One of the primary reasons WordPress is the preferred choice of blogging platform is the limitless possibilities one can expand and extend the functionalities of it with a vast choice of WordPress plugins.

In the last article, I have outlined right after your WordPress setup and in today’s installment of Post Install To-Do List, I’d like to recommend the essential 10 Plugins You Ought To Install to get the maximum performance out of your WordPress.

10 Essential Plugins You Ought To Install

With the new plugins being developed discovered everyday, it can really becomes addictive installing one after the other. The question you need to ask yourself in the context of your blogging needs is which plugins are considered luxuries you can live without and which are deemed necessary.

Plugins can extend WordPress to do almost anything you can imagine

In that regard, here are the essential 10 WordPress plugins you ought to install. Not in any order of importance but in my truest humble opinion these are what you ought to install first and foremost.

Note: For instructions on how to install, please refer to the respective developers’ site

#1 Akismet

Akismet is the de facto anti-spam plugin that comes bundled with your WordPress Package. The use of it requires a WordPress.com API key. Undoubtedly, it’s one of the most indispensable plugins and deemed to be one of the best to combat spammy comments.

Well, almost the best and for extra layer of protection, I’d recommend the combo use of Akismet and WP Hashcash.

#2 Platinum SEO

Platinum SEO Pack is the ultimate SEO solution to getting your blog ranks high better in the Search Engine Results. Basically, what it does is to optimize your post and page titles and automate all SEO relevant META tag (description and keyword tags) for search engines.

I can’t think of any other plugins that does the same wonderful job of on-site optimization than Platinum SEO. Kudos to Rajesh.

#3 Dofollow

In my opinion, if you are a new kid in the blogosphere, what other better incentive to offer your readers to comment than removing the nofollow tag on all the comment links and this Dofollow plugin is all that you need without messing up with your code.

Here’s Ultimate List of Nofollow & Dofollow Plugins by Andy Beard, the undisputed strong advocate of dofollow.

#4 Google XML Sitemaps

Google XML Sitemaps will generate a compatible sitemap of your WordPress blog which is supported by all the major search engines. Basically a sitemap tells the search engines how, when and what to index your site.

If your site is yet to be indexed by Google, submit your sitemap via Google Webmasters Tools using your existing Google account, or create an account if you don’t have one.

#5 FD Feedburner Plugin

In the last article, I’ve touched briefly on the need to create a Feedburner account, what this FD Feedburner Plugin does is to redirect all feeds to a Feedburner feed seamlessly and transparently for all users. Just tell the plugin what your Feedburner feed URL is and you’re done.

It does help to make subscription a whole lot easier for the non-tech savvy readers with just “One Easy Click”. Here’s how to create your FeedBurner account.

#6 Secure Contact

Contact form is the essential element of your blog. It’s the avenue of communication between you and your readers. Though there are a couple of contact form scripts for you to choose from, I’d recommend Secure-Contact for its sheer simplicity and enhanced security with captcha images.

#7 Subscribe to Comments

Being one of the underused plugins among the newer blogs, Subscribe To Comments allows your commenters to receive an email notification when a new message is posted.

As blog commenting on multiple blogs has become part of daily routine, I can’t think of a better way to encourage your commenters to come back and stay engaged in the discussion.

This is one simple yet useful plugin that has a huge implication on your readership level. So stop asking yourself why you aren’t getting enough comments.

#8 WP Database Backup

They say, “Prevention is better than cure”. Regardless of how old is your blog, you shouldn’t put off till another day to backup your blog, WP Database Backup is the easiest way to automate the daily backup of your blog lest anything goes wrong.

You can easily opt to send it to your email daily and everything works behind the scene for a peace of mind. Highly recommended…no question about it.

#9 WP Super Cache

WP Super Cache is a static caching plugin for WordPress. It generates HTML files that are served directly without processing comparatively heavy PHP scripts. By using this plugin you will speed up your WordPress blog significantly.

Here’s 5 Possible Ways to Speed Up Your Blog.

#10 OneClick

OneClick will certainly change the way you install plugin and theme on your WordPress. Once installed and used with OneClick Installer Firefox extension, it simplifies the effort to install both plugin and theme to just one single click without the use of any FTP upload.

All you need to is to right click on the download link, activate and presto, you’re done. It couldn’t be any easier than this and I can attest to it.

In Summary

Though the above list may not be exhaustive, these 10 plugins should be enough to cover the basic functions you need to optimally run your WordPress blogs and enhance its overall performance.

Keep in mind that theoretically the more plugins you use, the slower your blog will load. So selective use of them is highly recommended here.

For The Best of The Best, do check out what Jim @ The Net Fool has to recommend for Top WordPress Plugins for Any Type of Blog.

What other plugin do you think is equally important to be on this post install checklist? Suggestions are most welcome.

Trivial Question: Do you have any idea why I don’t link out all the plugins to the WordPress Plugins Directory?

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