WordPress has evolved from being just a simple blogging application into a tool that is now used to create all kinds of web sites.
Whatever you can imagine, somewhere around the world someone is bound to be already building it with WordPress!
This article will help you discover the simplest, most intuitive WYSIWYG content builder for WordPress sites.
Drag And Drop Content Editors For WordPress
The WordPress Editor – Is There An Easier Tool To Design Pages In WordPress?
With all the many advancements that WordPress has undergone in recent years, many WordPress developers and users feel that using the built-in WordPress visual content editor to create or edit complex web site pages can sometimes be quite challenging.
(The built-in WordPress content editor is great for adding, formatting and editing “linear” text and media, but adding complex layouts can be quite challenging!)
For example, let’s say you want to create something like the content shown below …
To create the above boxes with text and buttons, you would have to add short codes to your content for each page element you want to display …
Normally, this is not really an issue … until you need to reconfigure your layout (for example, move some of the content from box 3 into box 2, or change the button in box 1 from green to orange. Then, you’re stuck having to mess around with page code.
The WordPress visual content editor is supposed to provide users with an easy-to-use WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) content editor, but as you can see, if you are creating with complex content elements, often what you see in the WordPress visual content editor may not be what you are getting when the web page is published …
(“What You See” isn’t always “What You Get” … unless you can visualize code!)
In some instances, users could be better off working with the html source itself instead of the WordPress visual editor when trying to add something other than simple 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 challenge with having to use HTML and shortcodes to create content with WordPress can be summarized by asking two questions:
1) Speed – How long will it take to create a 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 screenshot, what you see when working in the content editor does not look anything like what you see in the front end. This means that you have to translate mentally what your 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 switching browser tabs and performing tweaks and updates to see how your content is coming along, which can interrupt the creative process, as you wait for your page to refresh.
Many WordPress web developers have come up with different solutions to make the visual editor easier. These range from standalone plugins you can install on your site that add new functionality to the editor, to WP themes that provide built-in features like drag and drop editing …
(WordPress “drag and drop” editors aim to make creating complex page layouts easier!)
Some solutions include so many complex page-building features, that users end up with complicated-looking front end content editors …
Many of these alternative editors work fine, but they still don’t address the fundamental issue of using HTML and shortcodes as described earlier. Creating and adding 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 web content?
Now, imagine this …
- You see something in your content that needs changing so you, just click on the content and start writing. Your content is instantly fixed.
- You simply drag and drop items on the page, and the page looks exactly as it will display on the front end without having to mentally translate any shortcodes or HTML.
- You have an idea for an item of content you would like to create, so you just begin typing, and your web page gets built on the fly, without delays, with no tab switching, and without having to wait for new web pages to resave and reload.
Would that not be the ideal way to build content for your site? Just click-to-edit and drag and drop elements around the pages and posts?
(Imagine being able to create complex web page layouts ”on the fly” for your web content without 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 Builder Plugin – The Simplest, Most Intuitive WYSIWYG Content Builder For WordPress
Plugin Description
Thrive Content Builder is a truly intuitive click-to-edit drag and drop content and page editor for WordPress.
Thrive Content Builder is a new and exciting way to set up conversion-focused pages on your WordPress website.
Once installed, the plugin adds a visual content editor with a sidebar menu that lets you drag and drop elements on your web page …
(Thrive Content Builder adds a new visual content editor to your WordPress site)
The Thrive Content Builder And Landing Pages plugin 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’ll examine each of the above plugins and how these powerful features work seamlessly together to help you easily transform and improve your business online and create awesome sales pages and engaging content.
Thrive Content Builder – WordPress Click-To-Edit Drag & Drop Content Building Plugin
Thrive Content Builder lets you easily build complex web page design layouts using drag and drop elements …
Everything on your page can be designed using simple ”click-to-edit” and “drag and drop” …
Once you have positioned elements on a page, you can then easily customize these without having to go through additional steps or opening more settings windows …
You can also build highly attractive landing pages and easily edit these …
Thrive Content Builder and Landing Pages is simple, easy to use, and ideal for all WordPress users at all levels. In fact, working on content with the plugin installed is so amazingly easy, that the developers warn that you’ll never look at the process of creating content the same way once you start using it
For more details, visit the plugin site here: Thrive Content Builder
The integrated Thrive Content Builder and Landing Pages plugin was created by the same team that developed Thrive Leads, another fantastic plugin we’ve recommended on this site.
See this page to learn more about the plugin:
Benefits
Here we have listed just some of the benefits of using Thrive Content Builder to speed up content creation:
Fast Installation
Thrive Content Builder installs just like any regular WordPress plugin. Just upload a zip file that contains the plugin files to your Plugins folder via your WordPress admin area and activate.
Add And Edit Content In Real Time
Thrive Content Builder is really simple to use and lets you edit and add content to your web pages in real-time.
A Truly Visual Content Builder
With Thrive Content Builder installed, what you see as you work within the content editor – fonts, visual elements, layouts, etc. is exactly what your visitors will see in the front end of your site.
Some additional benefits include the following:
- Beautiful Page Layouts With Drag-And-Drop Ease: Create any kind of layout you can imagine with intuitive drag and drop functionality.
- Add Design Elements With No Short Codes Involved: With the Thrive Content Builder plugin you not only get an exciting and simple-to-use drag and drop content builder, but the plugin also includes an impressive collection of customizable web design elements that you can insert into your web pages without using short codes, such as pricing tables, star ratings for review pages, dividers, responsive videos, etc.
- Distraction-Free Content Creation: Not having to constantly switch tabs as you tweak content and then wait for your page to refresh frees up your attention and allows you to build the content your business needs, quickly and without having to edit code or click through multiple layers of menus to get what you want done.
(Thrive Content Builder lets you easily create, edit and customize page elements like testimonial boxes, columns, content reveal feature, buttons, Google Map embeds, etc.)
Thrive Content Builder Features
Thrive Content Builder offers WP users many unique features. Here are just a few:
- Built-In Editor Functionality Is Preserved: You have access to all of the built-in WordPress editing options that you are used to (e.g. bold formatting, justified paragraphs, font sizes, etc.),
- Drag And Drop Elements: The plugin makes a “drag and drop” list of elements available on your post or page screen for editing content.
- Conversion-Boosting Elements: The plugin provides you with a range of attention-grabbing and customizable elements that will help you increase your conversions, including buttons and call-to-action elements, testimonials, and guarantee forms. In addition to customization options, multiple design options are also available for various elements.
- Responsive Element Design: Add mobile-friendly elements like column layouts, boxes, section dividers, e.g. which will display correctly on different-sized screens.
- Add Animation To Pages: The Event Manager feature lets you create animated page content, trigger lightboxes and more!
(Add Animated Elements To Your Pages)
Thrive Landing Pages Plugin – 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 signup to purchase, product download and more.
(Thrive Landing Pages provides you with conversion-optimized page templates)
Thrive Landing Pages – Benefits
- Everything is hosted on your own WordPress site
- Save time building beautiful-looking web pages
- 100% conversion-optimized page templates
- No web coding skills needed
- Works with any theme
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 beautifully designed, conversion optimized web page templates and fully customizable …
(Landing page sets that work together logically and use the same conversion-optimized design language)
There are over 30 templates available, with more templates being worked on. In addition to the templates that are currently available, expect to see new templates in the future for email lead generation, sales pages, lesson pages, personal branding pages, webinar pages and more.
Fully Customizable Landing Page Template
Normally, in order to fully customize landing page templates, you would need to either pay a web designer to do the work, or learn how to code web pages 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 complex 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 building conversion-optimized web pages.”
Thrive Landing Pages gives you stunning pre-designed web page templates that are fully optimized and ready to go, and complete design freedom that allows you to change or edit anything on the page template …
With the landing page template sets included with this plugin, you can:
- Change text in all bullet points, buttons, headlines, etc.
- Delete text, images or any other part of the landing page
- Replace any background images and edit colors
- Change the color of text, buttons, links, etc.
- Select your own fonts
- Select your own images and graphics
- Change content area size
- Rearrange the order of web page elements
- Translate pages into a different language
- Add any type of custom content in the pages
- Use pre-designed, customized pages, or create your own pages from scratch and save them as new page templates.
(Change and edit anything on the page)
Transform Your Site Into A Marketing Machine With Thrive Lightbox Plugin
The Thrive package includes Thrive Lightbox, which lets you add fully customizable 2-step opt-in forms and events to your pages …
(Add opt-in forms and animation to your marketing pages with the Thrive Lightbox plugin)
Thrive Lighbox 2-Step Opt-in Forms
A 2-step opt-in process can help improve your conversion rates. Visitors click on an image or button, and then they are presented with your opt-in form …
(Capture more leads and subscribers with a two-step opt-in process)
Event Manager
An “event” consists of a trigger and an action. You can make an opt-in form appear when when visitors click or hover their mouse over a button or an image, or when someone reaches a certain point on the page. You can also use the Event Manager to animate images on your pages, using a range of animation effects (e.g. zoom out, slide in from top to bottom, roll out, etc.
(Set up and manage events on your pages with Thrive Lightbox)
A lightbox and event is created automatically for your landing pages, but you also have complete control over your events, triggers and design.
User Feedback
Below are a couple of the testimonials and comments users have submitted for 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 – Useful Tips
Thrive Content Builder works with any theme in WordPress, not just with the Thrive Landing Pages plugin. Note, however, that you cannot use Thrive Content Builder to edit content that was not created using the plugin.
You can add short codes inside Thrive Content Builder or Thrive Landing Pages and they will display correctly on your website.
Thrive Lightbox works with any content you build with Thrive Content Builder.
Plugin Support
Thrive Content and Landing Page Builder comes with free updates, new landing pages and upcoming features. The Thrive team is constantly working on adding new features and improving existing ones.
Thrive plugins are very well-supported, and users get unlimited upgrades, and 1 year unlimited support with their purchase, backed by a risk-free, 30 day, 100% refund guarantee.
This is an exciting product for WordPress users that will just keep getting better.
Product Licensing Pricing
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 – This license allows you to activate the plugin on a single website. It includes full feature set, unlimited updates and one year of unlimited support. Cost = $59.00.
- Unlimited Sites License – This license allows you to configure the plugin on all websites that you own. Includes full feature set, unlimited updates and one year of unlimited support. Cost = $87.00.
- Agency License – Use on your domains & on all your client domains. It includes access to Thrive Content Builder, plus all Thrive Themes & Thrive Plugins. Price = $247.00 per year.
Please Note: Current pricing for the product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The pricing shown above was correct when this article was published. This may not be the actual price charged by the product developer when you visit the product site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the latest price here:
Additional Plugin Information
The developers of the Thrive Content Builder and Landing Pages plugin emphatically 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 web page elements and beautiful, conversion-optimized templates that help make designing your content faster, and on the other hand, you also have 100% control over the design process and the freedom to change and customize everything on your web page, using the plugin’s visual content editor, that allows you to see how the content you are working on will look after being published.
For a demo video of the plugin in action, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, customer helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the plugin website.
Get This Plugin …
If you want to edit something, you just click on the element and start editing. If you want to change something, you can see the change happen instantly. If you want to move something, all you have to do is drag it and drop it into its new position. There are no unnecessary steps involved.
If you want to transform and improve your business online and create amazing sales pages, streamlined landing pages and engaging content, this plugin delivers an incredible conversion-boosting package with a single, inexpensive plugin.
For full details, check out the plugin here:
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