Wordpress plugins - My Faves!

By freelancemom | Feb 6, 2009

I’ve worked with tons of wordpress blogs, for myself and for clients, and over time have come up with a group of plugins that I feel are ‘must have’! Here they are:

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1. AddThis

Add This - Social Bookmark and Feed Button Burner

Add This - Social Bookmark and Feed Button Burner

If you look at the bottom of my posts you’ll see a little graphic that looks like this: addthis2

When the user scrolls over it there is a popup menu with all the social bookmarking sites. It invites them to consider sharing something they like! Suggesting that someone share a post, comment on a post, forward an email, bookmark your site… really goes a long way. Especially if you make it easy! This little plugin is great for that!

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2. AdSense-Deluxe
There may be better plugins then this out there now but at the time it was a god send, and I’ve been using it ever since. AdSense Deluxe allows you to very quickly insert your adsense code into your blog posts by inserting a very simple code snippet which I can’t write here or my adsense will show up :)

The plugin is customizable and user friendly… And let’s you monetize your blog with ease!
adsense1

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3. Akismet
akismet

The whole point of a blog is to interact with your visitors… so it’s a major bummer when you are getting so much comment spam that you have to manually approve comments. For one thing, the visitor doesn’t get that instant gratification of seeing their comment go live, but also — who has time? I don’t want to go manually approve or delete the comments in all of my blogs!

In comes Akismet — the BEST plugin for helping you deal with the inevitable comment spammers — you’ve gotta get this one!

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4. All-In-One-SEO-Pack

A robust SEO plugin that allows you to put individual title tags and description tags in your posts… This is critical for helping your blog achieve search engine rankings and this plugin makes it very easy. When you are writing your new post, you’ll see a spot to enter your title and description tags (keywords too, but I ususally don’t bother with them). Just fill them out and publish the post! It’s easy!

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5. Contextual Related Posts

This is a superb little plugin that will add a list of related posts to the end of your blog posts. It’s great for SEO - and just to keep your visitors interested!

relatedposts1

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6. Hackadelic Sliding Notes

This is a plugin I just recently found that is very helpful when you have a lot of content on a page and want to have the main points ‘above the fold’. It works by adding a simple code snippet like this in your post:

slidingnotes2

and you get a result like this: Click here to see what sliding notes do!»

I hope some of these plugins are helpful for you! Leave a comment and let me know if you use them - or if you want to add to the list!

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  • Great information. I have just created a Wordpress blog and am looking to take it to the next level. Thank you for the tips.
  • Really the information is provided you is very helpful and thanks for sharing it.
  • Nice list! I'm currently using the Akismet, Add This and the All-in-One-SEO Pack. I've have to give the Contextual Related Posts a try.

    I also like the plugin, Comment Luv, but it's not compatible with Wordpress 2.7.1.

    <abbr>Holly - The Work at Home Woman’s last blog post..Lovable Links - Female Friendly Business Picks</abbr>
  • Actually askimet is bad. It's because you go to someone's blog and disagree with them. That person then fraudulently marks your comment as spam. Then suddenly you're on the askimet blacklist. When you're on it, every single blog either pretends to post your comment and never does or else gives you a blank page and no blogmaster can go and find your post to unmark it as spam, you just can't post. Google "akismet sucks".
  • freelancemom
    I haven't had issues like this with Akismet - sorry that you have.

    Everything Akismet deems to be spam is saved and the blog owner can choose to go through them at their leisure. At that point, if a genuine comment happened to have been marked as spam, it can be marked as 'not spam' right then and there and the comment will then go live.

    It's much less time consuming then the other way around... where all comments go live and you have to delete 90% of them!

    Here's a snippet from Akismet's FAQ's:

    Help! Akismet is catching a regular comment as spam!
    Don't worry, if you see a regular comment on your Akismet page, just click the "Not Spam" checkbox and submit and the comment will be sent back to Akismet as a mistake. The system will learn from your submission, though it may take a day or so in some cases. False positives, as they're called, are extremely rare and we watch them closely.
  • freelancemom
    Hi 'Lawn Care' :-)

    Well - I suppose anything is possible. I haven't noticed a problem. There is an area in the settings for this plugin where you can donate some of your earnings to the author. I don't say yes to that but assume that it would then rotate the authors adsense with your own if you chose that.

    If you have a separate channel set up for your blog - then you can keep an eye on the impressions and clicks and compare with previous months. That would tell you for sure :)

    For me though, really there hasn't been an issue.
  • I am curious about Adsense Deluxe. So far I am editing template to set my adsense code. But this one is really a time taking job ... if you want to do experiment with the places of your ads.

    I heard about adsense deluxe but I am afraid to use this. Is this one is really ok and it wont effect my earning.

    Kindly clear this one.

    <abbr>Lawn Care’s last blog post..Outdoor Services Home changed</abbr>
  • freelancemom
    Hi Cassie!

    That's really interesting about the subscribe to comments success you have had.

    Hey - I love your new blog design... love as in... LOVE. Very nice! I left a comment but think Akismet thought ill of me? :-)

    I noticed that you're using comment luv too - I like that feature where it tracks back the commentor's latest blog post. I'm going to install that too!

    Any other plugin goodies?
  • I've never used the sliding notes plugin, but all the other plugins are a MUST for any Wordpress install. Another plugin I try to have installed on all blogs is the "Subscribe to comments" plugin. That way, anyone who comments can choose to keep track of future comments by email. I've noticed a lot more comments on my blog since having that installed.
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