How To Build Your Online Presence On The Cheap – Step 6: The Do-It-Yourself Website Plugins

In this 6^th installment we will briefly go through the process of installing and setting up plugins, as well as some recommendations for which ones to use. This will not be an exhaustive study of what will work best, but instead it should get you started on adding some key functionality and enhancements to your site that will contribute to the growth of your online presence.

If you are just discovering this series, be sure to go back to the beginning and catch up so you will have a clear understanding of where we’ve been and where we’re going. Also be sure to subscribe to the RSS feed, sign up to receive updates via email and/or bookmark this site so you don’t miss any updates!

PLUGINS

Plugins are tools to extend the functionality of WordPress. Plugins offer custom functions and features so that each user can tailor their site to their specific needs. ~ WordPress Codex

WordPress comes with a couple of plugins already installed: Akismet and Hello Dolly. You can see these by clicking on the left sidebar on the button labeled Plugins. Go ahead and delete the silly Hello Dolly plugin and then take a quick look at Akismet. This is an important plugin to activate because it helps with preventing spam comments. In order to use it you will have to create a free account at WordPress.com and get the API key connected to your account, then cut and paste it into the configuration of Akismet. The instructions for this are shown to you when it’s activated, so go ahead and click on the link Activate underneath Akismet, then complete the configuration process as it instructs you.

WHICH PLUGINS?

Next you will need to determine which plugins you want to install that will help to get the most out of your site and increase your branding. Currently the WordPress Plugin Directory has 6,510 plugins available. This could take you a while to go through! There are countless things to consider so in the interest of brevity I will give you some basic must-haves for building your online presence.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO):
Most commonly used is the All In One SEO Pack. I have recently started using Greg’s High Performance SEO. Either of these are great plugins that when used correctly will help you be found better by the search engines. Be sure to read the documentation to set them up properly for best SEO.

RSS Feeds:
You must generate an RSS feed in order for visitors to subscribe to your blog, which in turn contributes to return visits and builds community interaction within your site. WordPress has this functionality built in, but it can be greatly enhanced for free by running your feed through Feedburner. There’s a great little plugin that will take care of this for you called FD Feedburner. You will have to create a Feedburner account through Google, but you will also use the Google account for analytics and more, so go ahead and set one up if you haven’t already.

Social Media:
It is crucial that you install social media plugins to enable the broadest reach for your website. Incorporating social bookmarking, the ability to tweet your posts or share them on Facebook, adding a Digg button and numerous other ways to share your site across social media channels is a vital part of enlarging your online footprint. The easier you can make it for visitors to share your posts, the more often they will do it. And the more you can show what your brand is doing around the web, the more your website visitors are likely to visit your other “locations” to see what you’re about.

You can see on my site that I have social bookmarking at the end of each post. This is a plugin I use constantly called Sexy Bookmarks. It’s highly configurable and looks great. The other popular social bookmarking plugin is Sociable. It is also highly configurable and I believe it has a lot more options, but I prefer the way Sexy Bookmarks looks and its ease of use.

Then in the sidebar I have incorporated a Retweet button to allow users to easily tweet my posts. I use Backtype’s TweetCount rather than the ever popular Tweetmeme because I can edit the colors of the button to make it match my site and brand, I can link it to my bit.ly account for tracking and analytics, and I can configure it to disallow crediting BackType so all the tweets are purely referencing the blog title, my Twitter username and the bit.ly link.

I also added a Digg button to give visitors the ability to add the posts to Digg, which gives it the potential of reaching a larger audience. There are several good Digg button plugins. The one I use is called (surprise) Digg This Button.

Notice that Sexy Bookmarks has Twitter and Digg included, so you may ask why use these features twice? I have done it because the retweet and digg buttons have become very recognizable, so for many users it will encourage them to use the buttons in the sidebar. I have seen the footer buttons and the sidebar buttons both get about the same use, so the jury is still out on this one. But I don’t think it hurts anything.

Some other features I would suggest including would be adding your Delicious bookmarks, your Twitter feed, and your Facebook status updates to your sidebar. There are several plugins that will do this also and I would encourage you to try them out to determine which ones best matches the look and feel of your theme. You definitely do not want them to be a distraction, but they can be great tools to enable your visitors to connect with you on all of the major social media channels.

Content and interaction:
Finally, I would suggest using a few plugins to manage your content and encourage visitors to comment. There are all kinds of ways you can do this, from including recent comments, recent posts, comment enhancements and more. I won’t go into all of these, but instead will give you a few resources where you can explore what will work best for your site.

15 Essential WordPress Plugins for Aspiring Designers

70 Best WordPress Plugins to Supercharge your Blog

10 WordPress plugins that every website needs… and others that may come in handy

INSTALLING PLUGINS

Installing plugins has become pretty simple with the latest versions of WordPress. There are several ways you can do it, but the simplest is using the built-in search and install feature. You can also use this to find other plugins without ever having to leave your administration area.

To find and install a plugin, simply click on the button labeled Plugins on the left sidebar, then click on Add New.

This will open the Search section, where you can type in any term to find the corresponding plugin. You can type in the exact title if you already know it (like any of those suggested above) or you can type in a term such as “Twitter”, then click on the button labeled Search Plugins.

A list will load that you can choose any plugin from. You can click on the plugin’s title to visit its website, or you can click on Install to go ahead and install the plugin. Don’t be afraid. WordPress is made to do this and does it quite well. If you install a plugin that you decide you don’t want to use, it’s very easy to deactivate it and delete it.

CONCLUSION

Go ahead. Try a few plugins out. See how the system works and get a feel for what will work best for promoting your brand and encouraging interaction within your website and social media channels.

This briefing on plugins is not even close to comprehensive and there are still many more steps and options that are available. Plus, once you get these plugins installed you will need to determine where they will go on the site (sidebar, footer, etc.) and for many of them you will be using the widget area to add them to your sidebar. There are many resources and guides, including usually the documentation that comes with the plugin itself, to assist you. Of course, if you get stuck you can always contact me with any questions you have.

In the next installment of the series we will look at Posts and Pages so you can start loading content into your site. Until then, have fun playing with the plugins!