Tag: WordPress Plugin

One of the most unique benefits of building a website with the WordPress web content publishing platform is that you can quickly expand your WP website or blog’s functionality using plugins.

About Plugins

Like most of us, you probably have a cell phone. What happens when you want to access something new on your phone like a new application, software or business tool?

Why, simple … you download and install an app!

An app is a software that is very simple and easy to install and integrates new features and functionality into a smart device.

(Just as there are social sharing apps …)

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

(… there are also social sharing plugins for WP sites!)

Almost always, adding new features to an existing web site involves additional cost. Depending on the complexity of the new features or enhancement, this could get quite expensive, particularly if web developers have to add new code or edit programs or install scripts that integrate with your current site.

This also applies to creating a new web site. Businesses will often pay for components they probably will never need.

To minimize costs, we suggest using a sustainable strategy to developing your website and WP plugins are ideal for helping you achieve this.

Imagine being able to:

1) Start simply with minimal expense involved. Get a basic, professional-looking web presence up and running quickly, then …

2) As you need more features or functionality, add new software modules with a few mouse clicks that integrate with your website, giving your web site a whole new and expanded range of useful features, and also …

3) Cost not a single cent extra to add to your site?

Well, this is precisely what WP plugins let you do!

WordPress Plugins – Benefits

Earlier, we compared plugins with apps. In a similar way that many apps are free to download and some apps cost a little bit of money, the same is true with WordPress plugins.

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

WordPress plugins that you buy are called “Premium” plugins. The good news, is that when compared to the price of paying for web development services to add the same functionality on your site, most Premium plugins are typically quite inexpensive.

Also, as WordPress makes its source code available to everyone, any web developer can create, edit and customize any portion of the code. This has allowed many third-party software development companies to build more tools that “plug into” WordPress than you can probably imagine.

• Plugins allow you to start off with a basic yet professional website and then add new features and enhancements to your site when necessary.
• Plugins allow you to add practically endless functionality to any web presence quickly, easily and really inexpensively.
• Plugins give you practically unlimited expanding capabilities.
• Plugins allow non-technical users to own a web presence that they can fully manage.
• Most plugins will normally work “right out of the box” and only require to be installed and activated to provide your site with instant new capabilities, enhancements and functionality.
• Some plugins can be a little more advanced and could require some configuring.

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

Like themes, loads of plugins are 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 almost anything you need done.

There are WordPress plugins for:

• Website Management
• Content Syndication
• Increasing Site Traffic
• User Engagement
• Social Engagement
• Media Management Automation
• Improving Website Conversions And Lead Generation
• Data Monitoring & Reporting
• Blog Optimization

You can expand your website with plugins such as:

• Contact forms
• Polls and quizzes
• Surveys
• Display advertising banners
• E-commerce (from setting up single-item ordering with PayPal buttons, to complete e-commerce stores with online shopping carts, payment processing, recurring billing, discount codes, etc …)
• Social sharing buttons
• Private Membership sites
• Newsletter opt-in forms
• Sales funnels
• Mobile conversion
• Improving your website’s Search Engine Optimization
• Image galleries (including rotating images, lightboxes, etc.)
• User testimonials
• Language translation (e.g. you can instantly change all content on your pages from English to Norwegian)
• Statistical reporting (e.g. number of visitors, pages visited, keywords searched, etc.)
• Custom navigation
• Customer interactivity – contest, live chat, currency conversion, etc.
• Media integration
• Making pages load faster
• Event management
• Niche directories
• Automatically sell spots on your blog
• Set up appointments and reminders
• Automate reservations and bookings
• Detect broken hyperlinks on your pages and send you reports
• Redirect visitors from specified pages to other areas on your site or other sites
• Monitor social conversations
• Make your pages printable or downloadable as a PDF file
• Add sitemaps
• Exclude specific from showing on areas of your site (e.g. sitemaps, feeds, etc.)
• Protect post content sections
• Import information from different publishing platforms
• Search and replace content
• Block SPAM
• Customize guest commenting (e.g. display Facebook posts)
• Inserting scripts and code elements into your posts and pages
• Add formatted tables
• Add animated graphic elements and advanced content formatting options
• Add and manage QR codes
• Improve Google search results
• Add a map
• Syndicate your posts automatically on social pages like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr and others
• Display countdown timers (for expiring offers, coupons, etc …)
• Display custom greetings, timed offers, etc …
• And so much more!

As you can clearly see, WordPress plugins give you practically limitless possibilities. If you plan to build a website for your business, or your existing website isn’t powered by WordPress, then consider getting a WP site or blog added to your domain, or you will be missing out on some serious functionality.

If you’re still wondering about the power and flexibility of using plugins, let’s take a look at some practical uses of installing a plugin on your web site.

For example, if you want to publish private content, you can use plugins to make an area of a page inaccessible, or create a complete membership site with customized login details for all users …

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

To extending your site’s reach and visibility across social media and search engines …

You can also add complex features to your website using relatively inexpensive paid WP plugins. For example, you can buy plugins that integrate and automate functionality on your website like managing customer testimonials and event bookings …

And even run a complete bookings and reservations system online … all for a tiny fraction of the cost of hiring web developers to create the same applications for you …

Additionally, you can take advantage of built-in WordPress commenting features and plugins that can enhance visitor engagement …

For example, your web visitors can easily:

• Post comments on your site (which can grow into online discussions) using either the built-in WP commenting feature, or integrated Facebook comments (which are then shared 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 users through online forums or even set up a private community on your site.
• Engage with your team using live web conferencing and chatroom facilities
• Dial your business from their smart phones while visiting your site
• Open a support ticket
• And much more …

Finally you, can even integrate sophisticated “back end” applications with a WP “front end”. This lets you control your business sales and marketing, while the third-party application handles the technological functions …

Useful Things You Should Know About Plugins

• There are many great WordPress plugins to choose from. Be careful of overloading your server with an excessive amount of plugins, as this can eventually affect your site’s resources and site loading speed. It can also mean more maintenance issues for you as a consequence of possible errors.
• Only keep those plugins that you really need to use. Delete any plugins you don’t use from your site, as these utilize resources.
• Many free plugins typically come with little to no support from the plugin author. When choosing premium WP plugins, ensure that you do a little research first to see what kind of reputation the plugin developer has when it comes to providing support, updates, new features, etc. Be sure to check some of the plugin reviews we publish here for more useful information.
• If you see that a plugin has not been updated for a very long time (e.g. two years), then think twice before installing it. The WordPress software changes often and older plugins that have not been updated can create problems.
• Ensure to always upgrade your plugins. Outdated plugins not only can create conflicts, they may also contain vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers and malware.

As you can see, plugins are an integral part of WordPress and contribute to making it the most popular CMS in the world. Plugins also provide WordPress users with an easy, simple and inexpensive way to add instant features to their website without spending thousands of dollars on web development costs.

One last thing on the subject of plugins:

If there is any feature or functionality you need for your web presence, you can be sure that a someone has probably already authored one that will do what you need it to do, and that this plugin will either be available at no cost, or if it’s a premium plugin, that it will be surprisingly inexpensive.

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

And, if by any chance this WP plugin has not been created yet, then a custom plugin that does just what you would like it to do can most certainly be coded for your business for a reasonable price.

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

***

***