Top 10 Wordpress Plugins

02 September 2012

Based on MySQL and PHP, WordPress is undoubtedly the web’s favorite free open source blogging tool and content management system. In fact, WordPress is so popular that it’s used to manage over 22% of all new websites and over 16% of the top one-million websites on the net. Obviously, these numbers include a lot of business websites.

If you operate a business online and are looking at WordPress to help you manage your content, here are some of the best plugins the program has available for you to use. 10 WordPress Plugins You Should Use

1: Hello Bar

The Hello Bar plugin adds a line above any post you make, allowing you to leave a personal message above the post. You can obviously use this to promote products, to offer advertising space, or for whatever else you wish.

2: Gravity Forms

Another great plugin to try, Gravity Forms is undoubtedly the quintessential form-based software out there, allowing you to easily create and manage posts, add images and different media uploads, and it even allows conditional logic.

3: DBManager

The WP-DBManager boasts many different features that could potentially come in handy, but it’s best known for its ability to back up your site. Once activated, this plugin will make a copy of your site and email it to you every single day. It’s not as technical as some backups, but you will always have a copy of your HTML.

4: W3 Total Cache

There’s a “total” in this plugin’s name for a reason – it is one of the best all-around plugins available for WordPress. Not only does using this plugin allow for quicker-loading pages, but it saves static versions of your site and allows you to use far less processing power.

5: Digg Digg

As a sharing bar, Digg Digg has the market cornered on effectiveness. You can find this floating bar (or a knockoff version of it) on nearly every popular social site out there, enabling users to add their different social media share buttons with ease.

6: The Slide

A great way to do business online is to always keep your customers entertained while keeping them within your niche. The Slide plugin helps with this by enabling you to easily suggest related posts to your site’s visitors. Once readers begin reading your content, they’ll be prompted to check out related content with a “Recommended for You” tag.

7: All in One SEO Pack

SEO is always important, regardless of what type of site you have or the number of sites you have. This particular plugin is billed as the only plugin you will ever need for your SEO. What this plugin does is simplifies the entire field of SEO, making it easy to generate Meta tags and to optimize your posts and links.

8: HeadSpace

As an alternative to the All in One SEO Pack, HeadSpace (WordPress SEO Made Simple) supposedly offers an even easier way to optimize your site correctly. Instead of offering a simple assist, HeadSpace is billed as a plugin that does the work for you.

9: Social Metrics

With the Social Metrics plugin, you can effectively track how well your posts are doing on your WP site and also across your entire network of social sites. Presented in a clean, user-friendly dashboard, you can read statistics about how many people like your material, if it’s trending on Twitter, and other pertinent details.

10: WP Touch

This plugin is important for the mobile market. Not everyone takes the time to optimize their material for all the smartphone users out there, so WP Touch helps with this by instantly formatting your material for users when they visit via mobile devices.

The above plugins aren’t listed in any particular order of importance or popularity. They’re all popular and useful in their own way. Each plugin on this list can help you manage your content and to grow your business presence.