12 of the Best Social WordPress Plugins
I have used WordPress to develop multiple sites and have found that there seems to be a plugin for almost anything you can think of. Having spent hours searching the web for the most useful plugins out there, I have come across some gems. However, instead of just list a bunch of plugins that I think every WordPress site should have, I decided to brake them up into categories. This particular post relates to the best social WordPress plugins available (at least that I have came across so far). And by social, I mean plugins that will allow and ask your readers interact with with the site and keep up to date about what is going on there. If you see any missing below that you have come across and found useful, please share by commenting below. If screenshots were available with the plugin, I used those. If not, I created my own real quick so you could see how they are used.
blippr
From wordpress.org:
Enhance your blog with ratings and reviews from blippr.com. Simply install the plugin and your content will automatically be scanned and enriched with the blippr plugin (don’t worry, we don’t change your actual posts – you can turn it off at any time by disabling the plugin).
Example:
digg digg
From wordpress.org:
Integrate “Digg”,”Reddit”,”dZone”,”Yahoo Buzz”,”TweetMeme(twitter)”, “fbshare(facebook)” and “Polladium” Into WordPress Content
Example:
disqus comment system
From wordpress.org:
Disqus, pronounced “discuss”, is a service and tool for web comments and discussions. The Disqus comment system can be plugged into any website, blog, or application. Disqus makes commenting easier and more interactive, while connecting websites and commenters across a thriving discussion community.
Example:
microkid’s related posts
From wordpress.org:
This plugin makes it super easy to manually select related posts. You can search and select posts that fit your criteria, all from within the write/edit post screen.
Example:
referrer detector
From wordpress.org:
This plugin displays a greeting message to visitors that come from different urls (known as referrers). For example, you may want to welcome Diggers with a message that reminds them to digg your story, or you may want to ask Del.icio.us users to bookmark your post, and so on.
Not only about a cool greeting box, it greatly helps to more efficiently interacts with your readers and build a better relationship between you (your website) and them.
Example:
sexybookmarks
From wordpress.org:
Though the name may be a little “edgy” for some, SexyBookmarks has proven time and time again to be an extremely useful and successful tool in getting your readers to actually submit your articles to numerous social bookmarking sites. Our sole aim was to stray away from the “in the box” thinking behind most social bookmarking plugins, and add a little flair that would entice your readers, rather than deterring them with microscopic icons that get lost in pages heavy laden with content.
Example:
subscribe2
From wordpress.org:
Subscribe2 provides a comprehensive subscription management and email notification system for WordPress blogs that sends email notifications to a list of subscribers when you publish new content to your blog.
Example:
twitter widget
From wordpress.org:
Adds a sidebar widget to display Twitter updates (uses the Javascript Twitter ‘badge’)
Example:
wp cumulus
From wordpress.org:
WP-Cumulus allows you to display your site’s tags, categories or both using a Flash movie that rotates them in 3D. It works just like a regular tags cloud, but is more visually exciting. Clicking the tags can be a little hard (depending on your speed setting) but does take you to the appropriate page :).
Example:
wordpress 2 ping.fm
From wordpress.org:
Links and integrate your WordPress account to Ping.fm. Once linked, the plugin will update all your social networks every time you publish a post. You can customize the look of your pings, send custom pings, and set rules for which posts you want to notify your social networks about. This is la creme de la creme of social network plugins, created by people who just happen to specialize in communication and social networks. You will need a Ping.fm account and an application key to use this plugin, which you can get for free at http://ping.fm
Example:
wp-email
From lesterchan.net:
Allows people to recommend/send your WordPress blog’s post/page to a friend.
Example:
newsletter or wp email capture
Both of these plugins allow you to capture email addresses and then to send out newsletters to those who sign up. I currently use newsletter, but both have their benefits. It would be nice to combine the two! Visit each of the links above to see more details about them.
Example:
Best Web Hosting for WordPress
If you know even a little about me or take a quick look at the sites I have developed, you will quickly notice that I build most my websites on the WordPress platform. Many use WordPress just for blogging, but I have found it to be a simple, yet powerful content management system with near endless possibilities.
Because I build so many sites using WordPress, I have had to learn what kind of server is required to run it and how to set them up quickly. So if you are looking to build a WordPress site and are wondering where the best place to host it is… you actually have a lot of options. Basically, you want to host in on a Linux server with a host that uses cPanel as their back end control panel.
Although you have many choices when is comes to choosing the best company to host your WordPress site, let me tell you what has worked extremely well for me. I use a company called HostGator to hosts my sites. Their ‘Baby’ package has met my needs so far and I actually host most of my domains under that one account. I do not actually use HostGator to purchase or manage my domains, I use GoDaddy to do that. I then make sure I sign up for the Linux plan (not the Windows plan) and I am good to go. Out of the couple of hosting providers I have worked with in the past, HostGator has been the fastest when it comes to processing requests. I can point my domain name system (DNS) settings to HostGator and almost immediately login to my control panel and configure the domain and start publishing content.
The reason I like using cPanel as the control panel for the back end is because it allows me to use a service called Fantastico where I can install WordPress, database and all, with just a couple of clicks. It is not too difficult to install WordPress manually either, but this saves me a lot of time.
Still have questions or would like to talk more about this? You can contact me here or leave a comment below.
