Maintaining and managing wordpress website effectively involves utilizing a variety of tools to ensure smooth operations, security, and optimal performance. Here’s a list of essential tools for these purposes.
Content Management System
Platforms like WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal make creating, updating, and managing website content easy without extensive technical knowledge. WordPress is known for its ease of use, making it accessible for beginners. A vast array of plugins allows users to add functionality without extensive coding. Numerous themes and customization options are available for design flexibility.
Joomla strikes an excellent balance between ease of use and flexibility for more complex websites, and built-in multilingual capabilities make it suitable for global websites.
Drupal features extensive customization options and is suitable for complex, large-scale websites. It has a strong security reputation, making it suitable for enterprise-level applications.
Web Hosting Control Panel
Control panels simplify server and website management tasks, such as domain and email configuration, file management, and database administration. cPanel, possibly the most popular one, is known for its straightforward and user-friendly interface, making it accessible to users of all technical backgrounds.
It offers email management, file management, database administration, and one-click installations for popular applications.
cPanel users can manage various aspects of their hosting environment without extensive technical knowledge. Another advantage of cPanel hosting involves one-click installations for a number of different applications, including content management systems.
cPanel includes tools for managing email accounts, configuring email forwarding, setting up autoresponders, and managing spam filters. It provides a comprehensive email solution for website owners.
cPanel includes security features such as firewalls, SSL certificate management, and password-protected directories. It is not the only control panel on the market, though.
cPanel vs. Plesk
Plesk is a decent alternative that you can use to manage multiple servers from a single interface. This makes it suitable for hosting providers and administrators managing multiple sites. Plesk supports both Windows and Linux servers, providing flexibility in the choice of server operating systems.
Plesk offers an extension catalog that lets users add extra features and functionalities to their hosting environment easily. It includes a WordPress Toolkit, making managing and securing WordPress installations easy.
Google Analytics and SEO Tools
Google Analytics provides detailed insights into website traffic, user behavior, and performance metrics. SEO tools like Google Search Console will help optimize your website for SEO with professionals, track keyword rankings, and analyze your site’s SEO performance.
Security Tools
Tools like Wordfence and Sucuri protect your website from security threats, malware, and hacking attempts. These tools often include features like firewall protection, malware scanning, and security monitoring.
Performance Monitoring
You can use Google PageSpeed Insights to evaluate and improve your website’s speed and performance by identifying and fixing issues like slow-loading pages.
Collaboration Tools
Tools like Slack and Trello facilitate communication and collaboration among team members working on website development and maintenance. How do they measure up?
Slack vs. Trello
Slack facilitates real-time communication through channels and direct messages, enabling instant collaboration and quick decision-making. It boasts seamless integration with a wide range of third-party apps and services, enabling users to centralize their workflows and access information from various sources within the tool.
Users can share files, documents, and images directly within Slack, promoting collaboration and reducing the need for separate communication channels for file sharing.
Slack’s robust search functionality enables users to find specific messages, files, and information quickly, making retrieving past conversations and reference materials easy.
Finally, Slack is available on various platforms, including desktop, web, and mobile applications, ensuring that teams can communicate and collaborate regardless of their preferred devices.
Trello’s card-based system provides a visual and intuitive way to manage projects, tasks, and workflows, making it easy for team members to understand project status at a glance. You can customize its boards, lists, and cards to match different project management methodologies, allowing teams to adapt the tool to their specific workflow.
Team members can collaborate on tasks by adding comments, attachments, due dates, and checklists directly to Trello cards, fostering a centralized and organized approach to task management.
Finally, Trello’s simple and user-friendly interface makes it suitable for people without technical expertise, reducing the learning curve for new team members.
SSL Certificate Checker
You can use the tool SSL Labs to ensure your SSL certificates are valid and configured correctly for secure data transmission.
Uptime Monitoring
UptimeRobot and Pingdom send alerts if your website experiences downtime, helping you address issues promptly.
Customer Feedback Tools
Hotjar and Google Forms allow website owners and managers to collect user feedback and make improvements if necessary.
Task Automation
Jenkins and Cron Jobs automate routine, repetitive tasks like backups, updates, and security scans to save time and reduce the risk of errors.