Tag: What Are Plugins

One of the most useful benefits of WordPress is that you can quickly enhance your WP site’s functionality using applications called plugins.

What Are Plugins?

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

Why, simple … you download and install an app!

An app is a piece of software that is very easy to install and integrates new functionality into your mobile device.

(Just as there are social sharing apps for mobile devices …)

A WordPress plugin is like an app. You simply install a little piece of software that adds new functionality to your WP site …

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

Normally, if you need to add new features to an existing web site, additional cost is involved. Depending on the complexity of the new features or enhancement, things can become fairly expensive, especially if website developers have to add new code or edit programs or install scripts that integrate into your current set up.

This is also applicable to developing a new web site. Many companies sometimes invest up front in added components they may probably never need.

To keep your expenses to a minimum, we suggest a cost-effective approach when growing your web site and WordPress plugins are ideal for helping you achieve this.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could:

1) Start simply and inexpensively. Get a web presence up and running quickly, then …

2) As the need becomes evident, you can install new software modules with just a few clicks of the mouse that integrate seamlessly with your web site, and give your website or blog an entirely new and expanded range of features and functionality, and also …

3) Cost not a single dollar more to install on your website?

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

WP Plugins – Benefits

Earlier, we compared plugins with smartphone apps. In a similar way that some apps are free to download and some may cost a little bit of money, so do WordPress plugins.

In fact, many useful plugins can be downloaded to your site at no cost.

Plugins that you buy are referred to as Premium plugins. The good news, is that when compared to the cost of hiring a professional web developer to get the same features and functionality on your site, most Premium (i.e. ”paid”) plugins are generally very inexpensive.

Also, because WordPress makes its source code available to everyone, anyone can create, modify and customize any portion of the WP code. This has enabled thousands of third-party web development professionals to enhance the core WP software application.

• WP plugins let you get started simply with a basic yet professional site and expand when necessary.
• Plugins let you add practically unlimited functionality to your website quickly and very inexpensively.
• Plugins give you virtually unlimited expanding capabilities.
• WordPress plugins allow ”non-techies” to have a site that they can manage themselves.
• Most plugins will typically work “right out of the box” and only require to be installed and activated to give your site instant new capabilities and functionality.
• Some plugins offer more extensive features and may require some initial configuration.

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

Like WP themes, loads of plugins are available to WP users … often at $0 cost!

You can download thousands of plugins from the Free WP Plugin Directory …

As mentioned earlier, you will find plugins that will do just about everything you can imagine.

Plugin categories cover:

• Site Administration
• Content Management
• Online Traffic Generation
• User Interactivity
• Social Monitoring
• Uploading Media Files – Videos, Images, Audio, Multimedia, etc.
• e-Commerce And Online Sales Automation
• Increasing Sales & Opt-In Conversions And Lead Generation
• Data And System Monitoring & Reporting
• WordPress Security

For example, you can add features to your website with plugins such as:

• Contact forms
• Quizzes and polls
• Social contests
• Display ad banners
• E-commerce (from setting up single ordering with PayPal buttons, to full scale e-commerce stores with online shopping carts, invoicing, recurring billing, coupons, etc …)
• Social sharing buttons
• Private Membership sites
• List-building subscription forms
• Sales funnels
• Mobile integration
• Improving your website’s Search Engine Optimization
• Image galleries (with rotating images, lightboxes, etc.)
• Customer testimonials
• Instant language translation (e.g. you can instantly change your website’s content from English to Spanish)
• Statistical reporting (e.g. number of visitors, pages visited, keywords searched, etc.)
• Custom navigation
• Customer engagement – contest, live chat, currency conversion, etc.
• Media management
• Faster page loading
• Event management
• Business directories
• Automatically sell advertising on your site
• Set client appointments and reminders
• Automate reservations and bookings
• Detect broken links and email you reports
• Redirect users from old pages to other areas on your site or other sites
• Monitor social signals
• Make your pages available for printing or downloading as PDF
• Add sitemaps
• Hide certain from showing on areas of your site (e.g. site maps, feeds, etc.)
• Protect post content sections
• Migrate content from other CMS applications
• Search and replace content
• Block SPAM commenting
• Customize guest comment displays (e.g. display Facebook comments)
• Insert scripts and script elements into your content
• Add formatted tables
• Display animated graphics and advanced content formatting options
• Create and manage QR codes
• Improve Google local search
• Add a map of your business location
• Post your posts automatically on social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and many others
• Display countdown timers (for expiring offers, coupons, etc …)
• Display personalized greetings, timed offers, etc …
• And so many other features!

As you can clearly see, WP plugins give you virtually endless possibilities. If you plan to build a web site for your business, or your existing web site isn’t built with WordPress, then consider getting one built on your domain, or you could be missing out on some serious functionality.

In case you’re still wondering about the power and flexibility of using plugins, let’s take a look at how you can benefit by adding a plugin to your web site.

For example, if you need to publish private content, you can install plugins to make an area of a post or page inaccessible, or transform your WordPress site into a full paid membership site with customized login details for every member …

As mentioned previously, free plugins can be used to improve your web presence in so many different ways. From adding functionality that will enhance your business, your web users’ experience and your understanding of what is happening on your site …

To extending your business reach and visibility across a number of social sites and search engines …

You can also add advanced functionality to your website using relatively inexpensive paid plugins. For example, you can download plugins that automate processes on your pages such as user testimonial and event registration management …

And even set up a custom-branded bookings and reservations system on your site … all for a tiny fraction of the cost of hiring programmers to code custom applications for you …

Additionally, you can take advantage of native WP commenting features and plugins that will increase user engagement …

For example, your visitors can easily:

• Leave comments on your blog posts (which can grow into online discussions) using either the native WordPress commenting function, or integrated Facebook comments (which then get shared throughout your visitors’ Facebook pages, giving your site increased exposure).
• Bookmark your content on social networking sites.
• Contact you using contact forms
• Engage online with other users through online forums or even set up an online community on your domain.
• Engage with your staff via live chats
• Call your business directly from their mobile phones when visiting your pages
• Open a support ticket
• And much more …

Finally you, can even integrate sophisticated enterprise-level applications using a WP “front end”. This lets you control your business sales and marketing, while your 3rd-party application handles the technical aspects …

Plugins – Additional Tips

• There are many plugins to choose from. Be careful of overloading your server with too many plugins, as this can begin to affect your site’s performance and site loading times. It also creates more maintenance issues for you resulting from possible conflicts.
• Only keep the plugins you really need to use. Delete any plugins from your site, as these use server resources.
• Many free plugins often receive little to no support from the plugin author. When considering paid WP plugins, make sure you do a little research first to understand what kind of reputation the developer has when it comes to providing support, updates, new features, etc. Be sure to check our plugin recommendations for additional helpful information.
• If you see that a plugin has not been updated for a very long time (e.g. two or more years), then think twice before installing it on your site. WordPress changes frequently and outdated WordPress plugins can cause errors.
• Always update your plugins. Outdated plugins not only can create conflicts, they could also have vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers and malware.

As you can see, WordPress plugins are an integral part of WordPress and contribute to making it the most powerful, flexible and scalable CMS available. Plugins also provide WordPress users with an easy, simple and inexpensive way to expand quickly without spending thousands of dollars on web developers.

One last thing on the subject of WordPress plugins:

Whatever feature or functionality you want for your web site, you can guarantee that a someone has probably already authored one that will do just what you need it to do, and that it can either be downloaded at no cost, or if it’s a paid plugin, that it will be fairly inexpensive.

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

And, if by chance such a WP plugin has not been created yet, then one can certainly be created for you at a reasonable cost.

Hopefully, this information has given you a better understanding of WordPress plugins – what plugins are and how they can improve your business blog. See our published posts to learn more about usingplugins.

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