Tag: WordPress Plugin Directory

One of the most useful features of WordPress is the ability to easily increase your WP web site’s functionality using plugins.

About Plugins

No doubt, you probably have a cell phone. What do you do when you would like to access something new on your device like a new software or a tool?

Why, simple … you download and install an app!

An app is a piece of software that is easy to install and adds new features and functionality to your smart device.

(Just as there are social sharing apps …)

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

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

Typically, adding a new feature to a web site involves additional cost. Depending on the complexity of the feature or enhancements, this can get fairly expensive, especially if website developers need to create new code or edit programs or install scripts to integrate into your existing site.

This is also applicable when starting a new website or business blog. Business owners sometimes fork out money in advance on extra features and customizations they may probably never need.

As part of sound strategic business planning, we recommend a cost-effective approach when growing your website and WP plugins are ideal for doing this.

Imagine if you could:

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

2) As more features are required, simply add new applications with only a few mouse clicks that integrate with your existing site, giving your website or blog a whole new and expanded range of useful capabilities, and …

3) Cost not one dollar extra to download and install on your website?

Well, that’s exactly what a WordPress plugin lets you do!

Plugins – Benefits

We began this blog post by comparing plugins with apps. Just like some apps are free to download and some apps cost a little bit of money, so do WordPress plugins.

In fact, many plugins can be downloaded and installed on your websites.

Plugins that you buy are referred to as ’Premium’ plugins. The good news, is that when compared to the price of investing in web development services to add similar features and functionality on your site, most Premium plugins are typically quite inexpensive.

Also, as WordPress makes its source code publicly available, any web developer can create, rewrite and customize any part of the code. This has enabled thousands of third-party web development professionals to enhance the WPsoftware.

• WP plugins allow you to start off with just a basic web presence and then expand if required.
• WordPress plugins allow you to add almost endless functionality to your web presence quickly, easily and cheaply.
• WP plugins give you almost endless expansion capabilities.
• Plugins allow business owners to own a website that they can self-manage.
• Most plugins will work “right out of the box” and only require installation and activation to give your website or blog instant new enhancements and features.
• Some plugins can be slightly more complex and require some initial configuring.

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

Like WP themes, thousands of WP plugins are made available to WP users … often at no cost!

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

As previously mentioned, you will find WP plugins that will do just about anything you want done.

There are plugins for:

• Site Administration
• Content Syndication
• Increasing Web Traffic
• Visitor Engagement
• Social Sharing
• Adding Media Files – Videocasts, Images, Audio, Multimedia, etc.
• e-Commerce And Online Sales Automation
• Improving Sales And Opt-In Conversions And Lead Generation
• Data Monitoring & Reporting Applications
• WordPress Security

For example, you can add features to a business online presence with plugins such as:

• Contact forms
• Polls and quizzes
• User Surveys
• Managing 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 media integration
• Membership sites
• Newsletter subscription forms
• Sales funnels
• Mobile integration
• Improving your site’s Search Engine Optimization
• Image galleries (including rotating images, lightboxes, etc.)
• User testimonials
• Language translation plugins (e.g. you can instantly change your website’s content from English to French)
• Statistical reporting (e.g. number of visitors, pages visited, keywords searched, etc.)
• Custom navigation menus
• Customer engagement – contest, live chat, currency conversion, etc.
• Media management
• Making pages load faster
• Managing events
• Niche directories
• Automatically sell spots on your blog
• Set client appointments and appointment reminders
• Set up reservations and bookings
• Detect broken hyperlinks and email you reports
• Redirect URLs
• Monitor what other sites are posting about your business
• Make your pages available for printing or downloading as PDF
• Add sitemaps
• Hide specific from displaying on areas of your site (e.g. sitemaps, feeds, etc.)
• Protect content on your pages and posts
• Migrate content from non-WP platforms
• Perform bulk content replacements
• Block SPAM commenting
• Customize visitor commenting (e.g. displaying Facebook posts)
• Inserting HTML and code elements into your posts and pages
• Add tables
• Add animated graphics and advanced text formatting options
• Add and manage QR codes
• Improve Google search
• Add location maps
• Post your content automatically on sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon and others
• Display countdown timers (for scarcity offers, coupons, etc …)
• Display personalized greetings, timed offers, etc …
• And hundreds of other features!

As you can clearly see, plugins give you limitless possibilities. If you are planning to build a website for your business, or your existing website isn’t powered by WordPress, then consider choosing it in the future.

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

For example, if you want to publish private content, you can install plugins to make a section of your post or page inaccessible, or transform your WordPress site into a professional paid membership site with personal login details for all users …

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

To increasing your business visibility across a number of social media and search engines …

You can also add sophisticated features to your website using inexpensive paid WP plugins. For example, you can purchase plugins that automate functions on your website such as managing customer testimonials and event registration details …

And even run a custom-branded bookings and reservations system on your site … all for a tiny fraction of the cost of paying software developers to code these functionality for you …

You can also take advantage of native WordPress commenting features and plugins that can enhance your site’s interactivity …

For example, your visitors can:

• Post comments on your site (which can turn into online discussions) using either the native WordPress commenting function, or integrated Facebook comments (which then get displayed throughout a visitors’ Facebook pages, providing you with increased exposure).
• Bookmark your posts on various social sites.
• Contact you via contact forms
• Engage in online discussions with other customers through forums or even set up a private online community on your own site.
• Engage with your staff through live webcam conferencing and chatroom facilities
• Dial your business directly from their laptops while visiting your pages
• Get support via a dedicated customer helpdesk
• And much more …

You can even integrate sophisticated enterprise-level applications with a WP “front end”. This enables you to control your business sales and marketing, while your third-party application handles the technical areas …

WordPress Plugins – Some Useful Information

• There are lots of great plugins available. Be careful not to overload your server with too many plugins, as this will start to affect your website’s resources and page loading speed. It also means more maintenance issues for you resulting from possible errors.
• Install only those plugins you really use. Delete all inactive plugins from your site, as these utilize server resources.
• Many free plugins normally receive very little to no support from the plugin author. When considering premium WordPress plugins, ensure that you check some reviews online and understand what kind of reputation the developer has when it comes to providing support, updates, new improvements, etc. Be sure to check some of our WP plugin reviews for more information.
• If you see that an unsupported plugin has not been updated for a while (e.g. two years), then think twice before using it. WordPress changes frequently and older plugins that have not been updated can create issues.
• Always keep all plugins upgraded to the most recent version. Older plugins not only can cause conflicts, they may also have vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers and malware.

As you can see, plugins are an integral part 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 functionality to their website without spending thousands of dollars on outsourced web development.

One last thing regarding WP plugins:

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

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

And, if by any chance this plugin does not exist, then a custom plugin that does precisely what you need it to do can probably be created for you at a reasonable cost.

Hopefully, this information has given you a better understanding of plugins – what plugins are and how they can help expand your blog. See our related posts to learn more about using WP plugins.

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