Category: WordPress 101

One of the main features of WordPress is that you can quickly enhance your WordPress website’s functionality using plugins.

About Plugins

Like most people, you probably own a smart phone. What do you do when you would like to access something new on your device like a new application, software or a tool?

Why, simple … you download and install an app!

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

(Just like there are social sharing apps …)

A WordPress plugin is similar to an app. You simply download and install a little software application that adds new functionality to your WordPress web site …

(… you can also find social sharing plugins for WordPress sites!)

Almost always, if you decide to expand the functionality of an existing site, additional cost is involved. Depending on how complex the feature or enhancement is, the cost can be quite significant, especially if web developers need to add new code or modify programs or install programs that integrate with your existing site.

This also applies when setting up a new web site. Companies tend to invest up front in features they may probably never need.

For this reason, we recommend a cost-effective strategy when developing your online presence presence and WordPress plugins are ideal for helping you achieve this.

Imagine being able to:

1) Start simply and inexpensively. Get a professional web site up and running quickly, then …

2) As new features become necessary, install new applications with just a couple of clicks of the mouse directly from your administration area, giving your web site an entirely new and expanded range of useful functionality, and …

3) Cost not a single dollar extra to download and install on your site?

Well, that’s precisely what WP plugins allow you to do!

Plugins – Benefits

I began this blog post by comparing WP plugins with apps. In a similar way that some apps are free to download and some apps cost a little bit of money, so do plugins.

In fact, many plugins are available at no cost to WordPress users.

WP plugins that you purchase are referred to as “Premium” plugins. The good news, is that when compared to the cost of paying for web development services to get the same features and functionality on your site, most Premium (i.e. ”paid”) plugins are priced quite low.

Also, since WordPress makes its source code publicly available, any person can create, edit and customize any portion of the WordPress code. This has enabled many professional software developers to enhance and contribute to the WordPresssoftware.

• WP plugins allow you to get started with just a simple web site and add new features and enhancements to your site when necessary.
• WP plugins allow you to add practically endless functionality to your web presence quickly, easily and really cheaply.
• Plugins give you practically unlimited expanding capabilities.
• WordPress plugins allow non-technical website owners to have a site that they can manage themselves.
• Most plugins will typically work “right out of the box” and only require installation and activation to provide your website or blog with immediate capabilities and enhancements.
• Some plugins offer more extensive options and require some configuring.

Plugins – Powerful, Flexible … And (Often) Completely FREE!

Like many WP themes, loads of plugins are available to WordPress users … often at no cost!

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

As mentioned earlier, you can find WordPress plugins that can do just about everything you can possibly need a website to do.

There are plugins for:

• User Administration
• Content Management
• Web Traffic Generation
• User Engagement
• Social Media
• Managing Media Files – Videos, Images, Audio, Multimedia, etc.
• e-Biz And Online Sales Automation
• Increasing Website Conversions And Lead Generation
• Data Monitoring & Reporting Tools
• Site Security

For example, you can add features to your WordPress site with plugins like:

• Contact forms
• Quizzes and polls
• User Surveys
• Rotating banners
• E-commerce (from managing single-item ordering with PayPal buttons, to enterprise scale e-commerce stores with online shopping carts, invoicing, recurring billing, coupons, etc …)
• Social media integration
• Membership sites
• List-building opt-in forms
• Sales funnels
• Mobile conversion
• Improving your website’s Search Engine Optimization
• Image galleries (including rotating images, lightboxes, etc.)
• Customer testimonial forms
• Instant 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
• Customer interactivity – contest, live chat, currency conversion, etc.
• Media management
• Making pages load faster
• Managing events
• Business listing directories
• Automatically sell and manage advertising on your site
• Set appointments and appointment reminders
• Manage reservations and bookings
• Detect broken hyperlinks and email you reports
• Redirect affiliate links
• Monitor social signals
• Make your pages printable or downloadable as a PDF file
• Add a site map
• Hide specific from displaying on areas of your site (e.g. sitemaps, feeds, etc.)
• Protect page content
• Import information from different CMS platforms
• Perform bulk data replacements
• Block SPAM
• Customize visitor comment displays (e.g. displaying Facebook discussions)
• Insert HTML and script elements into your posts and pages
• Add tables
• Display animated graphic elements and advanced text formatting options
• Create and manage QR codes
• Improve Google local search
• Add a map of your business location
• Syndicate your posts automatically on social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Tumblr and many others
• Display countdown timers (for expiring offers, discount coupons, etc …)
• Display personal greetings, timed offers, etc …
• And so many other features!

As it’s clear to see, plugins give you endless possibilities. If you are currently planning to build a website, or your existing site isn’t powered by WordPress, then consider using WordPress in the future.

In case you’re still wondering just how powerful and flexible plugins are, let’s take a look at how you can benefit instantly by simply adding an inexpensive plugin to your web site.

For example, if you need content protection, 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 customized login details for users …

As mentioned previously, free plugins can be used to improve your website in so many ways. From installing functionality that can enhance your business, your site’s user experience and your understanding of what is happening on your site …

To extending your business visibility across various social media and search engines …

You can also add complex features to your website using inexpensive paid plugins. For example, you can install plugins that integrate and automate functionality on your site such as managing customer testimonials and booking events …

And even run a complete bookings and reservations system online … all for a tiny fraction of the cost of paying software developers to design custom applications for you …

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

For example, your visitors can easily:

• Post comments on your blog posts (which can turn into online discussions) using either the native WordPress commenting function, or integrated Facebook comments (which are then displayed throughout the visitors’ Facebook pages, giving your site increased exposure).
• Share your content with other web visitors on social media.
• Contact you via contact forms
• Engage online directly with other users through online forums or even set up a private community on your domain.
• Engage with your team using live video chats
• Call your business directly from their devices while browsing your website
• Open a support ticket
• And so much more …

You can even integrate sophisticated enterprise-level applications with a WordPress “front end”. This lets you control the content that your visitors see on your web site, while the third-party application handles the technological aspects …

Useful Tips About WP Plugins

• There are so many fantastic plugins available. Be careful not to overload your server with too many plugins, as this will invariably begin to affect your site’s performance and site loading times. It also creates more maintenance issues for you as a result of potential conflicts and errors.
• Only keep those plugins that you really plan to use. Delete any plugins you don’t need from your site, as these utilize resources.
• Many free plugins often receive little to no support from the plugin developer. When choosing paid plugins, we recommend that you do a little research first to understand what kind of reputation the plugin developer has when it comes to providing support, updates, new improvements, etc. Be sure to check some of our plugin reviews for more expert information.
• If you see that a plugin has not been updated for a very long time (e.g. two or more years), then think carefully before using it. The WordPress application updates regularly and older plugins that have not been updated can cause problems.
• Always maintain your plugins updated. Outdated plugin not only can create issues, they may also have security vulnerabilities that can be exploited by hackers and malicious users.

As you can see, WP plugins are an important component of WordPress and contribute to making it the most preferred digital content management software available. Plugins also provide WordPress users with an easy, simple and inexpensive way to add instant functionality to their web presence without spending thousands of dollars on outsourced web developers.

One last thing about WordPress plugins:

Whatever functionality you want for your website, you can be sure that a someone has probably already created one that will do just what you need it to do, and that this plugin can either be accessed at no cost, or if it’s a premium plugin, that it will be fairly inexpensive.

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

And, if by chance this WP plugin has not been created yet, then a custom plugin that does precisely what you would like it to do can probably be created for you at a reasonable cost.

Hopefully, this information has given you a better understanding of WP plugins – what they are and how they can significantly improve your blog. See our related posts to learn about more useful WP plugins that we recommend using.

***

***