Useful WordPress Plugins and Widgets

Blinky

Owner
The title of the subject could not be the most descriptive, but I think you will understand what the theme includes.

I am posting this article, because there are a lot of people looking for specific widgets and plugins, and do not know how to find them. I have been using a lot of them and have great experience with most of listed below. Here is a list of 45 of most useful and popular at the same time widgets and plugins. Hope the theme will become a well-indexed (in SEs) list of what you use for your WordPress blog and what they do. So, please, do not share widgets and plugins without knowing what benefits could bring for the bloggers. You can post yours with an explanation, as the list is made.

So here is the list of the widgets and plugins I use and still using. There is a link and a short description:

1. W3 Total Cache - the best cache plugin, according to its configuration - apache + nginx + xcache. It gives a lot of configuration options as well as does not load the server (I use VPS, I do not know how it will be with share hosting plan).

2. WP-PageNavi - The best plugin (that I have ever seen), that makes your pages look great structurally.

3. Like-Button-Plugin-For-Wordpress - plugin that allows you to add Like button on your page. It could be done automatically or with a shortcode in your post / page. It comes with a lot of extras that you might find useful as well.

4. Article Templates - This plugin allows you to create templates for your articles. The template of the article is the one you have chosen, but if you have similar content, and you have to add same content every time (author, date, style, year), you can choose it as a template and with the new stuff, just to add the needed elements.

5. JavaScript to Footer - transfers all javascripts of the plugins (widgets) form the header to the footer of your template. That will rend your site few times better, because it won't be slower - javascripts are not nessesary when the site is opening.. You should also know what some plugins won't work properly, some at all. In this case you need to add this scripts in a list.

6. Style Box - an add-on to your interface. With a few changes you can achieve the effect "box" with text. Look at the screen shots there.

7. WP Keyword Link - you can include the keywords you want. Also it can make them a link in every article, if the plugin finds them. (Great for SEO).

8. The Welcomizer - it is a great plugin, that could give a living look of every element of our site, of course it must have ID tag here. Look the demo and you will find out more.

9. Tabber Widget - Some of you want to add more widgets, but the space there is not enough? With this plugin you can separate them to a different tabs, where you can edit their look by using the CSS file.

10. Platinum SEO Pack - the next generetion after the All in one SEO pack. This plugin is faster, better, does not overloading the server as much as the others. I think you know what this plugin does?

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11. Constant Footer - Allows you to "attach" a message to the bottom part of the site. Something you can see at vbox7.com in the beginning, but a little bit more friendly and not so intrusive. It helps a lot if you are looking to build your subscription list.

12. A to Z Category Listing - Really interesting plugin allows you to insert your category list on a specific page. Categories there have links to the articles, descriptions, titles. It will suites best (I suposs) for niche sites, recipe sites, technology products, and etc. In other words sites with well structure and fast and easy navigation. Remember that the plugin is not working out of the box. You should create you custom template and use the structure of your regular site, and from the inside to switch on the functionality of the plugin.

13. J Shortcodes - A plugin that insets buttons by using shortcodes. MUST HAVE for a big range of sites. Look at the screen shots and FAQs sections for more information.

14. Permalink Finder - Do not lose the "juice" of your structure. This plugin will help you structure of your articles (posts) / pages / categories / tags. I am really pleased with this plugin - does all automatically (redirect 301) - from the old URL address to the new one, without any problems (it's tasted with structures in English and Bulgarian /%date%/%postname%/, /%post_id%/%postname%/, /%postname%/, /%category%/%postname/, /%post_id%/%category%/%postname%/).

15. Word Replacer - useful plugin that you can easily replace the the word you want. It works best for SEO and anti-spam protection. For example, you want to rank your site for the keyword Shop, but you have to many articles, and you don't have the time to bold all the words in them. So, you can find the string Shop in the articles as well as pages and comments, and do the job.

----- HaRRo's Selection:

16. Network Publisher - A plugin that you can post automatically in bookmark sites (about 30). Something like the onlywire and ping.fm plugins, but is has more options.

17. GoCodes - Making link shorter or masking the affiliate links.

18. WP No External Links - Makes external links internal. Useful plugin fighting spam.

19. Dagon Design Sitemap Generator - User friendly front sitemap front page - Demo

20. FAQ-Tastic - A plugin that you can use to easily create FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page.


21. CopyFeed - It tracks those, who are stilling your content thanks to digital footprint, where you add the IP of the thief and a backlink to the original content.

22. LiveZilla - Chat, Live Support. It is not a WordPress plugin, but it could be easily integrated. Just paste the code in the text/html widget and you are done.

23. Related Posts Thumbnails - The name says it all. You should have one single pic in the content in ordet to be modified in thumb - it looks beautiful than the related post and YARP plugins.

24. Robots Meta - Must be combined with platinum seo and headspace2. Will do great job for your on-page SEO.

25. TweetMeme - Retweet button.

26. WP Hide Post - A plugin that could hide a post on your home page (category,tag,author page...).

27. WP htaccess Control - Inserted options for the htaccess(redirecting, error pages, mod deflate...).

28. SEO Smart Links - Automatically links keywords in the post to other post with related keywords.

29. SEO Friendly Images - Automatically adds title and alt tag to the image.

30. Login LockDown - Security plugin, that limits the access to the wp-admin after several tries from one IP.

31. Widget Logic - Controlling in which page you can make visible a widget.

32. EasyPayPal - Integrates PayPal. More information you can get on the site.

33. Heatmap - Plugin monitor user mouse movement and clicks. It will give you information where your visitors clicking / watching / stay on. Nice, isn't it?

34. Page Peel - The ads that open in the right of the top of your site.

35. SEO SearchTerms Tagging 2 - Links the post with the resent search terms, random search terms, popular search terms from the post or the widget.

36. WP Auto Tagger - Creating automatically tags, based on the content of the post/page.

37. Contact Form 7, Easy Privacy Policy, WP Disclaimer - Contact form plugins, rivacy policy and disclaimer.

----- AlexHD2's Selection:


38. Comments Cleaner - Cleaning the backlinks in the comments

39. Wordbooker - Automatically shares content in Facebook, on your profile page as well as on you fan page of the blog (if it has such). You can also add Like and Share buttons.

40. All in One Adsense and YPN - Adds automatically AdSense, whereever you want in your site (posts, pages) with the sizes, colors we want.

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41. Multiple Category Selection Widget - Really nice plugin, that searches as a category. Click on the link to see what is all about.

42. SplashGate - Read the description here. This plugin could be used promoting products / video clip / promotion of something, without destroying the structure of the site.

43. LoadedPress Show More - For those, who can really appreciate it. Why you show the whole text to people, that are not really interested in. That way the ads go to the footer. You have a content, that is visible for SE robots - this is important for you. With this plugin you can experiment in many ways (search for cloacking).

44. Div Shortcode - The most useful plugin I have ever worked with! You have the opportunity to stylize the post you want.

45. Hyper Cache Extended - Useful caching plugin. I am reading a lot of positive opinions about this plugin, mostly form people on share hosting plans.

After all, I will appreciate it if you post your list of part of it here. Every post from you will be valuable for the users. Hope you share your favorite plugins and widgets. All the best and thanks.

Specially provided by ktomov, Many thanks. :)
 
Последно редактирано:
От: Useful WordPress Plugins and Widgets

Hello,

Could you provide me a PayPal plugin for WordPress, that you use, because I can not find such?

All that I have tried are with a Donate buttons or do not work. What I need is something really simple - just adding the price in a field.
 
Последно редактирано от модератор:
Hi,

Sorry, but I am not sure what are you searching for. You want to add paypal button on the product page with a price on it? Something like that? Would be more specific?

I can share this with you: WordPress Simple Paypal Shopping Cart, but I am pretty sure, you have already tried it. Let is know a little bit more and we will try to give you something that will suite your needs.
 
От: Useful WordPress Plugins and Widgets

Hi,

I will make site for guests house and maybe I need form with fixed prizes. This above will not work for me because it is creating a cart.

Thank you for your answers.
 
Re: От: Useful WordPress Plugins and Widgets

ok, afraid i can't help you in this case but if you take little more efforts to explain exactly what you need maybe we could find some decision for you

Hello, this is interesting. Would give us more information. I can hardly understand what do you mean. I think that there is a plugin that could help you, but in order to find it, we need to know what we are looking for.
 

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