WordPress has evolved from being just a simple blogging application into a tool that can be used to create all types of web sites.
Whatever you can think of, somewhere around the world someone is probably already building it using WordPress!
This article will help you discover the most straight-forward way to build stunning content in WordPress.
Drag & Drop Content Editors For WordPress
Is The WordPress Visual Editor Meeting All Of Your Content Creation Needs?
Using the WordPress visual content editor to build or edit sophisticated layouts can sometimes be quite challenging.
(The WordPress content editor is great for adding, formatting and editing “linear” text and media, but adding complex page elements can be quite challenging!)
For example, if you look at the illustration below …
To create the above boxes with text and buttons, users would have to add short codes to the content for every element they would like to add to their page …
Normally, this is not an issue … until you have to reconfigure the layout (for example, move part of the content from box 1 into box 2, or replace the button inside box 1 from green to gold. Then, you’re stuck having to mess around with page code or html.
The WordPress visual content editor is supposed to give users an easy-to-use WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editor, but as you can see, if you are creating with complex content elements, often what you see may not be what you get …
(“What You See” isn’t always “What You Get” … unless you can visualize code!)
In some situations, you may even be better off working inside the WordPress html (text) editor tab instead of the WYSIWYG editor when trying to create non-linear page elements …
Even though WordPress is the most user-friendly CMS platform available, this makes it difficult for users with no knowledge of HTML or CSS to fully manage their own content.
The fundamental issue of using HTML and shortcodes to create content in the default WordPress editor can be summarized as follows:
1) Speed – How long will it take to build a page using the editor?
2) Abstraction – How closely does the content in the editor match the “front end” content when you are creating or editing a page?
As you can see from the above screenshot, what you see in the back end looks nothing like what you see in the front end. This means that you have to abstract what your content will look like when working with complex layouts. Other solutions require a number of steps before you can start configuring your page layout, or endlessly switching browser tabs and performing tweaks and updates to see how your content is coming along, which interrupts the creative process, as you wait for the page to reload.
A number of WordPress web developers have tried to come up with a range of solutions with the objective of addressing this issue. Some of these alternative solutions range from 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 content easier!)
Some solutions end up including so many complex page-building features, that users end up with complicated-looking front end editors …
Many of these alternative solutions work fine, but they don’t address the fundamental challenge of using shortcodes and HTML 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 content to look ”perfect” quickly, this can become very frustrating after a while.
Ask yourself this …
If there were no technical constraints, how would you like your content builder to work?
Now that you’ve asked this question, imagine this …
- You look at your content and if you see something that needs to be fixed, just click on the content and start typing. Your content has been instantly changed.
- You can drag and drop items around the page, and the page looks exactly as it will display on the front end without having to mentally visualize HTML or shortcodes.
- You have an idea for an item of content that you would like to create, so you simply start typing, and your page gets built on the fly, without delays, without tab switching, and without waiting for new web content to republish and reload.
Would this not be the ideal way to build content for your WordPress website? Just click-to-edit and drag and drop elements around the posts and pages?
(Imagine being able to create complex web pages ”on the fly” for your web content without technical constraints!)
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 Landing Pages And Content Builder – WordPress Click-To-Edit Drag & Drop Content And Landing Page Builder
Plugin Description
Thrive Content Builder is a revolutionary plugin for WordPress that gives you complete control over every aspect of your content pages using a powerful click-to-edit and drag and drop content editor.
Thrive Content Builder is a new and incredibly easy way to set up conversion-focused pages on your WordPress website.
Once installed, the plugin adds a visual content editor and a menu that lets you select, then drag and drop elements to your page …
(Thrive Content Builder adds a new content builder to your WordPress site)
The Thrive Content And Landing Page Builder plugin is actually a combination of the Thrive Content Builder and Thrive Landing Pages plugins merged into one, plus an additional plugin feature called Thrive Lightbox.
We’ll take a look at all of the above plugins and how all of this powerful functionality works seamlessly together to help you easily transform and improve your site and create awesome sales pages, streamlined landing pages and engaging content.
Thrive Content Builder – WordPress Plugin
With this plugin installed easily add complex design layouts to your web pages using drag and drop elements …
Everything on your web page can be created using ”click-to-edit” and “drag and drop” …
Once elements have been positioned on the page, you can then continue to edit or customize them without having to go through additional steps or complicated option windows …
You can also create beautiful landing pages that can just as easily be edited or customized …
Thrive Landing Pages and Content Builder is simple, easy to use, and ideal for all WordPress users at all levels. In fact, working on content with Thrive Content and Page Builder installed is so effortlessly simple, that the developers guarantee that once you start using it, it’ll ruin the experience of using all other content editors forever, and you will never look back!
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 terrific plugin for WordPress we’ve previously written about on this site.
To learn more about using the plugin, go here:
Benefits
Below we have listed just some of the benefits and advantages of using Thrive Content Builder to speed up content creation:
Easy And Quick To Install
Thrive Content Builder installs like any plugin. Simply upload a zip folder that contains the plugin to your Plugin folder via your WordPress dashboard and activate.
Real-Time Content Building & Editing
Thrive Content Builder is is not only simple and intuitive to use, it also lets you edit and add content right inside your web pages in real-time.
What You See Is Truly What You Get
With Thrive Content Builder installed, what you see as you work within the content editor – fonts, elements, layouts, etc. is exactly what your visitors will see on the front end of your site.
Some additional benefits and advantages include:
- Add Stunning Layouts With Drag And Drop Ease: Create any type of layout you can imagine with intuitive drag-and-drop functionality.
- Add Customizable Elements Without Short Codes: With Thrive Content Builder you not only get a visually exciting drag and drop content builder, but the plugin also includes an impressive collection of design elements that you can customizable and use on your web pages without using shortcodes, such as columns, text boxes, section dividers, credit card icons, etc.
- More Enjoyable Content Creation: Not having to constantly switch tabs as you edit your content and then wait for the new content to load frees up your attention and allows you to build the web pages your business needs, quickly and without having to edit code or click through multiple steps to get what you need done.
(Add, edit and customize page elements like testimonial boxes, flat design elements, borderless content, dividers, responsive videos, etc.)
Features
Thrive Content Builder offers a number of features to WordPress users. Below we have listed just some of these:
- Regular WordPress Content Functionality Is Still Available: You have access to all of the regular WordPress editing options that you are used to (e.g. underline, centering text, headings, etc.),
- Drag And Drop Elements: The plugin adds a “drag and drop” list of multi-style elements to your post or page screen when editing content.
- Conversion-Boosting Elements: The plugin comes with 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, testimonials, and guarantee forms. In addition to customization options, various elements also offer multiple design options.
- Responsive Web Page Design: Add responsive columns, guarantee boxes, dividers, e.g. which will display great on different-sized screens.
- Add Animation Events To Your Web Pages: Thrive Content Builder’s Event Manager feature lets you create animated page elements, trigger lightboxes and more!
(Add Animated Elements To Your Pages)
Thrive Landing Pages Plugin – Landing Page Template Sets
Landing page sets are web page 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 plugin lets you add conversion-optimized pages to your site)
Thrive Landing Pages – Benefits
- Everything is hosted on your own WordPress site
- Save time and money creating web pages for your WordPress web site
- 100% conversion-optimized page templates
- No technical skills needed
- Works with all themes
Thrive Content Builder and Landing Pages not only can be used to create beautiful-looking content in your WordPress posts and pages, but you can also choose from dozens of professionally designed, web 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 future release. In addition to the templates shown above, the developers plan to release new page templates for email lead generation, sales pages, course pages, personal branding pages, webinar pages and more.
Customizable Landing Page Template Sets
Normally, to be able to have fully customizable landing page templates, you would need to either hire a web developer 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 overly 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 building conversion-optimized web pages.”
Thrive Landing Pages gives you beautiful pre-built page templates that are fully optimized and ready to go, and complete design freedom that allows you to change or edit any aspect of your page template …
With the landing page templates included with this plugin, you can do the following:
- Edit text in any headline, button, bullet point, etc.
- Remove text, images or any other component of your landing page
- Replace any background images or colour
- Edit the color of text, buttons, links, etc.
- Choose your own fonts
- Use your own images and graphics
- Change the size of the content area
- Rearrange the order of elements on your pages
- Translate everything on the page into different languages
- Add custom content inside your pages
- Start with a blank page and create your own templates, or even build your own library of custom landing pages.
(Change and customize anything on the page)
Thrive Lightbox – Transform Your Website Into A Marketing Machine
The Thrive plugin package includes Thrive Lightbox, which lets you add fully customizable 2-step opt-in forms and animated objects to your site …
(Add lead capture forms and animation to your pages with the Thrive Lightbox plugin)
Two-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 2-step opt-in process)
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 over a button or graphic elements, or when someone reaches a certain point on the page. You can also use the Event Manager to animate attention-getting elements on your web pages, using a range of effects (e.g. zoom out, slide in from left to right, roll out, etc.
(Set up and manage events on your WordPress site with the Thrive Lightbox plugin)
A lightbox and event is created automatically for your landing pages, but you also have complete control over the events, triggers and design.
Testimonials
Below are a couple of the testimonials and feedback that plugin customers have provided for the Thrive Content Builder plugin:
”You guys are simply awesome I am loving everything you are doing at the moment. Keep up the great work you really are making such a big difference in this field. Jule Fuller”
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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 Thrive Landing Pages. Note, however, that you cannot use Thrive Content Builder to edit content that was not created with the plugin installed.
You can add WordPress short codes inside Thrive Content Builder or Thrive Landing Pages and they will be displayed correctly when published.
Thrive Lightbox works with any content you build with Thrive Content Builder.
Thrive Content Builder Plugin Support
Thrive Content Builder Plugin comes with free updates, new landing templates and upcoming features. The plugin developers are constantly working on adding new features and improving existing ones.
Thrive plugins are well-supported, and users get unlimited software updates, and one year unlimited support with their purchase, backed by a risk-free, thirty day, 100% money-back guarantee.
This is an exciting product for WordPress users that will just keep getting better.
Plugin 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 Edition – This lets you install the plugin on 1 site only. Pricing includes full feature set, unlimited updates and 1 year of unlimited support. Price = $59.00.
- Unlimited Sites Edition – This edition allows you to install the plugin on all of your personal web sites. Includes full feature set, unlimited updates and 1 year of unlimited support. Price = $87.00.
- Agency Licensing – This allows you to configure the plugin on all of your own websites and your client websites. Cost includes access to Thrive Content Builder, plus all Thrive Themes & Thrive Plugins. Cost = $247.00 per year.
Note: The cost to purchase the Thrive Content Builder software can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The price above was current when this article was written. This may or may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin developer when you visit the website and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after your purchase.
Check the plugin’s website for the current price here:
Additional Plugin Info
The developers of the Thrive Landing Pages and Content Builder plugin emphatically maintain 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 time-saving features like ready-made page elements and conversion-optimized templates that help to speed up content design, and on the other hand, you also have 100% control over your design process and the ability to edit and customize anything and everything on your web page, using the plugin’s click-to-edit and drag and drop features, that lets you see exactly how the content you are working on will display after being published.
For ”how to” videos of the plugin, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, support helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Thrive plugins website.
In Conclusion …
If you want to edit something, simply click on the element and start editing. If you want to change something, you will see the change happen immediately. If you want to move something, simply drag it and drop it into its new position. There are no complicated steps involved.
If you want to transform and improve your business online and create awesome sales pages, streamlined landing pages and engaging content, this plugin delivers an incredible conversion-boosting package with a single, inexpensive plugin.
For complete details, check out the plugin here:
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