Essential Wordpress Plugins You Need to Have On Your Site

byimbella

733 followers

Updated 2 years ago

Last edited: 10/29/2022

If you're new to Wordpress, you might be wondering what plugins you need to keep your website running fast and smooth, working properly, serving your readers efficiently, and ensuring your website's security. These are extremely important factors to consider in order to keep readers coming back for more of your content. Moreover, you want to be close friends with Google, Bing, and whatever search engines are out there.

For 🛡 Wordpress Security, these 2 are my top choices.

1. Wordfence (Free, Most Popular) - Has 4+ million installs and 3,760+ reviews, it is by far the most popular WP security plugin in the market. If you go Pro or paid, the price starts at $99/year.
2. iThemes Security (Free, Best Value) - Has 1+ million installs and 3,800+ reviews, it is the best bang for the buck if you want to go for the paid version for $60/year (1 site).
3. Defender (Free, My Recommendation) - Has 70k+ installs and a 4.8 start rating, Defender is my go-to security plugin for all of my websites. Unlike Wordfence and iThemes, Defender is almost fluidly compatible with any theme, which means it will rarely break your website (if utilized properly). For the premium version, it's pricier at $7.50/month but you will unlock the pro versions of ALL the plugins that they have which includes all of the plugin categories I outlined in this post. I think it's a great deal, tbh. I'm currently a satisfied client.

For 🕵️ Affiliate Cloaking (masking ugly affiliate links to match your website url), these are my top 3 choices.

1. Betterlinks (Free, Best Value) - Has 3,000+ installs and 12+ ratings (it's a relatively new plugin but gaining popularity), I love the modern look approach this plugin has. The free version is basically all you need for your site. Pro version starts at $49 per year.
2. Pretty Links (Free, Most Popular) - Has 300,000+ installs and 992+ ratings, Pretty Links is by far the most established cloaking plugin for Wordpress. The down side is that you can't categorize your links with the free version as compared to Betterlinks. Pro version starts at $79 per year.
3. Thirsty Affiliates (Free, Popular) - Has 40,000+ installs and 175+ reviews, Thirsty Affiliates is the one with the best value for your money. Pro version starts at $49 per year.

For 📈 SEO (search engine optimization) purposes, you cannot go wrong with these choices:

1. Rank Math (Free, Trending) - Has 1+ million installs and 4k+ reviews, RankMath is a fairly new SEO plugin that has gained popularity this year. I have recently switched from Yoast to RankMath because of its newest (should be patented) AI inclusive writing capability. Pro version starts at $49 per year.
2. Yoast SEO (Free, Most Popular) - Has 5+ million active installs and 27k+ reviews, Yoast is by far the most popular and widely known SEO optimization plugin for WP (perhaps due to its old age - established way back in 2008). Pro version is quite expensive at a cring-worthy $99 per year.
3. SEOPress (Free, Modern Feel) - Has about 200k+ installs and 700+ reviews, SEOPress has a modern look and feel to it. The pro version starts at $39 per year.
4. All-In-One SEO (Free) - Has 3+ million active installs with 2k+ reviews, AIO SEO is another popular plugin worth noting. Pro version starts at $49.50 per year. I don't know what that extra $0.50 is about, but whatever.

For 🌐 Page/Theme Builders, those who do not have design skills or those who simply want to create and design nice content layouts for their posts and pages, I have a few suggestions down below.

1. Elementor (Free, Most Popular) - Elementor is the most popular page builder on WordPress with 5+ million active installs and 6,129+ reviews. Pro version starts at $49 per year. I use this on my sites and enjoy using it everyday. You can create templates which you can use pretty much for everytime you write your posts and it speeds up your writing and formatting on pages, posts, product pages, portfolios, etc.
2. Element Pack Pro (Elementor Add-On) - This is a plugin that adds more features to Elementor and starts at $39 per year, but they also offer a $99 Lifetime Plan which offers lifetime updates and support (which I purchased, of course).
3. WP Avada Template ($60, WP Theme) - I really love the built-in page builder of the Avada Theme which you can buy at Themeforest. You not only have a WP theme, but a page builder built into it already. The load time is pretty quick which is what you want in a website, so I would say it's a good deal. I personally use this theme in one of my websites and absolutely love it! You can edit from the backend or frontend - so versatile!

For 📧 Email Newsletters, you can go from the simplest to the most sophisticated ones. However, if you're just starting out, it is always a good idea to start with the simplest and most affordable ones (like free 99 - get it?). I have to say that a lot of these services have some learning curve especially if you are new to email marketing.

1. Mailchimp (Free, Best for Starters) - I personally still use Mailchimp for basic newsletters. However, if you're looking to utilize affiliate links in your newletters, do not use Mailchimp. The monkey will be angry and ban you from using its service. In short, no affiliate links allowed.
2. Hubspot (Free, Best for Budding Businesses) - Another product I love to use is HubSpot because of the many features they offer. I am a fairly frequent visitor of their blog and academy. At 1K+ contacts, you will start paying $18 so my main tip here is if your contacts are robust and actual leads that you know are true buyers, then this might be a great tool for you. Otherwise, you should just take advantage of the free ones such as MailChimp. However, the free tools are actually pretty good such as live chat, ticketing, and email scheduling.
3. Mailpoet (Free, Best for WooCommerce Stores) - It's an open-sourced newsletter service provider that integrates seamlessly with WooCommerce, so if you have a store then this may be the Romeo and Juliet of them all.
4. Flodesk ($38/mo, Best for Service-Based Businesses & Creatives) - This is my dream newsletter service provider due to the nature of my primary business which is service-based and creative. Their templates are minimalistic and modern; I would phrase it as Email Marketing 2.0.

For 🛒 Shopping/Commerce if you plan to sell or need to sell at your website, these are my top choices. As an affiliate marketer, all of these are highly applicable too!

1. WooCommerce (Free, Most Popular) - Ah, the Swiss Army Knife of every WordPress website, don't you think? It has the full functionality of an ecommerce store at the free level.
2. StudioCart ($19/mo, Best Deal for Funnel Marketing) - Again, this one is a fairly new and budding funnel cart ideal for sellers who are service-based or those selling digitial goods such as online courses, memberships, ebooks, etc. It sort of caters to female creatives due to the theme it projects on its site, but obviously is usable by anyone.
3. WooFunnels ($179/yr, Funnel Builder) - If you are more akin to using a more robust funnel builder (at the cost of yes, a heftier price), then WooFunnels is your best bet. It works pretty much like Studiocart but offers more features and is well-developed.

So there you have it. This is not a comprehensive list, but rather my personal choices when it comes to the above-mentioned WP features. Feel free to add in to the conversation below if you have other choices that you think are better or worth noting. Let me know what you think!