Updraft Plus
If you run a WordPress website, you probably know you be backing it up everyday, but so many people we speak to seem to think this is their webhost’s job. The bad news is the host will almost definitely think it’s your job. If you get hacked, or just wreck your website during maintenance updates, you’ll want to have your own reliable backup at hand. Do not leave this to chance!
Updraft Plus is our go-to everyday Backup Plugin and the higest rated backup Plugin in the WordPress.org repository. We’ve been using it everday since 2014 and we install it on all of the websites we manage (that’s hundreds of websites!).
Our favourite features are the ability to automatically send backups to cloud storage such as Dropbox or Google Drive and the on-demand “Backup Now” Feature.
The free option is perfect for most use cases, but if you need more, Updraft Plus Premium has a ton of additional features.
If you have a WordPress website, you MUST have a Backup solution in place and Updraft is the best plugin for this in our opinion.
WP Downgrade
The Open Source nature of WordPress is undoubtedly behind the incredibly success of the CMS. Users all over the globe develop new functionality as plugins which is added to the WordPress Repository for other user to use on their own websites. Updates for WordPress plugins are released everyday, new features are added, bugs squashed, security holes closed and – sometimes – incompatibilities are introduced.
This is where WP Downgrade by Reisetiger comes in handy. If you see plugin errors after updating your WordPress Core, you can quickly revert to earlier versions until the compatability issues are identified. Very useful when upgrading long neglected websites!
Code Snippets
Code Snippets enables us to quickly add funcitonality to websites without the need for child theme or creating a new plugin. Although we always use a childtheme when creating sites ourselves, not all WordPress designers do this and we often inherit sites that need some new functionality.
It’s also incredibly useful for reducing bloat. Some plugins can be replaced with a few lines of code placed into Code Snippets. Over the years we’ve built a large library of well tested code for preceisely this purpose.
Advanced Custom Fields
Advanced Custom Fields (known as ACF), originally by Elliot Condon has been our goto utility plugin for a decade. ACF was originally a tool that allowed the creation of additional fields within a page or post. This simplified the creation of data driven and highly customisable websites using WordPress, and we really don’t know how we would survuive without out.
Since being bought by WP Engine, ACF has improved further (although we don’t like the updated user interface – maybe that will grow on us?). The addition of Custom Post Type and custom taxonomy creation is a game changer.
Looking for help managing your WordPress website? We are a UK based WordPress technical agency working with exclusively with WordPress for over fifteen years. We provide full expert WordPress website support, maintenance and management services as well as WordPress training and consultacy to businesses around the World. Let’s chat about how we can help you.
