Whenever you install WordPress for your blog, you get only two plugins – Akismet (Anti Spam) and Hello Dolly. You can however install more plugins to extend functionality, you can find a complete list of plugins here: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins
Here is a list of the best WP plugins which I use on my blog. Most of them are very useful and functional and are light- they won’t bog down your WP site / blog.
To install them, just extract the folders to /blog/wp-content/plugins and then log in to your WP Admin Dashboard and select the Plugins tab to select and enable them.
1. All In One SEO Pack
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/all-in-one-seo-pack/
This is the most popular WP Plugin ever. It is just a simple plugin using which you can optimize your posts for search engines by adding the title, description and keywords etc when drafting the post.
2. Google XML Sitemaps
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/google-sitemap-generator/
This plugin creats a Google sitemaps compliant XML-Sitemap of your WordPress blog. It supports all of the WordPress generated pages as well as custom ones. The sitemap gets updated automatically everytime you create a new post. You can submit this sitemap to Google and other search engines for better SEO.
3. Sociable
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/sociable/
This plugin automatically add links to your posts and pages to easily add your pages to 99 popular social bookmarking sites like Digg, Stumble Upon, Del.icio.us etc.
4. Viper’s Video Quicktags
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/vipers-video-quicktags/
You can use this plugin to easily add / embed videos into your blog posts and configure their attributes using a simple box. No need of meddling with any HTML embed codes anymore.
5. AdSense Manager
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/adsense-manager/
AdSense Manager is a WordPress plugin for managing AdSense ads on your blog. It generates code automatically and allows positioning with Widgets.
It includes support for AdSense, AdBrite, AdGridWork, Adpinion, Adroll, Commission Junction, CrispAds, ShoppingAds, Yahoo!PN and WidgetBucks.
6. Google Analytics for WordPress
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/google-analytics-for-wordpress/
This plugin automatically tracks and segments all outbound links from within posts, comment author links, links within comments, blogroll links and downloads. It also allows you to track AdSense clicks, add extra search engines and track image search queries.
7. Dagon Design Sitemap Generator
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/sitemap-generator/
This is a nice plugin which creates a sitemap for your blog. It is highly customizable, you can also link your XML Sitemap to this. It looks better than Google XML sitemaps, you should use both.
8. WP-Stats
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-stats/
This plugin allows you to display your WordPress blog statistics on a page. It can display general stats, plugin stats and top 10 stats.
9. WordPress Related Posts
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wordpress-23-related-posts-plugin/
This plugin will generate related posts via the tags used on your posts, and add the related posts link below each post and to your RSS feeds too.
10. WP Post Views
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-postviews/
This plugin allows you to display the number of times a post has been viewed.
November 27th, 2008 at 4:01 pm
Thats a very good list of plugins. However why don;t you try using platinum SEO pack, its better than all in one seo pack. Also i would recommend you whatwouldsethgodindo plugin and comment redirect or comment relish, wordpress cache.
October 12th, 2010 at 11:22 am
Many thanks for the excellent variety with plugins, i have a number of favourites to, such as the all known “All IN SEO “and also the easy privacy policy and also SEO friendly images (got some good results with it)and last but not least pretty links (great for cloacking) affiliate links…
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October 2nd, 2011 at 12:55 pm
Thanks for sharing those plugins because it surely helps the site. I am a wordpress lover and I am glad I found these plugins to your post.
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