23 must-haveWordPress pluginsto boost yourbusiness

2016

by Brad Turner - socialstack .com .au

Before we start

Make sure to keep yourplugins lean . Only useplugins relevant to your

business .

YOAST SEO

SEO Plugin

Studies have proven that the f irst 5 results ongoogles front page generate 75% of websiteclicks . SEO is a massive part dominating youronline presence . YOAST by word press is themost effective and user fr iendly plugin on themarket for SEO . Using YOAST is simple and amust have in your arsenal of plugins .

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GOOGLE ANALYTICS

Website statistics plugin

The Google analytics wordpress pluginautomatically inputs the code into everypage so you can track , view and reportfrom your Google analytics dashboard ,

making website reporting that mucheasier .

02

WORDFENCE

Security Plugin

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This is a personal favourite and its free. Wordfence is perfectfor adding an extra layer of protection against people tryingto hack their way onto your website. One of the manyfeatures this plugin offers is email alerts, these alerts aretriggered if anything suspicious is happening on your site,

they also offer a premium version that allows you to accesssupport if you need it.

MAILCHIMP

Email service plugin

Do you send emails for your business? I f not then werecommend you start . Mail Chimp is an emailmarketing solution to help you manage subscribers ,

send emails and track results . With the Mail Chimpplugin you can capture subscriber directly fromyour website using a subscribe section and expandyour marketing and customer reach with email .

04

WOOCOMERCE

Retail store plugin

Online retail and Woocommerce is the ultimatecombination . Woocommerce is a powerful pluginthat allows you to sell anything , with seamlessand beautiful user experience . I f you are lookingto streamline your online store this is the answer .

05

WP ROCKET

Optimization plugin

WP Rocket is the ultimate plugin to boostyour website speeds . Website speed can bedetrimental for both your ranking on Googleand your customer experience . Stats fromkiss metrics show that 47% of consumersexpect a page to load in 2 seconds or less .

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AKISMET

Security spam plugin

Spam , its something we all need to avoid .

Akismet scans your websites commentsagainst the Akismet web service to notify youif the comments are spam or not . It is asimple but effective plugin that can save youheadaches in the future .

07

JETPACK

The all rounder plugin

Jet-pack wordpress plugin is the jack of alltrades . With this quality plugin you canincrease your websites speed , increaseyour traff ic , view the website stats andprotect your website from potentialhackers .

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GRAVITY FORMS

Forms plugin

If you ’re looking for basic sign up forms or in-depthforms with complex bill ing or applications , Gravity willget the job done . I have used a wide range of formplugins and I can assure you this plugin is worth itsweight in gold . There is only a premium plugin availablebut with over a million wordpress sites actively usingGravity forms , you would be crazy to look elsewhere .

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SEARCH WP

Internal website search plugin

Have you ever been onto a website and you cantfind what your looking for? Search WP is an in sitesearch tool that allows users to search for specificthings within your webpage’s. Think of Google foryour website, but a lot less technical.

10

GOOGLE XML SITEMAPS

SEO plugin

The Google XML plugin allows searchengines l ike Google , Bing and Yahoo tohelp index your blog . With Sitemaps thisallows crawlers from search engines togather the complete structure of yourwebsite and crawl them more efficiently .

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UPDRAFTPLUS BACKUP

Wordpress backup plugin

If your website goes down , you need tomake large changes or it becomes f i l ledwith internal viruses , you want to makesure your site is backed up . Updraft plusallows you to backup your completewebsite data base and restore them to itsoriginal condition .

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WP SMASH PRO

Image compression plugin

I f your website consists of a lot of images thenyou want to compress them . Images candramatically slow your websites load rate andeffect your bottom l ine . WP Smash pro has beenbench marked the best image compression andoptimization plugin . This plugin allows you tomanually , automatically or in bulk optimizeimages .

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BROKEN LINK CHECKER

Link building plugin

Broken l ink checker scans and monitors your pages ,

posts , comments and everything within your site .

The plugin will identif iy any broken l inks , brokenimages or redirects . Once the broken l inks arefound within the site , you have the abil ity to editthe l inks within the plugin , which avoids manuallyadjusting each post .

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APPOINTMENT 'S +

Appointment schedule plugin

If your in the services industry , own a restaurantor even a barber , pen and paper isn 't going tocut it . With Appointments + its easy tostreamline your daily appointments digitally ,

this plugin also allows users to book and paythemselves , it has a range of features and amust try for all booking inquiries .

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EASY DIGITAL DOWNLOADS

Digital marketplace plugin

Sell ing digital or virtual goods on wordpress? Easydigital downloads offers a one size f its allsolution . This plugin is great for music ,

photographic or even course market placesonline , easy digital downloads also has a greatrange of other plugins to offer and Pippin and histeam create simple and seamless products , wehighly recommend them .

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UNSPLASH WP

Image plugin

We all need photos , whether its for blogposts , content pages or general websiteappearance . The Unsplash WP plugin offers atremendous amount of free images for youto use and upload onto your wordpress site .

With this plugin there is no need to leavethe dashboard , plus all the images can beuploaded into your l ibrary within moments .

17

BUDDYPRESS

Social Network plugin

Looking to give your site a new l i fe? Ormaybe create a community? Buddy pressallows you to run any kind of socialnetwork on your WordPress site . You canfeature member profiles , activity streams ,

user groups , messaging and more .

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CONTACT FORM 7

Contact form plugin

We did mention Gravity forms is the go to formplugin , but i f you are unable to spend the 59dollars to purchase it then we recommend touse contact form 7 . It 's features are l imitedcompared to Gravity forms , but sti l l allows youto create all the essential forms to help yourwebsite perform for free . We have used thisplugin previously , but since using Gravity wehaven ’t looked back .

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HEAT MAPS

heatmap plugin

Its important to understand your website , withthe heat maps plugin you can identify wherecustomers are spending most of there time onyour website , i f you see they spend most of thetime in one section then leave , you may need tochange that part of your website . Heat mappingis so vital in order to gather critical informationabout your visitor behavior .

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ULTIMATE BRANDING

Branding plugin

This is really cool , on your user dashboard you see allthe wordpress branding , with the Ultimate brandingplugin you can change and customize all the brandingto your own company . For example you can change thewordpress login from the generic one to a cooloptimized page with your logo and mission statement .

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SUMOME SHARE APP

Social Sharing plugin

Social media engagement is a massive part ofhow our businesses gain traction. A simplyplugin by SumoMe is all we need, SumoMecreates one of the most user friendlyexperiences for increasing your social shares,social proof and enhancing the visibility of yourcontent. Take a look for yourself and it looksfantastic.

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YET ANOTHER RELATER POSTS PLUGIN

Related post plugin

Yes it sounds obvious and to the point , but this pluginworks . Unlike many other related posts plugins thisone actually shows related posts that were engagingfor your audience . The plugin shows related posts ,

articles and custom posts related to the content yourvisitors are currently viewing . It can help increasepage views , engagement and time spent on your site .

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THE END

We hope you enjoyed the presentation andIf you have any other plugins that youthink would help boost others businesses ,

please feel free to email myself at :

brad@socialstack .com .au

This is a comprehensive l ist of all theessential plugins that will help you runyour business and boost your audience .

Again I hope you enjoyed the presentationand make sure to check out Social Stack .

www .socialstack .com .au

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