Best WordPress Plugins: A Quick Round-Up for 2023

How Many of These Plugins Do You Have Already?

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What’s the easiest way to extend the functionality of your WordPress.org website? 

Answer: Plugins.

For the uninitiated, a plugin is a software add-on you can use to add extra features to website platforms like WordPress

WordPress boasts thousands of plugins for users to download and benefit from. You name it – there’s a good chance there’s a plugin that will do the job – website accessibility, performance, security, SEO, etc., the list goes on. 

Do you want to improve your lead generation? Make your website multilingual? Or perhaps you want a plugin that allows you to create an online storefront? You can, of course, go through the thousands of plugins available. However, this is somewhat overwhelming, especially if you donโ€™t know what you want. 

Suppose that sounds like you; never fear. Below we’ve listed some of the best WordPress plugins on the market. 

There’s lots to dig into, so let’s dive straight in!

WooCommerce

Best WordPress Plugins for Ecommerce

Best WordPress Plugins

For the uninitiated, WooCommerce is an eCommerce plugin built using WordPress’s framework. You can create an entire eCommerce store that meets your exact needs using WooCommerce’s impressive suite of in-built eCommerce features. 

At the time of writing, WooCommerce is used by over 3,876,748 online stores, making it the worldโ€™s most popular eCommerce solution. Adding this plugin to your WordPress website only takes a couple of moments. But, thereโ€™s a wealth of benefits from doing so. 

That said, below are some of WooCommerce’s most notable features

  • Slick, responsive, and customizable templates
  • Various payment (Stripe, PayPal, Square, Amazon Pay, etc.) and shipping options
  • You can sell subscription and membership products.
  • Access to an intuitive dashboard
  • Automated tax calculations
  • Live shipping rates
  • A mobile app for iOS and Android devices
  • You can print shipping labels

…to name a few.

As WooCommerce is built using WordPress’s framework, the WooCommerce dashboard boasts a similar, easy-to-use interface. So rest assured, you’ll be able to hit the ground running in next-to-no time – especially if you already have some WordPress experience. 

Best of all, WooCommerce is one of the many free WordPress plugins.

Smart Notification Bar

Best WordPress Plugins for Notification Bars

Best WordPress Plugins

As its name so aptly suggests, this plugin offers WordPress users a notification bar or message. Youโ€™ve probably seen these yourself. These often appear on eCommerce sites – especially clothing stores looking to remind customers about important information while browsing their websiteโ€”for instance, shipping info, bundle deals, sale dates/times, etc. 

These notification bars are eye-catching, to-the-point, and you can customize them to target your visitors to increase sales and engagement. You can display the notification bar on your homepage, on just some of your pages, or your whole site- the choice is yours

Other key features include:

  • The plugin recognizes where website visitors come from. This could be via social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, or email marketing, etc., so you can display targeted messages to traffic coming from specific sources. For example, a custom welcome message or a message advertising your sale/special offers.
  • You can create animated call-to-action buttons within the notification bar that take visitors to whatever web page you wantโ€”for example, a product page, a specific product category page, a contact page, etc. You can add these buttons beside text content. You can also choose different layouts that include varying font sizes, colors, and background colors. You can also select different button layouts such as rounded, rectangular, or outlined. Emojis are also supported to create more noticeable calls to action. 
  • You can customize your notification barโ€™s background using their built-in color picker, allowing you to find the perfect color match or combination. Alternatively, you can add a background image. 
  • Customizable notification bar templates are available. 
  • You can pre-set notifications to target only mobile devices, desktops, or both. 

The pricing for Smart Notification Bar currently stands at $14.99 as a one-time payment. All future updates are included in this price, which is fantastic. This Plugin, however, will soon be offered for free. 

Gift Hunt Plugin

Best WordPress Plugins

The Gift Hunt plugin is a fantastic addition to any web page. Its basic function is to increase website visitors’ time on your web pages. How is this done, you ask? Gift Hunt adds prizes to your page, awarding browsers with rewards just for being there. But, of course, to access these gifts, visitors have to give their email and name – not only to unlock the treasure but for marketing purposes too. Needless to say, this works wonders for growing your email list.

Most users use the default popup window designs. There are five designs to choose from:

  1. Light
  2. Dark
  3. Easter
  4. Halloween 
  5. Christmas 

However, if you have web development skills, you can easily create your own version. For example, you can upload a custom icon or change the animation.

Gift Hunt costs a one-off fee of $19.99. However, itโ€™s said it would soon be offered for free- so keep an eye out for that! 

Convert Pro

Best WordPress Plugins for Lead Generation

Best WordPress Plugins

Convert Pro is an email opt-in and lead generation plugin that helps website owners boost their conversions; it includes features like:

  • A drag-and-drop builder – Pick one of Covert Proโ€™s high-performing mobile-friendly templates and modify it with their user-friendly drag-and-drop form builder. You donโ€™t need to write a single line of CSS code. 
  • Mobile-editor- You can make specific edits and changes that Covert Pro states โ€œshould be visible on mobile.โ€ Needless to say, Making your site mobile-friendly works wonders for boosting your websiteโ€™s accessibility.
  • Triggers – You can program opt-in forms to appear when specific triggers occur. For instance, when a visitor goes to leave your site, if a user is inactive for a specified time period, when a visitor scrolls past a specific point on your web page, or when your visitor first lands on your website. 

Convert Proโ€™s pricing is as follows:

  • The Basic bundle – At the time of writing, $89 (normally $99) for an annual subscription or $389 (usually $399), a one-time payment for lifetime access. 
  • The Growth bundle – $249 (normally $523) for an annual subscription or $699 (normally $1893) for lifetime access. 

LiveChat

Best WordPress Plugins for Customer Service

Best WordPress Plugins

LiveChat is explicitly designed to help website owners manage their client/customer interactions. It provides a few handy tools for streamlining customer service and boosting consumer engagement – most notably:  

  • Message sneak-peek: You can view what customers are typing in real-time before they hit send. You can start preparing answers to their questions to respond as quickly as possible. 
  • Canned responses: Save responses to common questions to reuse at a later date; this works wonders for maximizing efficiency. 
  • Rich messages: Instead of sending the same message to all customers, this feature allows the business to send more personal and tailored messages to add an intimate feel to your web page. 
  • File sharing: You can send files via live chat to provide customers with direct solutions/added value.
  • Chat archives: You can store and access chat logs at a later date. This comes in handy for analyzing customer service quality and pinpointing where thereโ€™s room for improvement. It may also be helpful if youโ€™re looking for evidence to help settle a customer dispute.  
  • Inactivity messages: You can keep in touch with customers when agents are inactive by asking for a customerโ€™s email address so that you can get back to them later when an agent is free. 
  • Notifications: Agents receive notifications complete with sound and visual alarms so that agents never miss a message. 

LiveChat costs $16 per agent per month (billed annually) for the Basic package. After that, the Team package increases to $33 per month per agent. Then finally, the Business package will cost you $50 per month per agent. Thereโ€™s also an Enterprise package for Fortune 500 companies, but youโ€™ll need to contact LiveChat directly for a custom quote. 

PrettyLinks

Best WordPress Plugins for Link Management

Best WordPress Plugins

PrettyLinks is a WordPress plugin that shortens and manages links and generates QR codes on your behalf. All you need to do is upload the plugin, activate it, and you can start creating links to use on your website straight away. Also, when it comes to affiliate links, the plugin can automatically and strategically add your link(s) throughout your website.

Core features include:

  • A โ€œMission Controlโ€ dashboard: From here, you can manage all your social sharing links for platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and even your emails and blog posts. You can also group, sort, and track your links from here.
  • URL redirection: If a user clicks on an outdated link, theyโ€™re redirected to your main URL
  • PrettyBar: This is a brandable bar at the top of any link, so you can remind people of your brand name even when they visit external links
  • Automatic short links for all your WordPress blog pages
  • Automatic Tweets: You can automatically Tweet customized posts on as many accounts as you want once youโ€™ve posted a new blog post.

PrettyLinks costs:

  • At the time of writing, $79 (normally $120) per year for the โ€˜Beginner’ package.
  • At the time of writing, $99 (normally $149)per year for the โ€˜Marketerโ€™ package.
  • At the time of writing, $149 (usually $199) per year for the โ€˜Super Affiliateโ€™ package.

Yoast SEO Plugin

Best WordPress Plugin for SEO

Best WordPress Plugins

Yoast SEO is one of the most popular WordPress SEO plugins. It helps website owners optimize their content for search engines to boost their ranking for specific keywords. 

Yoast SEO’s main features include:

  • SEO Workouts: This spots SEO optimization opportunities (internal linking, meta descriptions, outbound linking, etc.) and guides you with SEO tasks to help you achieve higher rankings.
  • Redirect Manager: Avoid deadlinks to your site, and ensure you have no 404 errors when you move or delete content on your site
  • Access to powerful integrations: For instance, Semrush, Zapier, and Elementor
  • Structured data: Yoast adds structured data to help Google understand your site and rank it appropriately
  • XML sitemaps: This provides search engines with directions to your content and communicates when it was last updated.
  • Tutorials: There are tons of excellent self-service tutorials on Yoast’s website.

Yoast SEO offers three packages:

  • Basic -$0: This free version includes access to SEO care and all the tools needed to start ranking on well-known search engines.  
  • The Premium version- $99 a year: This unlocks more advanced features like optimizing your site according to keywords, avoiding dead links, and controlling content quality. 
  • Plugin Subscription – $229 a year: Access to a year of updates, 24/7 support, five Yoast plugins, and access to all online SEO training courses

WP Rocket

Best WordPress Plugin for Enhancing Website Performance

Best WordPress Plugins

WP Rocket is a caching plugin designed to increase your WordPress website’s load times without you having to add any code (HTML, javascript, etc.). Using WP Rocket allows you to immediately see an improvement in your website performance and Google PageSpeed Insight scores, including Core Web Vitals. 

WP Rocket allows you to preload/empty the cache for specific languages (or all languages) automatically. This means visitors should be able to view your content in their own language faster. 

You can have WP Rocket up and running in as little as three minutes, so rest assured that there isnโ€™t a lengthy configuration process.

The per-year pricing for WP Rocket is as follows;

  • $39 for the Single package – one year of support and updates for one site.
  • $79.20 for the Plus package – one year of support and updates for three websites.
  • $199.20 for the Infinite package – one year of support and updates for unlimited websites. 

Elementor

Best WordPress Plugin for Page Building

Best WordPress Plugins

Elementor is a WordPress page builder plugin for WordPress sites. It offers several features that make it easier to build and optimize your WordPress site. 

These include:

  • A drag and drop page editor with live editing capabilities. 
  • Over 100 widgets to help with all aspects of website creation, including marketing, design, layout, animations, and more
  • Access to an intuitive landing page builder and pre-designed landing page templates
  • Integrations including MailChimp, ConvertKit, Zapier, and GetResponse
  • Over 90 website kits that include customizable fonts, colors, and templates
  • Access to an intuitive popup builder and 100 popup templates that you can use to encourage site visitors to perform actions such as input their email address or copy and paste a discount code

Elementorโ€™s pricing packages are as follows:

  • Essential – $49 a year for one website activation.
  • Expert – $199 a year for 25 website activations.
  • Studio – $499 a year for 100 website activations.
  • Agency – $999 a year for 1000 website activations

Gravity Forms

Best WordPress Plugins

Gravity Forms is one of the best opt-in and contact form plugins on the market. It enables you to create custom forms to store data, capture leads, and collect payments. 

Key features include:

  • A visual form editor that makes form creation a breeze. 
  • You can create engaging contact forms.
  • Automated online payments – you can manage subscriptions and fees with automated workflows using your preferred payment processor. 
  • Create dynamic forms that hinge visitor responses – you can hide pages, trigger pop-ups, and offer different options for customers to choose from. This works wonders for creating a more tailored user experience and boosting engagement. 
  • Data filled in by the customer is secure thanks to its virtual airlock feature. 

The pricing for this WordPress plugin is as follows;

  • Basic – $59 per year for standard support for one site.
  • Pro – $159 per year for standard support for three sites.
  • Elite – $259 per year for priority support on unlimited sites. 

HubSpot

HubSpot boasts a whole suite of tools to boost leads, build a strong web presence, and accelerate sales. As a result, it’s a popular choice used by over 135,000 customers across 120 countries. 

HubSpot offers different โ€˜hubsโ€™ that focus on various features:

  • The Marketing Hub: This provides all-in-one software for marketing, including the tools you need to increase traffic and generate and convert leads.
  • The Sales Hub – Here, youโ€™ll find tools to close deals faster by shortening the sales process and increasing your processing efficiency. 
  • The Service Hub – Features in this hub are explicitly designed to help you improve your customer service strategies.
  • A CMS Hub – Features in this hub provide a robust content management system where you can create and maintain a more secure and optimized website. 

The pricing for this plugin seems complex. Each hub is priced separately, or you can purchase hubs in bundles. Whichever plan you go for, at first, you get started for free. After that, paid versions are as follows:

  • Marketing: This has three plans, Starter ($45/mo billed annually), Professional ($800/mo billed annually), and Enterprise ($3,200/mo billed annually).
  • Sales: This has three plans, Starter ($45/mo billed annually), Professional ($450/mo billed annually), and Enterprise ($1,200/mo billed annually)
  • Customer Service: The prices are the same as the Sales Hub prices
  • CMS: This has three plans, Starter ($23/mo billed annually), Professional ($360/mo billed annually), and Enterprise ($1,200/mo billed annually)

Weglot

Best WordPress Plugin for Website Translation

Best WordPress Plugins

Weglot allows you to translate your website content into multiple languages. Some high-profile Weglot users include Spotify and IBM. Once integrated into the fabric of your website, Weglot seamlessly translates your text within minutes. 

Weglotโ€™s core features include:

  • Your website is automatically optimized for multilingual SEO 
  • Youโ€™ll get dedicated URLs for each language 
  • Hreflang tags are automatically indeed; these tags help search engines better understand the language used on a particular webpage. 
  • Weglot automatically scans, detects, and translates your page content without doing anything manually. 
  • You can manually review the translations with complete editing control to remove, edit and manage your website copy. 
  • You have the opportunity to work with professional translators.

And moreโ€ฆ

The cost of this Plugin comes at several price points;

  • Free – 2000 words in 1 language.

Then pro versions are as follows:

  • โ‚ฌ99/year – 10โ€™000 words in 1 language.
  • โ‚ฌ190/year – 50โ€™000 words in 3 languages.
  • โ‚ฌ490/year for 200โ€™000 words in 5 languages.
  • โ‚ฌ1โ€™990/year for 1โ€™000โ€™000 in 10 languages.
  • โ‚ฌ9โ€™990/year for a specific service arranged in consultation with the Weglot. 

Redirection

Best WordPress Plugins

Aptly named, Redirection enables you to redirect customers navigating your website. For example, if your website visitors go to a page where youโ€™ve deleted or moved content, the plugin navigates them to the correct page. Itโ€™s a free plugin thatโ€™s been on the market for over ten years and boasts a vast number of recommendations and uses.

Redirectionโ€™s key features include;

  • Login status โ€“ here, you can redirect the user when they log in or out
  • WordPress capability โ€“ redirect users when they perform a specific action
  • Browser โ€“ redirect the user to a particular browser
  • Referrer โ€“ redirect the user to visit a link from another page
  • Cookies โ€“ redirect a user when a specific cookie is set
  • HTTP headers โ€“ redirect a user based on an HTTP header
  • Custom filter โ€“ redirect a user based on your WordPress filters. 
  • Track 404 errors – Redirect tracks all 404 errors so you can find and resolve any problems. Errors can be grouped to show where you need to focus, and then you can implement redirects in bulk.
  • Server โ€“ Redirect a user to another domain if itโ€™s also hosted on the same server
  • Page type โ€“ Redirect the user if the current page is out of action, or a redirect to a 404 page

Are You Ready to Start Using The Best WordPress Plugins for Your Website? 

Here weโ€™ve only skimmed the surface of the many popular WordPress plugins on the market. But, hopefully, the several options weโ€™ve listed above have hinted at the breadth of functionalities and features on offer. 

That said, too many plugins can cause your site to crash, suffer slow loading speeds, lousy performance, and, in worst-case scenarios, can even cause security and malware breaches. Thatโ€™s why itโ€™s essential to do your research to ensure you only download and use high-quality plugins that work seamlessly with your chosen WordPress themes.

That said, weโ€™ve done our best to highlight some of the more reputable plugins on the market. Suppose you’re interested in broadening your research. In that case, we also recommend taking a look at smush (an image optimization plugin), Google Analytics, Easy Digital Downloads, optinmonster, updraftplus (a WordPress backup plugin), wpforms, wordfence (WordPress security plugin), dropbox, and monsterinsights. Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to cover these plugins in this round-up.

Are you considering any of the plugins above? If so, please tell us your thoughts in the comments box below. Speak soon!

Rosie Greaves

Rosie Greaves is a professional content strategist who specializes in all things digital marketing, B2B, and lifestyle. She has over three years of experience crafting high-quality content. Check out her website Blog with Rosie for more information.

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