Suddenly, Performance on Many Sites

Not sure how this happened, but I ended up creating a few WordPress sites for friends and relatives

• My Wife – http://carolinegilby.wordpress.com
• My Explorer Scout Unit  – http://www.anomalousunit.org
• The local District Scout Group – http://www.ampthillandwoburndistrictscouts.org.uk
• A friend’s construction business – http://www.convertyourspace.com
• This blog – https://davidjwbaileydotcom.wordpress.com
• My old blog — http://fomentors.com
• A new company I am working in http://www.merryns.com 
• The local village community pages  – http://mauldenvillage.org.uk

And it was at about that point (realising that I had spent the best part of 3 weeks bringing them all up to date on various hosts and working on their speed and features) that I found that I was using the same plug-ins over and over.

Why these ones? Partly because they are simple. I am not going to learn pHp or CSS. Life is too short. I learned ASM, BASIC, PASCAL, COBOL and FORTRAN as a teenager, and that was enough for me, thanks.

Mostly because, with a few clicks, they work. And word really well. Just plug them in, turn them on, and see the site performance and SEO rating jump over the next few hours.

Right tools, right job?

This is my tool box:

I’ve build a little library of cut and paste compliance pages for Data Protection, Privacy Law and Comment Rules.

Akismet                      Used by millions, Akismet is quite possibly the best way in the world to protect your blog from comment and trackback spam. It keeps your site protected from spam even while you sleep. To get started: 1) Click the “Activate” link to the left of this description, 2) Sign up for an Akismet API key, and 3) Go to your Akismet configuration page, and save your API key.Version 2.5.9 | By Automattic | Visit plugin site

Asynchronous Javascript         Improve page load performance by asynchronously loading javascript using head.jsVersion 1.3.5 | By Paris Holley | Visit plugin site

Autoptimize                Optimizes your website, concatenating the CSS and JavaScript code, and compressing it.Version 1.8.1 | By Frank Goossens (futtta) | Visit plugin site

BWP Google XML Sitemaps       A more lightweight Google XML Sitemap WordPress plugin that generates a Sitemap index rather than a single sitemap. Despite its simplicity, it is still very powerful and has plenty of options to choose.Version 1.2.2 | By Khang Minh | Visit plugin site

Category Posts WidgetDeactivate | Edit       Adds a widget that can display posts from a single category.Version 3.3 | By James Lao | Visit plugin site

Contact Form by ContactUs      Contact Form by ContactUs.com Plugin for WordPress.Version 4.1.1 | By contactus.com | Visit plugin site | Get Support

Contact Form 7            Just another contact form plugin. Simple but flexible.Version 3.7 | By Takayuki Miyoshi | Visit plugin site

Content Slide Plugin     WordPress plugin for simple slideshow.Version 1.4.2 | By Snilesh | Visit plugin site

Cookie Law Info          A simple way of ‘implied consent’ to show your website complies with the EU Cookie Law, which came into force on 26 May 2012.Version 1.1.2 | By Richard Ashby | Visit plugin site

Excel Interactive View PluginDeactivate | Edit        Adds a shortcode so you can add the Excel Interactive View to tables in WordPress.Version 0.4.1 BETA | By Harrison M Gordon | Visit plugin site

Fast Secure Contact FormSettings | Deactivate | Edit       Fast Secure Contact Form for WordPress. An easy and powerful form builder that lets your visitors send you email. Blocks all automated spammers. No templates to mess with.Settings | DonateVersion 4.0.18 | By Mike Challis, Ken Carlson | Visit plugin site

Flickr GallerySettings | Deactivate | Edit      Use easy shortcodes to insert Flickr galleries and photos (and videos) in your blog.Version 1.5.2 | By Dan Coulter | Visit plugin site

Google XML Sitemaps v3 for qTranslate        This plugin will generate a special XML sitemap which will help search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing and Ask.com to better index your blog. With qTranslate support.Version 3.3.1 | By DSmidgy, NeoEGM, Arne Brachhold | Visit plugin site | Settings| FAQ | Support | Donate

Google Universal Analytics       Adds Google Analytics tracking code on all pages.Version 1.3 | By Audrius Dobilinskas | Visit plugin site

GTmetrix for WordPress GTmetrix can help you develop a faster, more efficient, and all-around improved website experience for your users. Your users will love you for it.Version 0.4.1 | By GTmetrix | Visit plugin site | Settings

Hammy                      Creates adaptive images for your content area with breakpoints that you set.Version 1.4.1 | By Noel Tock | Visit plugin site

Jetpack by WordPress.com      Bring the power of the WordPress.com cloud to your self-hosted WordPress. Jetpack enables you to connect your blog to a WordPress.com account to use the powerful features normally only available to WordPress.com users.Version 2.8 | By Automattic | Visit plugin site

MailChimp for WordPress Lite   Lite version of MailChimp for WordPress. Adds various sign-up methods to your website.Version 1.5.2 | By Danny van Kooten | Visit plugin site

Meta Slider                  Easy to use slideshow plugin. Create SEO optimised responsive slideshows with Nivo Slider, Flex Slider, Coin Slider and Responsive Slides.Version 2.6.3 | By Matcha Labs

Meta Slider – Pro Addon Pack    Supercharge your slideshows!Version 2.2.8 | By Matcha Labs

Remove query strings from static resources Remove query strings from static resources like CSS & JS files. This plugin will improve your scores in services like PageSpeed, YSlow, Pingdoom and GTmetrix.Version 1.0 | By Your WP Expert | Visit plugin site

Rocket Lazy Load        Lazy image loader

Skimlinks                    Skimlinks helps you easily monetize content by converting product links in your post into their equivalent affiliate links on-the-fly. Install the plugin and add a new revenue stream to your blog, including monetising the links in your RSS feed, without affecting your users’ experience.Version 1.2.2 | By Skimlinks | Visit plugin site

VaultPress                  Protect your content, themes, plugins, and settings with realtime backup andautomated security scanning from VaultPress. Activate, enter your registration key, and never worry again. Need some help?Version 1.5.2 | By Automattic | Visit plugin site

W3 Total Cache           The highest rated and most complete WordPress performance plugin. Dramatically improve the speed and user experience of your site. Add browser, page, object and database caching as well as minify and content delivery network (CDN) to WordPress.Version 0.9.3 | By Frederick Townes | Visit plugin site

WordPress SEO           The first true all-in-one SEO solution for WordPress, including on-page content analysis, XML sitemaps and much more.Version 1.4.24 | By Joost de Valk | Visit plugin site

WP Excel CMS              Imports and managages content of Excel (*.xls *.xlsx) Files into WordPress and make the data available in the theme or shortcodes.Version 1.0.2 | By Vincent Schroeder | Visit plugin site

WP Smush.it               Reduce image file sizes and improve performance using the Smush.it API within WordPress.Version 1.6.5.4 | By WPMU DEV | Visit plugin site

I guess my toolkit will expand over time.

What do you use?