here’s no disputing the fact that WordPress is by far the most prominent content management system out there. Whether you are new to WordPress or have been using it for some time, you’ll know that it is an incredibly powerful platform.

What started out as just a basic blogging platform, is now evolved and used by millions and millions of sites.

There are thousands of websites out there for WordPress, dedica20ted to sharing tips, tricks and information about the latest resources available to help you move beyond the basics, towards becoming a fully fledged WordPress pro, but it’s not always easy to know which resources are the most up-to-date and relevant for you. New themes and plugins are produced nearly every single day, with constant developments and improvements.

With all of this going on, trying to keep up with WordPress can seem daunting so we’ve done all the hard work for you and picked the most influential and useful WordPress resources that are available on the web. You may think you already know about all the resources WordPress has to offer, but think again.

Here’s the ultimate list of resources for WordPress users and developers:

Hosting

The first step of starting a new WordPress site is obviously hosting. There are many options to choose from, which vary in price, performance, technology and quality of customer support service. Here are a few quality hosting services that we recommend:

Site Ground A WordPress/Joomla hosting company that provides a 24/7 award-winning support service and allows you to add our own custom-made solutions to make your website faster, safer, and better supported. They also have their own themes and an excellent knowledge base with in depth video tutorials and FAQ. Pagely A premium hosting service that’s designed especially to accelerate your WordPress site load speed and support all its functions, including resource heavy features such as wooCommerce. It also offers tight security and a scalability reassurance that performance will always remain excellent even as the site and traffic grow. 99+ WordPress Plugins Suite [ Upgrade your WordPress site with any of CM 90+ WordPress plugins and upcoming modules. Offer includes unlimited updates and expert support. Video ] [ Userguide Add to Cart Kinsta Another WordPress dedicated hosting company that allows you to choose the location of your server to ensure site speed. Kinsta offers several plans to support different sets of needs, with varying storage space, CPU and RAM limits. All plans include support, migrations, updates and backups and much more. WP Engine A Fully-Managed WordPress Hosting Platform that offers premium plans for sites with heavy traffic, starting from $29 for 25,000 visits per month, and going up to millions of visits per month. WordPress.com This is a free and easy to use out-of-the-box solution for those who need less customization and wish to save time using ready made solutions. Suitable for personal blogs and small business sites. In terms of SEO, wordpress.com hosting seams to give new websites a good starting point. It should be noted though that WordPress.com has very limited options, and is therefore not suitable if you wish to make customization or add plugins and features to your site.

WordPress Themes

After you’ve setup your hosting plan, the next thing to do is choose your site’s theme, which defines the way your website will look and feel. There are thousands of themes out there, and while premium themes tend to provide more flexibility, it does not necessarily mean that they are better for your website.

There are themes that are especially designed to support portfolios, eCommerce activity, multilingual sites, and other pre-set features. Most of these features can also be added later using plugins, but if you’re looking to create a complex structure, a premium theme will be more reliable in supporting your site in the long term.

When choosing your theme, always look for reviews, preferably on WordPress.org as they are far more reliable then a developer’s private website. Here are some theme developers you can trust:

Studio Press StudioPress creates Premium WordPress themes that are based on the Genesis framework, which is intuitive, mobile responsive, and provides a great infrastructure for SEO. It is also secure to use and has lots of intuitive layout options, making it great for beginners. Although their prices aren’t cheap, they do come with unlimited support and updates, and you can use their theme on as many websites as you like. DevPress DevPress has a much smaller theme collection, and currently only one of them supports eCommerce. The Theme Package gives you access to all DevPress themes for only $69. You’ll also get access to any new themes that come out while your license is valid. The purchase comes with a year of support and theme updates. Renewals after the first year are at a discounted rate. Cohhe Authors of 11 WordPress themes, some of which are free and others are premium, which can serve different sets of requirements, i.e. blog, directory, retail etc. They also offer services such as installing WordPress and choosing the right hosting for you. Cedaro Cedaro is a small company that develops a variety of themes, however the theme they are mostly proud of is AudioTheme, which provides a solution for websites built for musicians. AudioTheme includes the ability to embed audio and video players and display them in playlists, as well as manage an online events schedule. Elegant Themes Probably the most popular company out of this list, offering as many as 89 different themes for the price of one, including their #1 favorite Divi. Divi is a mobile responsive theme that has an intuitive page builder already incorporated, making it easy to create a unique layout for each of your pages. Other themes are also worth checking out although not all of them are mobile responsive.

Marketplaces

There are several platforms online which were specifically designed to gather everything you need for your website in one central place.

This includes design tools, plugins and features, graphics, background videos and even 3D figures! It also a good place for developers to publish and sell their code as it exposes them many new users. Some of these platforms are:

Creative Market A Marketplace of beautiful designs,Graphics, fonts, themes, photos, and more, all created by independent contributors and starting at only $2! Envato Market Envato Market is probably the largest marketplace of web solutions out there, offering thousands of themes, templates, plugins, scripts, images, graphics and video resources starting from $1.

WordPress Plugins Niche Marketplaces

These are places where you can find a variety of quality plugins for sale, created by developers that you can trust. On such platforms, many developers offer packages that entitle you to use a number of different plugins for a better price, or sign up for a membership plan where you can get more out of your plugins.

Mojo Marketplace Another large platform that provides many resources for purchasing themes, plugins, design templates and images, though not particularly focused on WordPress. Beginners may find this platform easy to use as it provide a buy & install service and also includes FAQ about how to build up your brand’s online presence. Easy Digital Downloads EDD provides a very simple solution for selling digital goods such as music files, software solutions and games, while integrating a variety of different payment gateways, including CM MicroPayment. There is no need to set up any shipping preferences and you can generate coupon codes and statistic reports whenever you like. The EDD website also offers a variety of themes, plugins and Add-ons that complement and enhance the EDD shopping cart platform. Pippin’s Plugins A small marketplace focused solely on WordPress plugins, built by the inspirationally young Easy Digital Downloads developer, Pippin Williamson. The site also offers a wide range of tutorials for different WordPress plugins. CreativeMinds Plugins A WordPress plugins marketplace that offers a variety of free and premium blogging tools that will help improve your site’s content and accessibility, as well as add new features such as a Tooltip Glossary, downloads management tool, a forum plugin and much more. CreativeMinds also offers a suite package with all its plugins included at a reduced cost, aside from that it offers different bundles at affordable pricing.

Featured WordPress Plugins

WordPress plugins are used for adding different functions to your website and boosting it with features. It is important once adding plugins to your WP installation to choose plugins which are well supported and up-to-date with the latest version of WordPress. You may discover that some plugins are built with bad coding standards, which tends to create conflicts and if not used properly, they can cause malfunction. Our recommended plugins:



WP Rocket A caching plugin aimed to make your WordPress site by pre-loading its content. It reduces the weight of HTML, JavaScript and CSS files through minification, and allows easy customization for developers. Visual Composer Visual Composer is a complete website builder that offers an easy-to-use drag and drop editor. Its free version is enough to build a simple website, however, Premium will give you access to the Theme Builder. The highlight of the Visual Composer is the cloud-based library of elements, templates, add-ons and extensive design options, called Visual Composer Hub. Additionally, it offers API for add-on development and theme integration.. Backup Buddy An excellent tool for creating both database and content backups and migrating/cloning content, themes, plugins, widgets and everything else between different domains. Visual Form Builder Visual Form Builder is a free plugin that allows you to build and manage all kinds of forms for your website in a single place. Building a fully functional contact form takes only a few minutes and you don’t have to write one bit of PHP, CSS, or HTML. W3T Cache A caching service that claims to make your site 10 times faster, increasing server performance, reducing the download times and providing transparent content delivery network (CDN) integration. SEO By Yoast Yoast’s WordPress SEO plugin is an all in one SEO solution for your WordPress blog and is a great tool that helps optimize your pages content, image titles, meta descriptions and more. Some of the features include XML sitemaps, API Docs and permalink cleanups. All in One Security A comprehensive, user-friendly, all in one WordPress security and firewall plugin for WordPress that reduces security risk by checking for vulnerabilities, and by implementing and enforcing the latest recommended WordPress security practices and techniques. Relevanssi Search Relevanssi is a WordPress plugin that fixes and improve the default WordPress search feature by placing the best results first, and highlighting the exact part of the document that matched the query. CM Tooltip Glossary An excellent Glossary plugin that presents term definitions inside hovering tooltips to help explain the meaning and context of frequently used terms in your posts and pages. It also includes a dedicated term index that contains lots of useful links and can be customized to display relevant and useful information. WP Events Plugin A Front end events management tool that allows you to integrate an Ajax powered calendar, a google maps API for location, and a booking system. Users can filter events by date, location or event category. Advanced support is also included. Ultimate Social Media Icons A bit less known but equally as good, Ultimate Social media icons adds a series of customizable social icons of your choice to pages and/or posts, allowing users to choose between liking/following and sharing/tweeting. The plugin also has a pop-up feature where you can invite users to join your mailing list. The best thing about this plugin is in how easy it is to set up- the interface is totally intuitive, as if it was built for children!

WordPress Development

Everybody knows what it’s like to have a crisis on your website, or to desperately be looking for a plugin that simply doesn’t exist. Whether you are a developer or just a beginner, its always good to have an expert at standby, just in case something happens. Are Malicious plugins breaking your site down to pieces? FTP file errors? Custom CSS gone all wrong? Try contacting one of these guys to help out:

WP Talents This is a great website that lists experts from all ends of WordPress, starting from web design, theme customization, custom plugin and down to maintenance and troubleshooting. WordPress talents are hand-picked by the site authors to ensure that all of them know what they’re doing. So if you happen to require assistance with your WordPress site WP Talents is a good place to start. WerkPress WerkPress is a fast-growing company that specializes in WordPress solutions, with strong orientation for digital UI/UX design. WerkPress team members regularly attend national WordPress events, often as speakers, which allows them to continually stay on top of new WordPress initiatives, functionality, and features. 10Up 10Up is a group of web developers, graphic designers, software engineers and project consultants offering their service at building, maintaining and customizing websites, as well as helping to build a strategy to maximize the functionality of your website. Among their team are WordPress leaders and speakers who have established their positions as community influencers, so you can count on them to know what their doing and get the job done right! CreativeMinds Development Services Having developed more than 200 WordPress plugins and apps, CreativeMinds has an expert team of WordPress developers which can take any WordPress web development. CreativeMinds WordPress team has proven abilities in developing and customizing WordPress plugins and apps and strictly follows WordPress coding guidelines. WP Site Care WP Site care is a relatively small firm offering support and maintenance services for WordPress websites. For a set monthly charge, you can get them to optimize your site performance, update your themes and plugins resolve issues and optimize your content for search engines. In addition, these guys will remain available to support you whenever something turns up to back you up. WordPress Custom Hourly Support Hire our expert WordPress developers on an hourly basis, a-la-carte service, to develop your own custom WordPress plugin, or add new features to an existing WordPress plugin. We also provide WordPress Professional development services based on your requirements. More Info

Blogs Worth Following

The Internet and WordPress in particular are constantly changing and evolving, so if you want to really be on top of things and stay informed, here’s a few recommended blogs you should by following:

Blogging Wizard Adam Connell is another one of those “ordinary people” who have somehow managed to figure out the algorithm for successful blogging and he has now become devoted to spreading the word out there and teaching others how to do it. Unlike some of his competitors, this guy actually knows what he is talking about and has some pretty useful advice. Smart Passive Income Getting made redundant was the best thing that ever happened to Pat Flynn. He provides an open, transparent and honest approach to his business, his income and his strategies to help like-minded people reach their goals. His personal experiences (both wins and failures) make him different to your average online marketing guru as he gives you a real-life insight into what it takes to earn an income from blogging. ProBlogger Problogger has over 7000 articles, tips, tutorials and case studies on blogging. Darren Rowse, the founder, started ProBlogger in 2004 and since then, has turned the site into a community for bloggers to share their tips. The site is dedicated to helping other bloggers learn the skills of blogging, share their own experiences and promote the blogging medium, making it a great blog for both beginners and pros. The posts often feature guest posts from other industry experts too. John Chow John Chow, also known as the Original Dot Com Mogul, rocketed onto the blogging scene by making over $40,000 per month from his blog in just two years, and he did it working just two hours a day. If anyone knows how to be successful at blogging, it’s Mr Chow. Read his blog to discover some of his secrets to making money from blogging. WP Tavern WordPress Tavern is a warm and inviting community where those interested in the software can hang out with fellow WordPressers to engage in enlightening discussions. Particularly focused on projects that stand under the Automattic umbrella, WP Tavern blog posts are often featured in the WordPress dashboard reading suggestions. This is thanks to its highly useful content updates and regular updates. WP Mayor Before acquiring a plugin or a theme, it is always advisable to check their reviews to make sure that they do what they’re supposed to and that they don’t contain viruses. WP mayor does that for you. They also provide periodical tutorials and guide you through selected products that they like to use. Altogether its a good blog to have on your bookmarks whenever you need it. Bob WP Bob’s daily blog gives useful advice about WordPress, WooThemes, Genesis Child Themes, WooCommerce and more. Bob himself is a WordPress trainer and coach and offers lectures as well as on-site training for companies and individuals. If you live in Seattle you can even attend his free WP training meetups, where he gives a more in-depth overview of his tips and advice. Post Status Post Status is dedicated to informing WordPress professionals and enthusiasts about the industry. You can read all the free posts straight from the homepage, or join the Post Status Membership Club, that offers more exclusive content and insights for serious WordPress professionals. Winning WordPress Winning WordPress explores WP from every possible angle, with endless categories that go all the way from plugins and themes to social media and even WP trivia. They also offer a variety of e-Books related to WP as well as a bunch of hot deals for purchasing WP services.

Tools For WordPress SEO

Promoting a website independently requires tons of work that involves all aspects of content marketing, social media, and building connections with your business community online. However, there are many tools that make it easier to track your progress and achieve better results. Here are some of them:

Quick Sprout If anyone knows about SEO and content marketing it’s Neil Patel. He’s helped companies like Amazon and NBC grow their revenue and has been recognized as one of the top entrepreneurs under the age of 30 by President Obama. The blog is great because not only does it solve problems that businesses are experiencing, it does so in a very simple way and it covers everything from link building, to social media and paid advertising. Search Engine Land Search Engine Land is the site to go to for all the latest news on the marketing industry; and includes the latest industry trends, breaking stories and feature announcements. It also has a tonne of guest posts from experts across all digital marketing disciplines, filled with practical tips, tactics and strategies for running successful marketing programs. HubSpot Hubspot is one of the largest and most diverse marketing blogs on the internet, with a huge social media presence. It’s full of tips on how to create content, optimize it for search engines and share it on social media. If you need to master any aspect of SEO or content marketing then HubSpot has the answers. It’s also a great resource for case studies and internet statistics. Keyword Hound The SEO Keyword Hound is the only SEO tool that tells you which keywords you should be using based on where your competitors already are. SEO Keyword Hound Streamline keyword management and boost the SEO of your website with this one-of-a-kind WordPress SEO plugin! The Hound monitors your keyword optimization and compares it with your page metrics over time, so you can constantly learn which keywords SERPs love, and which ones they don’t.. Moz Moz is arguably one of the best SEO/ Content Marketing blogs on the internet. The site is dedicated to offering tonnes of great tips and tricks for marketers. Moz’s co-founder, Rand Fishkin, is a marketing guru and knows pretty much everything about content, search and social on the web. Content Marketing Institute The Content Marketing Institute has to be one of the best resources for content marketers. The site is full of practical, how-to guides, info-graphics and surveys and there’s also a huge amount of insights from marketing experts. Not only that, there’s also an active community for discussing the latest news, information and advances that are moving the industry forward. Buzz Sumo Buzzsumo is a platform for content marketing and SEO agencies to help discover engaging content and outreach opportunities. It’s widely known to be one of the most important and useful tools for any content marketing or SEO campaign. With Buzzstream you can quickly find what content is working well within an industry and discover who the major influences are. NinjaOutreach Your content marketing won’t be sufficient without blogger outreach/influencer marketing. If you are not promoting your content and building connections with authority bloggers, chances are you will not be getting enough exposure for your blog. A tool that can help you achieve this is NinjaOutreach. Build your list of influencers/bloggers, reach out to them, and make connections Coschedule Coschedule is a powerful tool that allows you to schedule your blog and social media on the same calendar in WordPress. It makes planning blog posts and social media messages really simple. You connect CoSchedule to your WordPress blog and there you can create a queue of social media messages that will be automatically sent once your blog post goes live, allowing bloggers to create a series of messages that promote their blog posts on a rolling schedule. SEMrush SEMrush is a great tool to help optimize your blog for search engines. It shows you which keywords your website rank for and the number of searches done for those keywords each month. This information is great for deciding which pages to optimize on your site and can help improve your keyword ranking. Majestic Majestic SEO is a great tool for website owners and is probably one of the best link intelligence tools available. Majestic finds out how all the websites on the internet link to each other so you can find the backlinks of competing websites. It giving you detailed information about link building, website traffic analysis and competitive link analysis.

eLearning & Tutorials Magazines Interesting For Developers Communities

The WordPress community is the heart of all themes, plugins, code and design. After all, when WordPress first started out it was a community enterprise rather than a business. Luckily for all WP developers, WordPress has managed to maintain its identity and in the spirit of sharing and caring, community support is widely available not only on WordPress.org but throughout the entire web. Here are a few places to get started:

WP 101 plugin A plugin that is dedicated to providing video tutorials to a variety of other WordPress plugins as well as some basic WordPress features for beginners. By Installing WP101 on your site you are making dozens of tutorials accessible right from your WordPRess dashboard, so you can watch and learn from them whenever you install a new plugin. WP Sessions A Marketplace of online courses and live sessions aimed for WordPress users and developers of varying levels of expertise. Advanced topics include things like how to develop a WordPress theme or plugin, How to secure a WP site and how to improve performance. There are also a lot of marketing oriented courses such as how to prepare a promotional video and how to perform well on social media. Word Sesh WordSesh is an annual community networking event that takes place online via a live 24 hour hangout session. Participants join from all over the world to join the discussion, meetup, get to know each other and share their thoughts and ideas. Its a great way to get involved and meet new people as well as promote your own content or product on a more personal level. If you happened to miss the live session, don’t worry! The sessions are available on youtube all year-round. SpinPress A brand new Magazine that revolves around WordPress trends, innovations, tips and tricks for WordPress users and developers. Smashing Magazine Smashing Magazine is an independent publication that delivers useful and innovative information to Web designers and developers. The WordPress Plugin Boilerplate A standardized and organized platform that assists WordPress developers in creating plugins by laying down both the standardized coding and the documentation necessary for writing quality WordPress codes. Git Hub A social network of developers that allows them to share codes they have written, have them reviewed by other developers, and create Powerful collaborations based on code management for open source and private projects. WordPress Communities Around the world This is an excellent piece of content that lists WordPress groups and wordcamp sessions that take place in different parts of the world. If you’re a WordPress developer looking to connect with other developers in your local area, this is a great place to start. linkedin groups Linkedin is home of some of the largest WordPress support groups in the world, where users and developers of all levels can ask questions and help each other out. The link above goes to the main WordPress group on linkedin, which has over 53,000 members from all over the world. There are also some smaller groups that are more focused on specific members of the community, such as bloggers, designers, webmasters and others. Facebook Groups Facebook also has quite a few discussion groups that revolve around WordPress, with differing main topics such as WP development, WP SEO and WP blogging. There are also many localized groups where you can get advice in your own language.

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