Best WordPress Plugins for 2013

There are countless plugins available on WordPress. Whether you’re looking to organize your sidebar, insert a slideshow, or increase your page speed, WordPress plugin developers have got you covered. The variety is amazing, but sometimes it’s difficult to weed through the masses to find the well-crafted, efficient plugins that will make your website shine. So today we’re going to look at the best WordPress plugins for 2013. Suitable for all websites, easy to use, and beneficial to anyone looking to improve their website, these plugins are not only useful, they’re indispensable to a great Wordpress website.

best WordPress plugins

1. Gravity Forms

Developed by the Rocketgenius team, Gravity Forms is a contact form plugin. Simple and intuitive, Gravity Forms lets you build contact forms, multi-page forms, order forms, and more without any programming knowledge whatsoever. Undeniably one of the best WordPress plugins available, Gravity Forms is filled with easy-to-use options. Want users to know how far along they are in the form process? Check the “progress bar.” Need to add extra entry fields? Use the “advanced fields” option to capture more than just a name and a message. Running a contest but only want to accept the first 100 entries submitted? Check the “limit number of entries” box, set your limit, and even add a message for those who didn’t make the cut. Straightforward but versatile, Gravity Forms lets you interact with your audience without complication.

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2. Simple 301 Redirects

Simple 301 Redirects is vital when you need to redirect page requests. Whether you need to send visitors to another page on your website or to another website entirely, developer Scott Nelle can help. Simply enter in the request (ex: /about.htm) and your chosen destination address (ex: http:// www.scottnelle.com), and you’re finished! A truly lightweight plugin, Simple 301 Redirects does exactly what it says it will do: it redirects. That’s why it’s one of the best WordPress plugins around; it knows when to shut up.

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3. WordPress SEO

If you’re looking to increase your traffic through Search Engine Optimization, Yoast’s WordPress SEO Plugin is the perfect plugin for you. Developed by Joost de Valk, the WordPress SEO plugin uses page analysis to help you optimize everything from your page content and image titles to meta descriptions, XML sitemaps, and more. It’s got everything you need in one multi-faceted, convenient program (and truly one of the best WordPress plugins available). Whether your needs are basic or more complex, this plugin will fulfill your every SEO dream. Set templates for titles and meta descriptions, use the snippet preview function to see how your website will appear in a Google search, and test your site for usage of the focus keyword. The options will amaze you, and you’re bound to learn something new about SEO in the process.

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Don’t let the vast array of plugin possibilities overwhelm you. Just check out our choices for the top 3 best WordPress plugins to quickly and easily improve your website. Whether you want to enhance the viewer’s experience or increase your web traffic, these plugins are sure to impress.

To learn more about the best WordPress plugins of 2013, give us a call at 417-413-3340.

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Choosing Keywords For Your Google AdWords Campaign

Google Adwords. The most popular, and powerful, online advertising tool available. If you’ve been on any website, you’ve seen the ads to the side, top, bottom, or even middle of the page. Whereas they can appear spammy when poorly configured (what advertising doesn’t suffer from tackiness when left to amateurs?), it can also be a very effective tool for bringing in more visitors to your website and, ultimately, more business to your company.

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How to Choose Keywords for Your Springfield MO SEO Campaign

Location, location, location! Traditional brick and mortar businesses (those who have physical storefronts for customers to visit) have heard this mantra for decades. You know that you need to be in the right locale, being seen by the right people in order to attract the right kind of attention and increase your customer traffic. Having a great building that is so out of the way that no one will want to take the time to travel to doesn’t help you grow your business. Building in a location that doesn’t fit your target demographic doesn’t help either. In both cases, you’ve simply wasted resources.

It’s the same way on the Internet. Unless you’re an online retailer or disseminator of information, you’ve got to use your physical location to your advantage (even on the web) to avoid wasting resources.

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Crawling Your Way Up Google’s Search Rankings

As a website owner, Google is most likely a topic that comes up again and again when you think about your site. Particularly, you may want to know how to appear prominently in search rankings for topics and keywords related to your website. Throughout the quest for better search rankings, you’ll encounter a plethora of terms—“SEO,” “content marketing,” “back links”—but before diving into this vast ocean of techniques and terms, it helps to know: how exactly does Google come up with its search rankings?

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What is Responsive Web Design?

Responsive Web Design approaches the design and creation of websites with an eye toward providing users with the best possible viewing experience regardless of the device they use.

A responsive website is capable of adjusting its elements to adapt to the screen size on which it is being viewed. This means that regardless of device or browser screen size, the viewer of a responsive website always sees an optimized version of the website, eliminating the need to squint at miniscule text, or to scroll repeatedly to find specific information on a webpage. The outcome is a happier audience and, as claimed by proponents of the responsive approach, improved web analytics.

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What Is SEO and What Can It Do To Grow My Business?

SEO is a common buzzword, and has been for some time. So what is SEO? Why are so many people talking about it? Most importantly, how can it help you grow your business?

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How to Turn Your Website into a Marketing Tool

Building a website is more than just a way to get a business online – it’s merely the first step towards maximizing online exposure, generating traffic and converting online visitors into customers. Either way, the goal here is to use your website to move your business forward.

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How To Do On-Page SEO in Ten Steps

Building a website that meets Google’s Quality Guidelines for Webmasters is more important than ever. Follow these 10 tips below to build a site with proper on-page SEO. Doing so will mean a better user experience for those using your site, and higher domain authority with search engines like Google.

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Google Still Dominates Search (but don’t sleep on Bing)

comScore just released their August 2012 U.S. search engine rankings. You can read their press release here. Google is still the clear market leader with a 66.4% share of the total search market, followed by Bing with 15.9%.

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SEO in a Post-Panda and Post-Penguin Era

In the past couple of years, Google has waged a war on SEO and the people that practice it with two main updates to their algorithm, Penguin and Panda. Why? Two reasons:

  1. People are spamming search engines and it makes it harder for Google to do its job (provide quality, relevant results to searchers).
  2. They want people to spend their money on their pay-per-click advertising services (and not SEO).

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