May 25th, 2007 in Featured, Technology

Top Wordpress Plugins for the Smart Blogger

If you’re a blogger, then you probably know about the power of the Wordpress platform. Straight out of the box, Wordpress is one of the best solutions for blogging. It has a number of SEO benefits built straight into the software. However, the smart blogger knows how to optimize Wordpress for even further performance using plugins. Here is a list of plugins that the A-list bloggers are using.

Akismet - If you run a blog, then you need this plugin.Fortunately, it comes preinstalled with Wordpress. Popular blogs get hundreds of spam comments every day. Akismet helps eliminate this problem. Don’t waste your time deleting spam comments. Akismet will automate the entire process with ease by running hundreds of tests on your comments, trackbacks, and pingbacks to ensure their validity.
Bad Behaviour - This plugin isn’t as well known as the others but it should definetly be on your list. Bad Behaviour denies automated spambots access to your PHP-based Web site. This plugin complements Akismet by preventing spammers from ever delivering their junk in the first place.
Digg This - This plugin automatically adds a Digg story link whenever it detects incoming links from Digg.com. This is an excellent way to promote your articles on one of the most popular social bookmarking sites around.
Show Top Commentators - If you are looking for a way to increase your comments and the interaction among your readership, this plugin is an excellent choice. Show Top Commentators encourages discussion by rewarding readers for making a comment. The top commentators are displayed in the sidebar with the number of comments they have made and a link back to their website.
Related Posts - This plugin will find other blog posts that are related to the current post based on keyword matching. You can then display the related posts at the bottom of each article. This is an excellent way to keep visitors at your site for longer periods of time. Customize this plugin to display as many or as few related posts as you desire.
Adsense Deluxe - If you run adsense on your blog, then this is the number one plugin to implement. Adsense Deluxe allows you to automatically insert Google Adsense with ease.
WP-Cache - This plugin is an extremely efficient page caching system that will make your site much faster and responsive. This plugin is very useful for handling sudden bursts of traffic coming from social bookmarking sites like Digg and Slashdot. WP-Cache basically creates static versions of your pages so that they can be served to your visitors without querying the MySQL database.
Feedburner Feed Replacement - This popular plugin was recently adopted by Feedburner and renamed “FeedSmith” . This plugin forwards all of your feed traffic to Feedburner. FeedSmith often causes an elusive “bump in subscribers” when you first activate it because it will detect all ways to access your feed. Readers coming from http://www.yoursite.com/feed/ or http://www.yoursite.com/wp-rss2.php will both be redirected to your FeedBurner feed so that you can accurately track your subscriber base.
Ultimate Tag Warrior - This is the best tag system for WordPress. Ultimate Tag Warrior will help you pick up more traffic from Technorati and adds a number of SEO benefits to your blog.
Google Sitemaps - This plugin will automatically create a Google compliant sitemap of your Wordpress blog to ensure that all of your pages are indexed in Google. This is one plugin you definitely don’t want to be without.
Wordpress Dulplicate Content Cure - this plugin will eliminate any worries you might have about duplicate content. The Wordpress Duplicate Content Cure prevents search engines from indexing Wordpress pages that contain duplicate content. This includes archives and category pages.
Popularity Contest - This plugin allows you to show off your most popular posts in the sidebar of your Wordpress blogs.
SEO Title Tag - Title tags are one of the most important on-page factors for search engine optimization. This plugin allows you to optimize your title tag for optimum traffic.
WP-ContactForm - If you’re looking to avoid email spam, then this is the plugin for you. This plugin allows people to contact you without actually emailing you.
Wordpress Database Backup - Talk about a lifesaver. This plugin comes installed with Wordpress, providing an easy way to backup your Wordpress database. You can download the backup file or have it emailed to the address of your choice.

If you know of other great Wordpress plugins, feel free to share them in the comments.

Kim Roach is a productivity junkie who blogs regularly atThe Optimized Life. Read her articles on 50 EssentialGTD Resources, How to Have a 46 Hour Day, Do You Need
a Braindump, What They Don’t Teach You in School, and Free Yourself From the Inbox.

WRITER'S BIOGRAPHY

KimRoach

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Comments

AndyCast Andy says on May 25th, 2007 at 11:42 am

Hi Kim,

Excellent selection of plugins..there are a couple I need to seriously add to all my WP sites.

One additional one I’d suggest for anyone wanting to add video or MP3’s to their site would be PodPress. (http://www.mightyseek.com/podpress/)

Targeted primarily for podcaster, the plugin would be useful to any one wanting to add multimedia files to their blog posts.

Definitely worth consideration.

Excellent post, I’ve been looking for something like this for awhile.

Andy Bilodeau
Sean says on May 25th, 2007 at 12:25 pm

good list of plugins…i already run most of them, what i would like to see is a list of wordpress mu plugins for a site i run
Techie Buzz says on May 25th, 2007 at 2:54 pm

I too use almost all the plugins from the list. I will try out the Bad Behaviour and Duplicate content cure too.

I have created a plugin called Better Tools Management that allows users to reply to comments from the admin screen itself.

It also allows you to sort comments based on post.

You can check on more info at Better comments manager
Techie Buzz says on May 25th, 2007 at 2:59 pm

I too use almost all the plugins from the list. I will try out the few of those which I am not using yet

I have created a plugin called Better Tools Management that allows users to reply to comments from the admin screen itself.

It also allows you to sort comments based on post. You can check on more info at site.
rruben says on May 25th, 2007 at 3:57 pm

Thanks, good plugins
dangross says on May 25th, 2007 at 4:47 pm

This incredibly useful for a bright-eyed, bushy-tailed newbie like me. Thanks for sharing the love!
ali jabbari says on May 25th, 2007 at 5:09 pm

not complete.
Jaan says on May 25th, 2007 at 5:36 pm

What about Adsense Injection? I believe it should definitely be on that list. Increases CTR by randomly injecting ads into posts.
Timothy Flanagan says on May 28th, 2007 at 10:20 pm

Wow! This is just what we need. Our site is enjoying good traffic, but it’s flattened out even as we make the content deeper and richer. I just know we could serve visitors better with some of these, particularly Related Posts and Popularity Contest. Thanks!
jared says on May 29th, 2007 at 12:44 pm

This is a total newbie question.

Where is my plugin tab?

Are these only for self hosted sites?

I have a page hosted by Wordpress.
Shane says on June 4th, 2007 at 10:47 am

good list
Mario_uz says on June 11th, 2007 at 11:28 am

At last…
*
Blogmunch says on July 16th, 2007 at 9:37 pm

I too have a blog hosted at wordpress.com…how do i install these great plugins?

Thanks
Zach says on July 25th, 2007 at 9:46 am

If you have a wordpress hosted blog you can not add plugins.

Zach
T. Rockmann says on August 2nd, 2007 at 6:23 pm

Thanks for this list, what a huge timesaver for helping us get our blogs up to speed. I especially like the WP-Contactform for helping us reduce SPAM.

If anyone has a plugin for “Related articles” that would allow me to manually choose articles that go with a post, that would be a great help. I have found the automated ones to be less than accurate for my site.

Thanks again,

Terry
http://www.manazoo.com
shanpyaebo says on August 13th, 2007 at 3:52 am

Please surf my blog and advice me how to improve my blog.
Arstan says on August 26th, 2007 at 2:21 am

Thanks for the great plugin list!
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Mirror Blog says on November 8th, 2007 at 9:27 am

Mirror Blog is an application that integrates your existing blog into facebook. It archieves that by mirroring your existing into your facebook account.
Mirror Blog is a fully functioned blog writer. You can do blogging without leaving facebook.

The Mirror Blog supports all blogs powered by WordPress, including blogs hosted on wordpress.com. The setup is easy and you don’t need to change anything on your blog host.

Here is the Mirror Blog application URL:
http://apps.facebook.com/mirrorblog/
Bayanlara Ozel Ne Varsa says on November 17th, 2007 at 5:56 pm

This plugin allows you to show off your most popular posts in the sidebar of your Wordpress blogs.
Amanda says on November 23rd, 2007 at 2:35 pm

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Dean Saliba says on January 5th, 2008 at 5:49 pm

This is a great list I found a lot of new plugins now for my blog.
Charles Forster says on January 17th, 2008 at 10:59 am

Thank you so much for this list!
I’m implimenting many of these on my blog which is still in its infancy.
mike says on February 15th, 2008 at 1:52 am

dont forget:
Wordpress Auto Upgrade!
http://wordpress.org/extend/pl.....c-upgrade/
Sapan Bhatt says on March 7th, 2008 at 2:37 am

hi..

I am getting how to use the code. I have blogger’s blog and it wont allow me to add any .php thing in to its template. Again you said in the beginning that Worpress have these facility and you have given this codes for Blogger but I dont think any of the code is useful for Blogger. If yes let me know.

Thanks,
manele says on March 8th, 2008 at 7:16 am

Thank you so much for this list!
Richard Schieck says on May 6th, 2008 at 1:28 pm

Hi Kim,

I was just checking out your “top Wordpress Plugins for the Smart Blogger” post and think they should all be very helpful.

One question. Are you implementing any of the spam blocking ones? If so, which ones? They seem to not be working very well as I have noticed what appear to be commercially based comments.

Such as, a number of comments with tags for “Penis Enlargement”, “Hair removal”, “Viagra” and many more similar type comments.

I am going to assume that these are not the type of comments that you want to be displaying, but if I am wrong and you do, then please forgive me.

I am just curious as to the spam blocking plugins you use. Maybe there is some incompatibilities when multiple ones are implemented.

Please let me know at either my email address, steffsdad@rogers.com, or in a reply to this comment.

Thanks, Richard.
Emily says on June 13th, 2008 at 5:49 am

Thank you for your list.

One of my favourite plugin is DivvaFlip.

DivvaFlip makes photos gallery more glamorous with a flipping engine

Just try DivvaFlip, a page flipping engine, with a very easy
backoffice in AJAX and working with WordPress 2.3 and 2.5 !

Have a glance to the demo here http://www.divva-plugins.com/
enjoy!
Padma Lakshmi says on June 18th, 2008 at 12:04 pm

Hey!…I Googled for books of india, but found your page about dpress Plugins for the Smart Blogger - Stepcase Lifehack…and have to say thanks. nice read.
mike says on June 22nd, 2008 at 12:32 pm

thanks but the list is not complete.