Typically, this would be done by installing and configuring a plugin but her blog had already experienced slowdown issues due to complex plugins bogging down her server. So I needed to find a plugin that would do what she wanted but still be lightweight enough to keep things running smoothly. I found a lot of options out there and ultimately had to tweak a couple of different plugins in order to find the best related posts plugin for her site.

Why Use Related Posts Plugins?

Just as important as getting readers to discover your blog is getting them to stay on your blog. Related posts plugins are helpful tools to encourage readers to continue reading your content. There are a lot of different related posts plugins out there for WordPress and they all accomplish the same thing: they add a list of posts and/or pages of similar content to the end of an article or in the sidebar in order to help readers discover more of your content.

What Was the Best Related Posts Plugin For My Client’s WordPress Blog?

While doing my due diligence I found plenty of bloggers recommending Yet Another Related Posts Plugin (YARPP) as the best related posts plugin. It certainly seemed to be loaded with functionality but it sounded like it came with more bells and whistles than my friend needed for her blog. Even the plugin’s FAQ mentions that some server slowdown can be expected due to YARPP’s database calls.

A bit more searching led me to a pair of simpler, more lightweight related posts plugin solutions: the Related Posts by Category Widget and the Possibly Related Recent Posts plugin.

The Related Posts by Category Widget

This is a very light, easy to use plugin that creates a widget that displays random related posts in the sidebar. It only appears on the single post page and you can customize it to display a certain number of posts and order them a certain way.

It did require a couple of tweaks to get it up and running though. Initially, it would also display the category name of each post listed and I was unable to get rid of it without fiddling with the code.

Line 81:

if($data['showname'] = ‘yes’) {

Needs to be changed to:

if($data['showname'] == ‘yes’) {

It also broke the sidebar when viewing the homepage which also required a bit of code tweaking:

The code “echo $after_widget” located after the closing bracket for “if (is_single())” (as in, after “<?php” and before “register_sidebar_widget” in the PHP file) needs to be deleted to fix the broken layout in the homepage.

The Possibly Related Recent Posts Plugin

Another simple plugin that adds related links to the bottom of each post, both on the homepage and single post page. This is exactly what I was looking for but unfortunately it would only link to the most recent posts it could find. The most recent posts on the homepage would all link to each other and any posts older than a month or two wouldn’t make the cut. Not too useful when you want to encourage readers to dig around your archives and find something they would otherwise miss.

After some more tinkering with the PHP file I stumbled upon a fix. I changed the line:

foreach ( ( get_posts ( ‘numberposts=5&category=’ . $categories . ‘&orderby=date&exclude=’ .

to this:

foreach ( ( get_posts ( ‘numberposts=5&category=’ . $categories . ‘&orderby=rand&exclude=’ .

Changing the “date” to “rand” allowed it to access all the older related posts and display them randomly. Now readers would easily be able to find posts from months ago they never would have looked at otherwise.

As both of these plugins were relatively light I was able to keep both of them running on the site at the same time without slowing down the server. With a little bit of research and tweaking some code, I was able to find the best related posts plugin for my client’s needs.

The Subscribe2 Plugin and WordPress

The Subscribe2 plugin is an effective tool to collect, manage, and contact a list of email subscribers. Its setup and management is fairly easy and straightforward. Once installed, you add a widget to the sidebar where readers can add their emails and subscribe to your blog. Within the admin section you can manage your entire subscriber list and the different options the plugin makes available. This is where I had to go to solve the problem of the emails not being sent.

Making Subscribe2, WordPress and GoDaddy Work Together

Initially, I was stumped as to why Subscribe2 and WordPress would suddenly stop working. Searching for a solution on the WordPress support forums led me to believe it was most likely a problem with the site’s host, so I put a call into GoDaddy support.

While he couldn’t figure out why Subscribe2 would stop working with GoDaddy, he suggested changing the email associated with the plugin from my client’s Gmail account (ex: client@gmail.com) to one hosted by the site’s server (ex: client@WordPressBlog.com). This would prevent the emails from having to go through a separate server and being mistaken for spam and getting blocked.

I then went into the Subscribe2 settings within the WordPress admin. I changed the amount of emails that got sent out at once from 0 (unlimited) to a set number (30). Along the same line of thinking as the previous fix, this is to prevent the GoDaddy server from blocking the emails being sent out because it believes them to be spam or exceeds the server’s limit. Here are some FAQs on GoDaddy’s email settings.

After these two quick fixes, my client then added a new post and – TA-DA! – the emails went out.

Does anyone else have any tips to working with Subscribe2, WordPress, and GoDaddy?

• Devine Icons Part 2
• Sanscons
• iconSweets
• MediaLoot Freebie 3D Icon Set
• Komodo Media Social Icon Set
• icON Stage Icon Set
• 40 Unique Twitter Icons
• Cafe Icon Set
• Round Theme Icons
• Social Network Icons
• WebCons

These are just a handful of free icons for a WordPress blog but there are many more out there. Please share in the comments other icons you’ve found for your websites.

For the plugin-minded, there’s Simple Twitter Connect. This series of plugins not only adds a Twitter button but also allows you to customize your blog’s Twittering functionality to your heart’s content. Aside from easily adding the official Twitter button, you can also tweet new posts automatically and readers can comment on your content using their Twitter accounts.

A second plugin, for those who want to add a Twitter button to WordPress without all the bells and whistles, is WP Tweet Button. This is a simple way to add the official Twitter button to your WordPress blog without having to tinker with all that bothersome HTML.

These are only a few simple ways to add a Twitter button to WordPress but there are many others. How have you added a Twitter button to your WordPress blog?

Paste the following code in your .htaccess file, located at the root of your WordPress installation. As I said, always back up the .htaccess file before editing it. Also, don’t forget to change 123.456.789 to the IP address you want to ban.

<Limit GET POST PUT>
order allow,deny
allow from all
deny from 123.456.789
</LIMIT>

There’s almost nothing more annoying than having to clear out the same spam comments from the same IP address every day. Repeat line 4 on a new line with another address and you can block as many spam-happy bots as you like.

Simply open your wp-config.php file (located at the root of your WordPress install) and paste the following code:

define('EMPTY_TRASH_DAYS', 10 );

 

The second parameter is when to empty trash, in days.

If you’re like me, you’re constantly forgetting to permanently delete posts, comments, and pages that fill up your trash folder. If you don’t empty an overloaded WordPress trash bin your blog may experience slower loading times as a result. This fix will not only take care of a piece of routine blog maintenance you’re likely to forget, it should also help your site run faster.

That’s why I suggest keeping the amount of plugins to minimum when starting a WordPress blog. Every time your website is loaded, your server has to load all those plugins and having too many can slow your site down. It’s also easier to add plugins as your need for them arises; this way you can learn to manage each plugin as it’s installed instead of learning multiple plugins at the same time. This is not to say you shouldn’t have any plugins, otherwise you wouldn’t be making use of WordPress’s capabilities. Here are a few plugins that I feel are worth having once you start your WordPress blog (even if you haven’t written one post):

• Askimet – Included with WordPress, this is as good a spam blocker as you’re likely to find. As soon as you start your WordPress blog you can sign up for a free account with WordPress.com and they’ll supply you with your API key to get Askimet up and running.

• All In One SEO Pack- Once you start your WordPress blog you’ll probably be concerned with SEO. This easy-to-use search engine optimization plugin allows you to insert keywords into your homepage and every post. Once installed, access its options under the ‘Settings’ tab and enter all the applicable keywords for your site in the ‘Home Keywords’ field. Whenever you write a new post, enter that post’s keywords in the SEO fields at the very bottom of the ‘Edit Post’ page.

• Google Analytics For WordPress – Google Analytics is a free, powerful way to track and analyze your website traffic. This plugin makes it easy to install the necessary tracking code in your site without your having to edit your site’s HTML files. Accessible from the ‘Settings’ tab, you simply enter your Analytics ID in the appropriate field.

• Google XML Sitemaps – When you start your WordPress blog you’ll want to get it indexed by Google and other search engines as quickly as possible. This will automatically generate an XML sitemap for your site which helps search engines like Google and Yahoo index and search your content. It also notifies search engines whenever you update your site. In addition, you can submit this sitemap to Google Webmaster Tools which helps you manage your site’s search engine results. It can be configured from the ‘Settings’ tab, though you’re probably best leaving it at its default settings.

What other plugins do you find necessary when starting a WordPress blog?

What are Permalinks?

Permalinks are the permanent URLs to your blog posts. They are the titles used by readers to link to your blog’s content and also read by search engines. Setting your permalinks structure defines how your blog posts URL will look to both readers and search engines. The default setting in WordPress simply lists your posts by number – it looks something like this: http://example.com/?p=N – and is unattractive to readers and doesn’t provide search engines with any useful keywords.

Changing Your Permalinks Structure

Creating a custom permalinks structure is one of the first things you should do when you start your WordPress blog. Not only does it make your blog look more professional, it’s also a necessity if you want to grab any significant search engine traffic. You need to make sure you choose the best permalinks structure for your blog because it shouldn’t change once it has been set.

The Different Kinds of Permalinks Structures

Opinions vary on the best permalinks structure but ultimately it is up to you and what your blog requires. Many people argue that a custom structure is best, either consisting of only the post name (/%postname%/) or your post category followed by the postname (/%category%/%postname%). They suggest that this is the best permalinks structure for SEO as it loads your URL with search engine-friendly keywords.

Other bloggers and WordPress advise against this permalinks structure as it can cause your blog to load slower than normal. Without the identifying date or ID number before the post name, your blog may have to create more rules within its database to identify each post. They suggest using a structure that uses the date or post ID number (%post_id%) before the post name as this will help WordPress’ performance.

What’s the Best Permalinks Structure for Your Blog?

There seems to be no hard and fast rule as to which permalinks structure you should use for your WordPress blog. It all depends on the type of blog you want to have.

If you plan on running a blog loaded with posts, with a lot of similar titles, you should use a structure that prefaces the post name with a date or ID number to differentiate your content.

If you want to have a blog that is focused on specific keywords and topics, you should use a custom structure that only includes the post name or post name and category to attract attention from search engines.

What kind of permalinks structure do you find works best for your WordPress blog?