“What is one essential WordPress plugin you recommend for beginners, and how has it simplified your website management? What advice can you give about using it?” Here is what 10 thought leaders have to say.
- Optimize SEO with Yoast SEO
- Simplify Forms with WPForms
- Engage Users with WPForms
- Manage SEO with Yoast SEO
- Simplify SEO with Yoast SEO
- Streamline Content with Yoast SEO
- Optimize Everything with RankMath
- Optimize Images with Smush
- Design Easily with Elementor
- Learn SEO with RankMath
Optimize SEO with Yoast SEO
One essential WordPress plugin I recommend for beginners is Yoast SEO. It simplifies on-page SEO by providing easy-to-follow guidance for optimizing content, such as keyword usage, meta descriptions, and readability checks. For someone new to SEO, it’s an excellent tool because it breaks down complex optimization tasks into clear steps.
Yoast SEO has made managing SEO much more approachable. It provides immediate feedback, such as color-coded indicators that show where improvements are needed, making it easy to boost content visibility without deep SEO knowledge. It also generates XML sitemaps automatically, which simplifies getting your pages indexed by search engines.
My advice for beginners is to start by optimizing just a few key pages with Yoast’s suggestions, such as your homepage and service pages, rather than trying to optimize everything at once. This approach allows you to see results and understand how each element impacts SEO without getting overwhelmed.
Andrew Lee Jenkins, Owner, Andrew Lee Jenkins
Simplify Forms with WPForms
I found WPForms made managing my website much simpler by allowing me to quickly build forms to capture valuable user feedback without the need to waste hours in setup or troubleshooting. I can create forms that look professional and work well on all devices with its intuitive interface. And, of course, email notifications and spam protection help me stay on top of things without ending up buried in spam.
For the best results, I recommend:
- Starting with Templates: You can quickly create different kinds of forms, such as contact, feedback, or event registration using WPForms templates in its own library.
- Setting Up Notifications: Get email notifications whenever a new form is submitted to stay on top of visitors.
- Experimenting with Conditional Logic: With conditional logic, you can tailor forms based on user responses, making the experience more engaging.
- Integrating with Other Tools: WPForms integrates seamlessly with email-marketing platforms, which makes it easy to follow up with leads automatically.
Mei Ping Mak, Director of SEO and Web, Website Design Asia
Engage Users with WPForms
WPForms is ideal for beginners because it offers a drag-and-drop form builder that allows you to create contact forms and surveys without needing coding skills. It simplifies user engagement, allowing visitors to get in touch easily and turning your site into a more interactive space. A good way to use WPForms is to start with a simple contact form and gradually add more features, like surveys or feedback forms, as your site grows. It’s a simple, impactful way to enhance user experience from the beginning.
Ryan Stone, Founder & Creative Director, Lambda Video Production
Manage SEO with Yoast SEO
One WordPress plugin I always recommend for beginners is Yoast SEO. It’s an absolute lifesaver for managing on-page SEO without needing to be a tech wizard. It simplifies things like optimizing meta descriptions, titles, and keywords while giving you a handy traffic-light system to show how well your content is optimized. Even better, it guides you on readability, which is often overlooked but so important for engaging visitors.
Using Yoast SEO has made managing website content much more straightforward for me. It’s like having a mini-SEO coach built into your site—pointing out where you can improve without overwhelming you with jargon.
My advice when using it? Don’t stress about making every single post “green” on their scoring system. Use it as a guide, not a rulebook. Focus on creating content that serves your audience first, and let Yoast help fine-tune the technical side. It’s a brilliant starting point to build SEO confidence while keeping things simple.
Tom Jauncey, Head Nerd, Nautilus Marketing
Simplify SEO with Yoast SEO
An important WordPress plugin I always suggest for beginners is Yoast SEO. SEO on your content seemed overwhelmingly complex when I first started out until Yoast came along. The plugin gives you instant suggestions to enhance your SEO draft, from keyword usage to readability. This is a huge benefit for beginners; it’s like having an SEO coach inside WordPress.
The great thing about Yoast is how it takes complex SEO rules, simplifies them into different components we can tackle one by one and (arguably the best part) colors everything. Red means you still have some work to do, and green means you’re good to go. This visualization approach also allows you to stay on track, helping you remain dedicated to the process while making SEO less scary.
My tip when using Yoast is to move very slowly and carefully at every recommendation. SEO is no sprint; Yoast gets you running with a strong base post by post. First, concentrate on readability and, as you get familiar with it, slowly optimize keywords. With the help of Yoast, it has simplified SEO from a monster to just another step in my daily workflow and enabled me to write content that is both user-friendly and search-engine friendly.
Darryl Stevens, CEO, Digitech Web Design
Streamline Content with Yoast SEO
One essential plugin I’d recommend for beginners is Yoast SEO. It simplifies the process of optimizing content by guiding you through each step, from keyword use to readability. This plugin helped streamline our approach to SEO, making it easy to adjust titles, meta-descriptions, and keywords directly within the editor.
For those new to SEO, Yoast offers practical, real-time feedback on each page, which keeps optimization straightforward without needing technical expertise. My advice is to start with the free version to get a feel for the tool and focus on understanding its core recommendations for content structure.
Ramzy Humsi, Founder & CEO, Vortex Ranker
Optimize Everything with RankMath
The one single WordPress plugin that has changed the way I work is RankMath.
RankMath is an easy place to start as the setup wizard is simple and quick.
RankMath offers on-page SEO, Internal and External Link management, Meta Descriptions, Instant Indexing to both Bing and Google, 301 Redirects, and Sitemap generation—all from one plugin.
RankMath, for me, is the plugin that I can’t live without.
Ben Grimwade, Software Engineering Manager, Just Another Tech Lead
Optimize Images with Smush
One plugin that beginners often overlook but can be a real asset is Smush for image optimization. When I started our blog, I quickly realized that one of the biggest slowdowns in load times came from heavy, unoptimized images. Smush was an absolute lifesaver; it automatically compresses images as I upload them, maintaining quality while significantly reducing file size. This helped my site load faster, which not only improved the user experience but also positively impacted my SEO. With faster load times, my bounce rate dropped, and I saw a small but noticeable improvement in my rankings.
For beginners, I’d suggest setting Smush to automatically compress new images and running bulk optimization on existing ones. It’s a simple step that yields big results, especially if you have a lot of media on your site. Additionally, enable lazy-loading—a feature that loads images only as users scroll down the page—so your pages load faster initially. If you’re discussing this in an interview, emphasize how this plugin helped you manage website speed effortlessly, sharing real examples of the before-and-after impact on your site’s performance.
Sonu Bubna, Founder, Backlink Monitor
Design Easily with Elementor
Elementor is a powerful plugin that transforms the way you build and design your WordPress pages. For beginners, it’s a game-changer because it offers a user-friendly, drag-and-drop interface that lets you create custom layouts without needing to know any code. You can add sections, columns, images, text, and widgets with just a few clicks, making it easy to design pages that look professional and unique.
Elementor also provides a variety of pre-made templates and blocks, so even if you’re not sure where to start, you can quickly import a design and customize it to fit your needs. The real beauty of Elementor is how much control it gives you over your site’s design.
However, while it’s easy to use, I don’t recommend rushing through it. Take some time to learn the features, like responsive design settings and advanced widgets, which will help your site stand out even more. With Elementor, you can elevate your website without the need for a web designer, making it a must-have for anyone serious about creating a visually appealing WordPress site.
Rashid Al Aminour, Software Developer, 8gs.com
Learn SEO with RankMath
Besides the Elementor page builder for WordPress, RankMath is the only plugin that comes to mind and stands out as an essential tool in my journey as a web designer. It not only introduced me to the fundamentals of SEO but also helped me successfully rank several blog posts while I was still exploring on-page SEO in early 2019. It also built confidence in me so that I was able to acquire more clients.
The only advice is to not entirely rely on the tool. Educate yourself and work your way up.
Abbas Kizilbash, Sr Digital Marketing Specialist, HSJ Host
