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One of the main benefits of WordPress is that you can easily enhance your WordPress site’s functionality using inexpensive called plugins.

What Are WP Plugins?

No doubt, you probably use a device like a mobile phone. What do you do when you would like to access something new on your device like a new game or a new business productivity tool?

Why, simple … you download and install an app!

An app is a little piece of software that is very simple and easy to install and instantly integrates new features and functionality into your mobile phone.

(Just like you will find social sharing apps …)

A plugin is very much like an app. You simply download and install an application that adds new functionality to your web site …

(… there are also social sharing plugins for WP!)

Normally, expanding the functionality of your web site involves additional cost. Depending on the complexity of the new features or enhancement, the cost can be quite significant, particularly if it involves website development.

This also applies when setting up a new website or business blog. Companies will often invest in extra features and options they probably will never need.

For this reason, we recommend considering a cost-effective strategy when setting up your web site and WordPress plugins are ideal for doing this.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could:

1) Start simply and inexpensively. Get your website up and running quickly, then …

2) As you need new features or functionality, you can add new applications with a couple of mouse clicks that integrate seamlessly with your site, giving your site an entirely new range of practical functionality, and …

3) Cost not one cent extra to download and install on your web site?

Well, this is precisely what a WordPress plugin allows you to do!

Plugins – Benefits

Earlier, we compared plugins with apps. In the same way that many apps are free to download and some cost a little bit of money, so do WP plugins.

In fact, loads of plugins can be downloaded to your site for free.

Plugins that cost money are referred to as Premium plugins. The good news, is that when compared to the price of investing in web development services to get the same functionality on your site, most Premium (i.e. paid) plugins cost very little.

Also, as WordPress distributes its software as an Open Source application, anyone can create, edit and customize any portion of the code. This has allowed many professional web development professionals to enhance and contribute to the WordPresssoftware.

• WordPress plugins allow you to get started simply with a basic web site and then add new features and enhancements to your site if necessary.
• WordPress plugins let you add practically endless functionality to your web presence easily and inexpensively.
• WordPress plugins give your site almost endless expansion capabilities.
• Plugins allow anyone to own a website that they can manage themselves.
• Most plugins will normally work “right out of the box” and only require to be installed and activated to provide your website with new capabilities, enhancements and functionality.
• Some plugins provide more advanced options and could require some configuration.

WordPress Plugins – Powerful, Flexible … And (Many Of Them Are) 100% FREE!

Like WordPress themes, loads of WordPress plugins are available for WP users … and many of these great plugins are 100% FREE!

You can download thousands of plugins from the Free WP Plugin Repository …

As mentioned earlier, you can find plugins that will do just about anything you need a site to do.

Plugin categories cover:

• Site Administration
• Content Management
• Traffic
• User Engagement
• Social Engagement
• Media Management Automation
• Improving Sales Conversions And Lead Generation
• Data & System Monitoring & Reporting
• Website SEO

For example, you can enhance a website with plugins like:

• Contact forms
• Polls and quizzes
• Surveys
• Managing banners
• E-commerce (from setting up single sales with PayPal buttons, to complete e-commerce with online shopping carts, payment processing, recurring billing, coupon codes, etc …)
• Social media integration
• Private Membership sites
• Newsletter opt-in forms
• Sales funnels
• Mobile conversion
• Improving your site’s Search Engine Optimization
• Image galleries (with rotating images, lightboxes, etc.)
• User feedback forms
• Language translation (e.g. you can instantly change all content on your website from English to French)
• Statistical reporting (e.g. number of visitors, pages visited, keywords searched, etc.)
• Custom navigation menus
• Customer engagement – contest, live chat, currency conversion, etc.
• Media integration
• Faster page loading
• Event management
• Business listing directories
• Automatically sell spots on your site
• Set up client appointments and reminders
• Set up reservations and bookings
• Detect broken links on your pages and send you reports
• Redirect users from specified pages to other areas on your site or other websites
• Monitor what social media users are posting about your business
• Make your pages printable or downloadable as a PDF file
• Add a site map
• Exclude specific from showing on areas of your site (e.g. sitemaps, feeds, etc.)
• Protect content on your pages and posts
• Import information from other CMS platforms
• Perform bulk data edits
• Fight SPAM commenting
• Customize visitor commenting (e.g. displaying Facebook comments)
• Insert scripts and script elements into your pages
• Add formatted tables
• Add animated graphics and advanced text formatting options
• Create and manage QR codes
• Improve Google search listings
• Add a map
• Post your content automatically on social networks like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr and many others
• Show countdown timers (for special offers, coupons, etc …)
• Display personalized greetings, timed offers, etc …
• And so many other features!

As you can clearly see, WordPress plugins give you limitless possibilities. If you plan to build a web site for your business, or your existing website isn’t built with WordPress, then consider using WordPress in the future.

If you’re still wondering just how powerful and flexible WordPress plugins are, let’s take a look at how you can benefit instantly by installing a plugin on your website.

For example, if you want to protect your content, you can install plugins to make an area of your page or post inaccessible, or transform your WordPress site into a professional membership site with separate login details for every user …

As mentioned before, free plugins can be used to enhance your site in so many different ways. From adding new features that enhance your business, your web users’ experience and your understanding of what is taking place on your site …

To increasing your business reach across social networks and search engines …

You can also add sophisticated functionality to your site using relatively inexpensive paid plugins. For example, you can set up plugins that automate processes on your site such as displaying customer testimonials and booking events …

And even set up a custom bookings and reservations system online … all for a small fraction of the cost of paying web developers to create the same functionality for you …

Additionally, you can take advantage of built-in WordPress commenting features and plugins that can make your site even more interactive …

For example, your web visitors can easily:

• Leave comments on your site (which can grow into online discussions) using either the native WordPress commenting function, or integrated Facebook comments (which then get displayed throughout a visitors’ Facebook pages, providing you with increased exposure).
• Bookmark your posts on social networks.
• Contact you using contact forms
• Engage online directly with other online users via forums or even set up a private social network on your own domain.
• Engage with members of your team using live webcam conferencing and chatrooms
• Dial your business from their smart phones when visiting your site
• Open support tickets
• And so much more …

Finally you, can also integrate complex enterprise-level applications within a WordPress “front end”. This lets you manage your business marketing, while your 3rd-party application handles the technological aspects …

Some Useful Information About Plugins

• There are loads of plugins available. Be careful of overloading your server with too many plugins, as this can affect your website’s resources and site loading times. It can also mean more maintenance issues for you as a consequence of possible errors.
• Only keep the plugins you really use. Delete any plugins from your site, as these use server resources.
• Many free plugins often receive little to no support from the plugin developer. When considering paid WP plugins, make sure you check some reviews online and see what kind of reputation the developer has when it comes to offering support, upgrades, new features, etc. Be sure to check the plugin reviews we publish on this site for additional useful information.
• If you see that an unsupported plugin has not been updated for a very long time (e.g. two years), then think carefully before using it. WordPress changes regularly and older plugins can cause issues.
• Always maintain your plugins up-to-date. Outdated plugins not only can create issues, they may also contain security vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers and malware.

As you can see, WP plugins are an integral part of WordPress and contribute to making it the most powerful, flexible and scalable website management software available. Plugins also provide WordPress users with an easy, simple and inexpensive way to expand without having to spend thousands of dollars on web developers.

One last thing about WP plugins:

If there is a feature or functionality you need for your website, you can guarantee that a someone has probably already created one that will do exactly what you want it to do, and that it can either be accessed for FREE, or if it’s a paid plugin, that the price to buy it will be minimal.

(Whatever you need done, there’s a WordPress plugin for that!)

And, if by any chance such a plugin has not been created yet, then a custom plugin that does exactly what you need it to do can probably be created for you for a reasonable price.

Hopefully, now you have a better understanding of WordPress plugins – what they are and how they can significantly enhance the functionality of your business blog. See our published posts to learn more about usingplugins.

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