Do you want to prevent clients from accidentally deactivating WordPress plugins?
If you build websites for other people, then you probably have a few important plugins that you install on every client site. If a client accidentally deactivates one of these essential plugins, then it could break their site completely.
In this article, we’ll show you how to stop clients from deactivating WordPress plugins.
Why Prevent Clients from Deactivating WordPress Plugins?
If you create websites for other people, then you may have a list of must-have WordPress plugins that you install on every site. These might be security plugins that protect the client against hackers and malicious code.
If the client accidentally deactivates one of these plugins then it could make their website vulnerable to attack, or affect how it works. In the worst-case scenario, it might even break their website completely.
Even though this isn’t your fault, it’s still a bad client experience and could damage your reputation. With that being said, let’s see how you can stop clients from accidentally deactivating plugins in WordPress.
Simply use the quick links below to jump straight to the method you want to use.
By default, only the Administrator has permission to manage plugins, which includes deactivating plugins.
With that in mind, we recommend creating a single admin account for your clients so they have a way to manage their sites. You can then create non-admin accounts for anyone else who needs access but doesn’t require admin privileges.
Without admin rights, this means the majority of your clients won’t be able to deactivate plugins.
You can use any role for the non-administrator accounts. However, we recommend using Editor as it allows users to create, edit, publish, and delete content, including content created by other people. They just won’t have access to the higher-level WordPress features.
It’s also a good idea to give the Admin account to someone who has experience with WordPress and understands how to manage a WordPress website.
To create an account for one or more clients, go to Users » Add New in the WordPress dashboard. You can then type in some information about the person including their name and email address.
With that done, open the Role dropdown and choose the role you want to assign this user, such as Admin or Editor.
When you’re happy with the information you’ve entered, click on ‘Add New User.’
Method 2. Using the Members Plugin (Create a Custom Client Role)
Sometimes you may need to stop clients from deactivating plugins without restricting their access to other areas.
With that being said, the built-in user roles may not be right for your website. For example, Editors can’t deactivate plugins, but they also can’t add new users or install WordPress themes, which may be a problem for your clients.
If the default user roles aren’t quite right for your client, then you can create a custom role. This role can have exactly the permissions and capabilities the client needs. You can even create different roles for different teams, or even individual employees.
The easiest way to create custom roles is by using the free Members plugin. This plugin allows you to create new roles and then add and remove capabilities to those user roles, including the ability to activate and deactivate WordPress plugins.
This permission removes the Plugins setting from the left-hand menu, as you can see in the following image.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the Members plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how toinstall a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, go to Members » Add NewRole.
In the ‘Enter role name’ field, type in the name you want to use. This will be visible to anyone who has access to the WordPress dashboard.
After that, it’s time to grant and deny permissions.
The left column shows all the different types of content such as reusable blocks and WooCommerce products. Simply click on a tab and you’ll see all the permissions for that content type.
You can then go ahead and check the ‘Grant’ or ‘Deny’ box for each permission. For more detailed instructions, please see our guide on how to add or remove user capabilities.
To stop clients from deactivating plugins, click on the ‘Plugins’ tab on the left.
On this screen, check the ‘Deny’ box on the line that says ‘Activate Plugins.’
When you’re happy with how the user role is set up, click on ‘Add Role.’
You can now assign this role to any user, following the same process described in Method 1.
Method 3. Using Custom PHP (Prevent Clients From Deactivating Specific Plugins)
If you want to stop clients from deactivating all plugins, then you can use one of the methods mentioned above.
However, sometimes you may want to protect essential plugins only, while still giving clients the freedom to deactivate and delete non-essential software.
The best way to protect specific plugins is by adding custom code in WordPress. This allows you to remove the ‘Deactivate’ link for specific plugins.
This is an advanced method, so we don’t recommend it for beginners.
Note: Just be aware that clients can still deactivate any plugin using the Bulk Actions dropdown menu, or with an advanced tool like FTP or phpMyAdmin. However, removing the ‘Deactivate’ link makes it much more difficult for clients to accidentally deactivate an essential plugin.
To start, you’ll need to know the plugin’s file name and where it lives on your server. Typically, these files use the plugin’s name followed by .php, and live inside a folder named after the plugin. For example, the WooCommerce file is named ‘woocommerce.php’ and lives inside a ‘woocommerce’ folder.
However, it’s still worth checking, especially if the plugin has a long, complicated name or multiple words. For example, if you’re using the SR Product 360° View plugin to add interactive 360-degree images in WordPress, then its file is named ‘sr.php.’
You can check the file name and location by connecting to the site’s server using an FTP client such as FileZilla, or you can use the file manager of your WordPress hosting cPanel.
After that, go to /wp-content/plugins/. Here, you’ll see all the different plugins on your site.
Simply find the plugin that you want to protect, and open its folder.
After that, find the .php file.
Now, make a note of the folder name and .php file, as you’ll be using this information in your code. Simply repeat this process for every plugin you want to protect.
With that done, it’s time to add a code snippet to your site. Often, you’ll find guides asking you to add code to the site’s functions.php file.
However, this isn’t recommended as simple errors can cause countless common WordPress errors. You’ll also lose the custom code when you update your WordPress theme.
This snippet disables deactivation for WPForms and WooCommerce. To protect other plugins, simply replace ‘wpforms/wpforms.php’ and ‘woocommerce/woocommerce.php’ with the folders and file names you got in the previous step.
To disable deactivation for more plugins, simply add them to the code. For example:
After that, scroll to the ‘Insertion’ section. WPCode can add your code to different locations, such as after every post, frontend only, or admin only.
We only need to use the PHP code in the WordPress admin area, so click on ‘Auto Insert’ if it isn’t already selected. Then, open the ‘Location’ dropdown menu and choose ‘Admin only.’
After that, you’re ready to scroll to the top of the screen and click on the ‘Inactive’ toggle, so it changes to ‘Active.’
Finally, click on ‘Save Snippet’ to make the PHP snippet live.
Now, if you select Plugins from the left-hand menu, you’ll see the ‘Deactivate’ link has been removed for those plugins.
If you need to restore the ‘deactivate’ links at any point, then you can disable the code snippet. Simply go to Code Snippets »Code Snippet and click the switch next to your snippet to turn it from blue (enabled) to grey (disabled).
You can now deactivate these plugins by heading over to the Plugins menu.
You can also deactivate protected plugins using phpMyAdmin or an FTP client. This may be a good solution if you want to remove a specific plugin, but don’t want to completely disable the code snippet and leave all your protected plugins vulnerable.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
Do you want to easily create a custom WooCommerce thank you page?
A custom order confirmation is a great way to connect with your customers and get more sales by promoting related products, or even offering an exclusive coupon code.
In this article, we’ll show you how to create a custom WooCommerce thank you page.
Why Customize a WooCommerce Thank You Page in WordPress?
The order confirmation or thank you page may seem like a small part of your online store, but it can actually be a very valuable part of the sales process.
The default WooCommerce thank you page isn’t really optimized for conversions, so we recommend replacing it with a custom page. This page might encourage shoppers to buy more products by offering coupon codes or displaying popular products.
You can also show important information such as the items ordered, the total cost, and shipping information.
With that said, let’s show you how to easily create a custom WooCommerce thank you page, step-by-step. Simply use the links below to jump straight to the method you want to use.
Method 1. Create a Custom WooCommerce Thank You Page Using FunnelKit
The easiest way to create a custom WooCommerce thank you page is by using FunnelKit, formerly known as WooFunnels. It is the best WordPress sales funnel and automation plugin, and comes with ready-made Thank You templates that you can easily add to your online store.
This allows you to create professionally-designed and helpful thank-you pages without having to write a single line of code.
Note: There’s also a FunnelKit Pro plugin that comes with more ‘thank you’ templates. However, we’ll be using the free version of FunnelKit as it has everything you need to replace the default WooCommerce thank you page with a custom design.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, go to FunnelKit » Templates and click on the ‘Checkout’ button.
Choose a Thank You Page Template
You can now choose from any of FunnelKit’s ready-made templates, or select ‘Start from scratch.’ We recommend using a template as it helps you create a professionally designed Thank You page, fast.
To take a closer look at any template, simply hover your mouse over it and then click on the ‘Preview’ button when it appears.
FunnelKit will show a preview of the checkout page by default.
To see the thank you design instead, simply select ‘Thank You Page’ from the left-hand menu.
When you find a template you want to use, click on ‘Import This Funnel.’
We’re using the Livewire template in all our images, but you can use any design you want.
At this point, FunnelKit might ask you to install some extra plugins such as SlingBlocks, which adds page-building features to the WordPress block editor.
If you see this message, then click on ‘Activate’ to get the plugins you need.
After that, type in a name for the custom thank you page. This is just for your reference so you can use anything that will help you identify the page in your WordPress dashboard.
With that done, click on the ‘Add’ button.
Customize Your WooCommerce Thank You Page
You’ll now see all the steps that are included in the template.
Since you’re using the free version of FunnelKit, the template includes a thank you page and a custom WooCommerce checkout page, which you’ll need to set up separately. For detailed step-by-step instructions, please see our guide on how to customize the WooCommerce checkout page.
To go ahead and customize the thank you page, click on its ‘Edit’ link.
You can now click on ‘Edit Template’ to open the template in the WordPress block editor.
Note: If you’re using a page builder plugin, then FunnelKit may open the template in a different editor. If this happens, then you’ll need to click on ‘Switch to WordPress editor’ instead of ‘Edit Template.’
You can now customize the template in exactly the same way you build any WordPress page. Simply click on any block and then fine-tune it using the settings in the right-hand menu and the mini toolbar.
For example, you’ll typically want to replace the placeholder logo with your own custom logo. To do this, click to select the Image block and then select ‘Replace’ in the mini toolbar.
Now, either select Open Media Library and choose an image from the WordPress media library, or click on ‘Upload’ and select a file from your computer.
After choosing an image, you can add image alt text, change the width, add rounded corners, and more using the settings in the right-hand menu.
You’ll also want to replace the placeholder text with information about your own online marketplace. Simply click to select any text block and then type in your custom messaging.
You can also change the text’s styling using the settings in the right-hand menu. For example, you can use borders and box shadows to make the text stand out, change the font family, or change the text color in WordPress.
Just don’t modify any of the text inside the [ ] brackets as these tags allow FunnelKit to show personalized content, such as the customer’s name.
Customize the Order Details Widget
After that, scroll to the Order Details section and give it a click. This is a unique widget provided by FunnelKit that shows information about the customer’s order.
This widget works out of the box, but you may want to customize how it looks and the information it shows.
To start, you can change the section’s heading by typing into the ‘Heading’ field.
You can also choose whether to show the product image for every item in the customer’s order, using the ‘Show Image’ slider.
Do you sell subscriptions for a membership site, online courses, or similar? Then you may want to show information about the customer’s subscription, such as the price and when their next payment is due.
To add this section, click to expand ‘Subscription’ in the right-hand menu. Then, enable the ‘Show Subscription Preview’ toggle.
In this section, you can also replace the default ‘Subscription’ text with your own messaging by typing into the ‘Heading’ field.
Similarly, if you sell digital downloads then you can add a ‘Downloads’ section to the thank you page. This contains useful information, such as the filename, the number of downloads remaining, and the expiration date.
You can even add a button so shoppers can download their purchase directly from the custom thank you page, which will improve the customer experience.
To add this section, simply click to expand ‘Downloads’ in the right-hand menu. You can then add and remove information using the toggles.
You can also replace the default heading and button text with your own messaging.
When you’re happy with how Order Details is set up, you may want to change how it looks by clicking on the ‘Style’ tab.
Here, you can change the heading and background colors that are used across the entire order section, or change individual elements within the ‘Download’ or ‘Subscription’ sections.
Edit the Customer Details Widget
With that done, it’s time to look at Customer Details, which is another unique widget provided by FunnelKit.
Simply click to select the Customer Details section and then make your changes in the right-hand menu. For example, you can replace the default headline with your own messaging by typing it into the ‘Heading’ field.
You can also switch between a multi-column or single-column layout using the ‘Layout’ dropdown menu.
After that, you can click on the ‘Style’ tab and change the fonts, text size, colors, and more.
Add More Blocks to the Custom Thank You Page
When you’re happy with the changes you’ve made to the template, you may want to add your own content. This can help you improve the customer experience, get more sales, promote your brand, and more.
To add blocks, simply click on the ‘+’ icon in the right-hand corner and then drag any block onto your design. Both FunnelKit, WooCommerce, and WordPress have lots of different blocks you can use, so let’s quickly look at a few examples.
Promote Your Other WooCommerce Products
The thank you page may seem like the end of the buyer journey, but it doesn’t have to be. You can use this page to recommend other products the shopper may want to buy. This can get you more sales, while also raising awareness about the other great products you sell.
To see what blocks are available, scroll to the ‘WooCommerce’ section in the left-hand menu. Here, you’ll find blocks such as Best-Selling Products, Newest Products, On Sale Products, and more.
Simply find the block you want to use and drag it into your design.
With that done, click to select the block and then customize it using the settings in the right-hand menu.
Get More Social Media Followers
Social media websites like Twitter and Facebook are the perfect place to promote your products, so you’ll want to get as many followers as possible. With that in mind, it’s a good idea to add social media links to your custom thank you page.
Since these shoppers have already bought from your business, they’re more likely to follow you on Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, and other social platforms.
To get started, simply drag a Social Icons block onto your page. You can then click on the ‘+’ icon and choose the social icon that you want to add.
After making your selection, click on the new icon in the Social Icons block.
In the mini toolbar that appears, type in the URL of the profile you want to link to.
Simply repeat these steps to add all your social media accounts to the block.
Give Customers Exclusive Coupon Codes
A coupon code encourages shoppers to buy from you again. For that reason, you may want to add a coupon code to your thank you page. For example, you might offer shoppers a free shipping discount on their next purchase.
You can create a coupon code with WooCommerce’s built-in coupon feature, or by using a coupon code plugin.
After creating a coupon, simply add a Text block to the thank you page. You can then go ahead and type the coupon into this block, along with any other messaging you want to use.
This is a great start, but you may want to show different coupon codes to different customers. For example, you could offer first-time customers a big percentage discount on their next purchase, to help build customer loyalty.
The best way to do this is by upgrading to FunnelKit Builder Pro. This premium plugin has a powerful rules-based engine that allows you to show different coupons to shoppers based on the order total, item count, the WooCommerce payment gateway used, and much more.
Publish the Custom WooCommerce Thank You Page
When you’re happy with how the thank you page is set up, click on ‘Update’ to save your changes. After that, click on ‘Back To Thank You Page.’
You can now click on the ‘Draft’ button next to ‘Thank you Page’ and select ‘Publish’
Method 2. Create a Custom WooCommerce Thank You Page Using a Page Builder
You can also create a custom WooCommerce thank you page using SeedProd. This allows you to design the page using a drag and drop editor, which is perfect if you find the WordPress block editor too restrictive or difficult to use.
SeedProd comes with more than 180 professionally-designed templates including eCommerce templates that you can use to create sales pages and lead squeeze pages.
Even better, SeedProd has full support for WooCommerce and even comes with ready-made WooCommerce blocks that you can simply drag onto your layouts.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Note: There is a free version of SeedProd, but for this guide, we’ll use the Pro version because it has the built-in WooCommerce blocks we need. It also integrates with the email marketing services you may already be using to promote your online store.
Upon activation, go to SeedProd » Settings and enter your license key.
After that, go to SeedProd » Landing Pages and click on ‘Add New Landing Page.’
Next, you need to choose a template for your thank you page.
SeedProd’s templates are organized into different campaign types such as coming soon and 404 pages. Since you’re creating a custom WooCommerce thank you page, go ahead and click on the ‘Thank You’ tab.
For this guide, we’ll be using the ‘Order Completed Thank You Page’ template.
Simply hover your mouse over this template and then click on the checkmark icon.
Next, type in a name for your custom WooCommerce thank you page. SeedProd will automatically use this name in its URL, but you can edit the URL if you want.
When you’re happy with the information you’ve entered, click on the ‘Save and Start Editing the Page’ button.
This loads the SeedProd editor, which shows a live preview of the page to the right and some settings on the left.
To customize a block, simply click to select it in the page builder, then use the settings in the left-hand menu.
The left-hand menu also has blocks that you can drag onto the order confirmation template.
Get More Sales By Adding an Upsell Section
You may be able to get more sales by promoting other products on the thank you page. One option is to create an upsell block using SeedProd’s sections.
Sections are ready-made collections of blocks that are commonly used together, so they can help you create beautifully-designed pages, fast.
Simply click on the ‘Sections’ tab and then select ‘Hero’ in the left-hand menu. After that, hover your mouse over ‘Hero 2’ and click on the ‘+’ icon when it appears.
This adds the section to your page.
Go ahead and click to select the section’s ‘Image’ block. Then, in the left-hand menu click on ‘Use Your Own Image’ to open the media library.
You can now add an image for the product that you want to upsell.
Once you’ve done that, click on the ‘Headline’ block and type in the product title.
Next, click to select the ‘Text’ block and then type in the product description.
You can encourage customers to add this item to their basket, by replacing the placeholder call to action button with an ‘Add To Cart’ button.
To do this, click to select the ‘Call To Action’ block and then click on the ‘Delete Block’ icon.
Next, find the ‘Add To Cart’ block in the menu.
Simply drop this block onto the empty space in your Hero 2 section.
Now, it’s time to connect this button to the right WooCommerce product.
To do this, you’ll need to know the product’s ID. If you don’t know this information, then go to Products » All Products in your WordPress dashboard. Here, simply hover your mouse over the product to see its ID.
Back in the SeedProd page editor, click to select the ‘Add To Cart’ block and then add the ID to the ‘Product ID’ box.
You can also enable the ‘Direct to Checkout’ slider, so the shopper will go straight to your store’s checkout.
At this point, you can change how the button looks using the settings in the left-hand menu. For example, you can change its color scheme, button text, alignment, and more.
After that, it’s a good idea to add a heading that promotes your upsell product. For example, you could use something like ‘You may also be interested in’ or ‘This is the perfect addition to your order.’
Simply drag a ‘Headline’ block onto your layout.
You can then type in the messaging you want to use.
Promote Your Best-Selling WooCommerce Products
Another option is adding a best-selling products section to your thank you page. Since these products are already popular, there’s a good chance the shopper may also want to buy them.
In the left-hand menu, find the ‘Best Selling Products’ block and drag it onto your layout.
There are many other types of product grids you can add, like sale products, top-rated products, recent products, and more.
When you’re happy with how the WooCommerce thank you page looks, it’s time to publish it by clicking on the dropdown arrow next to ‘Save’ and selecting ‘Publish.’
After publishing the page, you need to change the WooCommerce settings so customers get redirected to your new page.
The easiest way to do this is by using the Thanks Redirect for WooCommerce plugin. This plugin allows you to redirect customers to any URL after making a purchase.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, you’ll need to enter the URL of your custom thank you page.
To get this information, go to SeedProd »Landing Pages and find the thank you page you just created. You’ll find its link in the ‘URL’ column.
Once you have this information, go to WooCommerce » Thanks Redirect.
Here, check the ‘Enable Global Redirect’ box.
You can now type the link into the ‘Thanks Redirect URL’ box.
With that done, click on ‘Save Changes’ to store your settings.
Now, WooCommerce will send customers to your custom thank you page when they complete an order.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
Are you seeing the critical error on your WordPress site?
WordPress may sometimes show an error message saying, ‘There has been a critical error on this website. Please check your site admin email inbox for instructions.’ It will also include a link to the WordPress debugging guide.
In this guide, we will show you how to fix the critical error in WordPress. We will also talk about what causes this error and how to avoid it.
What Is the Critical Error in WordPress?
The critical error in WordPress is an error that stops WordPress from loading all the scripts it needs to work correctly.
Previously, this WordPress error resulted in a white screen of death or a fatal error message on the screen. Most beginners didn’t find it very helpful and struggled to resolve the issue on their own.
Since WordPress 5.2, users will now see a generic error message: ‘There has been a critical error on this website. Please check your site admin email inbox for instructions’ with a link to the WordPress debugging guide.
It will also send an email message to your WordPress site’s admin email address.
This email includes more details about the plugin or theme causing the error and a link to access your WordPress dashboard in recovery mode.
Another variant of this error will only show that your website is facing a critical error. It will not instruct you to check your email address.
This can happen because WordPress wasn’t able to load the files it needed to make the recovery mode available or to send the email.
What Causes the Critical Error in WordPress?
The critical error in WordPress is generally caused by a malfunctioning plugin, script, or code that prevents WordPress from functioning correctly.
Due to the malfunctioning code, WordPress is unable to load the files it needs.
All top WordPress plugins are thoroughly tested, so they are less likely to cause a critical error. However, a conflict with another WordPress plugin or some custom code may trigger the error.
Let’s look at how to fix the critical error in WordPress and get your website back.
Fixing the Critical Error in WordPress (2 Methods)
The critical error message itself is not very useful for finding and fixing the issue’s cause. Luckily, WordPress also sends an email to the admin email address of your website.
Many WordPress websites are not configured to send emails using SMTP. Due to this reason, they may not get an email despite WordPress telling them that it has sent an email.
Similarly, some WordPress sites may only see the critical error message without instructions to check the email. That’s because WordPress wasn’t able to load files it needed to send an email or make recovery mode available.
If you are among those users, don’t worry. We will show you how to fix the critical error even without the email.
On the other hand, if you received the WordPress technical issue email notification, then we will show you how to make sense of it and use it to bring your website back.
Simply click the links below to skip straight to the section you need:
Are you unsure which email address you used as the admin email? It is the email address you provided when installing WordPress.
If your site is on Bluehost or you used a WordPress auto-installer, your admin email address will likely be the same one you used for your WordPress hosting account.
You will see an email in your inbox with the subject line, ‘Your Site is Experiencing a Technical Issue.’ Inside it, you will find more helpful information about what caused the critical error on your WordPress website.
For instance, the following screenshot shows that the critical error was caused by the WordPress theme on our test site.
The email also includes a unique link that will allow you to log in to your WordPress website in recovery mode to investigate and fix the issue.
At the bottom of the email, you will see even more detailed information about the error, including the specific file and code that triggered it.
In the example below, some code on line 614 of our theme’s functions.php file is responsible for triggering the error.
Here is another example showing an error caused by a malfunctioning WordPress plugin.
As you can see, the message highlights the plugin name and the line of code causing the error.
Now, you just need to click on the link to WordPress recovery mode, which will take you to your WordPress admin area.
You will be asked to log in to continue.
Once you are logged in, you will see a notification telling you about the critical error, what caused it, and a link to where you can go to fix it.
For instance, in the following screenshot, WordPress is notifying us about the critical error caused by the plugin with a link to the Plugins page.
If you click the link, it will show you the problem plugin. It will also show you exactly which line of code caused the error.
You can go ahead and deactivate the plugin for now by clicking on ‘Deactivate’.
Similarly, you will see a link to the Themes page if the problem lies with your theme. At the bottom of the page, it will say which theme is causing the issue.
You can change your WordPress theme. Alternatively, you can delete the broken one and reinstall a fresh copy of it from the official source to see if that resolves the issue.
Once you have addressed the issue, click on the ‘Exit Recovery Mode’ button at the top.
In most cases, your WordPress website would now start working normally.
However, if you still see the critical error in WordPress, you can try the troubleshooting steps in the next section.
Fixing the Critical Error in WordPress Manually (Without Email)
If you didn’t receive the WordPress critical issue notification email, then this method will teach you how to troubleshoot and fix the critical error in WordPress.
If the error was caused by a recent action you took, then you can undo that action to fix the issue.
For example, if you installed a new plugin and activating it caused the critical error, then you just need to deactivate it (we will show you how to do that in the first step below).
On the other hand, if you are unsure what caused the error, you can simply follow these steps.
1. Deactivate All WordPress Plugins
The easiest way to disable a faulty WordPress plugin is by deactivating it. However, due to the critical error, you won’t have access to the admin area or know which plugin to deactivate.
To address this, we will deactivate all WordPress plugins. Don’t worry, you can easily reactivate them once you get access to your WordPress admin area.
Simply connect to your WordPress website using an FTP client or the File Manager app in your web hosting control panel.
Once connected, you need to navigate to the wp-content folder.
Inside the wp-content folder, you will see a folder called ‘plugins’. You need to right-click on it and then select the ‘Rename’ option.
Next, change the ‘plugins’ folder name to anything you like. In our example, we will call it ‘plugins.deactivated’.
WordPress looks for the plugins folder to load the activated plugins on your website. When it cannot find the plugins folder, it simply cannot activate them and automatically sets them as deactivated.
You can now visit your website to see if the critical error message has disappeared.
Important: Don’t forget to rename the ‘plugins’ folder if the critical error issue has been resolved. WordPress will then recognize the folder, and you can reactivate the plugins one by one from the WordPress dashboard to identify which one caused the critical error.
The next step in troubleshooting the critical error is switching your WordPress theme to a default one. This will fix the critical error issue if some code in your current WordPress theme is causing the problem.
Simply go to the WordPress.org theme directory and download a fresh copy of a default theme like Twenty Twenty-Two or Twenty Twenty-Three.
Next, you need to unzip the theme file to your computer.
This will create a folder with the theme name on your computer.
Now, you need to connect to your WordPress site using an FTP client or the File Manager app in your hosting control panel.
Once you have connected, navigate to the /wp-content/themes folder, and you will see a list of all the themes installed on your website.
Go ahead and download all of these folders to your computer as a backup.
After that, you need to delete all the theme folders from your website.
Your WordPress site now doesn’t have a theme installed.
To fix this, upload the default theme folder you downloaded earlier.
Once this process has finished, you can try visiting your website.
If your WordPress theme caused the critical error, then the error message should have disappeared, and you will be able to access your website.
3. Reinstall WordPress
A corrupt WordPress core file or malware could also trigger a critical error in WordPress. The easiest way to fix this is by reinstalling WordPress.
After downloading the file, you need to unzip it to your computer. This will create a folder called ‘wordpress’, which contains all the files you need for the reinstall.
Next, connect to your WordPress site using an FTP client or the File Manager app in your hosting control panel.
Once connected, navigate to the root folder of your website. This is the folder that contains the wp-admin, wp-content, wp-includes, and wp-admin folders.
Now select the files inside the ‘wordpress’ folder on your computer and upload them to your website.
Your FTP client will ask if you want to overwrite these files or skip them. You need to select ‘Overwrite’ and check the box next to ‘Always use this action’.
Then, simply click on the ‘OK’ button to continue. Your FTP client will now replace your core WordPress files with fresh copies from your computer.
Once it has finished, you can try visiting your website to see if this resolves the error.
If the critical error was caused by a corrupt WordPress core file or malware, then the error message should disappear now.
4. Turn On Debugging in WordPress
WordPress comes with a built-in debugging system that allows you to catch errors, log them, and troubleshoot issues.
To turn it on, you need to edit the wp-config.php file. Just locate the following line:
define( 'WP_DEBUG', false );
Now, go ahead and replace this line with the following code:
Now, you can try visiting your website to see if this has resolved the critical error.
6. Upgrade Your PHP Version
WordPress requires PHP version 7.4 or greater. If your WordPress hosting server uses an older version of PHP, it may not work well and cause a critical error.
If you have access to the WordPress recovery mode, you can see which PHP version your site is using by visiting the Tools » Site Health page and switching to the Info tab.
From here, scroll down to the Server section and click to expand it.
There, you will see the PHP version installed on your hosting server.
If it is lower than 7.4, then you need to update the PHP version.
Most good WordPress hosting companies allow you to easily do that from your hosting account control panel. For details, please see our article on how to update your PHP version on popular WordPress hosting platforms.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
Do you want to create a custom search form for your WordPress website?
Search is how most users find relevant and interesting content on your site. If they can’t easily find what they’re looking for, then they may move on to a different website.
In this article, we’ll show you how to improve your website search by creating a custom WordPress search form.
Why Create a Custom Search Form for WordPress?
WordPress comes with a built-in search feature. However, it doesn’t search all types of content such as comments, product reviews, or custom post types.
This may stop the visitor from finding what they’re looking for, including products they may want to buy on your online store.
You may also want to prioritize some content over others, so that it appears higher in the search results. For example, you may want to show your site’s latest posts at the top of the search results page, or display your most popular WooCommerce products.
With that in mind, let’s see how you can customize the WordPress search form. We cover a lot of ground in this post, so simply use the quick links below to jump straight to the section you want to read.
The easiest way to improve the built-in WordPress search algorithm is by using SearchWP.
SearchWP is the best WordPress search plugin. It’s easy to use and gives you complete control over your site’s search algorithm, so you can help visitors find what they’re looking for, fast. It also searches content that WordPress ignores by default.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, go to SearchWP » Settings and then click on the ‘General’ tab.
Here, you need to enter your license in the ‘License Key’ box. You can find this information in your account on the SearchWP site.
Once you’re done, click the ‘Verify Key’ button.
Customizing the Search Engine
After activating the plugin, you can fine-tune how SearchWP indexes, searches, and displays your content. You can think of this as creating a custom Google search algorithm that’s just for your WordPress blog or website.
To start, head over to SearchWP »Algorithm.
Here, you’ll see a section for the different content types that SearchWP searches by default, including pages, posts, and media files.
To include more content types in the search results, click on the ‘Sources & Settings’ button.
Depending on the WordPress plugins you’ve installed, you may see some extra options. For example, if you’re using WooCommerce then you can include ‘Products’ in the SearchWP search results.
Simply go ahead and check the box next to each content type you want to include in the search results.
You’ll also notice that ‘Keyword Stems’ is selected by default. This means SearchWP may include results that don’t have the same ending as the search term.
For example, if you search for ‘run’ then keyword stemming will include ‘running,’ and ‘runners’ in the results.
This can help show relevant results to visitors, so we recommend leaving the ‘Keyword Stems box checked. However, you can uncheck it if you want to show exact matches only.
When you’re happy with the information you’ve entered into the popup, click on ‘Done.’
You’ll now see a section for all the sources you selected.
Each section has its own ‘Applicable Attribute Relevance’ sliders.
This is the weight that SearchWP will give to each attribute when creating the search results.
Content that matches an attribute with high relevancy will appear higher in the search results. By contrast, content that matches an attribute that has less relevancy will appear lower in the user’s search results.
To give an attribute greater weight, simply move its slider to the right. In the following image, the search engine will place more value on matches that it finds in the post title, compared to matches that it finds in the post’s content.
Every WordPress website is unique, so you may want to try different relevancy settings to see what gives you the most accurate and helpful search results.
For example, if you’ve uploaded your menu as a PDF on your restaurant website, then this is important content and you’ll typically want to show it high in the search results.
You can also create rules that determine whether certain content is included or excluded from the search results. For example, if you have an online marketplace then you may want to exclude the account page, checkout page, and thank you page.
Simply click the ‘Edit Rules’ button in the section where you want to create the rule. For example, in the following image, we’re adding a new rule to the ‘Posts’ section.
This opens a popup where you can edit the search engine rules.
To go ahead and create your first rule, click on the ‘Add Rule’ button.
You can now choose the content you want to include or exclude from relevant search results.
To start, open the first dropdown menu and choose either ‘Only show entries if’ or ‘Exclude entries if’ depending on the kind of rule you want to create.
You can now use the rest of the settings to specify the content you want to exclude or include. For example, if you wanted to include or exclude a specific category then you’d type in the category name.
You can also type in any custom taxonomies you want to exclude or include.
To exclude or include specific post tags from the search results, simply open the dropdown menu and select ‘Tags.’
Then, type in the tag’s name.
To add another rule, just click the ‘Add Rule’ button and repeat the same process described above. When you’re happy with how the rules are set up, click ‘Done.’
You can now create rules for other content types such as media and pages, by scrolling to their sections and clicking on their ‘Add Rule’ buttons.
When you’re happy with how the search algorithm is set up, scroll to the top of the page and click on ‘Save.’
SearchWP will now rebuild the index. Depending on the speed of your Internet connection and your WordPress hosting provider, this may take a few minutes.
As soon as you see ‘Index Status 100%,’ you’ll know that SearchWP has added all your content and rules to the search index.
Create Custom Search Forms For Your WordPress Website
By default, all the search forms on your WordPress website will use the new SearchWP algorithm you created in the previous section. This means that visitors will start seeing more accurate and relevant results straight away.
However, for even better results you may want to create advanced search forms for different kinds of content. For example, you might create a smart WooCommerce product search form that looks at particular product categories only.
Each form will override the default WordPress search algorithm, so you can create as many different forms as you want with unique settings.
How to Create a Custom Search Form
To get started, head over to SearchWP » Search Forms and click the ‘Add New’ button.
This creates a new search form, ready for you to customize. For example, if you run a review website, then you might create a form that searches for product review posts and ignores other content like your blog posts and media. This can help visitors find what they’re looking for, faster.
Now, give the form a unique name by clicking on the small pencil icon next to ‘Search Form 1’.
You now type in a name for the custom search form.
This is just for your reference so you can use anything that helps you identify the form in the WordPress dashboard.
After that, you can choose a layout using the ‘Layout Theme’ thumbnails.
Some of these layouts are designed for specific search forms. For example, if you are creating a form that searches by category in WordPress, then ‘Category Search’ already has many of the settings you need.
Simply click on the different themes to see a preview of how this form will look on your website. After making your decision, scroll to the ‘Custom Styling’ section.
The settings you see may vary depending on your theme layout. For example, if you selected ‘Quick Search’, then the ‘Quick Search’ setting will be enabled by default.
You can disable and enable the different options using their toggles. The preview will update automatically as you make changes, so you can see what works best for your website.
Depending on your layout and the kind of form you want to create, you may need to enable and disable some of the ‘Custom Styling’ settings. For example, if you want to create a form that searches by category, then click to enable the ‘Category Search’ toggle.
After that, find the ‘Select Category’ field and type in each category that you want to include in the search results. For example, if you run an online store, then you may want to create forms that search specific product categories.
If you want to allow visitors to filter their search results using factors like the author, post type, and tag, then you will need to click to enable the ‘Advanced Search’ toggle.
After that, scroll to the ‘Advanced Search Filter/s’ field. By default, SearchWP allows visitors to filter their results using Authors, Post Types, and Tags.
To remove any of these filters, just click on its ‘X’ button. If you want to add more filters, then simply type their names into the field.
Then, when the right option appears in the dropdown, give it a click.
By default, SearchWP will search all the media, pages, and posts on your WordPress website. If you’ve created any custom post types, then you can include them in the search results using the ‘Type of search’ field.
Simply go ahead and type in each custom post type that you want to include. When the right custom post type appears, click to add it to the search.
Do you want to exclude media, pages, or posts from the search results?
Then just click the small ‘X’ next to ‘Media’, ‘Pages’, or ‘Posts’.
By default, SearchWP will show a generic ‘Enter keyword and search’ message before the visitor enters a search query.
You can replace this with your own messaging by typing into ‘Field Label’.
When you are happy with these settings, scroll to the ‘Form Style’ section.
Here, you can choose between different form styles, add a border, and change the font size.
Under ‘Button Style,’ you can customize the ‘Search’ button that appears in the form.
There are more settings that you can use to change how the form looks and acts. However, this is all you need to create an advanced custom search form.
When you’re happy with how the form is set up, you can scroll to the top of the screen and click on ‘Save’ to store your settings.
To create more custom search forms with unique settings, simply repeat the exact same process described above.
Add a Custom Search Form to Any Page, Post, or Widget-Ready Area
You can add an advanced search form to any page, post, or widget-ready area using the Search Form block.
As an example, let’s see how you can add a search form to a post. Simply open the post in the WordPress content editor and click on the ‘+’ icon. Then, type in ‘Search Form’.
When the right block appears, give it a click.
You can now open the ‘Select a Form’ dropdown and choose the form you want to use.
When you are ready to make the search form live, just click on either ‘Update’ or ‘Publish’. Now, simply visit this page or post to see the search form in action.
To add a search form to a widget-ready area, head over to Appearance » Widgets. Here, click the ‘+’ block icon in the area where you want to show the search form.
Then, type in ‘Search Form’.
When the right block appears, click to add it to the widget-ready area.
You can now open the dropdown menu and choose the search form that you want to use.
When you are finished, just click the ‘Update’ button to make the search form live.
Many online marketplaces and websites use live Ajax search. This automatically shows possible search results as the user types in the custom form, similar to how search engines such as Google work.
With Ajax live search, you can show relevant results without even reloading the page. This makes it a great choice if you sell digital downloads or physical products online, as shoppers can instantly see products that match their search query.
The easiest way to add Ajax live search to WordPress is by using SearchWP Live Ajax Lite Search. This free plugin automatically adds instant search to your website and works perfectly with any WordPress theme.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, the default WordPress search form will automatically use the Ajax live search feature. If you visit your site and start typing into the search bar, then you’ll see instant search in action.
Next, it’s a good idea to enable some advanced settings that will make it easier for users to find what they’re looking for.
To do this, go to SearchWP » Settings and scroll to the ‘General Settings’ section.
Here, you can activate any of the following settings:
Partial matches. With this setting enabled, SearchWP will display results that aren’t an exact match for the visitor’s search query.
Closest match. After enabling partial matches, you can also show the closest matches when a search has no results.
“Quoted†searches. This allows visitors to search for exact phrases using quotes.
Highlight terms. Automatically highlights the search terms to help visitors find what they’re looking for.
Measuring Search Results and Improving Conversions
To help you fine-tune your website’s search, it’s a good idea to monitor how visitors are using the search feature. This allows you to see what’s working and what’s not working on your WordPress blog, so you can constantly improve your site’s search and help visitors find what they are looking for.
This data can even help you generate blog post ideas by showing the content that visitors are already searching for.
To see the search history and most popular search terms, simply select ‘Statistics’ in the left-hand menu.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
WPML is the ultimate solution for creating a multilingual website effortlessly. With an improved WordPress core, WPML manages translated content effectively, allowing you to share your website’s content with readers worldwide in their preferred language. WPML’s added functionality expands your website’s reach, making it more appealing to a broader audience with minimal effort.
Are you wondering about the proper way to use H1-H6 heading tags in WordPress?
When you use headings effectively in your posts and pages, you make your content more readable, improve user experience, and boost your website’s SEO.
In this article, we’ll show you how to properly use heading tags in WordPress.
What Are Heading Tags in WordPress?
Heading tags are HTML elements used to identify the title and headings on a webpage.
Both visitors and search engines will understand your content better when your posts and pages contain headings. When you add headings correctly, you can improve the post’s SEO, so it ranks higher on search engine results pages (SERPs).
You add a logical structure to your posts by using different heading levels. Post titles will use H1 tags, and you typically use H2 tags for the main headings and H3 tags for subheadings.
When viewing a webpage as HTML, heading tags look like this:
<h1>Post Title</h1>
<h2>Heading</h2>
<h3>Subheading</h3>
<h4>And so on</h4>
However, you can easily add heading tags to your WordPress posts and pages without using code.
The sizes and colors of the different heading styles are controlled by your theme’s stylesheet, and we’ll show you how to customize their appearance below.
With that being said, let’s take a look at how to properly use H1-H6 heading tags in WordPress. Here is a quick overview of what we’ll cover in this guide:
1. Use Headings and Subheadings to Structure Your Content
Headings help you create a logical structure for a post or page. They guide your readers through the article by briefly describing the main sections of the topic and how they relate to one another.
You can use up to six hierarchical heading levels to structure your content:
H1 tags are the most important and there should be only one H1 heading in a post. This tag is used for the post title, and you can learn how to add and optimize your titles in our guide on SEO titles and H1 post titles in WordPress.
H2 headings are the main headings and are used in the different sections of a post. If you need to split these sections up into subsections, then you can use H3 tags. Most themes will display H3 subheadings in a smaller font than H2 headings.
Most posts only need two or three levels of headings, so you may never use heading tags H4 to H6 on your WordPress website. However, they can be used to provide further structure in very long posts or academic articles.
Structuring your posts in this way helps both website visitors and search engine crawlers quickly grasp the context of your content. A well-structured post may be ranked higher on search engine results pages.
Tip: Make sure you use heading tags to structure your article, and not simply for formatting, such as making a block of text larger. For more on formatting text, see our guide on how to easily change the font size in WordPress.
2. Customize the Appearance of Headings to Grab Attention
Using headings in your content is a great way to grab user attention with a larger-size font. In most WordPress themes, headings are in a larger font than regular body text. They allow you to break your posts and pages into sections.
You can also customize the appearance of your headings, so they stand out even more. For example, you can attract attention to your headings by adding color, especially with H1, H2, and H3 headings.
Some themes offer preset font choices that will change the font on your entire website.
Besides that, you can also change fonts for individual elements on your theme. For example, you can use a different font for the body text and headings. There are even options to use separate fonts for each heading level.
3. Use Headings to Improve Readability and User Experience
No one likes a wall of text. The easiest way to make your content more readable is by breaking it up using headings and short paragraphs.
This makes it easier to read and understand your content. It also helps your users scan through the article quickly and find the sections they want to read more thoroughly.
Checking the Readability of Your Headings Using All in One SEO
The best way to check the readability of your post is by using All in One SEO (AIOSEO). It’s the best WordPress SEO plugin that allows you to easily optimize your WordPress website for search engines and social media platforms.
Note: The free version of AIOSEO will show you if your post contains enough headings, and also let you set a focus keyphrase as we cover below. However, the extra features of the premium version will get your site ranking even higher on search engines.
You will find a ‘Page Analysis’ section that gives you a list of actionable tasks you can follow to make the post rank higher. It includes tabs for ‘Basic SEO,’ ‘Title,’ and ‘Readability,’ and each tab shows you how many errors you need to fix in that category.
The ‘Readability’ tab offers suggestions on how to improve readability, such as including images, shortening paragraphs and sentences, using transition words, adding subheadings, and more. Items marked with a red cross need more work.
Under ’Subheading distribution’, you will be given feedback on any steps you need to take to improve the headings in the post, such as:
‘1 section of your text is longer than 300 words and is not separated by any subheadings. Add subheadings to improve readability.’
‘You are not using any subheadings, but your text is short enough and probably doesn’t need them.’
‘Great job!’
You should aim to get a green checkmark next to every item under the Page Analysis section to improve the post’s SEO.
4. Optimize Your Headings for SEO by Adding Appropriate Keywords
Adding headings to your blog posts is great for your site’s SEO. That’s because search engines give headings more weight than normal paragraph text. Google will try to use the content of your headings to better understand the topic you are writing about.
You can optimize your headings for SEO by adding appropriate keywords. These are the keywords users will search for when looking for your content. You can learn how to find them in our guide on how to do keyword research for your WordPress blog.
But it’s important that you don’t just add random keywords to your headings. Only use keywords when they make sense and clearly describe what that part of the post is about.
Checking Whether Your Headings are SEO Optimized Using All in One SEO
You can use All in One SEO‘s SEO Analysis feature to check whether you have used enough keywords in your headings.
First, you need to add a focus keyword to your post. Simply scroll to AIOSEO Settings under the post content, then type the post’s most important keyword next to ‘Focus Keyphrase.’
The plugin will then analyze your content for the keyword, show you a score, and give suggestions on how to improve your ranking.
Among other things, All in One SEO will show you if your post has a healthy number of keyword-optimized H2 and H3 subheadings.
Besides adding keywords, we also recommend making your headline catchy and click-worthy. That’s because your organic click-through rate (CTR) plays an important role in SEO.
5. Automatically Create a Table of Contents From Headings
A table of contents is a clickable list of the headings contained in a post. They make it easier to jump between the sections of a long article, improving navigation through your content.
When your visitors click a link in the table of contents, they will be taken immediately to that heading in the article. This allows users to quickly move to the content they are interested in.
All in One SEO can save you time by automatically generating the table of contents based on your subheadings, while also making it completely customizable with editable links.
When editing your post, you’ll need to click the blue ‘+ ’ icon and locate the ‘AIOSEO – Table of Contents’ block. Simply drag the block onto the post or page where you wish the table of contents to appear.
The plugin will automatically identify the headings on the page and add them to your table of contents. If you use different heading levels (say H2 and H3), then lower-level headings will be indented to show the structure of your content.
If you are still writing the contents of your post or page, then any headings added to the document will be automatically added to the table of contents. Also, any changes that you make to the headings themselves will be reflected in the ToC block.
6. Optimize Headings to Rank for Google Featured Snippets
Organizing your heading tags well may help your content rank for Google featured snippets. These are highlighted results that are shown at the top of the search results page.
Google was able to pull the headings from the above post to create the number list you see on the search results page, earning this post a featured snippet.
This will help you get the maximum SEO traffic since a user is more likely to click on a featured snippet than a plain search result.
FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions About Heading Tags in WordPress
Here are some of the most common questions our readers ask us about heading tags.
What is the difference between H1 and H2 in WordPress?
H1 is used for the post title, and this should be the only H1 heading in a post. H2 is used for the main headings throughout a post. For many blog posts, H1 and H2 are the only heading tags you will need.
What are the six types of headings in WordPress?
There are six types of heading tags in WordPress, and they are H1, H2, H3, H4, H5, and H6. The H1 tag is used for the title and H2-H6 can be used for different levels of headings and subheadings throughout the post.
You don’t need to use all six levels of headings in a post. However, you shouldn’t skip a level. For example, when you use H2 for headings, you should use H3 for subheadings, and not skip straight to H4.
What is the difference between H1 and TITLE in WordPress?
The title you type at the top of a post or page is an H1 heading. However, when search engines display the post in search results, they will use a different title identified by a TITLE tag rather than H1. This is known as the SEO title or meta title.
When you create a new post or page in WordPress, you will see the words ‘Add title’ at the top of the page. Simply type the post title on this line to add an H1 heading.
While it is possible to create additional H1 headings using Heading blocks, we don’t recommend using more than one H1 tag.
How many H2 headings should a WordPress post have?
H2 headings are used to break up a long post and make it more readable, and there are no rules about how many you should use. In fact, if your post is only a few paragraphs long, then you may not need to add H2 headings at all.
The All in One SEO plugin has a Page Analysis feature that can check your blog post for readability. In general, if you have 300 words of text or more without a heading, it will recommend adding more headings or subheadings.
Do heading tags affect your WordPress website’s SEO?
Yes, the title of your blog post is extremely important for search engine optimization (SEO). A powerful title can get people to click on the link to visit your website, so we recommend you use a headline analyzer to create engaging titles that get more clicks.
H2-H6 headings can also impact SEO. They improve user experience, and this improves SEO. Adding appropriate keywords to your headings may also help your post rank higher.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
Having a brilliant website isn’t enough. Even if your business came with a substantial, pre-existing customer base (and let’s face it, most don’t), continuing communication is essential for retainment and growth.
Running a successful business means building and maintaining a connection with your clients – existing and potential.
There are, of course, many ways to reach your business prospects in today’s digital world: paid ads, social media, real-time messaging platforms, chat, and more.
But would you be shocked to learn that email – approaching its 45th birthday! – remains the most used, most successful platform for customer engagement?
According to Tom Wozniak, of OPTIZMO Technologies: As audience tracking and targeting become more challenging, the email address will continue to be the most valuable piece of audience identification data. [Forbes]
In this article, we’re going to look at why email is the most effective way to promote, proffer, and position your business for prime growth. Plus, we’ve hand-picked a selection of WordPress plugins that handle the various outreach tasks quite effectively.
Which (Customer Acquisition) Channel is Best to Watch
The ways in which you reach your audience are your customer acquisition channels. They are also the avenues for increasing your customer base.
Though some might rule it out because it’s the oldest, email remains one of the best acquisition channels available. [Lesson: Don’t throw the baby granddaddy out with the bathwater.]
Email is simultaneously simple yet powerful in terms of content that can be delivered. And it’s separate from third-party elements (eg, social media, search, etc); meaning, there’s no algorithm to work around. It’s a straight shot into the hands (ie, inboxes) of your customers.
Here are some telling stats:
By 2025, the number of global email users is expected to reach a total of 4.6 billion [Statista]
When it comes to online advertising, email has seen higher click-through rates than on social media [Statista]
59% of marketers say email is their biggest source of ROI [Sopro]
59% of survey respondents say marketing emails influence their purchase decisions [Sopro]
Email is also extremely cost effective, allowing for a minimal investment in a tool/platform that will likely have most of the important features that mirror its high-end counterparts. It’s also easy to scale as your business grows.
With consumers averaging an online time of 397 minutes daily – giving you a golden opportunity of 6+ hours for engagement – there is simply no better way to speak directly with your customers than email. [Oberlo]
Email topples social media in marketing stats. [Source]Three more stats on email’s impressive reach: [OptinMonster]
44% of users check their email for a deal from a company they know, whereas only 4% will go to Facebook
60% of consumers state that they have made a purchase as the result of a marketing message they received by email
There are 400 million more email users than social media users
Repeat: Four hundred million MORE. If those numbers don’t convince you, I don’t know what will.
Now that we understand the value of email as a customer acquisition channel, let’s look at the different types of emails you can employ to build relationships and drive sales. Plus, one very important bit of housekeeping that needs attention first.
How to Deliver Successful Results Easily and Reliably
Whether you run a simple website or a large eCommerce store, reliable email-sending is a necessity. As fantastic a CMS as WordPress is, it has multiple limitations when it comes to sending emails.
Because WordPress uses PHP mail functionality to send emails:
you can’t easily build HTML templates, embed images, or add attachments; and
it lacks proper email headers, which often results in delivery impediments, causing emails to land in spam folders (or not get delivered at all)
Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (ie, SMTP) provides an easy way to improve successful sending of WordPress emails, increasing email deliverability by using authentication and assuring that your intended audience receives what you send.
SMTP can be set up manually using the PHPMailer library (more difficult), or connected through the use of a plugin (easier).
SMTP Plugins
There are a number of plugins for setting up SMTP in your WordPress email. After looking at the most popular, here are the five we like best.
This plugin sits at the top of this list, allowing over three million WordPress users to send their emails reliably.
When using one of WP Mail SMTP’s built-in SMTP mail provider integrations (see below), emails are sent using the provider’s direct API. This means even if your web host is blocking SMTP ports, your emails still send successfully, helping you fix the not-sending-email issues that are prevalent in WordPress.
An easy-to-use setup wizard and detailed documentation will guide you through the process, and for most options, you can specify the “from name†and “email address†for outgoing emails.
You can send emails using your own or third-party SMTP email server, or by using integrations with popular email providers, such as:
SendLayer
SMTP.com
Sendinblue SMTP
Gmail SMTP (Gmail, Google Workspace, G Suite)
All Other SMTP
Instead of having to use different SMTP plugins and workflows for different SMTP providers, WP Mail SMTP brings it all into one, providing the ideal SMTP solution for WordPress.
They also offer paid plans, which include additional features (like one-on-one support, white glove setup, and native integrations for Microsoft, Amazon SES, Zoho Mail, etc).
With 700,000 active installs, Easy WP SMTP resolves email deliverability issues using transactional mailers or an SMTP server.
The plugin offers configuration from a number of popular mailers, including SendLayer, Mailgun, Sendinblue, and more.
Easy WP SMTP also allows you to debug events that log any failed email sending attempts and the error that caused them, and the ability to specify a Reply-to or BCC email address.
Premium, paid versions are also available, and add more features (like shopping cart plugins, priority support, and reports).
With active installs at 300,000 and climbing, Post SMTP Mailer is a next-generation WP Mail SMTP plugin that improves email deliverability for your WordPress websites, sending emails to millions of users worldwide.
Post SMTP has a smart setup wizard that covers everything from getting started to sending test emails. It uses a commercial-grade connectivity tester to better diagnose server issues, has a built-in email log that can help with any failed email problems, and uses OAuth 2.0 security to increase the protection of email passwords.
Post SMTP also offers premium upgraded integrations, through a number of pro extensions. These are: Zoho Mail Pro, Mail Control, Twilio, Office 365, and Amazon SES.
WPMU DEV’s Branda plugin, known as the White Labeling wunderkind, also has an easy SMTP tool built right in, and is completely free. Setup is a cinch with our easy-to-understand documentation.
Branda allows you to customize every aspect of WordPress to fit your brand. Transform your dashboard, customize system (default) emails, quickly toggle maintenance mode and “coming soon” landing pages, change every aspect of your login screen, remove or replace logos, create color schemes, and much more. Branda has everything to rebrand WordPress for free without touching any code or hacking modifications.
There is also a pro version of Branda, if you’d like to get the full collection of 30+ modules, along with a membership that includes an entire suite of plugins, premium 24/7 live chat support, and more.
WP Offload SES Lite is trusted by more than 20,000 sites to send their email, with good reason – it works exceedingly well.
This plugin is different in that it’s not sent over SMTP. They believe that going the SMTP route makes you prone to hitting rate limits, and is also missing some key features (like an email queue).
WP Offload SES Lite gives you the high deliverability, powerful managed infrastructure, and low cost of Amazon SES, with the support of a quality WordPress plugin that’s easy to set up and notifies you of sending failures.
Some of WP Offload SES Lite’s top features include:
Effortless configuration with an easy step-by-step setup wizard
Configure the default email address and name that WordPress uses for notifications
Set up a custom “Reply To†and “Return Path†address
View statistics on your Amazon SES send rate
There is also a pro version, which gives you additional features like premium support, open and click reporting, engagement analysis per specific emails, filter/search functionality, and more.
The Marketing Tools and Strategies You Need to Know
With your WordPress email primed and ready for most effective delivery, let’s turn our attention to the best ways to engage with your audience using email.
First, you need to collect that all-important contact information (email addresses and names, at the very least), so you have a concrete way to reach interested parties.
Second, you’ll want to offer something of value, to establish a sense of fairness/generosity and drive interest in what you do. This free offering to potential customers, in exchange for a piece of their personal information (e.g. an email address or social media follow), is a tried-and-true marketing technique.
Common incentives – like a discount coupon, downloadable, or other item of interest – can be offered as compensation for providing an email address, in order to attract potential customers. Hence the name: lead magnets.
Finally, you’ll want to measure and track which campaigns or giveaways get the best results. That will give you a sense of how your site is performing; the number of visitors to your different pages, and where you’re getting conversions from. All of which help you understand which content performs the best.
This is where lead generation tools come in. They are specifically designed to identify, capture, store, and analyze leads – with the goal of turning visitors into paying customers, and paying customers into repeat business.
Lead Capturing Plugins
Employing tools and services specific to lead generation is a great way to collect the desired information, without requiring any manual work on your part. The tools automate the process, allowing you to focus on other areas of your business.
It’s not a bad idea to experiment with different options from the methods above. But for the purposes of this article, our focus will be on-page, opt-in forms, as they are the simplest to employ and incredibly successful.
Why? Well, you’re collecting contact details from people who already have an interest in your business, even if it’s at the most basic level. They’re on your site, and therefore the most likely to provide you with their contact information. After all, they came looking for you, not the other way around.
Additionally, studies have shown that most people are receptive to emails that come from companies they’ve already shown an interest in.
Here are our top 5 picks for lead capturing plugins.
Of course we’re partial to our very own contact form, payment form and custom form builder, Forminator, but it’s more than just us who think so, with more than 400,000 happy users.
Forms, polls, quizzes… nothing’s off limits with Forminator. Create new campaigns in minutes with the easy-to-use, drag-and-drop form builder, using pre-fab templates or starting from scratch – with the ability to customize settings, style, and behavior.
Forminator is the easiest way to create any form, such as a contact form, order form, payment form, email form, feedback widgets, interactive polls with real-time results, Buzzfeed-style “no wrong answer†quizzes, service estimators, and registration forms with payment options.
Speaking of payments… take donations, down payments, full payments, sell merch and more with the included Stripe and PayPal integrations. (No Pro upgrade required!) SCA-compliant Stripe and PayPal come included. Just enter your publish keys to activate the Forminator payment module for both fixed and variable payments.
Forminator comes stacked with crowd-favorite third-party integrations – email services, CRM, storage, and project managers such as HubSpot, Google Sheets, Trello, MailChimp, AWeber, Slack, and any generic webhooks (such as Zapier).
But wait – there’s more! Forminator also has these amazing features:
Gutenberg Block – say goodbye to shortcodes and quickly add forms to posts with the Forminator block for Gutenberg
Email Routing and Pre-Populate – make your site more efficient, from visitor input to email response times; use query strings to pre-fill visitor information and deliver forms direct to specific teams with email routing, auto-response and conditions
User Front End Post Submissions – visitors can submit post ideas from the front end of your site so you can easily curate and publish their thoughts
Captchas – stop the crazy bots without making it hard on your visitors (ie, no more hard-to-read random phrases)
Collect, Track and GDPR ready – store and organize submissions to sort, analyze, and manage responses; all while complying with the GDPR and other legal privacy policies
There is a pro version as well, which contains all the same features as the free version, plus the additional “E-Signature†and “Stripe Subscriptions†features.
Formidable is a solutions-focused WordPress form plugin. Use drag and drop to create a contact form, survey, quiz, registration form, payment form, lead form, or calculator form.
Formidable is 100% mobile responsive, so your forms look great on all devices (desktop, laptop, tablets, and smartphones). It’s also optimized for speed and maximum server performance.
This free version of Formidable comes with a variety of features, like advanced email subscription forms, multi-page forms, a smart form with conditional logic, stack on repeater fields, payment integrations, form templates, relationships, and cascading dropdown fields.
Submissions are stored in your WordPress database so you won’t lose any leads, and quiz and survey entries can be viewed right from your WordPress dashboard. Also, the form generator is GDPR-friendly (even though entries are saved), and you can turn off IP tracking or stop saving submissions entirely.
Create a payment form and accept credit card payments right from your website, with seamless integration with PayPal, Stripe, and Authorize.net. You can even create a WooCommerce form with custom fields.
There is a pro version as well, that includes many more features and functionalities that help you build more powerful and larger applications.
Design beautiful, complex forms with a dedicated support team at your back.
Easy drag-and-drop fields, row and column layouts, multi-page forms, conditional forms… you don’t have to be a designer to create forms that will blend beautifully with your WordPress website.
You can accept PayPal and credit card payments securely and easily from any of your WordPress forms: single payments, subscriptions, fixed, variable, or user entered amounts. Give your customers or donors all the options, or just one with a PayPal form, Stripe form, and more.
Grow your mailing lists and bring in new leads using integration with MailChimp, Constant Contact, Campaign Monitor, Salesforce CRM, Zoho CRM, Insightly CRM, and more.
Ninja Forms is also GDPR compliant, as it doesn’t collect or store personally identifiable information, or any information, from your forms. Easy-to-use templates are included for Right to Be Forgotten and Data Export requests, and tie into native WordPress GDPR features for automated compliance.
Includes pre-built templates for a contact form, registration form, application form, MailChimp form, quote request form, PayPal form, Stripe form, and more. Also mobile responsive and design-adaptable to fit in with any theme or brand.
Ninja Forms offers additional features and upgrades in two ways: per add-on, or through a membership (different tiers vary in the number of allowable sites and add-ons).
At five million+ active installs, Contact Form 7 is the OG WordPress plugin for contact forms.
It has stood the test of time, still able to create simple and multiple contact forms, while allowing for the customisation of the form and the mail contents flexibly with simple markup.
Forms support Ajax-powered submitting, CAPTCHA, Akismet spam filtering, and do not track user data or use cookies. However, activation of certain features may invoke personal data to be sent to service providers (eg: reCAPTCHA, Stripe).
While the plugin boasts massive numbers and is still popular, it is becoming less so as more advanced, feature-rich competitors have become available. Especially since most of these are free to use as well.
Additionally, unlike newer plugins, an additional plugin is needed (they make one called Flamingo) just to save submitted messages from contact forms in the database.
They have also started requesting contributions from users, citing the difficulty in continuing support and development of a free plugin.
Hustle in the ultimate marketing plugin for building a mailing list and converting site traffic.
Incredibly versatile and engaging, Hustle has a myriad of options and customizations.
Easily grow your mailing list or display targeted ads across your site with popups, opt-ins, slide-ins, widgets, and shortcodes.
Build a social following with Hustle’s diverse social sharing capabilities.
Choose colors, animations, layouts, drop shadows, and display conditions for all your marketing modules from easy-to-use design settings. (There’s even CSS if you really want to go all out.) All a cinch with Hustle’s flexible appearance settings.
Default layouts and templates are fully mobile responsive, while allowing for granular adjustments (margins, padding, borders, container sizing) so you can make every module your own.
Target visitors with email opt-ins or ads using Hustle’s behavior and condition settings, and set up intelligent conditions if desired as well (e.g. specific pages/posts, visitor device/browser, country, browser cookie, etc).
Smart triggers allow you to set up a range of options for popups and slide-ins, including time on page, scroll, exit intent, and more.
Schedule when you want your marketing modules to deploy by selecting start/end dates, or show them on specific days of the week, time of day, along with custom time zones.
Easily follow up on user engagement with manual or automated email messages, and build your following on social networks with floating widgets and shortcodes to add followers.
Hustle smoothly integrates with popular form builders (like Forminator), to embed those forms/polls/quizzes into popups and slide-ins for interactive lead generation.
While you’re at it, integrate Hustle with an email service; 19 of the most popular are offered (including AWeber, MailChimp, Sendinblue, MailPoet, Zapier, and more).
Rounding out the additional features you get with Hustle:
Gutenberg WP editor block
ReCAPTCHA spam warrior
Ability to override Ad Blockers that try to prevent popups and slide-ins
Intelligent tracking on each module (including conversion stats, insightful charts, custom dashboard widget)
There is also a pro version of Hustle, which gives you all the same settings and options as the free version does. The difference is, Hustle Pro offers unlimited opt-ins, custom content, and social sharing, whereas the free version allows three of each type (popups, slide-ins, social share bars, and embeds).
Email Campaigns and Analytics Plugins
Once you’ve got those all-important email addresses collected, it’s time to set your sights on the various campaigns you can use to turn casual interest into a revenue stream.
There are a number of ways to use email campaigns to engage your audience and increase sales.
Blog posts can help by specifically targeting your audience, catering your content to them. It’s a proven way to align with your audience by providing (free) information of value to them, while keeping the connection warm. Plus, they can be kept in a devoted section of your website, making it easy for both old and new customers to partake in the historical canon unique to your business.
Newsletters and announcements are great for keeping your audience up to date on any site changes, or to promote particular products or discounts. Announcements could include down-time notices (for example, planned changes where your site will be offline briefly), or information about sales, coupons, special offers, etc – anything that is a change in your ‘norm’ that falls within a specific timeframe.
We looked at some email plugins early on, where the purpose was to improve email delivery by directing through SMTP servers or transactional mailers.
There is another category of full-featured email plugins/services that provide additional marketing, campaigning, and analysis features on top of trustworthy delivery. These can be quite handy if you want to avail yourself of pre-designed email templates, auto sending schedules, and tracking customer journeys.
More than 600,000 websites use MailPoet to keep in touch with their subscribers, delivering 30 million+ emails each month to inboxes, not spam boxes. Enjoy high open rates with their unmatched deliverability rate and rock solid infrastructure.
MailPoet works seamlessly with your favorite CMS so you can start sending emails right away. Quickly add content and images directly from your media library. No need to upload files to third-party services when it’s all right there, ready to use in your WordPress dashboard.
From first hello to loyal customer appreciation, send emails to the right people at the right time. Welcome new subscribers with an automated series of onboarding emails and enjoy open rates of 40% and higher.
Automatically send email updates to let subscribers know about your latest blog posts, in your choice of sending schedule (daily, weekly, monthly) and bring them back to your website.
Create email updates and newsletters your subscribers can’t wait to open with beautifully designed templates you can customize to match your personality (and brand). With plenty of design options and advanced features, you can choose from a template, customize whatever you need, then send it out. Quick previews allow you to always see how your emails look before hitting send.
MailPoet is available via paid plans as well, which add features and functionality like more subscribers, unlimited emails, advanced analytics, the ability to remove branding, priority support, and more.
HubSpot is an extremely popular, all-in-one CRM platform with tools and integrations for marketing, sales, and customer service.
The CRM in HubSpot’s WordPress plugin is your site’s command center, with 360-degree views of your customers, where you can easily:
Manage contacts (CRM)
Engage visitors with live chat and chatbots
Add beautiful forms to pages; create engaging email marketing campaigns
Capture leads with custom or existing forms; send newsletters and automated marketing campaigns
Track site health with easy-to-understand analytics, directly from the dashboard
See a unified timeline of a contact’s page views, past conversations, and more in a WordPress CRM
You’ve also got full-service email, newsletter, and marketing automation software, from which you can build professional emails in minutes, then send them to your entire contact database.
Features here include:
20+ pre-designed email templates to match your campaign goals
(Choose from templates such as newsletters, ebooks, welcome emails, and more)
Drag and drop email builder; adjust typography, designs, colors, and more to create campaigns your subscribers will love
Email automation, tracking, and A/B testing
Send emails anytime someone fills out a form or engages with your live chat/chatbots
Send messages immediately or use email scheduling to send messages later
Email tracking assures all of your emails are logged in your database; measure engagement of each with reports for open rate and click rate
Forms and popups are included, with a variety of templates (contact us, newsletter signup, ebook download, etc) and display options (embed, standalone page, pop-up box, dropdown banner, etc). Choose from a variety of settings, color schemes, and fonts — or start from scratch.
HubSpot also allows for integrations with other WP form builders and lead generators (like Forminator and Hustle ).
And there’s much more, such as:
Live chat and chatbots (with custom styling, real-time messaging, Slack integration, 24/7 live support on autopilot)
Seamless use of more than 1030 integrations – including social media, ads (Facebook, Google, LinkedIn), Hotjar, YouTube, Zoom, Gmail, Hustle, MailChimp, Sendinblue, Shopify, WooCommerce, Forminator, LiveChat… and the list goes on
In addition to their free version, which offers a taste of limited features, HubSpot offers a number of paid version packages – Starter, Starter CRM Suite, Business, Professional, and Enterprise – with many different combinations of features and services to suit all needs.
OptinMonster is a customer acquisition and lead generation plugin. As a SaaS, its use requires an OptinMonster account, but that’s quick to set up.
OptinMonster’s popup maker allows you to create popup campaigns, email subscription forms, sticky announcement bars like hello bar, gamified spin-a-wheel opt-in forms, and other types of interactive popups for your site. Use the drag-and-drop editor to customize the look and feel of your campaigns, or choose from hundreds of templates.
OptinMonster also offers mobile popups so your marketing messages look great on all devices (mobile, tablet, laptop, and desktop). It’s also optimized for both web and server performance.
Popup options include:
Lightbox
Floating Bar
Slide-ins
Fullscreen Welcome Mats
Gamified Spin a Wheel Popup
Countdown Timers
OptinMonster also has targeting behaviors, like page level targeting, geolocation targeting, popup behavior automation, and WooCommerce. Plus trigger behaviors, like exit intent, scroll trigger, and time-on-site popups.
There are also quite a few email and CRM integrations available, such as Constant Contact, MailChimp, AWeber, and more.
A free account includes three campaigns and up to 500 campaign impressions, which never expire.
OptinMonster also offers premium, paid versions which include more features and remove the limits imposed in the free version.
Sendinblue is a powerful all-in-one marketing platform, trusted by more than 165,000 companies around the world to deliver their emails and SMS messages.
Sendinblue optimizes deliverability using a proprietary infrastructure over SMTP, with options that include email, SMS, Facebook, chat, CRM, and marketing automation.
The Sendinblue WordPress plugin uses their own API to synchronize contacts, send emails and get statistics. Synchronization is automatic, so it doesn’t matter whether your lists were uploaded on your WordPress interface or on your Sendinblue account: they will always remain up-to-date on both sides.
Sendinblue’s free account takes less than two minutes to set up, and allows you to send up to 300 emails per day on their free (forever) plan.
Sendinblue integrates with most lead capture and advanced form builder plugins, but also contains their own native subscription forms, with the following features:
Form designer with WYSIWYG and direct HTML, and CSS editing (if desired)
Integration as widget or shortcode
Send a confirmation email – you choose the template and the sender
Use a double opt-in confirmation – you choose the template and the sender
URL redirection
Confirmation / error message customization
The following additional options are included as well:
Transactional emails (with auto replacement of default SMTP)
Statistics (real-time and exhaustive)
Sendinblue offers a free (forever) plan that includes 9000 emails per month and unlimited contacts, with no hidden costs.
They offer premium, paid plans as well, which remove the limits, and include additional features (like removing the Sendinblue logo, A/B testing, marketing automation, priority support, and more).
Follow the Leader to the Very Top
Lead generation is often the difference between the smashing success or abject failure of a business.
And while there are many components that go into lucrative marketing, you can tap into WordPress’s generous supply of free plugins to eliminate the heavy lifting.
As shown in this post, email still holds the #1 spot when it comes to customer acquisition channels, with significant reach and conversion rates.
Determine the plugins that best meets your needs, and get going on cultivating your contact lists, securing good delivery with SMTP sends, and setting up email campaigns that drive customer engagement, traffic, retention, and loyalty.
If you want to really ensure best results, make sure you have trusted, dedicated hosting (we’re a top pick for web developers), speed and SEO optimization (our memberships come with a suite of premium plugins, including performance and security), and world-class, always-on support.
WordPress has a native way of sending emails. It uses the PHP mail() function to deliver all those newsletters, password resets, or any other type of email you’re sending to your audience. While this method should theoretically be sufficient, it’s far from perfect. In WordPress, sending emails with SMTP is a much better alternative. And […]
Discover how to elevate your website design with the 60/30/10 rule, a powerful color proportion technique that enhances visual appeal, user experience, and brand identity. Learn its benefits, application, and tools for WordPress users.
Are you looking for an easy way to show a contact form popup on your WordPress website?
Contact forms are great for communicating with your visitors. Placing them in a popup makes it even easier for your customers to contact you about your products and services.
In this article, we will show you how to add a contact form popup in WordPress.
Why Use a Contact Form Popup?
Every WordPress website or blog needs a contact form so users can reach out with questions, feedback, or problems.
However, if your contact form is only on a single page, then it’s hard for people to find it.
As a result, your users may end up leaving your site before contacting you, and you could lose potential leads and conversions.
A contact form popup helps solve this issue by allowing your visitors to quickly view the form by clicking a button, so they can get in touch with you from whatever page they’re on.
It helps keep people on your website, as they don’t have to exit the page they are viewing. You can also grow your email list using a contact form popup.
That said, you will first need to create a contact form and then place it in a popup to display on your web pages. Don’t worry, we will guide you on creating a contact form and adding it to a popup in WordPress.
There are many free and paid options you can choose from, but we recommend using WPForms as it’s the best option.
WPForms is a beginner-friendly form plugin and offers a drag & drop builder that allows you to create a contact form in WordPress in just a few clicks. It also offers prebuilt form templates and lots of customization options.
For this tutorial, we will use the WPForms Lite version because it is free and offers a contact form template.
However, you can also use its premium version to unlock more features. For instance, WPForms Pro offers multiple form templates, more customization options, powerful addons, and lets you collect online payments.
To start, you will first need to install and activate the WPForms Lite plugin. If you need help, then see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Once the plugin is active, you are now ready to create your contact form. All you have to do is go to WPForms » Add New from your WordPress dashboard.
After that, WPForms will ask you to enter a name for your form and select a template.
Go ahead and select the ‘Simple Contact Form’ template.
Next, you can add fields in the form using the drag-and-drop builder.
Simply drag the fields you want to add to the form from the options given in the menu on your left. You can also reorder the positions of each field in the form.
WPForms also lets you customize each field in the contact form.
For example, if you click on the Name field, then you’ll get different options, such as changing its label and format. You can even add a description or mark any field as required.
Once you are done, go ahead and click the ‘Settings’ option to configure the form notification and confirmation.
In the General settings, you can rename the form, change the submit button text, enable anti-spam protection, and more.
Next, you can go to the Notifications settings option. By default, the notifications are sent to the admin email that is set up on your WordPress website.
However, you can send your contact form notification to any email address you want. If you wish to receive notifications on multiple emails, then separate each email with a comma.
For the email subject line, WPForms uses the form name you entered earlier. However, you can edit the text of the subject line to whatever you wish.
After that, go ahead and click the Confirmations option.
WPForms will use ‘Message’ as the default confirmation type, where your visitors will see a thank you message upon submitting a form.
However, you can change the message type and redirect users to a specific page on your website when they complete a form.
Once you are done creating a contact form, make sure to click the ‘Save’ button at the top right corner to save your changes.
Next, click the ‘Embed’ option in the top corner next to the Save button.
When a new window appears, select the ‘use a shortcode’ option.
WPForms will display a shortcode for your contact form as soon as you click the link. We suggest that you keep this tab/window open as you will need it in the next step, where we’ll show you how to add your contact form in a popup.
We recommend using OptinMonster as it is the best lead generation and conversion optimization plugin for WordPress. Over 1.2 million websites use the powerful tool.
For this tutorial, we will use the OptinMonster Pro version, which includes a clutter-free template and advanced display rules to show the popup.
You will first need to sign up for an account by going to the OptinMonster website. Simply visit the website and click the ‘Get OptinMonster Now’ button.
After the plugin is active, you will see the setup wizard. Go ahead and click the ‘Connect Your Existing Account’ button.
A popup window will now appear, and OptinMonster will ask to connect to your account.
Simply click the ‘Connect To WordPress’ button.
Now that your account is connected, the next thing is to create a new campaign for your contact form popup.
You can start by going to OptinMonster » Campaigns and then clicking the ‘Create Your First Campaign’ button.
On the next screen, you will have to select a campaign type.
Since we will create a contact form popup, select ‘Popup’ as your Campaign Type.
After that, scroll down to choose a template for your popup. OptinMonster offers over 75 attractive and highly converting designs for your popups.
You can select any template that you like. Next, enter a name for your campaign and click the ‘Start Building’ button.
Now using the drag-and-drop builder in OptinMonster, you can edit your popup template.
You will now see different Blocks appear in the menu on your left. Simply head over to the ‘WPForms’ block and drag and drop it on your template.
After that, you’ll need to click the ‘Form Selection’ dropdown menu from the block settings in the left menu and select the ‘Add Shortcode Manually’ option.
From here, enter your WPForms contact form shortcode in the block. To find the code, go back to your WPForms embed settings and copy the shortcode.
An important thing to note is that you won’t see a preview of the contact form in the template when you add the shortcode.
This is normal, as your contact form will appear when the campaign is published.
Next, you can go to the Display Rules tab at the top to choose when the popup should appear on your website.
By default, OptinMonster will set it to when the time on the page is 5 seconds, and the popup will appear on any page.
However, you can change the display rule settings and select different triggers and targeting options.
We suggest using the MonsterLink (On Click) targeting. This way, your popup will appear when a visitor clicks a link or a button.
After that, you can click the ‘Copy MonsterLink Code’ button and add it to any text, image, or button on your website.
For example, let’s say you want to add a contact us button on your site. You can start by editing any page or post and go to your WordPress editor. Next, click the (+) plus sign at the top and add a ‘Buttons’ block.
After that, you can enter a text for your button and then click the link icon.
Now add the MonsterLink URL to your button.
Once you have done that, publish your WordPress post or page. The MonsterLink will now be added to your contact us button.
Next, head back to your OptinMonster campaign to complete the configuration.
After selecting MonsterLink as your target and showing it on any page, you can click the ‘Next’ button at the bottom.
On the next screen, you will see options to change the campaign view type, add a MonsterEffect animation, and play a sound when the popup appears.
Go ahead and click the ‘Next’ button when you are satisfied with the settings.
After that, OptinMonster will show a summary of your Display Rule settings.
This helps to ensure you have correctly set up when your campaigns will appear on your website.
Now, you are ready to take your campaign live and publish your contact form popup. To do that, go to the ‘Publish’ tab at the top.
Next, you can click the ‘Preview’ button before publishing your campaign. This will show you a live preview of how your popup will look on your website.
When you are happy with the appearance of your campaign, change the ‘Publish Status’ from Draft to Publish.
You can exit the OptinMonster campaign builder and check the status of your campaign from your WordPress dashboard as well.
Simply click the ‘Status’ dropdown menu on your right and change the status from Pending to Published.
Don’t forget to save the changes.
Next, go to the contact us button you created earlier with MonsterLink and see the contact form popup in action.
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WordPress has a native way of sending emails. It uses the PHP mail() function to deliver all those newsletters, password resets, or any other type of email you’re sending to your audience. While this method should theoretically be sufficient, it’s far from perfect. In WordPress, sending emails with SMTP is a much better alternative. And […]
