12 Plugins & Widgets To Socially Pimp Wordpress

Social this, social that. That’s all we hear these days and with reason. It’s also not going anywhere so get used to it

Here are some great plugins and tips to “socialize” your Wordpress.

1. Add a “Like” Button To Your Wordpress Posts.

There’s a few ways to this actually but I’m featuring here what I think is the best plugin so far to accomplish this.

Features:

-Choose form 2 layout styles
-Show faces option
-Control width
-Choose to use “like” or “recommend” as the text
-Choose font
-Location settings – above or below posts, then to show on index page, single pages, single posts

Screenshot of settings area:

Why I like it: It’s easy to install and still gives some cool control / customizing options.

What I’d like to see:More customization options, for example more layout styles, perhaps let people choose a custom color and icon that they specify. Also let people choose what text to use instead of letting them choose from only 2 options.

>>>Get it here<<<

2. Socialize Your Comments Area

I’ve debated a bit between 2 plugins for this but I choose Disqus mostly because it had more features. However there are some things that I’m not crazy about, namely that it’s a 3rd party app that is depending on their systems to function. I hate giving control to a crucial part of my site to a 3rd party like that but in some cases it’s worth the risk. Before deciding to go with a 3rd party, hosted solution like this I look at who is behind it and in this case, they look really solid with reputable people behind it. Always look for who has the biggest reputation to lose and that’s usually the safest bet

That said, my second choice was StandOutComments. John Chow seems to be involved and it does seem promising. What I like about StandOutComments is  what I don’t like about Disqus – it’s stand alone and hosted on your site.

Features: Take a look at their website for all the features but basically what I like and is missing with StandOutComments is:
1) the ability to login from other networks, like Twitter, Facebook, Open ID, etc.
2)  It’s free  (though there is a paid version)
3) It grabs and displays reactions from various social sites and appends them below your comments area, like for example if someone discusses your post on Twitter, it’ll display that there. So your comments area becomes like a social hub of everything surrounding what is being said about your post, aggregating those various networks onto your site instead of just having regular old blog comments there.
4) It has some easy customization features.

Screenshot of settings area:

Why I Like it: because of the strong aggregation / centralization of the various social networks to create  hub that displays in a central location, your site

What I’d like to see: I’d like to see a few more features get added, likeStandOutCommentshas like ability to control more of the branding, sharing options and monetization. I’d also like to see them offer a version that is not so depended on their servers. Though I haven’t tested this and it might already be implemented (reply in the comments below if you know)… is the ability to display all the comments as regular wordpress comments should their systems go down.

>>>Get it here<<<

3. Add Sexy Bookmarking Options

There are many social bookmarking Wordpress plugins out there and even the plugin mentioned above, StandOutComments has some included in that plugin. The one I prefer out of the many I’ve tested over the past few years is Sexy Bookmarks. Just look at the bottom of this post, I’m using them. Aren’t they sexy?  :)

Features:
- Choose up to 85 Social Bookmarking Options
- Ability to add no follow to links
-Ability to set links to open in new windows
-Ability to animate the “expand” option when hovering over the area with your mouse
-Ability to choose some cool background images
-Ability to control the position (above / below) content
-Ability to control where it gets displays (home page, posts, pages, etc)
-Ability to show in RSS feed
-Ability to hide from mobile browsers

Screenshot of settings area:

Why I like it: Cause it’s the sexiest of all the other plugins that do this

What i’d like to see: Ability to specify your own background images (upload your own or provide link to the image) and perhaps ability to add your own sites, although 85 is plenty for most, including myself :p

>>>Get it here<<<

4. Add Social Sharing Badges

Adding badges that allow people to Retweet using Tweetmeme or share your post using Facebook or buzz it up with yahoo etc is a great way to give your readers options to spread your post to their favorite network(s). I’ve tested a few but choose Digg Digg because it offered the most options in one plugin for me.

Features:

Screenshot of settings area:

Why I like it: It has the ability to insert many different social sharing sites as opposed to having to deal with multiple plugins, this one does it all.

What i’d like to see: Really, it does everything I could want. Perhaps give the option to choose your own button graphics that you could upload would be a nice feature.

>>>Get it here<<<

5. Give Your Wordpress Users A Social Networking Component (or turn it into a social network!)

Sure, there’s Buddypress to turn a WPMU install into a fully-fledged social networking but how about just something simple that turns a regular Wordpress install into a mini social network, without over-doing it. Mingle to the rescue. After all you want to give your site a social networking component, not turn it into a social networking site (or maybe you do – it can also be used this way. Here’s a link to a demo site the author setup using Ming that uses it as a social network site rather than a component.

Features:

-User Profile Pages
-User Friending
-User Profile Posting (for friends)
-User Profile Post Commenting (for friends)
-Friend Activity Pages
-Full Member Directory
-Login & Navigation Widget
-Random or Recent Users Widget
-Email Notifications
-User Email Notification Opt-Outs

Screenshot of settings area:

Why I like it: It’s easy to setup and give your site a social networking aspect while not being too much. It’s not for every site but for those that need it, it’s a dream plugin because you can just use Wordpress which you already use and don’t have to deal with another bulky solution such as Buddypress.

What i’d like to see: I think it does everything it needs to do, the author did a great job of keeping it simple and focusing on what  such a plugin needed to accomplish.

>>>Get it here<<<

6. Create A Forum

Discussion forums are perhaps the earliest forms for social networking sites, it allowed people to come together and form communities and to this day it’s still relevant. Forums are a great way to create a community within your site. For Wodpress there’s the obvious choice of using BBpress and integrating it with Wordpress but I like this other solution better because it plugs in your existing wordpress site without having to intall and integrate something else. Meet Simple-Press. You simply upload it as a plugin and click a button to perform the auto installation, then you can insert your forum into a wp page. It’s crazy simple to install and start using yet is pretty darn powerful, check out the features:

-Fully integrated with WordPress user registrations and logins
-Creates ‘pretty/seo friendly’ permalinks
-Underpinned by a powerful user and permission system
-Can create private forums
-Forums can be ‘Members Only’ or can allow for Guests
-Private Messaging system
-Admins can allow for post moderation (approval)
-Built in Search tool
-Fully customisable skins and icons
-Most rendering functions are ‘pluggable’
-Member Profile updating – users can change own passwords
-Choice of Editors (RTE, HTML, bbCODE)
-Options Signatures, Signature Image, Avatars, and Rankings
-A variery of Template Tags – recent posts etc
-Progammable Hooks for user extension
-Optional Spam Prevention tools
-Optional Cookies to track Guests and Members
-Fully Localised for language support
-Optional and various RSS feeds and email subscription to topics
-Various display options to suit your needs and theme
-An Admin toolset to perform many tasks from within the forum itself
-Blog Posts and Forum Topics can be linked
-Support for the Democracy Polls plugin
-Support for the Gravatars 2 plugin
-Forum Statistics – including who is online
-Complete uninstall/removal option
-Support for the All In One SEO Pack Plugin (Browser title bar)
-View Admins New Post Queue from ALL views with ‘Quick Reply’
-Right-to-left language support in the TinyMCE editor
-Topic Status Tracking
-Custom Smileys
-RTE Toolbar Customisation
-Pre-registration Policy display option
-Post Ratings
-Add Custom Profile data items
-’Watched’ topics
-Multiple forum Admins
-Members List

Settings area screenshot:

Why I like it: What’s not to like! This is a killer plugin and I can’t believe it’s free! The author really did a great job with this plugin. Now you can have a fully-fledge forum from within your Wordpress installation without worrying again about installing something else and then integrating it. 2 thumbs up.

What i’d like to see: There is only one feature that I wanted to see that was close to working but I had to get my programmer to code for me. That is the ability to cross-link users to Mingle profiles (see 5. above) Just allowing a specif URL syntax for linking to profiles would work and it does almost work with existing settings options but not quite. This is a personal wish of a feature however and I really can’t ask that of the plugin developer who has already gone above and beyond what you’d expect from a free plugin. So overall, it’s hard to dislike anything about this plugin!

>>>Get it here<<<

Other Worthy Mentions

Some other plugins / widgets you might want to consider include:

Gigya Wodpress Plugin – this plugin will allow you to use the Gigya 3rd party service to allow users to signin your site using 3rd party social networking sites. However, I found that at least on my sites, it made the site load slowly in some cases (this may just be a coincidence – but it can happen with these 3rd party services, which is something to consider before implementing) and also, Disqus already allows people to login to comment using 3rd party social network sites so Gigya isn’t that useful for me but it might be for you.

Tweet This – This plugin allows you to add links or buttons to allows readers to tweet your post to their followers. The feature I like most about this one though is the function that allows you to automatically tweet new posts to your account. The only reason i’m including it in this section is that I don’t like what I see on the author’s site “Sorry guys, I’m not planning any more updates to Tweet This. I don’t feel like coding anymore… I’ve gotten lazy.” – The guy seems nice though, he’s responded to me quickly when I had incompatibility issues with the plugin. And he seems pretty young to be a plugin developer so maybe he’ll change his mind and continue working on it. One thing is for sure, I personally hope he continues and not just on this one but that he continues creating new plugins… he definitely has talent for it.

OnlyWire Plugin - The onlywire plugin is pretty cool, it allows you to automatically bookmark new posts to some sites. Things I don’t like however are the restrictions and requirements on the free accounts but hey, of course they need to pay the rent too so I can’t really blame them for that. The other thing I don’t like though is that it’s not very reliable – it doesn’t seem to work for all the services during the time I tested only perhaps  50% of the services advertised worked, at best.

Chat Catcher – The Chat Catcher service works similar to the “reactions” feature of Disqus. It displays social mentions of your post. Worth checking out, specially for those not interested in Disqus because of the points I brought above or some other reason(s)

Facebook Fan Box – Nice widget that display fans of your Facebook page and allows people to “like” from your sidebar. Personally i think it’s starting to use up a lot of space and I find the other Facebook integration mentioned above sufficient. Though I might change my mind  and you might want to have such a fan box on your site.

Twitter Sidebar Widgets – There’s some plugins available too but I find the widgets that Twitter offers from their site work fine and you can integrate them using the text widget in your Wordpress installation.

Got any favorite “social” plugins / widgets that I didn’t feature here? Post them in the comments below.

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