Category Archives: Plugins

Tools for bloggers: a new store option and two handy WordPress plugins

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New services and tools created especially for bloggers are important to know about; you might not always find them useful to your own needs or have the time to put them in place (and I hear you on that one!) but being aware of what’s out there can help you spot valuable opportunities. This applies not only to money, but to page views, visitors, page ranks, search engines, and reader experience, among others.

So what’s new currently?

An interesting new offering is Zlio. It’s basically a shop you can integrate with your blog. Yes, there’s already a similar service over at Amazon, but that’s pretty much it. It never hurts to have a little competition, it only makes things better — at least for us, the consumers.

What’s so special about Zlio? First of all, it’s really quick. You can literally have a store up and running within few minutes. Of course, you can also customize it to fit the blog’s look, which would take some extra time; I’d recommend doing it if you plan on running the store long term, but it’s very handy to just get started right away (especially if you’re just testing the concept). Like Amazon, you can choose to add millions of products to your store. If your blog is about… say… biking, you can have books on that topic, and even sell technical stuff that you personally use, like a specific bike component or jersey. If you have more than one blog, not unusual for power users, you can create several shops with different products using the same account. Very handy.

New WordPress Plugins

Ultimate Category Excluder is a WordPress plugin that allows you to quickly and easily exclude categories from your front page, archives, and feeds. Just select which categories you want to be excluded, and UCE does all the work for you!

“Deep Thoughts” Random Quote Widget is the widgetized version of Random Quote. Extra stuff can sometimes add a lot of style and feeling to a blog, so carefully chosen random functions and widgets like this one can be really amusing for your readers. I know I enjoy something smart or wise now and then, as an addition to the enjoyable post in a good blog.

WordPress plugin and theme releases

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Always as exciting when new plugins are released for WP, isn’t it? New functions that can make the look of your dear baby smoother. Yes, blogging is more than a cold site, it’s your own site that you take care of. You feed it, you update it, you gain from it. Your baby.

So what’s out there this time?

Plugins

Let’s begin with some handy plugins. Add Related Posts to Your Feed is something I’ve seen in some sites already and really like it. New readers arrive all the time and few take the time to read everything previously written. They just enjoy the current ride. That’s why by adding related posts to the feed of a new one can help readers notice older posts and you get more page-views. It requires Ultimate Tag Warrior though, so make sure to install it before.

For you that want to get some extra income through all possible ways, there’s AdSense Attachment. It works like this: if you have images in your posts that are “linked to page”, they’ll be shown with ads around them when clicked. Great for blogs that mainly compile and add information from the net.

If you don’t like tabs in your admin interface, try Tab-U-Later that ought to eliminate those.

Themes

Two themes are also floating around. The first one is Reality tales, a light colored, 2 column graphical theme, with clean coding by Ekta Paneri. If you’re interested in my personal opinion, it’s a beautiful theme. A blog should be thin, clean and different, which “Reality tales” is.

The next one is called Green Grass, a two column theme featuring green grass in the header. Nothing very new, nothing very special, still very nice. It has a great color-theme and font. Very clean as well.

So that’s about all, the new updates of WordPress. Pick your favorites and implement them—it will certainly freshen up the site.

Back up your WordPress blog automatically

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Backing up our work is one of those things that we all kind of know we should do, but mostly don’t get around to doing. Well, if you use WordPress, you’re in luck. There are two plugins that will make the process much easier.

The first plugin is WP-DB-Backup, a handy utility that comes packaged with new versions of WordPress. Once this plugin is installed and activated, it just takes a click to back up your WordPress database (the core of your blog), either to the server, or via email. This is extremely handy.

But what if you can’t be bothered (like me) to remember to go click the button? It’s your lucky day again. The same author (Scott Merrill) has also released a plugin called WP-Cron. Once you’ve installed and activated this plugin, you get a new option on your backup page to have your database emailed to you daily.

These two plugins are literally the first two to get activated when I install a new blog because they’ve saved my bacon in the past. I have all of these backups being sent to my Gmail account, where I have a filter set up to automatically file them for me. I never see them, except when something goes wrong, at which point they’re right there waiting for me.

If you have any questions about these plugins or installing them, please feel free to leave a comment and I’ll do my best to help!

Nine of my favorite WordPress plugins

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Update: Since this post was originally published in August 2006, my list has changed and expanded somewhat. See the most current list of plugins we include every time we install a blog.

Essentials

These are the first three plugins I set up whenever I’m installing a new WordPress blog. They are the plugins that save my tail when things go wrong, so while they’re not as flashy as some of the other plugins, they get first priority.

Akismet: Any blog owner who’s suffered through a comment/trackback spam-fest without adequate protection will appreciate the value of this plugin. Akismet uses a central server and data from a huge pool of bloggers to identify spam (with amazing accuracy) so you don’t have to wade through it. This plugin comes pre-packaged with the most recent versions of WordPress.

WordPress Database Backup: I keep current copies of most of my website files on my development computer, but unlike templates and core files, the databases are always changing. The Database Backup plugin helps me stay current by giving me the option to download or receive via email a current copy of all of my database info. Most useful when used in conjunction with the next plugin! This plugin comes pre-packaged with the most recent versions of WordPress.

WP-Cron: This plugin takes WordPress Database Backup from a good intention to a life-saver. I believe it’s from the same author, and it integrates perfectly to provide time-based commands; in this case, you can set a time interval (I do “one day”) at which the database will be backed up. I use this plugin to send each and every one of my blog databases to my Gmail account daily. If ever something goes terribly wrong, I have a copy of all of my data that’s guaranteed to be no more than a day old.

User navigation

These two plugins make it easier for visitors to use the blog and find entries that are relevant to them. That’s always a good thing!

Search Everything: Some blogs won’t need this, but if you have a blog that has a good selection of articles or other content-filled Pages, you need this plugin to provide the best search results to your readers. By default, WordPress just searches Posts and excludes Pages. This plugin includes Pages in search results, making more of your good information readily accessible.

Related Entries: This plugin makes your blog “stickier”; when someone takes the time to read through your post, the plugin show them other similiar posts they might find interesting. Since the recommendations are based on similarity, a site with a lot of good content could inspire a reader to keep clicking and reading all afternoon, all on a topic of interest.

Behind-the-scenes improvements

The blog’s visitors may never realize the existance of these plugins, but they are very important to me in fine-tuning the blog and its content.

Feedburner Feed Replacement: I love the statistics and user-friendly interface that Feedburner provides. This plugin takes the default WordPress feeds and routes them to your Feedburner feed, giving you a more complete picture of usage (it’s easier to track when it’s all going through one gateway). It also helps clear up “feed confusion” among readers by providing a human-readable, friendly explanation of what’s going on.

Search Meter: This plugin sits alongside the Dashboard and provides information on what your visitors have searched for (within your blog). This is useful for two reasons. First, you can form a better understanding of your visitors when you know why they came to you. Second, you can get great ideas for future posts by knowing what your visitors expected to find but didn’t. Those are great opportunities.

Pretty

These plugins make it easier to run a pretty blog. They both automate aspects of the blog’s presentation, aspects that used to have to be managed by hand. This saves a lot of time and encourages blog owners to use features that otherwise might be too much effort to maintain.

Sidebar Widgets: Widgets are an easier way of handling sidebar content. Instead of hand-editing the code to show some specific bit of info, you just drag-and-drop your content to your sidebar (in the admin panel). There is some room for improvement within Widgets, but it has made it far easier to keep the blog periphery current.

Headline Images: Sometimes, you just need a certain font. Since you can’t count on everyone having the font you want to use, an image replacement is your best bet. This plugin lets you dynamically create a graphic version of text from any TTF. This can definitely be overused but is a very nice (and easy!) touch when used in moderation.

This post was partially inspired by the similar list at M and L Adventures. There are several plugins on that list that I haven’t tried, and therefore can’t recommend, but I’m looking forward to getting started with them.