My Top 10 Wordpress Plugins
Originally published at Morbid Romantic. You can comment here or there.
One of the best things about using Wordpress is getting to install and play around with various plugins. I am a full on plugin addict as you can see from my plugin list.
Plugins allow users more content and design manageability while also adding cool features for site visitors. The right plugin can improve the way the site runs, make navigation easier, smooth out the back end, and just make a more unique site. For me, I install plugins that will allow me to do things more efficiently, or that will allow me to personalize my site to my pleasure.
So, these are my top ten Wordpress plugins in no particular order.
- Amazon Reloaded for Wordpress- I use this one every day. What this one does is add an Amazon search function to your post/page add pages. If you have an associates ID, you can add it and rack of some affiliates credits for money or gift cards. Instead of having to log onto Amazon to make associate links or to find products, you can do that within your own Wordpress admin panel. It works great. And it’s a great way to make extra money.
- MiniManager- This is another one that I use almost every day. If there is a common line of text or HTML that you add to all of your pages that you find yourself typing out or copy/pasting over and over again, this plugin will save you time. All you do is make a ‘block’ of it and insert it using a short code in your post like {text}. It will just auto insert your line or HTML coding. For all of my Book Giveaway posts, I use a block {bookgiveaways*} to insert that massive bunch of text before each entry. It saves me tons of time.
- Events Calendar- I just think it’s awesome to have a calendar with what I am going on my blog.
- Livejournal Crossposter- I like livejournal and I like having LJ friends and joining communities. But, it was a hassle having to take every post of mine and copy and paste it into LJ. Now, with this plugin, it is done automatically. Awesome.
- Cross-Linker- This is another time saving plugin for me. This one assigns links to specific words or phrases. With this plugin, instead of having to search out links and create a link, the link is automatically created when you type the word in. Observe: postcrossing. See how that became a link? All I did was type the word itself and the plugin changed it into a link with the URL I assigned.
- Extended Comment Options- I like this one because it allows others to reply to comments or quote comments. Since some of my pages have to do with Myspace games, this plugin lets visitors answer the questions of others.
- WP to Twitter- This one creates a Tweet notifying your Twitter friends that you have a new blog entry posted. It’s an easy way to direct traffic to your website.
- Clean Archives Reloaded- What do I like about this one? I like that the archives page is dynamic. When you go to the page, you see a bunch of months with numbers next to them. When you click a month, you are given a list and link for every entry made that month. You can expand and contract as your heart desires. It’s clean and easy navigation. You can check mine out here.
- Now Reading- I was unsure about this one at first because it took some serious style tweeking to get it to show up right on my page. But after I figured out where the code was weak, I was able to get it to work. Now I just love that I get to create a page with my current 2009 reading list.
- CformsII- Easy to make and integrate forms. What’s not to love?