WordPress essentials: Get started creating, managing, and optimizing your site When you‘re just getting started with making a website, I know that the process of learning how to use WordPress can feel overwhelming. We’ve all been there, so you're certainly not alone. While WordPress does have a bit of a learning curve, I still think it‘s something that anyone can use to build a website — even people who have never done so before. That’s why WordPress is, by far, the most popular way to make a website. To make the process as painless as possible, all you need is the right knowledge, which is what we‘ve created this post for. Below, I’ll take you step-by-step through how to use WordPress to build your very own website. Table of Contents What is WordPress? WordPress.org vs. WordPress.com vs. WordPress VIP WordPress for Beginners: How to Use WordPress How to Build a WordPress Website WordPress Website Tips and Tricks To give you more flexibility when designing your website and adding features, the core WordPress software is built in a very extensible way. You can use WordPress plugins to add new functionality to your site and WordPress themes to control the design of your site. Below, I‘ll cover everything that you need to build your own WordPress site, starting from zero and working up to adding your own content and plugins. Beyond the step-by-step guide, I’ll also share a list of tips and...

The 15 Best WordPress Email Plugins in 2024 If you’re on the lookout to enhance your business blog with an email newsletter, using a WordPress email plugin is indispensable. These plugins not only simplify content distribution but also offer insights into your target audience’s preferences, enabling you to optimize your content strategy effectively. Discover the 15 best WordPress email plugins on the market from the list below, and choose the one that’s right for your needs and goals. 1. HubSpot WordPress Plugin The HubSpot WordPress Plugin offers a variety of features to help you collect leads and grow your customer base. In addition to allowing you to create forms and pop-ups with a simple drag-and-drop interface, HubSpot collects submissions from any form on your WordPress site and instantly adds those leads to your CRM, allowing you to start nurturing them into loyal customers right away. The plugin features a live chat function, which allows you to start interacting with site visitors and potentially create leads from such talks. You may also use bots to answer simple inquiries from your website visitors, ensuring that you’re helping them even when your team is unavailable. When someone fills out one of your pop-up forms, you can automate a simple kickback email to contact them and give them the stuff you promised. You can also upgrade to a paid version of Marketing Hub to begin emailing those contacts right away. Best for: We recommend the HubSpot WordPress Plugin for anyone....

15 Best WordPress Survey Plugins in 2023 (Hands-On) On the hunt for the best WordPress survey plugin? Whether you're looking to improve the user experience on your website, increase your customer satisfaction, or simply learn more about your visitors, embedding a survey on your website is the fastest way to get the feedback you need. To help you find the best WordPress survey plugin, I went hands-on with as many options as possible. Then, I curated my picks for the 15 best options based on that. Here are all of the plugins installed on my site, so you can be confident that I tested them all. Let's dig in! 1. HubSpot WordPress Plugin Why I like it: HubSpot is a great option if you want to use your surveys for customer service/feedback, marketing, and/or sales purposes, as it includes a built-in CRM and lots more advanced features. HubSpot’s plugin for WordPress is a free and easy way to add forms, live chat, CRM, and more to your WordPress site. Using the drag-and-drop form builder allows you to collect contact information or qualitative feedback from your site’s visitors. Then, you can easily sync that data to HubSpot’s free CRM to track any feedback you receive in an organized manner. For even more powerful surveying tools, HubSpot’s customer feedback software allows you to send net promoter scores (NPS), customer effort scores (CES), customer satisfaction surveys (CSAT), and more. These tools can help you understand your customers while tracking...

30+ Best WordPress Plugins for Marketers Did you know there are over 56,000 WordPress plugins available today? WordPress plugins allow you to enhance your website's functionality by adding features and capabilities that don't come standard with the system. Whether you want to improve your writing, optimize a blog post for SEO, or interpret your site's analytics, there's a plugin out there for you. But with so many options available, it's tough to figure out the best ones to use — and that's why we've done the work for you. Below you'll find a list of the best WordPress plugins (not in any specific order) that every marketer should explore. These plugins have been reviewed by some of the top marketers in the industry. They'll also keep both you and your WordPress website running efficiently and effectively. If you want more, check out the official WordPress plugin page. 1. HubSpot WordPress Plugin HubSpot's drag-and-drop form builder allows you to easily build contact forms to use on your WordPress website. The plugin also includes a pop-up creator, live chat widget, contact database, and previously written code for you to simply copy and paste into WordPress. All-in-one plugins provide multiple functionalities in a single plugin, making them a more lightweight solution than having multiple plugins limited to single functionality. Because HubSpot provides everything in one plugin, you can be sure it will not bloat your site, which is important as you consider load speeds. 2. Elementor Elementor is WordPress's...

How to Set Up Google Analytics for WordPress Have you ever wondered what people actually do when they enter your WordPress website? Have you thought about which website pages they tend to stay on longest, what campaigns bring them there, and which of your website pages convert the best? Google Analytics can help you understand all of this information and more. By simply installing a Google Analytics plugin on your WordPress website, you can start collecting this data immediately. With help from a plugin, adding Google Analytics to WordPress is a painless process. If you’d rather not install a plugin for this purpose, there are other ways to integrate Google Analytics with your website too — as long as you’re comfortable with code. In this guide, we’ll walk you through how to install Google Analytics in WordPress with two different methods. In a handful of steps, you can uncover insights about your website visitors — including what is and isn’t working for them — to improve the user experience, increase conversions, and learn about your audience. Google Analytics for WordPress: What Can You Track? Whether you’re looking for details about who is visiting your site, what they’re doing while on your site, or how long they’re staying on specific pages, Google Analytics provides you with the report you need. The tool allows you to track many interactions between your website and visitors. Let’s review some more of the specific types of reporting Google Analytics provides: Real-time Activity Realtime...

How to Eliminate Render-Blocking Resources From Your WordPress Website Have you ever finished creating a WordPress website and loved everything about it? Then, promptly began to hate it after realizing it takes forever to load? Not only are slow loading speeds a nuisance for you and your visitors, but they can also cost you significantly when it comes to SEO. Since 2010, Google algorithms have accounted for loading speed in ranking decisions, so slow pages appear lower on results pages. You might be familiar with the common culprits of poor page performance — excessive content, uncompressed image files, insufficient hosting, and lack of caching to name a few. But, there’s another often-overlooked perpetrator in play: render-blocking resources. Don’t get me wrong — CSS and JavaScript are great. Without CSS, websites would be walls of plain text. Without JavaScript, we wouldn’t be able to add dynamic, interactive, engaging elements to our websites. But, if executed at the wrong time, both CSS and JavaScript can put a dent in your website performance. Here’s why: When a web browser first loads a web page, it parses all the page’s HTML before displaying it onscreen to a visitor. When the browser encounters a link to a CSS file, a JavaScript file, or an inline script (i.e., JavaScript code in the HTML document itself), it pauses the HTML parsing to fetch and execute the code, which slows everything down. If you’ve optimized your page performance in WordPress and are still experiencing problems, render-blocking resources may...

The 18 Best Lead Generation Plugins to Add to Your WordPress Site Collecting high-quality leads is a challenging task that marketers face. Even once you've created a fantastic, high-converting landing page, you're not done. The good news is that there are a number of plugins available that you can add to your WordPress website to help with lead generation. Before we dive into 18 of the best plugins available, let's cover the characteristics of a powerful and useful lead generation WordPress plugin. Learn how to build a WordPress website using Elementor with this free course. What to Look For in a Lead Generation Plugin for Your WordPress Website Here are some tips to help you pick the best lead generation plugin(s) for your website: 1. There are positioning options. Your lead capture form's positioning and location on your website play a role in conversion rate. Make sure your chosen tool offers the positioning options you want. Ask yourself: "Do I want to use a popup? A two-step opt-in? An in-content form?" 2. You can add integrations. Many lead generation plugins exist to help you capture leads and get those leads into your CRM or list management tool. Whether it's your CRM, Sales Hub, or management tool your team uses, make sure your plugin can integrate. 3. There are customizable fields. Effective lead capture forms are all about balancing the number of fields on a form and the form's conversion rates. Usually, a shorter form means a...

12 WordPress Live Chat Plugins to Connect With Users Let’s be honest. No one wants to send a support email only to receive a (possibly automated) response 48-hours later. Similarly, no one wants to be put on hold for 30+ minutes while being told they’re the next caller in line. We live in a world of instant gratification. Your customers are busy and they want to speak to you on their terms and get the help they need on their time. Live chat allows for you to provide immediate, personalized, and efficient support for your customers and prospects. So, if you're part of the 37% of internet users with a WordPress website and you need live chat functionality, this guide is here to help. We'll cover 12 WordPress live chat plugins to engage visitors and offer effective and speedy support. 1. HubSpot WordPress Plugin With HubSpot's WordPress plugin, you get more than just live chat — you also get forms and pop-ups, CRM and contact management, email marketing, marketing automation, and reports and analytics. Plus HubSpot integrates with over 500 other tools. In addition to the capabilities just mentioned, the plugin also allows you to add chatbots that function 24/7 to your site. This way, you can automate some of your support (e.g. use chatbots, rather than reps, to answer FAQs) and offer assistance to visitors when your team is offline (a.k.a. when reps are asleep). HubSpot's WordPress plugin is simple to install and applies to...