WordPress Plugins add new functions to your site: contact forms, social sharing, SEO tweaks, and more. Learn about how to select plugins and learn about some leading plugins too. Includes a valuable list of WordPress resources.

1. @tonycecala
Your Guide to
Wonderful
WordPress Plugins
Tony Cecala, Ph.D.
Digital Media Consultant

2. What’s the Big Deal about Plugins?
Extend the functionality of WordPress.
Connect external services/data to your site.
Make your site faster (slower).
Make your site more secure (insecure).
Build a web application, not a static brochure.

3. How Do I Know if a Plugin is Wonderful?
Use the WordPress.org/plugins/ Repo
How old is the plugin?
Has it been maintained?
Look at the Star rating
Read the reviews
Is the documentation is well-written?
Read the “Changelog”

4. Finding Plugins
Searching for plugins in the WordPress Repository is easy, but tedious.

5. searching… 399 super cache results

6. searching… 1000+ cache results

7. How Do I Know if a Plugin is Awful?
It’s pretty easy to see which plugins haven’t been getting
any love.
Those updated >2 years will be flagged.
Note the version of WordPress it was last tested on.

8. An old, old plugin.

9. An abandoned plugin.

10. Old plugin. Better alternative exists.

11. Mostly obsolete favicon plugin.

12. No longer supported on WP.org

13. “Abandoned” plugin.

14. Ancient 4 y.o. plugin.

15. What about Third-Party Plugins?
Themeforest.net and CodeCanyon.net
WPCore.com
Reviews/Comments
Is the documentation well-written?
What is their History of abandoning Code?

16. List of Quality Plugins
What makes these plugins special?
Longevity
Quality
Functionality

17. Contact Form 7
Just another contact form plugin. Simple but flexible.
http://wordpress.org/plugins/contact-form-7

18. WordPress SEO by Yoast
Improve your WordPress SEO: Write better content and
have a fully optimized WordPress site using Yoast's
WordPress SEO plugin.
http://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-seo

19. Google Analytics by MonsterInsights
Track your WordPress site easily with the latest tracking
codes and lots added data for search result pages and
error pages.
http://wordpress.org/plugins/google-analytics-for-
wordpress
http://wordpress.org/plugins/google-analytics-for-wordpress

20. Widget Logic
Widget Logic lets you control on which pages widgets
appear using WP's conditional tags. It also adds a
'widget_content' filter.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/widget-logic/

21. Widget Logic
Widget Logic lets you show and
hide Widgets based on page types
and other if/then rules
https://wordpress.org/plugins/widget-
logic/

22. Soliloquy
The best responsive WordPress slider plugin. Made lite
and free.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/soliloquy-lite/

23. Recent Posts Widget with Thumbnails
Displays more informations about the posts like e.g. thumbnails, excerpts
and assigned categories.
The thumbnails will be built from the featured image of a post or of the
first image in the post content. If there is neither a featured image nor a
content image then you can define a default thumbnail.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/recent-posts-widget-with-thumbnails/

24. Call Now Button
Inserts a calling button on the bottom of your website
when displayed on mobile devices
Automatically dials your number when the button is
pressed
https://wordpress.org/plugins-wp/call-now-button/

25. Activity Log
The Activity Log plugin does one thing and it does it very
well: it keeps a detailed list (or log) of almost every single
action that occurs within your WordPress site. We’re not
exaggerating either – the plugin tracks updates, new
comments, login attempts, WooCommerce sales, and
more.

26. Stream

27. Sucuri Scan
The Sucuri WordPress Security plugin is a security toolset
for security integrity monitoring, malware detection and
security hardening.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/sucuri-scanner/
http://j.mp/fixhack

28. Disable Title
Disable the title per page/post
https://wordpress.org/plugins/disable-title/

29. Three Special-Use plugins…
Special use cases
Travel
Photography
User Interface Mods

30. Nomad World Map
Create your own custom travel map. Link
locations on the map to blog posts and share
your travel plans.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/nomad-world-
map/

31. Twenty20 Image Before-After
Show before-and-after pictures
in your blog, with an interactive
slider that allows users to
compare them.
https://wordpress.org/plugins-
wp/twenty20/

32. Menu Image
Adds a field to load the image in a menu item and
displays the image inside the link in the menu before
the text.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/menu-image/

33. More Bonus plugins…
for Optimization
Too many plugins and features can impact server
performance and make a site load slowly.
So, of course, there’s a plugin for that!

34. WP Super Cache

35. W3 Total Cache Easy Web Performance Optimization (WPO) using
caching: browser, page, object, database, minify and
content delivery network support.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/w3-total-cache/

36. WP YouTube Lyte
High performance YouTube video, playlist and audio-only
embeds which don't slow down your blog and offer
optimal accessibility.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-youtube-lyte/

37. Autoptimize
Aggregates and minifies all the JS, HTML, and
CSS code in any given site
https://wordpress.org/plugins/autoptimize/

38. Better WordPress Minify
Allows you to combine and minify your CSS and JS
files to improve page load time.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/bwp-minify/

39. Lazy Load for Videos
Speed up your site by replacing embedded Youtube and
Vimeo videos with a clickable preview image. Visitors simply
click on the image to play the video
https://wordpress.org/plugins/lazy-load-for-videos/

40. More Quality Plugins

41. Jetpack
Increase your traffic, view your stats,
speed up your site, and protect
yourself from hackers with Jetpack.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/jetpack/

42. Facebook Messenger LiveChat
https://wordpress.org/plugins/fb-messenger-livechat/

43. Advanced Custom Fields
https://wordpress.org/plugins/advanced-custom-fields/

44. WooCommerce
Amazon Affiliates

45. UberMenu

46. Essential Grid
https://codecanyon.net/item/essential-grid-wordpress-plugin/7563340

47. Subtitles
add subtitles easily and elegantly
https://wordpress.org/plugins/subtitles/

48. Flow Flow Social Stream
https://wordpress.org/plugins/flow-flow-social-streams/

49. WordPress Social Stream
https://codecanyon.net/item/wordpress-social-stream/2201708

50. UberGrid
UberGrid is a powerful responsive grid /
gallery builder for WordPress that can build
nice looking walls of square items defined
manually or pulled automatically using your
WordPress posts includi WooCommerce
products and custom post types created by
third party plugins or themes. You can use
UberGrid to present your portfolio, team,
products, photos, blog posts, or anything
else that can be presented with square cells.
Its unique customisability will adopt to almost
any needs.
https://codecanyon.net/item/ubergrid-responsive-grid-builder-for-wordpress/4851992

51. Logos Showcase - Multi-Use
Responsive WP Plugin
https://codecanyon.net/item/
logos-showcase-multiuse-
responsive-wp-plugin/4322745

52. Gravity Forms
http://www.gravityforms.com/

53. Justified Image Grid
http://justifiedgrid.com/

54. CMS Tree Page View
https://wordpress.org/plugins/cms-tree-page-view/

55. BackWPup
https://wordpress.org/
plugins/backwpup/

56. Edit Flow
https://wordpress.org/
plugins/edit-flow/

57. Enhanced Media Library
Media Categories for categorizing
and filtering media items in
WordPress admin. This feature
alone will save you hours of
searching through a media library
with even as few as 100 images.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/enhanced-media-library/

58. Revive Old Posts
https://wordpress.org/
plugins/tweet-old-post/
Plugin to share about
your old posts on twitter,
facebook, linkedin to get
more hits for them and
keep them alive.

59. Worth The Read
A little adjustable progress
meter showing how much
of the post the user has
scrolled through.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/worth-the-read/

60. Social Share Buttons - Social Pug
Social share buttons with style
that will increase your social
shares and user interaction with
your website.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/social-pug/

61. LocateAnything -
Searchable map Plugin
https://wordpress.org/plugins/locateanything/

62. Inline Related Posts
variable positioning for related posts
https://wordpress.org/plugins/intelly-related-posts/

63. Automatic Alternative (“Alt”) Text
https://wordpress.org/plugins/automatic-alternative-text
how about adding some AI to
your blog?
automatically determines the
image contents and adds the alt
text to new uploaded images
requires a free key to Microsoft's
Cognitive Services Computer
Vision API

64. Learn more about Plugins
https://wpcore.com/

65. Learn more about Plugins
https://www.sitepoint.com/wordpress/

66. One more thing…
New plugin directory is coming soon.

71. WordPress Plugins: Resources
How to Enable Automatic Updates for WordPress Plugins
http://go.tony.io/wpautoupdates
16 Best WordPress Plugins for Marketers
http://go.tony.io/16bestwp
How to Create Beautiful Long Form Content in
WordPress with StoryBuilder
http://go.tony.io/longformwp
9 Best PDF Plugins for WordPress
http://go.tony.io/bestwppdf
10 LinkedIn WordPress Plugins to Win New Customers
http://go.tony.io/wpbestlinkedin
5 Best WordPress Ecommerce Plugins Compared – 2016
http://go.tony.io/5bestwpecomm16
How to Easily Add CSS Animations in WordPress
http://go.tony.io/addcssanimwp
11 Of The Best Premium Wordpress Plugins Worth Their
Money
http://go.tony.io/11bestprem
SiteGround’s Recommended Plugin List
http://go.tony.io/sgrecwp
20 WordPress Plugins You Can Install Today for Easier
Sharing, Better Posting, and a More Powerful Blog
http://go.tony.io/bufferbestwp
Which is the Best WordPress Slider? Performance +
Quality Compared
http://go.tony.io/2bYEMO5

72. @tonycecala
Thank you.
you can find this presentation online at:
http://www.slideshare.net/networker/