Tag: Simple Staff List Plugin

Business experts have successfully proven over time that people tend to buy from those they already know, like and trust.

If you are searching for quicker and simpler ways to sell more products or services online or get people to stay longer on your site, then help your prospects get to know, like and trust you, your team and your organization better.

Adding a directory of staff or team members to your site can help to generate more trust, increase your online credibility and get more prospects to contact you.

This tutorial shows you how to create and add an easy-to-update employee directory in your website.

How To Easily Add A Staff List Directory: WordPress Plugin Tutorial

In this tutorial, you will learn how to install, activate and configure a free WordPress plugin called Simple Staff List.

Simple Staff List Plugin For WordPress

(Simple Staff List Plugin For WordPress)

Simple Staff List is free and lets you employee.

First, let’s install and activate the plugin.

Log into your dashboard and navigate to Plugins > Add New …

(Plugins Menu – Add New)

In the Plugins screen, search for “simple staff plugin”. This should bring up the Simple Staff Plugin in your search results area.

Click on Install Now …

(WordPress Plugins  – plugin search results)

Click on Activate Plugin …

(Activate plugin)

After the plugin has been installed and activated, you will see that a new menu entry will appear in the main WP menu section called Staff Members …

(Staff Members)

All of the settings and options for the Simple Staff List plugin are configured and managed from this menu.

Configuring The Plugin

Depending on how many people are in your team and how you want to structure your directory, you could just begin to add new staff member details after installing the plugin, or create several groups (i.e. categories) that you will assign to individual employees.

Staff Members – Groups

Let’s start by setting up your categories. From your dashboard menu, select Staff Members > Groups …

(Staff Members – Groups)

The Groups settings screen …

(Groups section)

Note: Configuring directory groups is similar to working with WordPress categories …

(Groups work like WordPress categories)

Add new groups by typing in the following information:

1. Group Name – Type in your category name
2. Slug – Type in the slug of your category. Note: make sure that all letters are in lower case and use hyphens instead of spaces.
3. Parent – Use this section if you plan to set up a directory hierarchy
4. Description – Enter the group description here (optional)
5. Click the Add New Group button when finished to create a new group …

(Groups area)

If you are a business that employs many people, the ability to set up different categories can be very useful. For example, you can create a category for founders, developers, departments, etc.

Create as many groups and nested categories as you need by adding new Groups and then using the Parent drop-down menu to assign these to a hierarchical structure …

(Nested categories)

Remember to click the Add New Group button after entering each item …

To edit Groups for individual entries, hover your mouse over a category title and click on the Edit link …

Your selected group details will open in the Edit Group screen. Select a new parent group from the Parent dropdown menu …

(Edit Group settings)

Click Update to save your changes …

To change your Group name or slug, hover your mouse over the group name and choose Quick Edit …

Click the Update Group button when done …

Continue adding groups in this section until you have created your directory structure …

Add as many nested categories as you like …

(Nested categories)

After you are done setting up your hierarchical structure, you can begin to add your people to your directory.

Staff Members – Add New

In your admin menu, select Staff Members > Add New …

(Staff Members – Add New)

This brings up the Add New Staff Member settings …

(Add New Staff Member section)

This area provides an easy-to-use interface for adding and editing your staff member information and includes the following fields:

Name Section (1)

• Name: Enter the employee’s name
• Permalink: Modify your staff members’ slug (you will see this section after saving your details).

Staff Photo Section (2)

• Photo: Upload a photo in this section

Staff Member Info Section (3)

• Position: The employee’s position
• Email: Type in the person’s email here
• Phone Number: Enter the person’s phone number into this field
• Facebook URL: Type the person’s Facebook URL (note: use the full URL, e.g. http://www.facebook.com/username)
• Twitter URL: Add your company’s Twitter username (note: only enter the username, not the full twitter URL)

Staff Member Bio Section (4)

• Staff Member Bio: Add a profile description for your staff members here. This uses the WordPress Text Editor, so you can add formatted content into this section.

Groups Section (5)

• Groups: Assign a staff or faculty member to a specific group (see the previous section to learn how to set up your groups).

If you click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your screen …

(Screen options tab)

You can enable additional page settings …

(Enable additional fields in screen options tab)

Now that you know what each section does, enter each staff member’s details …

(Add New Staff Member fields)

After you have entered each of you staff member’s details, assign your new entry to a directory group in the Groups feature in the sidebar …

(Groups feature)

Note: If you did not set up groups before starting to add new staff members, you can create a new group by clicking on Groups > + Add New Group …

(Add a new group inside your Groups box)

A field for entering your new group name will display, with a drop-down menu that lets you assign your new entry to a parent group. Type in the name of your new category and click on Add New Group …

The new directory category will be created. Make sure that the checkbox is ticked …

(New group)

Note: Groups cannot be edited when adding or making changes to a person’s details. To edit an item, go to the Groups section of the plugin’s settings (see “Groups” section above for details).

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After typing in the person’s details, click the Publish button to add them to your directory …

Click View Post …

You can update your employee’s profile by clicking the Edit Staff Member link in the admin toolbar …

(Edit Staff Member link – WordPress admin toolbar)

We have created a detailed tutorial about using the WordPress admin toolbar here:

• Your WordPress Control Panel – A Step-By-Step Tutorial

Note: If errors like the one shown in the screenshot below shows up, check that you have correctly set up your permalinks …

(Check your permalinks if you get an error)

For a detailed step-by-step tutorial about setting up permalinks, go here:

• How To Change Your WordPress Permalinks

Repeat the above process to continue adding new entries to your employee directory directory.

Staff Members – All Staff Members

After entering staff details to your directory, you can view and edit details by choosing Staff Members > All Staff Members on your menu …

(Staff Members Menu – All Staff Members)

This brings up a table listing all the staff profiles and their details …

(Staff Members details list)

If you need to modify individual entries, just hover your mouse over their list name, and a submenu will appear.

Click on Edit to modify their Staff Bio, or Quick Edit to change details like name, slug, group, and publish status. You can also remove a member from your staff directory by clicking on the Trash link, or view the entry on your site by clicking on View …

(Edit Staff Members profile info)

Depending on what you are using the plugin for, your table can become unwieldy.

You can use the Search Staff Members search feature to find items if required …

(Search members)

You can specify which fields to display in this screen. To hide or hide fields on your screen, click the Screen Options tab at the top of your page …

(Screen Options tab)

Placing a tick in the item’s check box displays the field and unselecting it hides the field. You can also choose how many staff members are listed per page. Click Apply when done to save your settings …

Staff Members – Order

Simple Staff List also features a drag-and-drop interface that allows you to specify the order that entries show on your directory page.

Choose Staff Members > Order in the menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Order)

To reorder your items, click and drag the entry to the new position …

(Reorder listings using drag and drop)

Your directory will automatically be rearranged …

(Reordered list)

After adding your employees’ details to your directory, the next step is to make the directory display to your site users.

Staff Members – Order

Simple Staff List also features a drag-and-drop interface allowing you to arrange the order in which listings appear on your directory pages.

Choose Staff Members > Order in the menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Order)

To reorder your entries, click and drag the entry to the desired location …

(Reorder listings using drag and drop)

Your directory will be automatically reorganized …

(Reordered list)

Once you are done adding all of your members’ details to your directory, the next step is to add the directory on your site.

Simple Staff List – Additional Notes

The plugin allows you to edit the layout and style of your employee directory entries using template tags and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets).

Templates Menu

To customize the layout and style of your directory, select Staff Members > Templates from your menu …

(Staff Members – Templates)

This opens the Templates screen …

(Customize your directory template)

To customize your directory, reorganize any of the allowable template tags inside the [staff_loop] [/staff_loop] code.

For example, below is the default template used for displaying directory listings …

(Default Plugin Template)

The This code displays your listing as shown below …

(Default Template Listing)

Notice that there are no Facebook or Twitter addresses showing in the above listing. To display these fields, you will need to add the [staff-facebook] and [staff-twitter] tags to the template loop, as shown below …

(Template tags added to Staff Loop Template)

Here is what your listings page should now look like …

(Staff profiles with social media links added)

Note: If you want to customize how your staff directory looks but don’t want to mess with editing code or are not sure what to do, please contact us for help.

Usage Menu

In addition to allowing you to customize your listing templates, the Simple Staff List plugin allows you to display your staff profiles differently using modified shortcodes.

In your menu, choose Staff Members >Usage …

(Staff Members – Usage)

This opens the Usage screen …

(Usage Shortcode screen)

This screen lists all different shortcode variations that the Simple Staff List plugin lets you use.

A useful variation you can insert in your page, for example, to display a list of persons belonging only to a specific group is the shortcode [simple-staff-list group=”group name”], (e.g.:[simple-staff-list group=”customer representatives”])

You can also make your listings display in ascending or descending order by adding the shortcode [simple-staff-list order=”ASC”] (ascending).

Options Menu

Select Staff Members >Options in your menu …

(Staff Members – Options)

This brings up the Options page …

(Simple Staff List – Options screen)

This section lets you edit some of the labels used in the plugin

Finally, you can also export your staff members details by going to the WP admin menu and selecting Tools > Export …

(Export Staff Members plugin info)

If you need plugin support, go to the plugin plugin site and contact the plugin author.

Additional WordPress Plugins For Creating Simple Employee Directories

Simple Staff List isn’t the only for creating a directory of your employees in WordPress. Here are a few other free WordPress plugins you can look at:

Modern Team Staff Directory

(Modern Team Staff Directory – Plugin For WordPress)

This plugin helps you collect your team information and showcase it anywhere on your site in beautiful grids, columns and tables. This premium plugin features over a dozen presets and provides editors that make it easy to edit and update your directory.

(Modern Team Staff Directory – Responsive Templates)

More info:

• Modern Team Staff Directory – Plugin For WordPress

Staff Directory

(Staff Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin)

With the Staff Directory plugin, you can easily create a directory of team/faculty/staff members. The plugin supports staff categories and can be used for churches, schools, etc.

This plugin lets you set up custom fields …

(Custom Details Fields Screen. Screenshot source: Staff Directory plugin website)

Learn more about the plugin here:

• Staff Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin

Faculty And Staff Directory

(Faculty And Staff Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin)

This plugin was developed to provide a simple and flexible faculty and staff directory for a small college or university.

The plugin also installs a widget that allows you to feature a profile in a widget area.

Learn more here:

• Faculty And Staff Directory – WP Plugin

Company Directory

(Company Directory)

The Company Directory plugin lets you add your staff to your site. Different layouts are available, including grid and single views, as well as fields like position title, email address, phone number, image and bio, allowing you to present your company and capabilities.

Visitors will be able to click through from your list, grid, and table views to learn more about each staff member in a customizable single view …

(Display your staff and faculty members in an easy-to-view format. Screenshot sourced from Company Directory plugin website)

This plugin uses simple shortcodes.

For more details, visit the plugin site here:

• Company Directory – WP Staff Directory Plugin

Employee Spotlight

(Employee Spotlight – WordPress Plugin)

Employee Spotlight displays employees, founders or just one single member of your team in a four-column circle grid page. This page can be easily created with a setup assistant upon plugin activation.

With the Employee Spotlight plugin, you get two sidebar widgets which display featured and recent employees selected in the editor, plus two responsive views which adjust to the device screen size.

Detailed information about  each team member can be displayed in their own page, as well as in summary …

(Responsive layout with employee circle grid. Screenshot sourced from plugin website)

For more details, visit the plugin site here:

• Employee Spotlight – WP Staff Directory Plugin

Staffer

(Staffer – WordPress Plugin)

The Staffer plugin uses custom post types for employee management and supports the display of staff members via a shortcode, allowing you to easily create and manage an onsite employee directory …

(Staffer archive page. Screenshot source: plugin website)

Staffer works with many popular WordPress themes, and also allows for custom template use and custom content wrappers.

For more details go here:

• Staffer – Plugin For WordPress

If the directory plugins listed above aren’t what you’re looking for, search the WordPress plugin directory or go online and search for:

• Add Staff Directory To WordPress
• WordPress Staff List
• Staff Directory WordPress Plugin
• Staff Directory Plugin WordPress
• etc.

Hopefully, now you know how to add an easy-to-update simple employee directory in your WordPress site using a free WordPress plugin.

Images used to depict sample staff members in this tutorial were sourced under creative commons license from pixabay.com

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