One of my goals last week was to add more more plugins to The Sensible Mom to make it easier for everyone to use. This has been a long time coming. I have procrastinated adding more plugins for functionality to The Sensible Mom for way too long, and I finally took the plugin plunge and added many that I’ve never used before. All of these plugins are reliable, relatively easy to use, and highly recommended (which is very important when it comes to searching for plugins – not all plugins are created equal).
Most of the plugins that I added are fabulously free! But there are a couple that do cost money. These are known as Premium plugins. I purchased the PluginBuddy Developer Suite because of the great plugins that they offer for both bloggers and WordPress blog designers. As a WordPress blog designer, I thought the best bang for my buck would come from the PluginBuddy Developer Suite. It includes all of the PluginBuddy plugins plus I can use it for my client sites. That’s a major plus.
The most exciting plugin in the suite for me is, BackupBuddy. Not only can I back up my own blog with this plugin, but it’s going to shave a lot of TIME off of transferring a client’s site from my testing area to their actual domain and web host. This was a MAJOR factor in choosing to purchase the PluginBuddy Developer’s suite. Another bonus was that I got to use a coupon code to bring the total for the suite down to only $110 from the regular price of $197. π And I used recent blog design earnings to buy the suite.
Now for the actual plugins that I added….
Free WordPress Plugins:
Comment Luv – displays a commenter’s last post from their blog (I love commenting on blogs with this plugin installed)
All in one SEO Pack – great for search engine optimization
Print Friendly and PDF – adds a button to the bottom of your posts that allows readers to easily print your content
Subscribe to Comments – allows readers to subscribe to individual post comments and helps to keep the conversation going on your blog
Share This – allows readers to quickly share your posts with others via social networks and email
WP Security Scan – helps to make sure your blog is secure and lets you know if your blog is vulnerable to a security breach
Premium WordPress Plugin$:
PluginBuddy Mobile – for viewing your website on mobile devices (the huge plus with this plugin is that you can customize how your website shows up on different devices, such as the ipod, ipad, android, iphone, etc…)
Backup Buddy – backs up your pages, posts, theme, etc… and it’s also a very useful tool for WordPress designers to have in their toolbox
These are not all the plugins that I use on my site, but they are the newest. I’m hoping to write more posts in the future to get into the details of these plugins and breakdown further their benefits.
If you are new to WordPress and don’t know how to add plugins, just head to your WordPress Dashboard and go to “Plugins” then click on “Add New” and search for your desired plugin. Once you find the plugin you want, click on “Install Now”, then click “Activate.” After you’ve activated the plugin, see if there are any settings you need to change in order to get the plugin enabled and working on your blog. This part is usually pretty easy, too.
Are there any plugins you can add to this list that you find particularly useful?
Sandra…is the “Share This” plug in the same one that is included in word press already? I found it among the widgets when I first started my blog.
Hi Erin,
I’m not sure if it’s the same plugin or not because in my WordPress install, it didn’t start out in the widgets area. My guess is that it probably is not the same.
You can find info about the ShareThis plugin I installed here: http://help.sharethis.com/integration/wordpress
You can actually install the plugin via your WordPress Dashboard in the plugins area. π
I have a question, I have been searching for a plugin that will automatically put my posts on Facebook and/or Twitter..I used to have this option when I was doing a free wordpress site, but now that I have switched over to wordpress.org I can’t seem to find that option. Would you know if there is a plugin for it? Thanks!
Tiffany,
You can use twitter feed to post your blog post onto facebook. I am sure it will work with twitter too. But I don’t have a twitter account yet. I was using it for all my posts but I decied to just post them each myself. But the twitter feed worked for me.
http://www.twitterfeed.com
Thanks for chiming in and answering Tiffany’s question, Shelly! π
I personally manually post all of my posts to facebook and twitter to try to keep them from getting “lost” amidst so many updates.