WordPress has evolved from being just a simple blogging tool into a tool being used to design all types of pages – direct sales pages, portfolio pages, local business pages, etc.
Whatever you can think of, someone is most likely already building it using WordPress!
In this article you will learn how to create stunning content faster and design beautiful layouts with drag & drop ease in WordPress websites.
Drag & Drop Content Editors For WordPress
The WordPress Visual Editor – Is There An Easier Tool To Design Pages In WordPress?
Using the default WordPress content editor to create or edit sophisticated content elements can be quite difficult for non-technical users.
(The WordPress WYSIWYG content editor is great for adding, formatting and editing “linear” text and images, but adding more complex content elements can be challenging!)
For example, if you look at the screenshot below …
Creating the above boxes with text and buttons in a page would require adding something that looks like this in the default WordPress visual content editor …
Typically, this is not an issue … until you want to change your layout (for example, move part of the content from box 1 into box 2, or replace the background colour in box 2 from red to light blue. Then, you’re stuck having to mess around with code.
The WordPress visual editor is supposed to provide non-technical users with an easy-to-use WYSIWYG content editor, but as you can see, if you are trying to add more complex content elements, often what you see in the WordPress visual content editor screen may not be the same as what you get …
(“What You See” isn’t always “What You Get” … unless you can visualize code!)
In some situations, users could even be better off working directly with the html source itself instead of the WYSIWYG editor when trying to add non-linear page elements …
Even though WordPress is the most user-friendly CMS platform available, this makes it hard for non-technical users to have full control of their own content.
The fundamental problem of using HTML and shortcodes to create content in the default WordPress editor can be summarized by asking 2 questions:
1) Speed – How long does it take to create a web page using the editor?
2) Abstraction – How closely does the content in the ”back end” match the content in the “front end” when you are creating or editing a page?
As you can see from the above image, what you see in the content editor looks nothing like what you see in the front end. This means that users have to translate mentally what the content will look like when working with sophisticated layouts. Other solutions require taking several steps before you can begin configuring your page layout, or endlessly going back and forth between tabs and performing updates to see how your content is progressing, which then impacts how quickly you can create your content, as you wait for your updates to refresh.
Many WordPress web developers have tried to come up with various solutions with the objective of making content editing more intuitive. Some of these alternative solutions range from WordPress plugins you can install on your site that add new functionality to the editor, to themes that come with built-in features like drag and drop editing …
(WordPress “drag and drop” editors aim to make creating complex page layouts easier!)
Some solutions end up including so many complex page design features, that users need to learn how to work with complicated-looking front end editors …
Many of these alternative editors work, but they don’t really address the fundamental challenge of using HTML and shortcodes as described earlier. Creating, adding and editing sophisticated content elements on a web page becomes overly complicated, involves multiple steps and doesn’t match what users expect to see on the “front end.”
If you want your page content to look ”perfect” quickly, this can start to become quite frustrating.
Ask yourself this …
If there were no technical constraints, how would you like to build and edit your content?
Now that you’ve asked this question, visualize this …
- You spot something in your content that needs to be corrected so you, just click on the content and start typing. Your content is instantly changed.
- You just drag and drop elements around the page, and see them exactly as they will appear on the front end without having to mentally visualize code.
- You have an idea for an item of content that you’d like to create, so you immediately begin typing, and you build your page as you go, with no delays, no tab switching, and without having to wait for web pages to republish and reload.
Would that not be the perfect way to create content for your site? Just click-to-edit and drag and drop elements around your pages?
(Imagine being able to create complex pages quickly for your web content with no technical skills required!)
If you are ready to change the way you create content in WordPress site, then here is a plugin that you may want to consider using …
Thrive Content And Landing Page Builder
Plugin Description
Thrive Content Builder is a truly intuitive WordPress click-to-edit drag and drop content editing plugin.
The Thrive Content Builder plugin is a new and exciting way to speed up the process of creating amazing content on your WordPress website.
Once installed, Thrive Content Builder adds a visual content editor with an item menu that lets you drag and drop elements to your page …
(Thrive Content Builder adds a new content builder to WordPress)
Thrive Landing Pages And Content Builder is actually a combination of the Thrive Content Builder and Thrive Landing Pages plugins combined into one, plus an additional plugin feature called Thrive Lightbox.
We will take a look at all of the above and how all of this functionality works seamlessly together to help you easily transform and improve your website and create awesome sales pages and engaging content.
Thrive Content Builder Plugin
You can easily add complex design layouts to your web pages using drag and drop elements …
Every element of your page can be built by ”clicking-to-edit” and “dragging and dropping” things around the page …
Once you have positioned elements on a page, you can then easily customize or edit them without going through additional steps or switching tabs …
You can also create highly attractive landing pages and easily edit these …
Thrive Landing Pages and Content Builder is simple, easy to use, and ideal for all WordPress users at all levels. In fact, designing pages and working on content with the Thrive Landing Pages and Content Builder plugin installed is so effortlessly easy, that the developers warn that once you start using it, it’ll ruin the experience of using all other content editors forever, and you will never look back!
Learn more about the plugin here: Thrive Content Builder
Thrive Content Builder and Thrive Landing Pages were created by the same team that developed Thrive Leads, another fantastic plugin for WordPress that we have written about on this site.
To read more about the plugin, go here:
Benefits Of Using Thrive Landing Pages And Content Builder Plugin
Below we have listed just some of the many benefits and advantages of using Thrive Content Builder to speed up the process of designing pages and creating content for your web site:
Ready To Go To Work In No Time
Thrive Content Builder installs just like every other WP plugin. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Build & Edit Content In Real Time
Thrive Content Builder is is not only really simple to use, it also lets you create and edit content in real-time.
What You See Is Exactly What You Get
With Thrive Content Builder installed, what you see as you work within the editor – typefaces, elements, page layouts, etc. is exactly what your visitors will see on the front end of your site.
Additional benefits include the following:
- Attractive Layouts With Drag & Drop Ease: Create any type of layout you can imagine with drag and drop ease.
- Add Customizable Elements Without Using Short Codes: With Thrive Content Builder you not only get an amazing click-to-edit WordPress content editor, but the plugin also includes a very decent collection of customizable web design elements that you can customizable and use on your content layouts without using shortcodes, for e.g.: tabbed content, feature grids, page section dividers, responsive maps, etc.
- Distraction-Free Content Creation: Not having to wait for your content to refresh frees up your attention and allows you to be more focused while you build content or click through multiple steps to get what you need done.
(Insert, edit and customize page elements like testimonial boxes, flat design elements, table of contents builder, section dividers, countdown timers, etc.)
Plugin Features
Thrive Content Builder provides many powerful features to site owners. Here are just some of these features:
- Regular Editor Functionality Is Preserved: You have all of the built-in content editing options that you are used to (e.g. underlines, paragraph formatting, headings, etc.),
- Drag And Drop Elements Menu: The plugin adds a “drag and drop” table of elements to your post or page screen for creating or editing content.
- Conversion-Boosting Elements: The plugin includes a range of eye-catching and customizable elements that will help you increase the effectiveness of your sales pages, including buttons and call-to-action elements, testimonial boxes, and guarantees. In addition to being customizable, multiple design options are also available for various elements.
- Responsive Design: Add responsive elements like column layouts, boxes, dividers, e.g. which will display great on all different kinds of devices.
- Add Animation Events To Web Pages: The Event Manager feature lets you create animated buttons, trigger lightboxes and more!
(Add Animated Elements To Your Pages)
Thrive Landing Pages – Landing Page Sets
Landing page template sets are web templates that work together logically and use the same conversion-optimized design language to take your visitors all the way from initial signup to purchase, product download and more.
(Thrive Landing Pages plugin gives you conversion-optimized page templates)
Thrive Landing Pages Plugin – Benefits
- Everything is hosted on your own WordPress site
- Save time and money creating attractive-looking web pages for your web site
- 100% conversion-optimized landing pages
- No coding skills needed
- Works with all WordPress themes
Thrive Landing Pages and Content Builder not only lets you create beautiful-looking content in your WordPress posts and pages, but you can also choose from dozens of professionally designed, page templates that are conversion-optimized and fully customizable …
(Thrive Landing Pages provides sets of templates that work together logically and use the same conversion-optimized design language)
There are 30+ templates available, with more templates planned for release. In addition to the existing templates, expect to see new templates in the future for email lead generation, sales pages, lesson pages, personal branding pages, webinar pages and more.
Completely Customizable And Flexible Landing Page Template Sets
Normally, in order to fully customize landing page templates, you would need to either pay a web designer to do the work, or learn web coding languages like HTML and CSS and figure out how to edit the page code yourself.
As Shane Melaugh, co-founder of Thrive Themes says …
“There are many ways to get a pre-designed page published quickly, but the problem comes with customization. Total design freedom requires either hiring web developers to do the work for you, or learn how to do it yourself, which involves learning how to mess around with code or use complicated editors. Customizable usually means complicated, expensive or time-consuming. So, you can either have something that is fast and easy to set up, or something that is customizable and flexible. But you couldn’t have both … until now! With Thrive Landing Pages you get the best of both worlds for creating conversion-optimized web pages.”
Thrive Landing Pages gives you beautiful pre-built web page templates that are fully optimized and ready to go, and complete design freedom that lets you change and customize any element of your page templates …
With the landing page templates included with this plugin, you are able to:
- Edit text in all bullet points, buttons, headlines, etc.
- Remove text, images or any other component of the landing page
- Replace all background images or color
- Edit the color of links, buttons, text, etc.
- Choose your own fonts
- Use your own images
- Modify content area size
- Rearrange the order of web page elements
- Translate everything on the page into a different language
- Add custom content anywhere in any of the pages
- Use pre-designed, customized pages, or create your own pages from scratch and save them as new web page templates.
(Change or customize anything on the page template)
Thrive Lightbox Plugin – Transform Your Web Site Into A Marketing Machine
The Thrive package also includes Thrive Lightbox, which lets you add fully configurable 2-step opt-in forms and animated elements to your content pages …
(Add lead capture forms and animated elements to your web pages with Thrive Lightbox)
Two-Step Opt-in Forms
A two-step opt-in process can improve your conversion rates. When visitors click on an image or button they are presented with your opt-in form …
(Opt-in forms can improve your conversion rates.)
Event Manager
An “event” consists of a trigger and an action. You can make an opt-in form appear when your visitor clicks or hovers their mouse over a button or graphic elements, or when someone scrolls down to a certain point on the page. You can also use the Event Manager to animate images on your page, using a range of animation effects (e.g. fade out, slide in from right to left, roll out, etc.
(Set up and manage events on your web pages with Thrive Lightbox)
A lightbox and event is created automatically for your landing pages, but you also have complete control over events, triggers and design.
Testimonials
Here are a few of the testimonials and feedback plugin users have submitted regarding the Thrive Content Builder plugin:
“I have had nothing but the best experience imaginable with this tool since I purchased it. This is by far one of, if not the best plug-in I have purchase to date and it has definitely made working with WordPress a whole new experience. Jim Bond”
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“I’m blown away by the plugin. Keep up the incredible, WordPress changing work, guys! Dean Phillips”
Thrive Content Builder Plugin – Tips
Thrive Content Builder works with any WordPress theme, not just with Thrive Landing Pages. You cannot use Thrive Content Builder to edit content on pages or posts that were not created with the plugin.
You can add WordPress shortcodes inside Thrive Content Builder or Thrive Landing Pages and they will display correctly on on your site.
Thrive Lightbox works with any content built with Thrive Content Builder.
Plugin Support
Thrive Content Builder and Landing Pages provides free updates, new landing templates and upcoming features. The plugin developers are constantly working on adding new features and improving existing ones.
Thrive software is really well-supported, and users get lifetime software updates, plus one year unlimited support with their purchase, backed by a risk-free, thirty day, 100% money-back guarantee.
This is an exciting product that will just keep getting better.
Plugin Cost
At the time of writing, the pricing information shown below includes all three components described above (Thrive Content Builder, Thrive Landing Pages & Thrive Lightbox):
- Single Site License Edition – This lets you set up the plugin on a single site. Price includes full feature set, unlimited updates and 1 year of unlimited support. Price = $59.00.
- Unlimited Sites License Edition – This lets you install the plugin on all of your personal websites. Pricing includes full feature set, unlimited updates and 1 year of unlimited support. Price = $87.00.
- Agency Licensing – Use on all your websites and on client domains. Cost includes access to Thrive Content Builder, plus all Thrive Themes & Thrive Plugins. Cost = $247.00 per year.
Note: The cost to purchase Thrive Content Builder depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The pricing shown above was correct when this content was written. This may not be the actual pricing set by the software author when you visit the website and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details:
Additional Plugin Info
The developers of the Thrive Landing Pages and Content Builder plugin repeatedly assert that the plugin’s architecture gives you the “best of both worlds,” and help bring back the “joy of creating content.”
On the one hand, you have the time-saving benefits of ready-made page elements and beautiful, pre-designed templates that help make designing your content faster, and on the other hand, you have 100% control over the design process and the freedom to edit anything and everything on your web page, using the plugin’s click-to-edit and drag and drop features, which lets you see how the content you are working on will look on the “front end” after being published.
For ”how-to” videos showing plugin usage, including installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, customer helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Thrive plugins website.
Install The Plugin …
If you want to edit something, you click on the element and start editing. If you want to change something, do it, and you can see the change happen immediately. If you want to move something, you drag it and drop it into its new location. There are no complicated steps involved.
If you want to transform and improve your web presence and create awesome sales pages, streamlined landing pages and engaging content, Thrive Landing Pages and Content Builder delivers an incredible conversion-boosting package with a single, inexpensive plugin.
For full details, check out the plugin here:
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