WordPress plugins you should use for your website

My last WordPress tutorial was about how to build an FAQ page using custom post types. The fourth part of my WordPress series is not about code or themes, but about WordPress plugins.

WordPress plugins to build “regular” websites

I used the following plugins for my latest WordPress websites and sure you will like them, too. Visit also the WordPress plugins page for a complete list of recommended plugins.

WP Super Cache

Every WordPress website needs a file cache, this plugin is easy to use and works on all hosting platforms I have used in the past. Don’t miss a cache plugin or your WordPress website will slow down if for example a nasty bot will visit your website too often.

Yoast SEO

This is the only SEO plugin you need for: breadcrumbs, Google sitemaps, single page analysis and many onsite optimizations! I wrote about this SEO plugin before and today I like to mention a feature that is very helpful for your article optimization.

1. Enter a “Focus Keyword” and click the save button.
2. Inside the publish box a the grey bullet will turn green, yellow or red.
3. Click “Check” to get more details about the optimization status of the current article.
4. Check also the number of keywords used in the different parts from your article Yoast SEO meta box.

Redirection

You need this plugin to redirect old URLs to the new ones. If you use this plugin it’s not necessary anymore to edit your .htaccess file for every redirection rule. I use this plugin for every website I move to WordPress and for all older WordPress websites. The plugin provides also a report function to recognize broken links (404) and this report shows you how often a redirected URL was followed.

Types – Complete Solution for Custom Fields and Types

This plugin is a complete suite to create custom post types, taxonomies and fields. If you don’t like to write PHP code for these custom WordPress elements, you should use this plugin. It’s easy to use and the custom fields are very useful for your custom posts, like a product post type for example. There is another advanced feature you can manage which user group can edit which kind of post type.

Widget Logic

I mentioned a few example conditions in my article about widgets and sidebars. If you use a dynamic sidebar this plugin is a requirement. It’s simple to use and there are no special settings. If you don’t like to enter all these conditional tags, you might look after this plugin. I used it once, but I prefer the “original”.

Smart WYSIWYG Blocks Of Content

The second tutorial in the series was about dynamic sidebars and widgets. I used this plugin to add custom content to the sidebar. This plugin is not very special, because it creates “only” a post type and a widget (or shortcode). On the other site it’s a huge time saver and for sure your customer knows how to use it too.

These short list of plugins and maybe a few others are the minimum plugins you need if you build a custom website based on WordPress. If your site is a kind of blog or magazine site, you need more plugins for comments, related posts, etc. Next week I will post in the last part of this series some tips on how to optimize a WordPress website.

Published in: WordPress Development