Plugins are technically one of the most important tools for increasing features and functionality to a WordPress website without getting into a hectic coding thing. They make the maintenance of your website a hell lot of easier and can add several exciting features.
But with the plethora of plugins available online, a beginner may find it very hard to choose plugins for his WordPress website as not all plugins act similarly and are not good as others. Although the niche of your website mostly determines what plugins you should have on your WordPress website, there are some universal plugins that every website needs.
So, today, I will be telling you guys about 9 best plugins for beginners that one must have on your website irrespective of the niche to make it worth your time.
Without wasting any more time, let’s roll out the list of best WordPress plugins for your website. These nine WordPress plugins are useful for every blogger and webmaster on the WordPress platform.
Table of Contents
1. Yoast SEO
Ever thought how different search engines like Google rank websites? Well, there are a lot of factors affecting that but the most important one is Keywords. Keywords are a single word or a phrase of words that attributes the niche of your website.
That means Google ranks your website by checking the number of words that match the user’s query. This task is very difficult to maintain but Yoast SEO makes it easier by suggesting to you the words which should be added to your post turning up your rank better in the search results.
It tells you about the words which users are searching most and also suggests many more things to get your WordPress website rank higher.
2. Akismet Anti Spam
Each website has received some sort of unwanted ‘junk’ comments, or better to say spam on their WordPress website. A beginner has to work hard to get rid of them. And here comes the use of the Akismet plugin.
This WordPress plugin helps fend off comment spam and even can delete all the junk comments on its own, saving a lot of time and hard work.
3. Wordfence Security
Having an only strong password is not enough to protect your WordPress website as there are no passwords that can’t be cracked. So what you need in extra to protect your blog? Wordfence Security is the answer.
The security WordPress plugin allows important features like blocking malicious networks, scanning for vulnerabilities, monitoring various metrics that could make your site more prone to attack, or even get hacked. It also sends regular updates regarding the site status to the registered email address.
Their customer service is also good and even help webmasters to get their already hacked websites back.
4. Autoptimize
Different websites open up at different speeds. Some even take several seconds to open and that loses the traffic. A survey tells that most users tend to move on if the opening time is more than 3 seconds.
The HTML coding, CSS, Java Script, and images are responsible for your WordPress website opening time.The bigger file means your browser will have to download more data in order to load the website, leading to a slower web speed.
So it should be like the more you use them, the slower your blog gets? It is where the Autoptimize plugin gets in handy. It reduces the image sizes and compresses JS up to 90% without losing the quality so if the total data of your home page was 3 MB then it can now be reduced to just 500 KB, which makes your website way lot faster.
5. W3 Total Cache
You must have read in school that cache memory speeds up the working capability of CPU by storing basic structural data so that it doesn’t always have to reach primary memory all the time. The same implies here.
The cache is stored data in your browser which contains structural coding and user-specific settings to a particular WordPress website, so the web browser needs even less data to download as the basic coding and settings are already saved offline in your browser, which in turn, reduces the site opening time thereby increasing your Google rank too.
W3 Total Cache can reduce the website loading time by up-to 30%, if used in correct manner. You can always check speed insights of your WordPress website at Google Page Speed.
6. Profile Builder
If you want to make your website more user-friendly then you need visitors to register on your WordPress website as users and access your content easily.
Profile Builder user registration plugin provides you a brilliant way to create stunning registration pages so that website visitors can register, make their profile, edit their data and you can also assign custom user roles like editor, subscriber, etc, to the registered users. Besides, it lets you provide discounts, bonuses, and offers exclusively to the registered users.
7. WP forms
Every WordPress website needs a contact form, a query form, or some other sorts of forms. WP forms plugin lets you create great attractive forms without any effort.
It has a drag and drop form builder which also lets you mark fields as required or not required. I find it the best way to contact your visitors and engage them by allowing them to give feedback about your WordPress website.
8. Jetpack
Another marvelous plugin from the creators of WordPress i.e. Automattic. There is a lot to love about the features provided by Jetpack plugin, making it another must-have WordPress plugin. Features like related posts, picture CDN, known as Photon, site status make it very handy to have.
You can check your site status, update plugins, and much more on a smartphone too, saving a lot of time. This plugin is a must use one fir beginners as it saves people like us from lot of headache.
9. Social Snap
Social bookmarking has become a major ranking factor for SEO in WordPress websites. The best method for getting more shares is placing your social sharing buttons in prominent places.
When readers see these options at the right time, theyre more likely to share your article, increasing your social media influence. Many beginners don’t take social media seriously that causes lesser backlinks and traffic on the website.
Social Snap is by far the best social media sharing plugin. It lets you add sharing buttons on both your desktop and mobile sites with ease.
