself rather than theme included ones?
And if you're willing to share, what plugin/s did you use?

I see MetaBox looks good, has lots of extensions, though geared towards more advanced users, really would need to know CSS and some other things to really take advantage of it's capabilities(if you did, could create a nice custom casino review website with your own custom ranking modules and stuff). Also, any recommendations for other plugins to create custom post type widgets or short codes and stuff would be appreciated.

Though one other thing, just a tip, as I have successfully used mercury theme in other niches totally unrelated to online gambling, if you are on mercury, you can always go to ACES and change the slugs and labels of any of the the ones built in(Casinos, Games, Bonuses, for example I used one for another niche and did "Vendors", "Products", and "Coupon Codes"). Though for the purpose on casino review sites, if you were using mercury, but for example did not want to do game reviews, you can always just modify the slugs and titles and taxonomies for the "games" one, and use it for something else(for example, could do payment methods, while it is already a taxonomy for casinos on that theme, someone might want to use it to for creating a payment methods widget on their homepage, and use the games shortcode to display them in a pretty way and can assign casinos to it so they display on the page).

Anyway, just got my mind going about some ways to use it that could be interesting, and wanted to know if anyone has tried going that route for their site

[baldidiot]

We use custom post types all the time. Tbh unless is a straight forward blog, we'll probably be using some form of CPT on it. When used in conjunction with custom fields and shortcodes you can pretty much do whatever you want on a site.

The simplest example for this is to separate out your casino reviews to a CPT. But like you say, you can then use other CPTs for software, payment methods, games etc... whatever you want really.

Set up a custom field to associate the reviews with the relevant software/banking posts and you can use a shortcode or theme file to auto output a list of relevant brands.

Something else we do since all the compliance nonsense hit is to detach bonuses from the reviews. So we have a CPT for the brands (eg: /reviews/) and a separate CPT for the bonuses (eg: /bonuses/). We then use a custom field to associate the bonus with the relevant brand.

The main benefit of this is that to remove a bonus, all we have to do is unpublish the post for that bonus and it's gone, without editing the review. With this method you can also schedule bonuses to go live or stop at a certain point.

It's a huge time saver for things like the Grand National as it means we can just remove the bonuses in a click and put them back with another one.

Technically we could schedule them as mentioned above, but I don't really like doing this as they landing pages never seem to go live when they say they will after the GN, so we do a manual check first.

[newcustomeroffer]

WIt's a huge time saver for things like the Grand National as it means we can just remove the bonuses in a click and put them back with another one. Technically we could schedule them as mentioned above, but I don't really like doing this as they landing pages never seem to go live when they say they will, so we do a manual check first.

That's a great shout, must take the pain right out of the annual farce around the Grand National.

[baldidiot]

That's a great shout, must take the pain right out of the annual farce around the Grand National.

Yeah that was half the reason for doing it. Before that we used CPTs and just stored the bonus info within the review post, but this makes those kinds of shenanigans way easier.

The other benefit is that you can have multiple bonuses for a single brand. Handy for when the bonus varies by product (eg: if there's a separate table games and slots bonus).

[content]

We use custom post types all the time. Tbh unless is a straight forward blog, we'll probably be using some form of CPT on it. When used in conjunction with custom fields and shortcodes you can pretty much do whatever you want on a site.

The simplest example for this is to separate out your casino reviews to a CPT. But like you say, you can then use other CPTs for software, payment methods, games etc... whatever you want really.

Set up a custom field to associate the reviews with the relevant software/banking posts and you can use a shortcode or theme file to auto output a list of relevant brands.

Something else we do since all the compliance nonsense hit is to detach bonuses from the reviews. So we have a CPT for the brands (eg: /reviews/) and a separate CPT for the bonuses (eg: /bonuses/). We then use a custom field to associate the bonus with the relevant brand.

The main benefit of this is that to remove a bonus, all we have to do is unpublish the post for that bonus and it's gone, without editing the review. With this method you can also schedule bonuses to go live or stop at a certain point.

It's a huge time saver for things like the Grand National as it means we can just remove the bonuses in a click and put them back with another one.

Technically we could schedule them as mentioned above, but I don't really like doing this as they landing pages never seem to go live when they say they will after the GN, so we do a manual check first.

I appreciate you sharing your experience. Definitely seems to have some good benefits.

I wish I had learned all this when I first got started with wordpress years ago. Now I better understand it(hadn't understood even how to customize post templates and query loop templates), I feel like I've gone years trying to assemble furniture without reading the instructions(even did a multi-thousand page woocomerce site without learning any of that, just relied fully on the theme's layouts and all). Now I've gotten the hang of it, I feel like I could make a good casino review post format without a theme, as was as good query loop styles to display them(still going to use a theme anyway, but customizing things a bit differently than the defaults).

I'm using Kandence Blocks pro now to help with post layouts and query loop layouts(they have a good query loop template with sidebar to display categories and taxonomies, which can be used for displaying casinos neatly with buttons to filter them), and also Kandence plugin for related posts(can use it to display related casinos based on common taxonomies and stuff). Makes it pretty easy. Got some ideas for custom post types(could even be used for just simple things for design, content for sliders and that sort of thing, or little cards to different cryptocurrencies with info or stuff like that). I feel pretty dumb now for being fully reliant on themes and individual specific plugins for things I see now I could have made myself.

Anyway, good stuff

[DaftDog]

I'm using Kandence Blocks pro now to help with post layouts and query loop layouts(they have a good query loop template with sidebar to display categories and taxonomies, which can be used for displaying casinos neatly with buttons to filter them), and also Kandence plugin for related posts(can use it to display related casinos based on common taxonomies and stuff). Makes it pretty easy. Got some ideas for custom post types(could even be used for just simple things for design, content for sliders and that sort of thing, or little cards to different cryptocurrencies with info or stuff like that). I feel pretty dumb now for being fully reliant on themes and individual specific plugins for things I see now I could have made myself.

Anyway, good stuff

I also use the Kadence theme and have just restarted learning to use CPT's. I'm using the ACF plugin as well as the Kadence query loop. Nothing live just yet.

[content]

I also use the Kadence theme and have just restarted learning to use CPT's. I'm using the ACF plugin as well as the Kadence query loop. Nothing live just yet.

Good stuff.
I am just using the Kadence add ons, like Kandence blocks, rather than the Kandence theme it'self.
I am now using ACF as well. A cool thing is that the existing taxonomies from the custom post types that were built into my theme to begin with are selectable for any new custom post type I create so can create post relationships. Stumbled on some things like custom fields vs custom taxonomies(difference for those who don't know, for the sake of example, if you had "word count" for a review or something, you'd use custom field, as no one would need to sort by articles with example 1152 words or whatever, but if like a common attribute, like a bonus type, more likely would want to use taxonomy, so could show deposit bonuses only or no deposit bonuses whatever). A little tricky at first but seems essential now really.

Edit: I am now realizing, I really need to use Kadence theme to customize the post layouts and archive layouts(well, not as important, can use query loops to display posts separate from theme archive page layout). Had been customizing the query loops and query loop cards without issue with my current theme using Kadence Blocks(which, does 90% of everything I need to do). And while had created custom post types, I realize I couldn't find where the tutorials went to edit the post layouts, because I have to use the Kadence theme it'self with the theme kit to actually use that(can use the query loop templates without using the Kadence theme, which gets me halfway there).

This would mean having to rebuild layouts to use for the casino review pages themselves and losing my existing themes short codes for displaying casinos which are pretty nice, though not really a problem to recreate a ratings blocks and taxonomies, so thinking of just doing that. Since it's a new site, won't lose much as haven't published to much yet. Will be directly traffic to from another traffic source I have established off site anyway, not in too much of a rush, as not relying on SEO from this site(though obviously, goal will to have search traffic later on). Anyway, just thinking outloud.
Going to check out a few other options without switching themes, but kandence is really nice, and I really want to use it for creating post templates/layouts through the elements feature. Also I really want to do separate isolated custom post types and menus for other languages, with geo specific casinos, and with my current theme, if I were to do that, it'd either be a different casino template for non-english since can't duplicate that built in casino post type and retain the layout, or I'd publish the non-english reviews all in the existing casino post type but the archives would have duplicates of the casinos for each language - and would rather give them their own isolated site structure(so might as well do kandence theme, so the casino review pages will be uniform, I separate languages with separate post types, I know there's other ways to do that, but really want to). I think it will be best this way(originally instead of post layouts, was going to do some of that by just manually creating editing blocks with details I could use custom fields and post templates for, but realizing now, smarter to start with the custom fields and layout templates, since can edit design and format in one place and update all pages of that post type at once with the kadence theme builder kit thing).

[baldidiot]

Stumbled on some things like custom fields vs custom taxonomies(difference for those who don't know, for the sake of example, if you had "word count" for a review or something, you'd use custom field, as no one would need to sort by articles with example 1152 words or whatever, but if like a common attribute, like a bonus type, more likely would want to use taxonomy, so could show deposit bonuses only or no deposit bonuses whatever). A little tricky at first but seems essential now really.

A custom taxonomy is just like your own version of a tag. So use it the way you'd use tags.

IMO there are often better ways to handle data using fields though, especially if you're talking about associations between multiple post types.

Say you had two post types, "slots" and "software" and you add a custom taxonomy for "software" to associate the slots with their software. If you wanted to output a list of slots for each software you could create a shortcode that filters by the relevant value. Eg: a shortcode that outputs slots that have been tagged as "playtech".

If you then wanted to output the name of the software that a slot uses on a slot review page, then you could technically do it this way as well by outputting the value of the tag for that post. So you could output "Playtech".

But that's pretty much all you could do. The "Playtech" taxonomy is just a classifier, it's not connected to the actual playtech post in any way.

On the other hand, you could use a post object field within the slot post type to associate the slot directly with the relevant software post. Ie: Within your slot you have a "software" field where you select the "Playtech" post.

By doing this, not only can you do all of the above, but you can also pull field data from the software post and filter additional loops by its post ID. So instead of just outputting the name of the software you could also output a logo that's been saved in the "playtech" post as well as a link to the main playtech page. Let's throw in a count of how many other playtech slots there are reviewed on the site as well, just for kicks.

And if the software is part of a larger group and you have a field about that within the software post, you can output that information as well, along with a link to parent group if you wanted.

Want to then list the other software companies that are part of that group? No problem. You could even list the latest slot that's been added for each of those companies as well, if you were so inclined (not sure why you would want this, but just a nice example of what can be done).

So taxonomies are only really useful for simple classification. Beyond that you want to use fields really.

I would also use logic in a lot of cases rather than a custom taxonomy. For example, if you have a field for "roulette bonus" you can just query whether that field has a value set and determine the output based on that, rather than needing to also set a value for a taxonomy.

Or to go one step further, if you have pages for bonuses based on their percentage match it's better to have a field that lists the percentage and query it (eg: bonuses over 100%, 200%, 300%...) rather than having to tag to each page that you might want (eg: 100%, 200%, 300%, 400% and so on).