Great WordPress Plugins Every Blogger Should Have

For a new blogger, the world of WordPress is a confusing one. There is so much to learn, so many new techniques and features for you to master. You have to figure out how to put up attractive posts, how to pull visitors to your site, how to make sure your page doesn’t take too long to load, and so many other little things. But perhaps the most bewildering part of owning a new blog is to make sense of which plug-ins to install.

While some plug-ins are nothing but a waste of space and can serve to slow down your blog, others are extremely useful and can help you in ways you did not think possible. Since its quite a dilemma to choose among so many WordPress plug-ins available freely, we have for you a list of eight of the best plug-ins a new blog cannot do without.

1. Add This

Boost your blog’s reach in social networking circles with this plug-in that will help you get new visitors to your blog by the hundreds. Add This lets you and your current viewers share your posts in over 330 social media networks. This small, barely noticeable plug-in can increase your blog’s popularity manifold.

2. Anti-spam Bee

WordPress.com users are generally well protected from spam, but WordPress.org users are not so lucky, they have to fend off tons of spam comments every day, or run the risk of having their blog flooded by spammers. Anti spam Bee helps prevent this by identifying spam comments accurately and heading them off to one folder, where you can just delete them all with one click.

3. All in One SEO

This plug-in automatically optimizes your blog to appear in search engines. Once you write a post, you have to provide this plug-in a custom title, custom description, and some keywords, keeping to a word limit of 160 words per description. The plug-in will ensure that your blog is visible in any search results for such keywords as you have provided.

4. WP Touch

If most of your visitors view your site from their smartphones, then going for WP Touch may be a good choice for you. This plug-in gives your blog an application like theme, with ajax and all other mobile features, that make it very easy for your readers to access your blog from their smartphone.

5. Slick Social Share

This plug-in makes it very easy for your blog to be shared on various social networks such as Stumble Upon, Reddit, Delicious, Pinterest, and of course Twitter, Google Plus, and Facebook. Viewers simply have to click on the share button on the blog itself. Not only that, Slick Social Share also provides you with detailed information regarding social sharing.

6. WordPress Database Backup

Taking backup is something you can ignore only at your own peril. If you do not take regular backup of your blog, you run the risk of losing all your data in the case of a virus attack or an ambush by hackers. This plug-in takes backup of all your posts and other information on your blog in a regular manner, without having to be reminded.

7. WP Copy Protect

What could be more irritating than having another blog copy from your posts word for word without mentioning you as a source? Not only is it plain stealing, it is also harms your blog because you do not get due credit and hence lose out on the potential additional traffic. WP Copy Protect Plug-in ensures that people are not able to select and copy chunks of text from your blog.

8. Google XML Sitemap

Enable search engines to find your blog quickly with Google XML Sitemap plug-in, that creates an XML sitemap of the blog, allowing search engines like Yahoo and Google to locate your blog with ease.