Tag: What Are Plugins

One of the main benefits of building a website with WordPress is that you can quickly and easily expand your WordPress web site’s functionality using plugins.

What Are Plugins?

No doubt, you most likely own a smart phone. What do you do when you would like to access something new on your device like a new application, software or a productivity tool?

You download and install an app!

An app is a little software that is really simple and easy to install and immediately adds new features to a smart phone.

(Just as there are social sharing apps …)

A WordPress plugin is very similar to an app. You install a software application that adds new functionality to your site …

(… you can also find social sharing plugins for WordPress!)

Typically, adding new features to an existing site involves additional cost. Depending on the complexity of the feature or enhancement, the cost can be significant, especially if it requires website development.

This is also applicable to developing a website or business blog. Many companies often invest money in added features or customizations they probably will never need.

For sound, strategic business planning reasons, we recommend a sustainable approach when setting up your web site and WordPress plugins are ideal for doing this.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could:

1) Start simply and inexpensively. Get a professional-looking web site up and running fast, then …

2) As more features become necessary, just add new software modules with just a few clicks of the mouse that integrate with your current site, and give your website or blog a whole new and expanded range of features and functionality, and …

3) Cost not one cent extra to download and install on your site?

Well, this is precisely what a WordPress plugin allows you to do!

WordPress Plugins – Benefits

I began this article by comparing WP plugins with apps. In the same way that some apps are free to download and some apps may cost a little bit of money, the same is true with plugins.

In fact, thousands of plugins can be installed on your websites.

Plugins that you buy are called Premium plugins. The good news, is that when compared to the price of hiring a professional web developer to get the same functionality on your site, most Premium plugins are typically quite inexpensive.

Also, as WordPress distributes its software as an Open Source application, any person can create, modify and customize any part of the WordPress code. This has enabled thousands of third-party software developers to build more applications that plug seamlessly into the WordPress platform than you can imagine.

• Plugins let you get started with a simple website and then expand only as required.
• WordPress plugins allow you to add almost unlimited functionality to your web site quickly and cheaply.
• Plugins give you practically endless expansion capabilities.
• Plugins allow ”non-techies” to have a web presence that they can manage themselves.
• Most plugins will normally work “right out of the box” and only require installation and activation to provide your website or blog with instant new enhancements and features.
• Some plugins can be slightly more complex and may require some configuration.

Plugins – Powerful, Flexible … And (Many Of Them Are) Completely FREE!

Like WordPress themes, thousands of plugins are made available for WP users … and many of these great plugins are 100% FREE!

You can download thousands of plugins from the Free WordPress Plugin Repository …

As previously mentioned, you will find plugins that will do just about everything you need done.

WordPress plugin categories cover:

• User Management
• Content Management
• Traffic
• User Interactivity
• Social Engagement
• Managing Media – Video, Images, Podcasts, Multimedia, etc.
• e-Commerce And Online Sales And Marketing Automation
• Increasing Sales Conversions And Lead Generation
• Data And System Reporting Tools
• WordPress Security

You can expand a website with plugins such as:

• Contact forms
• Quizzes and polls
• Surveys
• Managing banners
• E-commerce (from setting up single-item sales with PayPal buttons, to full scale e-commerce with shopping carts, payment processing, recurring billing, coupon codes, etc …)
• Social sharing buttons
• Private Membership sites
• Newsletter subscription forms
• Sales funnels
• Mobile conversion
• Improving your site’s SEO
• Image galleries (with rotating images, lightboxes, etc.)
• User testimonials
• Language translation plugins (e.g. you can instantly change your site’s content from English to Portuguese)
• Statistical reporting (e.g. number of visitors, pages visited, keywords searched, etc.)
• Custom navigation
• Customer engagement – contest, live chat, currency conversion, etc.
• Offline storage integration
• Faster page loading
• Managing events
• Niche directories
• Automatically sell and manage advertising on your website
• Set up appointments and appointment reminders
• Automate reservations and bookings
• Detect broken hyperlinks and email you reports
• Redirect affiliate pages
• Monitor social conversations
• Make your pages printable or downloadable as a PDF file
• Add sitemaps
• Exclude certain from showing on areas of your site (e.g. sitemaps, feeds, etc.)
• Protect content on your pages and posts
• Migrate data from non-WP applications
• Search and replace content
• Block SPAM
• Customize guest comment displays (e.g. display Facebook discussions)
• Insert HTML and code elements into your posts
• Add formatted tables
• Add animated graphics and advanced font display formatting options
• Create and manage QR codes
• Improve Google search
• Add location maps
• Post your posts automatically on social networks like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr and others
• Show countdown timers (for special offers, discount coupons, etc …)
• Display personalized greetings, timed offers, etc …
• And so many other features!

As you can clearly see, WordPress plugins give you limitless business scalability. If you are currently planning to build a web site, or your existing site isn’t powered by WordPress, then consider using WordPress in the future.

In case you’re still wondering just how powerful and flexible plugins are, let me show you some practical advantages of installing an inexpensive plugin on your site.

For example, if you want to protect your content, you can use plugins to make a section of a page inaccessible, or create a complete paid membership site with customized login details for users …

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

To extending your site’s reach across multiple social sites and search engines …

You can also add advanced features to your site using inexpensive premium WP plugins. For example, you can install plugins that automate tasks on your site such as user testimonial and event bookings management …

And even run a custom bookings and reservations system on your site … all for a tiny fraction of the cost of paying software developers to design the same 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 easily:

• Leave comments on your site (which can grow into online discussions) using either the native WP commenting function, or integrated Facebook comments (which then get shared throughout the visitors’ Facebook pages, giving your site increased exposure).
• Share your posts with other online visitors on various social sites.
• Contact you using contact forms
• Engage online directly with your team members via forums or even set up a private online community on your own site.
• Engage with your support team via live webcam conferencing and chatroom facilities
• Dial your business directly from their smart phones while browsing your website
• Get help via a dedicated client support helpdesk
• And so much more …

You can also integrate complex enterprise applications within a WP “front end”. This lets you control the content that your visitors see on your web site, while the 3rd-party application handles the technological functions …

Some Useful Tips About Plugins

• There are lots of plugins to choose from. Be careful of overloading your site with an excessive amount of plugins, as this will inevitably affect your website’s resources and site loading times. It also creates more maintenance issues for you as a result of potential conflicts and errors.
• Install only the plugins that you really need. Delete any plugins you don’t use from your site, as these utilize server resources.
• Many free plugins typically come with very little to no support from the plugin author. When considering paid plugins, we recommend that you check some reviews online and understand what kind of reputation the plugin developer has when it comes to offering support, upgrades, new improvements, etc. Be sure to check our plugin reviews for more expert information.
• If you see that an unsupported plugin has not been updated for a very long time (e.g. two years), then think twice before using it on your site. The WordPress platform updates frequently and out-of-date plugins can cause errors.
• Make sure that you always keep your plugins up-to-date. Outdated plugins not only can create conflicts, they may also contain security vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers and malware.

As you can see, plugins are an important feature of WordPress and contribute to making WordPress the most downloaded CMS in the world. Plugins also provide WordPress users with an easy, simple and inexpensive way to add instant features to their web presence without having to spend thousands of dollars on outsourced web development.

One last thing regarding WordPress plugins:

If there is any feature or functionality you need for your website, you can be sure that a plugin probably exists that will do exactly what you want, and that this plugin can either be downloaded for FREE, or if it’s a premium plugin, that the price will be minimal.

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

And, if by chance such a plugin does not exist, then a custom plugin that does exactly what you would like it to do can most certainly be coded for you at a reasonable cost.

Hopefully, now you have a better understanding of plugins – what plugins are and how they can help improve your web site. See our related posts section to learn about more useful WordPress plugins that we recommend using.

***

***