Tag: Staff Directory WordPress Plugin

No doubt you’ve already heard that people will mostly buy from people they already know, like and trust.

If you are looking for ideas to sell more products or services online, then something you can do, is make it easier for visitors to get to know your organization better.

Adding an employee directory to your site can help to generate greater trust, boost your online credibility and get interested prospects buying from you.

In this tutorial, you are going to learn how to create and add an updatable directory of staff or faculty members to a WordPress site using a free plugin.

Tutorial: Adding An Employee Directory In WordPress

In this tutorial, we will install, activate and configure a no cost plugin called Simple Staff List.

Simple Staff List WordPress Plugin

(Simple Staff List – WordPress Plugin)

The Simple Staff List plugin is free and lets you easily build a basic staff directory for.

First, let’s install and activate this plugin.

Log into your WP administration and in your admin menu, select Plugins > Add New …

(Plugins Menu – Add New)

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

Click on Install Now …

(Plugins  – Add Plugins screen)

Activate the plugin …

(Activate plugin)

After the plugin has been installed and activated, you will notice that new menu entry will be added to the WordPress menu called Staff Members …

(Staff Members)

All of the settings and options for this plugin are configured and managed in this menu.

Plugin Configuration

Depending on the size of your team and how you want to structure your employee directory, you can just start adding new staff member details at this point, or create various groups (i.e. categories) that you will assign to individual staff.

Staff Members – Groups

Let’s start by setting up your categories. In your WP dashboard menu, choose Staff Members > Groups …

(Staff Members – Groups)

This takes you to the Groups settings …

(Groups settings screen)

Note: Setting up directory groups works in the same way as adding WordPress categories …

(Groups work just like categories)

Create new groups by typing in the following information:

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

(Groups section)

If you run a medium to large organization, the ability to set up different groups can be very useful. For example, you can create a group for partners, developers, departments, etc.

Create as many groups and nested groups as you need by adding new Groups and then using the Parent drop-down menu to build a directory hierarchy …

(Nested categories)

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

To change Groups for individual items, hover over a category title and select the Edit link …

The selected category details will open in the Edit Group screen. Select a new category from the Parent drop-down 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 click on the Quick Edit menu feature …

Click the Update Group button to save your changes …

Continue adding group names to this section until you are done creating your directory structure …

You can add as many nested categories as you like …

(Add nested categories your directory)

Once you have finished setting up your directory structure, you can start adding your people to your directory.

Staff Members – Add New

From your admin menu, click on Staff Members > Add New …

(Staff Members – Add New)

This brings you to the Add New Staff Member area …

(Add New Staff Member settings)

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

Name Section (1)

• Name: The employee’s name
• Slug: Here you can change each staff members’ slug (this section appears after saving your details).

Staff Photo Section (2)

• Photo: Add a photo of your staff member

Staff Member Info Section (3)

• Position: Your staff member’s role
• Email: Type the person’s email address
• Phone Number: Your employee’s phone number
• Facebook URL: Enter the person’s Facebook address (note: use the full URL, e.g. http://www.facebook.com/username)
• Twitter URL: Type your company’s Twitter username (note: only enter the username, not the full twitter URL)

Staff Member Bio Section (4)

• Staff Member Bio: Enter a profile description for your staff member here. Since this uses the built-in WordPress Text Editor, you can add formatted content into this section.

Groups Section (5)

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

Click on the Screen Options tab at the top of the screen …

(Screen options)

You can enable additional features …

(Enable additional fields in screen options)

Now that you know what each section does, enter your employee’s details …

(Add Staff Member settings)

After you have entered each staff member’s details, assign the new item to a directory group in the Groups section located in your sidebar …

(Groups section)

Note: If you did not set up categories before starting to add staff member details, you can add a new group in this screen by clicking on Groups > + Add New Group …

(Groups > + Add New Group link)

A field for creating a new group name will appear, with a dropdown menu to assign your new entry to a parent group. Type in the name of your new category and click on the Add New Group button …

Your new group will be added. Remember to tick the check box to assign an entry to the group …

(New group added)

Note: You cannot edit groups when adding or editing new employee 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 filling in your team member’s details, click the Publish button …

Click View Post …

To modify the person’s profile, click on the Edit Staff Member link in your WordPress admin toolbar …

(Edit Staff Member link – WordPress admin toolbar)

If you need help using the dashboard admin toolbar , go here:

• The WordPress Control Panel Explained

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

(Check your permalinks if you get a ‘page not found’ error)

We have written a detailed tutorial about using permalinks in WordPress here:

• Using Permalinks To Improve Your WordPress SEO

Repeat the above process to add new details to your employee or faculty directory.

Staff Members – All Staff Members

After entering staff members into your directory, you can view and edit their details by clicking Staff Members > All Staff Members in your menu …

(Staff Members Menu – All Staff Members)

This brings up a table listing all your listing entries and their details …

(Staff Members details)

If you need to edit individual entries, just hover over their listing, and a submenu will appear.

Click on Edit if you want to update the Staff Bio, or Quick Edit to change details like name, slug, group, and publish status. You can also delete someone from your directory by clicking on Trash, or view the entry on your site by clicking on View …

(Edit Staff Members profile information)

Depending on what you are using the plugin for, your table can grow quite large.

Use the Search Staff Members search feature to find member details if required …

(Search members)

The plugin also allows you to specify which fields can display in this screen. To show or hide fields on your screen, click on Screen Options …

(Screen Options)

Tick or untick the checkboxes to display or hide fields. You can also specify how many staff members are listed per page. Click the Apply button when done to update your preferences …

Staff Members – Order

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

Click Staff Members > Order on your menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Order)

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

(Reorder listings using drag and drop)

Your list will automatically be rearranged …

(Reordered list)

Once you are done adding member details to the directory, the next step is to make the directory display to your visitors.

Staff Members – Order

Simple Staff List also features a drag-and-drop interface that lets you set the order that your staff entries appear on your directory page.

Click Staff Members > Order on the main admin menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Order)

To rearrange the order of your entries, click and drag the item to the desired location …

(Rearrange items using drag and drop)

Your directory will be automatically rearranged …

(Reordered listings)

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

Simple Staff List – Additional Notes

Simple Staff List allows you to edit the style and layout of your staff 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 dashboard menu …

(Staff Members – Templates)

This brings up the Templates page …

(Customize your directory template)

To customize your directory listings, insert any of the allowed template tags inside the [staff_loop] [/staff_loop] code.

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

(Default Simple Staff List Template)

The above code displays the listing shown below …

(Default Staff Loop Template Listing)

Notice that there are no Facebook or Twitter addresses showing in the above example. To make these fields show up in your directory, we will need to include the [staff-facebook] and [staff-twitter] template tags, as shown below …

(Use template tags to customize your directory page)

Your directory details will now appear with Facebook and Twitter addresses as shown in the screenshot below …

(Directory listings with social media links added)

Note: If you want to customize how your staff directory looks but don’t want to mess around with CSS styles and template tags or are not sure how to edit the template as shown above, please contact us for help.

Usage Menu

As well as being able to customize your directory templates, the Simple Staff List plugin lets you display your staff profiles differently using modified shortcodes.

In your WordPress admin menu, click on Staff Members >Usage …

(Staff Members Menu – Usage)

This brings up the Usage screen …

(Usage shortcodes)

This screen provides a list of all different shortcode variations that the Simple Staff List plugin lets you use.

For example, a useful shortcode variation you can select to display only members of 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 the dashboard menu …

(Staff Members – Options)

This opens the Options screen …

(Simple Staff List – Options settings)

Here you can change some of the labels used in the plugin

Finally, you can also export your staff members data by going to your menu and choosing Tools > Export …

(Export Staff Members information)

If you need plugin support, go to the plugin plugin website.

Other Employee Directory Plugins For WordPress

Simple Staff List isn’t the only for displaying a directory of your staff. For example, here are a few other plugins you can use:

Modern Team Staff Directory

(Modern Team Staff Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin)

The Modern Team Staff Directory 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)

For more details, visit the plugin site here:

• Modern Team Staff Directory – WP Staff Directory Plugin

Staff Directory

(Staff Directory – WordPress Plugin)

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

You can also create custom fields …

(Custom Details Fields. Screenshot sourced from plugin website)

Go here to learn more:

• Staff Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin

Faculty And Staff Directory

(Faculty And Staff Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin)

Faculty And Staff Directory provides a simple and flexible faculty and staff directory for a small college, school or university.

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

More info:

• Faculty And Staff Directory

Company Directory

(Company Directory – WordPress Plugin)

The Company Directory plugin lets you add your staff, team or faculty to your website. Different layouts are available, including grid and single views, plus as fields like title, email address, phone, image and staff bio, allowing visitors to get to know your company and capabilities.

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

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

This plugin uses shortcodes.

For more details go here:

• Company Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin

Employee Spotlight

(Employee Spotlight – WP Staff Directory Plugin)

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

With Employee Spotlight, you also get two sidebar widgets which display featured and recent employees selected in the editor, plus two responsive views which adjust to the viewer’s screen.

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

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

Go here to learn more about this plugin:

• Employee Spotlight – Plugin For WordPress

Staffer

(Staffer – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin)

This 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 staff directory …

(Staffer archive page. Screenshot source: Staffer plugin website)

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

Go here to learn more about the plugin:

• Staffer – WordPress Plugin

If the above plugins 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 Plugin
• Staff Directory WordPress Plugin
• Staff Plugin WordPress
• etc.

Hopefully, now you know how to easily add an updatable list directory of employees to your web site using free WordPress plugins.

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

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