Understanding WordPress for business: Third in a series

As business owners, what’s most important is to understand the value of WordPress to their business website needs. In this series, I’ve been breaking down and explaining parts of the WordPress CMS over several posts. In this entry, you’ll learn what WordPress Plugins and Widgets are, and what they can do for your site — and your business.

Continuing a food analogy, these are the extras that make a sandwich your own.

Just as a WordPress theme provides the foundational look of your website, the meat and bread, if you will, Plugins and widgets add functionality and customization within your overall website. Think of plugins as the variety of mustard, pickles, tomato and lettuce you might add, and widgets as the flavor a certain type of pickle adds vs. another type.

Plugins are third party pieces of software that can be installed and used on a WordPress site to add functionality that isn’t included in the standard WordPress installation.  Do you want a better contact form?  Want to show a social media or Yelp feed on your website, or add the ability for people to sign up for your blog? There is probably a plugin, or several, that can provide the function you seek. Developers around the world are working on new plugins every day. As you might expect, some are great, others can create problems for your website. So being selective about them is as important as picking quality ingredients for your sandwich.  Add a too-strong peppercini or wilted lettuce to your sandwich, and you’ll suffer for making the wrong choice. And more is not always better when it comes to your site visitor’s user experience.

Plugins often contain Widgets as part of their makeup. The editorial staff at wpbeginner.com write, “A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page.”  But that doesn’t tell the whole story.  WordPress themes include widget areas that allow you to place functional elements, like image sliders, Images, database integration, chat, and more to your site’s user experience.  These widget areas allow you to specify things in certain places on a site page, like the head area, footer, and sidebars.  Instead of each page on the site needing to be coded with the widget, it’s done in one place and populated throughout the site for users to see.

With my next installment, I’ll share three important things you need to avoid when using WordPress Themes, and four of the top must-haves to include in your WordPress site.

That’s my take on this. Want to learn more? Sign up for my email newsletter.