Tackle it Tuesday – today focus on tackling a business task/project you have been avoiding.  By facing it head on and completing it you will have a boost of energy and feel some weight released from your shoulders.  You might have a lot of tasks/projects you have been “avoiding” and not know which one and then you have become even more overwhelmed and shut down… DON’T the best thing you can do is just pick ONE and Do It!  The others will still be there weighting for you, and that is OK – once you complete one you will have one less!  So Tackle It Today and complete a “bigger” task/project you have been avoiding.

WordPress Blog Site Plugins!

How to Install WordPress Plugins…

One Monetize Monday we discussed the plugins that came with the wordpress basic blog structure – today moving forward we will discuss “Tackling” the installation of plugins to your blog site so you can continue to customize the look, feel and function of your blog site.  The insallation process for plugins is fairly simple and standard.

There are two ways to install a wordpress plugin:

  1. Directly upload it to the plugins folder located in the “content” folder for your blog on the server
  2. Use the “add new” button in your “Manage Plugins” dashboard in the back office of your blog

Process #2 is by far the easiest to do and we will start there for today.  Process #1 is only needed when you are using more advanced plugins that might have a function script in them that can be modified even more prior to installation or the code needs to actually be placed somewhere other than the plugins folder on the server.  We will go step by step installing plugins through the “add new” button.

First, when you log into your wordpress blog and are on the main dashboard – click on “Plugins”:

WP DashboardYou will be taken to the “Manage Plugins page (don’t be distracted by the plugins listed here we will go over that later):

Manage Plugins

Next, at the top you will see an “Add New” button – click on it and you will open the “Install Plugins” page:

plugins

From here you have some choices… you can:

  • Search: you use this when you know a name of a plugin or a term/author/tag of the plugin.  You might have been told of one to use, read about it or just know what you want
  • Upload: you use this when you have purchased a plugin and have the “zip” file or someone has shared a plugin with you and you have the “zip” file or you found one from a developer online not through this library and have the “zip” file on your computer – the gist here is you have the “zip” file.  (If you do not know what a “zip” file is don’t worry you don’t have to at this point – but if you want to know before we do a post on it please feel free to contact me through the contact page and I am happy to share that info with you, it is not hard)
  • Featured: you use this filter to see the plugins that are featured in the “library” these will change from time to time
  • Popular: you use this to filter to see the most popular plugins – this helps you to see what other people consider to be good to use.  If you see one in there read about it, maybe even google it and see what people have to say about why they are using that one before you jump on the popular bandwagon.
  • Newest: you use this to filter to see the newest plugins developed and now in the “library”
  • Recently Updated: you use this to see plugins that have been updated to work better with the newest version of wordperss (you will be notified by your manage plugins page if any of your plugins have been updated and you need to update your version

Most of the time you will be using the Search feature here…

For this example I will type in the word Facebook (since it is important to connect your social media outlets to your blog)

Facebook Plugins

You see several choices – I like the wordpress Facebook Like Button Plugin – Click the name of the plugin you want to install and a new page opens for the Plugin Directory and there is a download red button on the right, click that and then it come up to as if you want to “install” it – click it.  Once that is done, you will be asked to “activate it” – click it.  (you can deactivate it on the “manage plugins” page if you need to turn it off)

Some plugins you install will put a segment on the left dashboard side like above you can see “cforms II” and “Platinum SEO” – that is because there are settings that need to be set up, others will just be installed and ready to work.

I have a PDF tutorial for installing plugins you can have with a little more details, if you are interested please contact us and we can send it to you for FREE!

WordPress blog sites are simple to use and work with.  Perfect for beginners and the advanced users!  Don’t let any of it overwhelm you, it is only a matter of taking it step by step and completing one thing at a time for the end goal!

We look forward to being here for you and answering any questions you might have!  Contact us!