Tag: Plugins

One of the main features of the WordPress web site publishing software is the ability to quickly and easily increase your WordPress website’s functionality using inexpensive called plugins.

Understanding Plugins

No doubt, you probably have a device like a mobile phone. What happens when you would like access to something new on your device like a new software or a new productivity tool?

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 a smart device.

(Just like there are social sharing apps for smart phones …)

A WP plugin is similar to an app. You install a little software application that provides new functionality to your website …

(… there are also social sharing plugins for WordPress users!)

Normally, adding new features to an existing web site involves additional cost. Depending on how complex the features or enhancements are, the cost can be significant, particularly if web developers have to create new code or edit templates or install programs that integrate with your existing set up.

This is also applicable when developing a new website or business blog. Companies will often invest money up front for bells and whistles they probably will never need.

To keep costs to a minimum, we suggest a modular approach to setting up a website and WordPress plugins are ideal for doing this.

Imagine if you could:

1) Start simply with minimal cost involved. Get your web presence up and running quickly, then …

2) As new features are required, you can add new software modules with just a few mouse clicks directly from within your WordPress dashboard panel, and give your site a completely new range of capabilities and functionality, and …

3) Cost not one dollar more to install on your web site?

Well, that’s precisely what a plugin allows you to do!

Benefits Of WordPress Plugins

We started this post by comparing WP plugins with smartphone apps. In the same way that some apps are free to download and some apps may cost a little money, the same applies with plugins.

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

Plugins that you buy are referred to as “Premium” plugins. The good news, is that when you compare the price of buying a Premium plugin to the cost of paying for professional web development services to add similar functionality on your site, most Premium plugins cost very little.

Also, because WordPress distributes its software as an Open Source application, any web developer can create, edit and customize any part of the WordPress code. This has enabled thousands of professional web development professionals to build more new tools that plug seamlessly into WordPress than you can imagine.

• Plugins let you get started with a basic yet professional site and expand only as necessary.
• Plugins allow you to add practically endless features to your web site easily and cheaply.
• WordPress plugins give your online presence practically endless expansion capabilities.
• Plugins allow ”non-techies” to have a site that they can manage themselves.
• Most plugins will work “right out of the box” and only require installation and activation to provide your site with instant new capabilities and functionality.
• Some plugins can be slightly more advanced and may need some initial configuration.

Plugins – Powerful, Flexible … And (Often) 100% FREE!

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

You can access thousands of plugins from the Free WordPress Plugin Directory …

As previously mentioned, you can find plugins that can do almost anything you can think of.

WP plugin categories cover:

• User Management
• Content Distribution
• Traffic
• Visitor Engagement
• Social Connectivity
• Media Utilities Automation
• Increasing Website Conversions And Lead Generation
• Data Analysis
• Securing Your

You can expand a business online presence with plugins like:

• Contact forms
• Quizzes and polls
• Surveys
• Rotating banners
• E-commerce (from managing single-item sales with PayPal buttons, to full e-commerce stores with online shopping carts, invoicing, recurring billing, coupons, etc …)
• Social media integration
• Private Membership sites
• Newsletter subscription forms
• Sales funnels
• Mobile integration
• Improving your website’s Search Engine Optimization
• Image galleries (with rotating images, lightboxes, etc.)
• Customer testimonials
• Language translation (e.g. you can instantly change all content on your site from English to Norwegian)
• 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
• Niche directories
• Automatically sell advertising on your blog
• Set up client appointments and reminders
• Automate reservations and bookings
• Detect broken hyperlinks and send you reports
• Redirect URLs
• Monitor what other sites are posting about your business
• Make your pages available for printing or downloading as PDF
• Add sitemaps
• Exclude certain from displaying on areas of your site (e.g. sitemaps, feeds, etc.)
• Hide post content sections
• Import content from non-WordPress platforms
• Search and replace data
• Block SPAM commenting
• Customize visitor comment displays (e.g. display Facebook discussions)
• Inserting code and code elements into your site’s header and footer
• Add formatted tables
• Add animated graphic elements and advanced font display formatting options
• Create and manage QR codes
• Improve Google local search
• Add business location maps
• Publish your posts automatically on social pages like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr and others
• Show countdown timers (for scarcity offers, discount coupons, etc …)
• Display personal greetings, timed offers, etc …
• And so many other features!

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

In case you’re still wondering just how powerful and flexible plugins are, let’s take a look at some practical uses of installing a plugin on your web site.

For example, if you need to publish content which is only accessible to some but not all users, you can use plugins to make a section of a page or post inaccessible, or create a full membership site with personal login details for users …

As mentioned previously, free plugins can be used to improve your business site in lots of ways. From adding features that can improve your business, your website visitors’ experience and your understanding of what is happening on your site …

To extending your site’s reach across a number of social networks and search engines …

You can also add advanced functionality to your site using relatively inexpensive paid WordPress plugins. For example, you can download plugins that automate functions on your pages such as customer testimonial and event registrations management …

And even run a complete bookings and reservations system on your site … all for a small fraction of the cost of paying software developers to create similar 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 web visitors can:

• Post comments on your blog posts (which can grow into online discussions) using either the built-in WordPress commenting function, or integrated Facebook comments (which are then shared throughout the visitors’ Facebook pages, providing you with additional exposure).
• Share your posts with other web visitors on social networks.
• Contact you via contact forms
• Engage in online discussions with your team using forums or even set up a private online social network on your site.
• Engage with members of your team using live web conferencing and chatroom facilities
• Dial your business from their laptops when visiting your pages
• Open a support ticket
• And so much more …

You can even integrate sophisticated enterprise-level applications with a WP “front end”. This enables you to control the content that your visitors will see on your site, while the 3rd-party application handles the technical aspects …

WordPress Plugins – Useful Tips

• There are so many plugins to choose from. Be careful not to overload your site with an excessive amount of plugins, as this can affect your website’s resources and site loading times. It can also mean more maintenance issues for you resulting from potential conflicts and errors.
• Only keep those plugins you really use. Delete any plugins you don’t need from your site, as these use resources.
• Many free plugins normally receive little to no support from the plugin developer. When considering paid plugins, make sure you check some reviews online and understand what kind of reputation the plugin developer has when it comes to providing support, upgrades, new improvements, etc. Be sure to check some of the plugin reviews we provide on this site for more 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 installing it. The WordPress application changes on a regular basis and older plugins that have not been updated can cause issues.
• Make sure that you always update your plugins. Outdated plugin not only can cause errors and conflicts, they could also have security vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers and malicious users.

As you can see, WP plugins are an integral part of WordPress and contribute to making it the most used content management system in the world. Plugins also provide WordPress users with an easy, simple and inexpensive way to add new features to their web presence without spending thousands of dollars on outsourced web development costs.

One last thing on the subject of plugins:

If there is any feature or functionality you want for your web site, you can be sure that a plugin probably exists that will do exactly what you need, and that this plugin can either be downloaded at no cost, or if it’s a premium plugin, that the price to buy it will be reasonable.

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

And, if by any chance this WordPress plugin is not available, then one can most certainly be created for you at a reasonable cost.

Hopefully, now you have a better understanding of plugins – what plugins are and how they can significantly improve your website. See our published posts to learn more about using WP plugins.

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