We’re just one month into the new year, but we’re already seeing a ton of awesome new WordPress plugins.
Below are 7 of the plugins I’m most excited about. Check each of them out for yourself, and see if they would be useful in your own plugin arsenal. Also, be sure to share any plugins you’re excited about in the comments section after the article.
1. Custom Login Page Customizer
Customizing the WordPress login page has never been an easy task — but this plugin changes things.
Using the built-in WordPress customizer, this plugin gives you complete control over your WordPress login page. Options include adding a logo, adding a page background image, and customizing all colors and fonts.
No longer will your clients need to see the WordPress logo when logging in. You can now give them a completely branded experience.
2. Simple Follow Me Social Buttons Widget
This plugin lets you add follow me buttons to any sidebar or widgetized area on your site. Out of all the follow me plugins I’ve come across, this one is the most robust, yet at the same time easiest to use. . .
It includes icons for almost every social network you’ll need (and if it doesn’t, the plugin author invites you to email them requesting additional icons). You can also customize the social icons: choose between a square or rounded icon, and change the icons to any color you want. Plus, you can specify the pixel size of the icons.
Important to note: these icons are not images, but instead font icons. That means that these icons will look great on any display (including retina displays).
3. Auto Terms of Service and Privacy Policy
Did you know that Automattic (the company founded by Matt Mullenweg, creator of WordPress) has made its privacy policy and terms of service pages are available for you to use under the Creative Commons Sharealike license?
If you didn’t and want to use them, you can use the Auto Terms of Service and Privacy Policy plugin to automatically populate them on to your site.
Once you install the plugin, just enter your name in the plugin’s settings and then enter the plugin’s shortcode on any page.
Voila! Your own terms of service and privacy policy pages.
4. Menu Image
Adding images to menu items increases the visual appeal of your site as well as improves navigation.
Doing this with code is rather difficult. But the Menu Image plugin makes it incredibly easy.
With the plugin installed, you’ll now have fields to add images using the built-in WordPress menu editor. You can also add a different image for link hover, change the image sizes, and select whether you want the text before, after, or under the image.
5. Tabs Shortcode and Widget
Tabs are a clean method of conveying a lot of information in a small space. But building tabs requires some knowledge of HTML, CSS, and Javascript.
The Tabs and Shortcode Widget let you add tabs without any coding at all.
It’s easy-to-use interface lets you set up tab instances by selecting how many tabs you want, what style of tabs, what to label each tab header, and what content should appear for each tab.
You can then add your tabs to any page or post using a button in the visual editor, or add it to the sidebar using a widget.
6. Max Mega Menu
This plugin allows you to build out highly customizable mega menus.
Within each mega menu, you can break them down into 1-8 columns. But what is coolest about this plugin is that you aren’t limited to only text links. You can also add widgets to each mega menu.
So, for example, you can have a “Contact Me” menu item that opens a mega menu with a contact form widget right there.
7. All 404 Redirect to Homepage
404 errors occur when someone tries to access a URL on your site that no longer exists. Perhaps they typed the URL incorrectly. Or you deleted a page.
Having too many 404 errors can affect your search ranking. Ideally, you’ll want to set up a 301 redirect for old URLs to new URLs. But what about the URLs that you miss?
With this plugin, instead of sending your visitors to a boring 404 “Not Found” page, you can redirect them to the homepage. Just install this plugin and it takes care of the rest.
