The WordPress user community is always abuzz with the news of the latest updates, upgrades or new plugins that are being released on an almost daily basis to cater for the diverse needs of online marketers.
Being in the know about the cool new plugins just out of beta and what’s the right fit for your WordPress website goes a long way in helping you to stay on top of your game because you’ll be far ahead of your peers in securing, optimizing and supercharging your website or blog before they even get wind of what’s going on.
Almost every day new or updated plugins are published at wordpress.com and it’s to your advantage if you stay in the loop of what’s new and what’s trending. But, to make your life a lot easier this year –here are the top 10 free WordPress plugins for 2014 that are worth a second glance. Please review and let me hear your thoughts in the comments below. Cheers!
1. Rename wp-login.php
Here is a must have plugin if you are concerned about the security of your WordPress website or blog. Rename wp-login.php is the plugin that you can trust to keep out hackers who usually target the wp-login file. This plugin can intercept requests made to the login page and prevent direct access to the wp-login.php file. In addition, it also allows you to rename your login page or URL structure without compromising the core WordPress system files
2. All-in-One WP Migration
Migrating a fully functional WordPress site to another host or server can be a daunting task if you are not a WordPress guru. Well, you don’t have to worry about that now because the All-in-One WP Migration plugin saves you the trouble of having to manually download, transfer and setup a replica site on another server. With just a few mouse clicks, you can easily export your entire site into a single archive, for instance a zip file which you can later import into the new host. Better still, this plugin allows you the convenience to specify exactly what you want to export or replace. Migrating WordPress website or blog has never been easier.
3. WP Fastest Cache
All your SEO, content and social media marketing amounts to nothing if your site takes an eternity to load because your prospects are likely to switch to another website instead of waiting to read your inaccessible web content. Enabling cache on site is an innovative way turbo speed up your web pages without overloading the server. Among the different caching plugins that I have tested so far, the WP Fastest Cache plugin is my favorite simply because it’s easy to set up and configure. You can also choose to disable caching for mobile browsers.
4. WordPress Calls-to-Action
It’s very hard to achieve any tangible goal with your site without clear and concise CTAs to direct your prospects to exactly what you want them to do. Great CTAs do not only help you achieve your set goals such as increasing conversion rates or generating new leads, but, also allow to measure the success of your marketing effort. With the WordPress Calls-to-Action plugin, you can do all that plus so much more. For instance, you can even run split tests on each of your CTAs to discover hidden trends or customer behavior.
5. WordPress SEO by Yoast
This is one of the best WordPress SEO plugins judging by the raving user reviews and rating. With its friendly user interface, ease-of-use and incredible features, WordPress SEO by Yoast is a must have if want to optimize your website or blog for search engines. You can manage virtually every aspect of your SEO strategy with this plugin including generating XML Sitemaps
6. WP Google Drive
Having plugins that you can use to back up your WordPress website can save you lots time and money when disaster strikes. However, you will feel much safer if you can backup to your google drive that you can access from anywhere. WP Google Drive is the magic wand that helps you backup your WordPress site including databases to the Google cloud seamlessly without too much tinkering.
7. Shareaholic
If you are into social media marketing, Shareaholic is the plugin that you certainly can’t do without. This plugin gives you a single platform from which you can share your web content to various social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google+. Plus, it allows you to add custom sharing buttons to make posts stand out.
8. JM Twitter Cards
Since their introduction, Twitter Cards have taken the online marketing industry by storm because now people can embed multimedia content into their tweets just like Facebook or Google+. JM Twitter Cards is the plugin that allows you to integrate Twitter into your WordPress site –so now you can publish your graphics or video blog posts on twitter for maximum engagement
9. Google Publisher Plugin
You need to try out this plugin if you are using Google products for SEO, affiliate marketing or just routine webmaster tasks. The Google Publisher plugin allows you access to various Google products such as AdSense, Analytics and Webmaster Tools for within your WordPress Dashboard. In addition, you can use this plugin for a one click verification of your website with Webmaster Tools or Google Analytics
10. Akismet
The Akismet plugin is all you need if don’t want those annoying spammers from filling your site with irrelevant content. You simply install Akismet and forget about comment moderation because it will automatically filter out spam comments for you. You are also free to review the comments classified as spam by Akismet for moderation error but rarely happens.
WordPress is a fantastic platform for business websites. If its time you tried WordPress for your business ask us about our WordPress Packages starting at $900!
