WordPress plugins I use

20 July 2007 • 400 views, 1 today

WordPress plugins I use

Hello there! If you are new here, you might want to subscribe to the RSS feed for updates on this topic.

I know it’s been talked about by other bloggers, but I’ve gotten asked about which WordPress plugins I use. So here goes…

Plugins serve to extend your WordPress blog — to give it more oomph, more pizzazz even. But most importantly, they help you make sense of your whole blogging experience. It could be to make blogging more fun, such as running polls or contests off your blog. Or to maintain a directory (as opposed to a simple blogroll). For me, my primary use of plugins is for extending the power of the already-powerful WordPress platform.

So here’s a list of the plugins that I use in almost all my WordPress blogs. They’re all compatible with version 2.2.1, by the way.

Absolutely necessary plugins

Akismet: Who doesn’t use this heaven-sent plugin?? Of course it comes pre-packages with WP — all you need to do is activate it and feed it your WP API key. No idea how to get one? Go to WordPress.com, sign up for a free account; and after the registration process, check out your User Profile, which will display your API key.
All-in-One SEO Pack: This plugin gives you more control over how your content is “seen” by search engine spiders. It lets you create meta information for each post; for example, you can define custom page titles for each post you publish. This is a good way of “tagging” your posts, too. It will take a bit of getting used to — plus a smidgen of discipline — but the effort will be worthwhile, especially if you plan on getting into the SEO gig.
SEO Wordpress: I won’t pretend to know the inner workings of this plugin, but SEO experts have attested that what it does for your blog is a necessary service. Basically, it takes care of a weakness in WordPress when it comes to search engine visibility. No, your WP blog is no less visible to search engines as other blogs. Fact is, it might be too visible. You see, WordPress, for some reason, displays your posts in many locations within your blog: the front page, in the archive, in tag folders…. In SEO parlance, this is not sound practice and might attract the Big G’s ire. But don’t ask me why.
Google Sitemaps: Since we’re in the topic of search engines, here’s another plugin to help your blog rank better within the Big G’s system. Perhaps not better than other blogs right away, but definitely better than before you installed this plugin. It takes some tweaking, though, and you will need access to your blog’s server to be able to successfully make use of it.

Good-to-have plugins

Daily Top 10 Posts: I’m proud of this one because it was created by a fellow Dabawenyo. It lets you display your posts’ stats (visitors), either per post or as a widget on your sidebar. Check it out! (Oh and here’s a similar, and admittedly more powerful, plugin: Popularity Contest.)
Subscribe to Comments: This is another abuggedlife.com find for me! If you leave comments on blogs and diligently keep track of those threads, you’d appreciate it if the blogs you comment on notify you of updates. N’est-çe pas? So, you’d want to offer such a service on your own blog as well, no? Believe me, this plugin gets your readers heading back to your blog better than many other plugins!
Dagon Design Form Mailer: A mouthful, I know. But also a handful!! I’d put it in the absolutely-necessary-plugins list, but I realize not all people really need it. And yet, perhaps they don’t know what they’re missing! This plugin is just awesome: it lets you design web-to-email forms with more than just basic functions. It’s a bit involved, but then that’s because it’s really very extensible. So much so that it leaves more to be desired!
Related Posts: This lets you show, as the name might imply, other posts of a similar topic, right within each post on your blog. I have it on all my blogs, and it’s pretty useful. Not 100% accurate, but it does the job, which is to encourage your readers to jump to more pages within your site.; Too bad, though, that I couldn’t find the correct URL of this plugin. The published link’s broken. Why don’t you just head on over to the WP repository and do a search?

Fancy-schmancy plugins

Get Recent Comments: WP’s built-in Recent Comments widget is just too boring, so plug this one in right away! This plugin gives you aesthetic — as well as layout — control over how you present your blog posts’ visitors and their comments. There are similar plugins out there, but this is the one I got to really appreciate.
Democracy: Democracy is based on what fundamental right? The right to vote. Yes, this plugin is about polls. It’s very simple to implement and maintain. I’m sure there are others out there that are more sophisticated, but this one is good enough for me.
Category Cloud Widget: Another built-in widget I suggest you replace is the Category thingie. This plugged-in widget lets you display your blog’s categories in a more visually pleasing manner. And that’s all there is to it.