Do you want to learn how to use WordPress block patterns on your website?

Block patterns allow you to quickly add commonly used design elements to your post or page layouts.

In this article, we’ll show you how to use WordPress block patterns and find more patterns to use on your website.

Here are the topics we’ll cover in this guide.

• What are WordPress Block Patterns
• How to Use Block Patterns in WordPress
• Finding More Block Patterns to Use on Your Website
• How to Create and Share Your Own Block Patterns
• Creating WordPress Block Patterns Manually
• Remove a Block Pattern in WordPress
• What’s The Difference Between Reusable Blocks and Block Patterns

What are WordPress Block Patterns?

WordPress block patterns are a collection of pre-made design elements that you can use for creating custom content layouts faster.

WordPress comes with an intuitive editor commonly known as the block editor. It allows users to create beautiful layouts for their posts and pages using blocks for common content elements.

However, not all WordPress users are designers or want to spend time creating layouts each time they need to create a post or page.

Block patterns provide an easy solution to that problem. WordPress now comes with a bunch of useful block patterns by default.

Popular WordPress themes also provide their own patterns that you can use when writing content.

These patterns include items like pre-built multi-column layouts, media and text patterns, call-to-action patterns, headers, buttons, and more.

You can find even more patterns on the WordPress.org website, and you can even create and share your own patterns as well.

That being said, let’s take a look at how to easily use block patterns in WordPress to create beautiful content for your website.

How to Use Block Patterns in WordPress

By default, WordPress comes with a bunch of useful block patterns that you can use on your website. Your WordPress theme and some plugins may also add their own patterns.

To use block patterns, you need to edit the WordPress post or page where you want to use the block pattern.

On the post edit screen, click on the Add Block button to open the block inserter. From here, switch to the Patterns tab to view available block patterns.

You can scroll down to see available block patterns.

You can also view block patterns in different categories like featured, buttons, columns, header, and more.

Alternatively, you can also click on the Explore button to view block patterns.

Here you can see larger previews in a popup.

Once you find a pattern you want to try, you can simply click to insert it to the content area of your post or page.

After that, you can simply point and click on any block inside the pattern to edit and change its contents to your own requirements.

You’ll still have all the options you normally have for each block. For instance, if it is a cover block, then you can change the cover color or background image.

You can add as many patterns as you need for your blog post or page. You can also simply delete a pattern to remove it from a post or page like you would delete any WordPress block.

By using block patterns, you can quickly make beautiful layouts for your articles and WordPress site.

Ultimately, block patterns help save you time that you would otherwise spend on manually arranging blocks each time you need to add a header, gallery, buttons, and more.

Finding More Block Patterns to Use on Your Website

By default, WordPress comes with a few commonly used block patterns. WordPress themes may also add their own patterns to your website.

However, you can find a lot more block patterns than the ones available under the block inserter on your website.

Simply go to the WordPress Patterns Directory website to view many more block patterns.

Here you’ll find many more block patterns submitted by the WordPress community.

To use one of these block patterns, simply take your mouse over to the block pattern and click on the Copy button.

Next, you need to go back to your WordPress blog and edit the post or page where you want to insert this block pattern.

On the post edit screen, simply right-click and select Paste in the browser menu or press CTRL+V (Command + V on Mac).

How to Create and Share Your Own Block Patterns

Want to create and share your own WordPress block patterns and share them with the world?

WordPress makes it super easy to create block patterns and use them on your own websites or share them with all WordPress users across the globe.

Simply visit the WordPress Pattern Directory website and click on the ‘Create New Pattern’ link.

Note: You’ll need to sign in or create a free WordPress.org account to save your patterns.

Once signed in, you’ll reach the block pattern editor page. It is identical to the default WordPress block editor, and you can use it to create your pattern.

Simply add blocks to create your pattern layout.

You can use layout blocks like group, cover, gallery, and more to organize your layout.

There are also royalty-free images available to use in your media blocks. The WordPress media library will allow you to easily find and use these images in your patterns.

Once you are satisfied with your block pattern, you can save it as a draft or submit it to the pattern directory.

Before you can submit your block pattern for the pattern directory, make sure that you have read block pattern directory guidelines.

You can manage all your block patterns by clicking on the My Patterns link. It will show all block patterns you have shared, draft patterns, and patterns you have favorited.

If you only want to create block patterns for your own use, then you can save them as drafts. After that, you can simply copy and paste them from My Patterns page to your WordPress website.

Creating WordPress Block Patterns Manually

You can also create block patterns manually and add them to your WordPress theme or custom snippets plugin.

Simply create a new post or page in WordPress. In the content area, use blocks to create a custom layout or block collection that you want to save as a pattern.

After that, switch to the Code Editor mode and copy all content you see in the code editor.

Next, open a plain text editor like Notepad and paste that code in there. You’ll need it in the next step.

Now you are ready to register your blocks as a pattern.

To do that, simply copy and paste the following code into your theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin.

 function wpb_my_block_patterns() {     register_block_pattern(         'my-plugin/my-awesome-pattern',         array(             'title'       => __( 'Two column magazine layout', 'my-theme'),             'description' => _x( 'A simple magazine style two-column layout with large image and stylized text', 'my-theme' ),             'categories'  => array( 'columns' ),             'content'     => ' Your block content code goes here'             )     ); } add_action( 'init', 'wpb_my_block_patterns' );  

Now copy and paste the raw blocks data you copied earlier as the value for the content parameter. In other words, you’ll need to replace the text that says ‘Your block content code goes here’ with your block code. Be sure to leave the single quotes surrounding the text in place.

Lastly, don’t forget to change the title and description to your own and save your changes.

You can now visit your website and edit and post or page. You’ll now be able to see your newly registered block pattern in the block inserter.

Remove a Block Pattern in WordPress

You can easily remove or unregister any block pattern in WordPress. Let’s say you want to remove the block pattern you created in the above example.

All you need to do is copy paste the following code to your theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin.

 function wpb_unregister_my_patterns() {   unregister_block_pattern( 'my-plugin/my-awesome-pattern' ); } add_action( 'init', 'wpb_unregister_my_patterns' ); 

In this example, 'my-plugin/my-awesome-pattern' is the name of the pattern we used when registering it.

You can use this code to unregister any block pattern created by your theme or a plugin. All you need to know is the name used to register the pattern.

Remove Core WordPress Patterns

The core WordPress patterns are available to all WordPress users. This means they may be over used and might not even match rest of your WordPress theme.

If you don’t want to use a pattern, then you can simply avoid adding it to your content. However, if you run a multi author WordPress site, then you may want to prevent all users from using these core patterns.

To remove all core WordPress patterns, you need to add the following code to your theme’s functions file or a site-specific plugin.

 remove_theme_support( 'core-block-patterns' ); 

What’s The Difference Between Reusable Blocks and Block Patterns?

Block patterns and reusable blocks both intend to solve a similar problem: provide users with options to easily add commonly used blocks.

However, they are quite different from each other.

For instance, reusable blocks can be edited and saved right inside the post editor, but they are not as flexible as block patterns.

One big difference is that if you make a change to a reusable block, it changes the block on every post or page you’ve used it on.

For more details, see our tutorial on how to use reusable blocks in WordPress.

On the other hand, if you insert a pattern and edit it, then those changes only apply to the post or page where you have added that pattern.

Block patterns can also be registered by your WordPress theme or plugins such as block plugins. This allows those developers to offer you a lot more design options to create your post and page layouts.

We hope this guide helped you learn how to use WordPress block patterns on your website. You may also want to see our guide on how to choose the best web design software, or our expert pick of the best email marketing services for small business.

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 add rich snippets on your WordPress site?

Rich snippets allow you to have custom search listings for special content such as reviews, recipes, events, and more. These search listings will stand out and help get more traffic to your site.

In this article, we’ll show you how to add rich snippets to your WordPress site, step by step.

Why Use Rich Snippets on Your WordPress Site?

Rich snippets use what’s called schema markup to provide extra information about your content to the search engines.

The search engine bots use this data to show additional information about your posts and pages in the search results.

This helps to make your posts and pages stand out more in the search results, which can improve your organic click through rate and help you increase your blog traffic.

It also helps you build authority in your niche, as your site becomes more visible in the search.

Rich snippets are not just for review sites or recipes. You can use rich snippets for events, products, people, video, music, apps, articles, blog posts, and more.

That being said, let’s show you how to add rich snippets to WordPress. Simply use the quick links below to jump straight to the method you want to use.

• Adding rich snippets in WordPress with a WordPress plugin (Recommended)
• Adding rich snippets in WordPress by adding code to WordPress

Method 1. Adding Rich Snippets in WordPress Using a WordPress Plugin

The easiest way to add rich snippets to WordPress is by using the AIOSEO plugin. It’s the best WordPress SEO plugin in the market used by over 3+ million websites. 

It helps you easily optimize your site for the search engines without the need to hire an SEO expert. Plus, you can set up rich snippets on your site in a couple of clicks.

Note: You’ll need the pro version of AIOSEO since it includes schema markup functionality and other features like XML sitemaps, a redirection manager, and more. There is a free version of the plugin you can use to get started. 

First thing you need to do is install and activate the AIOSEO plugin. For more details, see our beginner’s guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you’ll immediately be taken to the AIOSEO setup wizard. You need to click the ‘Let’s Get Started’ button. 

If the setup wizard doesn’t immediately show up, then simply go to All in One SEO » Dashboard.

From here, you can click the ‘Launch the Setup Wizard’ button. This will walk you through the steps of setting up the plugin for your website. 

As you go through the setup wizard, you’ll need to activate the ‘Advanced Rich Snippets + Schema Markups’ addon.

Simply check the box so it turns blue, then click the ‘Save and Continue’ button.

On the final screen, you need to enter your license key and then click the ‘Connect’ button.

You can find this information under your account page on the AIOSEO website. 

For more details, see our ultimate guide on how to set up AIOSEO for WordPress correctly.

After that, you can go to AIOSEO » Search Appearance in your WordPress admin panel, and then click on the ‘Content Types’ tab.

Then, you can set the schema markup type for your posts and pages.

Simply click the ‘Schema Markup’ menu option, then you can choose the schema type from the drop down.

You will be able to see different content types that you can create with the plugin. The list includes:

• Course
• Product
• Recipe
• Software/App
• FAQ
• Web page
• Profile
• Article

Clicking on any content type will show you the fields that will be available.

These settings will be the default settings when you add a new blog post. However, you can change these on an individual post basis too.

Below the post schema markup, you can also control the default schema for your pages.

Simply select the ‘Schema Type’ from the drop down. Then, you’ll have additional options for the schema type you select.

Once you’re finished making changes, click the ‘Save Changes’ button before you leave the page. 

Adding Rich Snippet Information to Your Posts and Pages

Now, you can add schema information to your individual posts and pages, so they’ll display with unique rich snippets in the search results.

To do this, simply open up a blog post and scroll down below the post editor. Here you’ll see a meta box called ‘AIOSEO Settings’.

You need to click the ‘Schema’ tab and then select the proper schema for the post from the ‘Schema Type’ drop down.

There will be different fields available, based on the option you select. For example, the ‘Software Application’ schema type includes fields for the name, price, description, review, and more.

Once you’re finished, make sure to click ‘Update’ or ‘Publish’ to save your changes.

Adding schema markup to individual WordPress pages is similar. You need to open up the page you want to edit and then scroll down to the ‘AIOSEO Settings’ meta box below the page editor.

Then, click the ‘Schema’ menu option and select your page schema type from the’ Schema Type’ drop down.

Different options will appear depending on the type of schema you select. 

Just like above, you need to click ‘Update’ or ‘Publish’ to make your changes live. 

Adding rich snippet information won’t make a difference on the front end of your WordPress blog. However, you’ll be giving the search engine bots extra data to display with your posts and pages in the search results. 

Method 2. Adding Rich Snippets by Adding Code to WordPress

Another way to add rich snippets to WordPress is by adding code to WordPress. If you haven’t done this before, then see our guide on how to copy and paste code in WordPress.

Rich snippets or structured data markup can be written into three different vocabularies. These vocabularies are microdata, RDFa, and JSON-LD. You can use any of them on your site. However, most beginners find RDFa to be more beginner friendly.

Here is an example of a user’s about page in WordPress. Normally the text of the page will look something like this:

 John Smith <img src="johnsmith.jpg" alt="Photo of John Smith"/> Support Technician 342 Acme Inc. 101 Washington Avenue Eagleton IN 98052 (425) 123-4567 <a href="mailto:johnsmith@example.com">johnsmith@example.com</a> Website: <a href="http://www.example.com">example.com</a> 

This can be easily transformed with rich snippets.

If you are familiar with HTML, then you can easily understand the following example:

 <div vocab="http://schema.org/" typeof="Person">   <span property="name">John Smith</span>   <img src="johnsmith.jpg" property="image" alt="Photo of John Smith"/>   <span property="jobTitle">Support Technician</span>   <div property="address"  typeof="PostalAddress">     <span property="streetAddress">       342 Acme Inc.       101 Washington Avenue     </span>     <span property="addressLocality">Eagleton</span>,     <span property="addressRegion">IN</span>     <span property="postalCode">46818</span>   </div>   <span property="telephone">(425) 123-4567</span>   <a href="mailto:johnsmith@example.com" property="email">johnsmith@example.com</a> Website   <a href="http://example.com" property="url">example.com</a> </div> 

For each content type there are some special properties that need to be defined.

Schema.org is the organization that helps maintain the standard for different content types. You will find extensive documentation with examples for each schema content type on their website.

Here is another example of a recipe with rich snippets.

 <div vocab="http://schema.org/" typeof="Recipe">   <span property="name">Mom's World Famous Banana Bread</span>   By <span property="author">John Smith</span>,     <img property="image" src="bananabread.jpg"     alt="Banana bread on a plate" />   <span property="description">This classic banana bread recipe comes   from my mom -- the walnuts add a nice texture and flavor to the banana   bread.</span>   Prep Time: <meta property="prepTime" content="PT15M">15 minutes   Cook time: <meta property="cookTime" content="PT1H">1 hour   Yield: <span property="recipeYield">1 loaf</span>   Ingredients:   - <span property="recipeIngredient">3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed</span>   - <span property="recipeIngredient">1 egg</span>   - <span property="recipeIngredient">3/4 cup of sugar</span>   ...   Instructions:   <span property="recipeInstructions">   Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Mix in the ingredients in a bowl. Add   the flour last. Pour the mixture into a loaf pan and bake for one hour.   </span> </div> 

If you are manually adding rich snippets into your WordPress posts, then you will need to manually add HTML to WordPress. For more details, see our beginner’s guide on how to edit HTML in WordPress code editor.

You may also need to refer to Google’s Developer resource on structured data to understand which properties are required for each content type.

Testing Your Rich Snippets and Schema Markup

If you’re adding rich snippets manually, then you’ll want to make sure you’ve added the structured data to your WordPress website properly.

To check your rich snippets, simply head over to the Google Structured Data Testing Tool. Then, there are two different tests you can run to test your structured data.

First, click the ‘Go to the Rich Results Test’ button. This will see what rich results can be generated for your page.

Then, enter your page or post URL into the box.

Next, click the ‘Test URL’ button.

This will automatically generate a report to see which rich results features can appear when that page or post is listed in the search results.

It will give you any errors or warnings, so you can improve your structured data. You can click the drop down arrow next to any warning and you’ll get detailed instructions for how to fix it.

Next, you can test your schema markup by going back to the Google Structured Data Testing Tools page.

Then, click the ‘Go to the Schema Markup Validator’ button.

Next, enter your URL or code snippet into the ‘Test your structured data’ popup.

Then, click the ‘Run Test’ button.

The tool will automatically analyze your code to see if there are any errors.

You’ll want to see 0 errors on the right hand side of the page.

We hope this article helped you learn how to use rich snippets on your WordPress site. You may also want to see our guide on how to choose the best domain name registrar and our expert picks of the best AI chatbots software for your website. 

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.

Every WordPress installation comes with Akismet plugin pre-installed, but it’s not activated by default.

Often users ask us what is Akismet and whether you really need to activate this plugin on your WordPress.

In this article, we will explain what is Akismet and why you should start using it right away.

What is Akismet?

Akismet is a comment spam filtering service for WordPress. Automattic is the company behind Akismet and it was founded by the WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg.

Akismet goes through the blog comments and filters out spam using its algorithms. The algorithm learns from its mistakes and the actions taken by other websites.

For example, when several websites start reporting similar-looking content as spam, then Akismet will learn to identify that kind of content as spam in the future.

As of today, Akismet has caught more than 523 billion spam comments, and the number is still growing.

Why You Should Use Akismet?

On popular WordPress websites, the number of spam comments could get as high as 85%. This means that out of every 100 comments, only 15 are legitimate.

Besides that, comment moderation is a time-consuming task. You would have to spend countless hours filtering spam comments manually.

This is where Akismet can save you hours. The WordPress plugin will automatically catch spam comments before it lands in your moderation queue as pending. This allows you to focus your energy on moderating comments by real users.

When a comment is marked as spam by Akismet, it will not show the Awaiting Moderation notice like you normally see with other comments. Instead, it will automatically move them to the spam folder.

Now, let’s look at how you can configure Akismet on your website.

How to Set up Akismet in WordPress

The first thing you’ll need to do is install and activate the Akismet Spam Protection plugin for WordPress. For more details, please see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you can navigate to Settings » Akismet Anti-Spam from your WordPress dashboard. Next, go ahead and click the ‘Set up your Akismet account’ button.

Now, a new tab or window will open in your browser, and you’ll see the Akismet pricing page. Akismet offers free and premium pricing plans.

If your site is not for commercial purposes, like it doesn’t run ads, then you can choose the Personal plan. Otherwise, you’ll need to select one of the commercial plans.

For the sake of this tutorial, we’ll be using the Personal plan.

On the next screen, you’ll need to enter your email address, name, and website URL to create an account, along with choosing a price you want to pay for your account.

By default, the price will be set to $36 per year. However, you can move the pricing slider under ‘What is Akismet worth to you’ to any price from 0 to $120 per year.

Aside from that, Akismet will also ask you to check the boxes if you’re not running ads, selling products and services, or promoting a business on your site.

Once that’s done, simply click the ‘Continue with Personal Subscription’ button.

Next, you’ll need to enter the confirmation code that you received in the email address provided upon signup. After entering the code, click the ‘Continue’ button.

Akismet will verify the code and then show you a page with additional instructions to complete the signup process.

To complete the configuration, you can head back to your site’s WordPress dashboard and navigate to the Settings » Akismet Anti-Spam page.

Now go ahead and click the ‘Manually enter an API key’ button.

When you click the button, a new field will appear where you’ll need to enter the API key. You can find the API Key in your email inbox.

After entering the key, simply click the ‘Connect with API key’ button.

Once the API key is connected, Akismet will start protecting your website from spam comments.

You can also tweak the settings in Akismet. For instance, the plugin lets you display the number of approved comments beside each comment author, review spam comments or automatically discard them, and show a privacy notice under comment forms.

When you’ve made the changes, go ahead and click the ‘Save Changes’ button.

Next, you can review spam comments by navigating to Comments from your WordPress dashboard and then selecting the ‘Spam’ tab.

If you feel that a legitimate comment has been marked as spam, then you can simply click the ‘Not Spam’ button under the comment.

You can also permanently delete comments or click the ‘Empty Spam’ button to clear the spam folder.

We hope this article helped you learn what is Akismet and why you should start using it right away. You can also check our guide on how to create a free business email address and the best live chat software for small businesses.

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 know how to start affiliate marketing as a beginner?

Affiliate marketing is one of the most popular ways to make money online. It allows you to add a steady income stream to your blog’s monetization strategy.

In this affiliate marketing guide for beginners, we will explain how affiliate marketing works, and how to get started right away.

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is when you earn a commission when a person makes a purchase after clicking your unique referral link.

Unlike other ad types which pay based on clicks or views, affiliate marketing works on a CPA (cost-per-acquisition), or CPL (cost-per-lead) basis. In other words, you only earn a commission when someone takes an action such as buying a product or signing up for a free trial.

Because there is less risk for the advertiser, affiliate programs pay out much higher commissions to publishers compared to Google AdSense or other types of ads.

Affiliate marketing requires a more hands-on approach. You have to find a product or service that you believe will be helpful to your users. After that, you have to strategically add it to your blog posts and other areas of your site so your users can purchase the product using your referral link.

To give you a better idea, here are some popular affiliate marketing blog examples.

Wirecutter

Wirecutter is a well-known product recommendation website from the New York Times. It publishes product reviews and ‘best of’ lists for all types of affiliate products including kitchen tools, home decor, pet supplies, software, and more.

Lucie’s List

Lucie’s List is an affiliate marketing blog for new and expectant parents. Throughout the blog, you can find buying guides with affiliate links for strollers, car seats, bottles, high chairs, and other baby products.

NerdWallet

NerdWallet is another popular website that earns money by promoting financial products to its audience. It publishes reviews on the best credit cards, mortgages, and banking services.

How Does Affiliate Marketing / Tracking Work?

First, you have to find a company or product that you want to promote. You need to select a product or service that you believe will be relevant to your blog’s topic and useful for your audience. The product or company you choose is often called a ‘Merchant’.

Next, you have to partner up with the company by joining their partner program. This makes you their ‘Affiliate’. Some companies also use the terms associates or partners.

Once you have joined their partner program (also called an Affiliate Program), you will get a unique affiliate ID. You will need to use this affiliate ID in all affiliate links that you add to your website to promote the product.

You can promote the product by adding in-depth product reviews, recommending it in your articles, displaying banner ads, sending an email newsletter, and more. All traffic you send to the merchant website with your unique ID will be tracked.

Once a user makes a purchase, you will earn a commission. Your payment is issued once your earnings reach a particular threshold, typically 45-60 days.

How to Get Started with Affiliate Marketing

First, you need to make sure that you are using the right blogging platform, and that you are allowed to run affiliate marketing campaigns on your website.

For example, if you are using WordPress.com, then there are some restrictions regarding the products and services you can link to. For more details see our comparison of WordPress.com vs WordPress.org.

On the other hand, if you are on a self-hosted WordPress.org website, then you can add any affiliate link you want and efficiently manage your affiliate campaigns.

If you haven’t created a website already, then you can get started right away. Simply follow the instructions in our step-by-step guide on how to start a blog, and you’ll be up and running in less than 30 minutes.

Next, you need to let your users know how you make money from your website by adding a disclosure page. See WPBeginner’s disclosure page and feel free to use it as a template.

You will also need to add a privacy policy and terms of service page to your blog.

These are among the must-have pages for every WordPress blog. They not only save you from legal issues in the future, but they also help you build trust with your audience.

Finding Affiliate Products and Services to Promote

There are many ways to find products and companies that you can partner up with as an affiliate. Here are some of the easiest ways to find the products you can promote.

1. Become an affiliate for products you already use

First, you need to look at the products and services that you already use and find useful. This makes it easy for you to convince your users about the product since you already know the pros and cons.

Next, you need to go to the product’s website and search for terms like ‘Affiliate program’, ‘Partners’, or ‘Affiliates’. Many companies are actively looking for affiliate marketers to promote their products, so they often add a link to their affiliate page in their website’s footer.

2. Look for products other blogs are recommending

Another way to find products is by looking at other blogs similar to yours. You will be able to find many similar blogs that are using affiliate marketing to make money.

But how do you know that they are promoting affiliate products?

First, look for the obvious and easily noticeable banner ads on their website. Take your mouse to the banner ad, and you will see a link in your browser’s status bar.

This link will usually have an affiliate ID. Affiliate ID helps merchants track which affiliate partner is sending them traffic and sales.

Sometimes these links may look like internal links, but when you click on them they will take you to a product website with the affiliate marketer’s ID in the link. You will also find similar affiliate links throughout their content.

3. Join bigger affiliate networks

Another way to find products to promote is by joining affiliate networks. These websites act as a middleman between affiliate marketers and merchants.

You will notice that many products and companies that you want to partner with already use an affiliate network. This helps you quickly find a lot of products that you can start promoting on your website.

In the next section we’ll share more about affiliate networks and our top recommendations.

4. Reach out to companies

If you really want to promote a product but can’t find any information about their affiliate program, then you can simply ask them via email.

Some companies may not be actively promoting their affiliate program. If they have an affiliate program, then they can invite you to join.

What are Affiliate Networks? Why You Should Join Them?

Affiliate networks act as a middleman between you (the affiliate marketer) and merchants (companies that want to sell their products).

For merchants, they provide their platform as a service to list their products, track affiliate traffic, manage affiliates, and send payments.

For affiliate marketers, they offer an easy-to-use platform to search for products, sign up as an affiliate, and track your campaign performance and earnings.

Following are some of the most popular affiliate networks that you can join.

• ShareaSale – One of the largest affiliate networks with many high-paying affiliate products for almost every category imaginable. For example, the popular WordPress hosting company WP Engine uses ShareASale to manage its affiliates.
• CJ Affiliate (Formerly, Commission Junction) – Another top affiliate network with a huge number of merchants and products neatly organized in categories and easily searchable. Companies like GoDaddy, Expedia, and many others use CJ.
• ClickBank – This is a large online marketplace for selling digital products in various categories from different vendors. It is easy to use and has tons of learning resources for new affiliate marketers.
• Amazon Associates – Amazon is the world’s largest eCommerce store with millions of products. You can sign up for their affiliate program and start earning by sending people to a website they already use for their online shopping. See this guide on how to build an Amazon affiliate store in WordPress.

Which affiliate networks should you join?

You should join affiliate networks that have the products you want to promote. You can join multiple affiliate networks for different products. We use all the above networks and a few others.

Make sure that you always check the network program policies. You also need to review the program policies of individual products and merchants. This will give you a clear idea about your earnings, payments, additional incentives, and more.

Affiliate Marketing Tips to Increase Earnings

Now that we have covered the basics, let’s dive into some more tips on how to actually make money from affiliate marketing.

1. Choose good products and companies to promote

As an affiliate marketer, you don’t have control over the future of products that you are recommending. That’s why you need to make sure that you are recommending the best products from reputable companies.

The best way to do this is by recommending the products and services that you have actually used. If you want to recommend a product that looks useful, then feel free to contact them to learn more.

If you ask nicely, most companies will gladly offer you a free account or copy to test their product or service.

2. Keep your audience in mind

Keep your website’s audience and their interests in mind when choosing the product. For example, if you run a fashion blog, then you would want to promote fashion accessories, clothing, and similar products that your audience would want to buy.

You also need to make sure that you are not just recommending products because they are offering higher commissions. If a user buys a product based on your recommendation, and it doesn’t turn out useful, then they will never trust your recommendations again.

3. Offer highly useful and valuable content

You can add affiliate links and banners anywhere on your WordPress site. However, simply adding links will not result in convincing your users to actually buy those products.

You need to convince your users by offering useful and valuable information about the product. Many affiliate marketers do that by writing in-depth product reviews, video reviews, product comparisons with pros and cons, and more.

4. Start an email newsletter

Promoting affiliate products in your email newsletter is another powerful way to boost your affiliate income.

That’s because email marketing is direct and ongoing. Once people sign up for your newsletter, they’ll regularly receive awesome deals and product recommendations directly in their inbox.

To convince people to subscribe to your newsletter, you can use a tool like OptinMonster.

OptinMonster is the best email capture tool on the market. Using the drag and drop builder and 400+ built-in templates, you can quickly create eye-catching newsletter optin forms.

Check out this guide to learn how to build your email list in WordPress with OptinMonster.

5. Sell dropshipping products

Aside from promoting affiliate products on your website, you can also diversify your income with dropshipping.

Dropshipping is where you accept customer orders without keeping any products in stock. When a customer purchases a product from your site, you place the order with the original vendor and they’ll ship the product directly to the customer.

You can learn more in our step-by-step dropshipping guide for WordPress.

Affiliate Marketing Plugins and Tools for WordPress

As your blog grows, you will be recommending a lot of different products. This will make it difficult for you to manage all the affiliate links, banners, and ads spread all over your website.

Luckily, there are excellent affiliate marketing tools and plugins for WordPress that you can use to help with management.

1. ThirstyAffiliates

Manually adding links to your content becomes quite difficult as your site grows. You will have to copy the URL with your affiliate ID every time you mention the product and paste it into WordPress.

This is where ThirstyAffiliates can help. It is an affiliate link management plugin that allows you to easily add affiliate links in WordPress.

It also lets you change lengthy affiliate links into cloaked pretty links which are more user-friendly.

ThirstyAffiliates also has the option to automatically replace keywords with affiliate links, which can significantly help you boost your affiliate revenue.

2. AdSanity

AdSanity is the best WordPress ad management plugin and a must-have for every affiliate marketer’s toolbox. It allows you to create banner ads from your WordPress site and manage them from a single dashboard.

AdSanity also makes it easy to insert ads into your WordPress posts, pages, and sidebar widgets. You can use it to manage your third-party ads like Google AdSense ads and banners as well. For detailed instructions, see our guide on how to manage ads in WordPress with AdSanity.

3. MonsterInsights

MonsterInsights is the best Google Analytics plugin for WordPress. It allows you to see where your users are coming from and what they do when they are on your website.

It also helps you track your outbound affiliate links using Google Analytics. This enables you to find out which affiliate links are clicked more often and helps you discover missed opportunities.

You can see all of this important data in a single, easy-to-read report right from your WordPress dashboard.

MonsterInsights can also detect if you’re using ThirstyAffiliates to manage your affiliate links. That means it can automatically track all your affiliate links, no matter what link prefix you’re using.

Other powerful MonsterInsights features include eCommerce tracking, file download tracking, forms tracking, and much more.

Need more tools? See our full list of top affiliate marketing tools and plugins for WordPress.

We hope this ultimate affiliate marketing guide for beginners helped you learn how to become an affiliate marketer. You may also want to see our ultimate WordPress SEO guide to bring more visitors to your website.

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 wondering what you can do with sticky posts in WordPress?

Sticky posts are one of the least known features in WordPress, but they can really beneficial for your site. Using them can help keep important content visible to your audience, which can increase conversions and engagement.

In this article, we will show you 6 cool things you can do with sticky posts in WordPress.

What are Sticky Posts and Why Should You Use Them?

A sticky post is any content that sticks to the top of your site’s blog page. You can also show them on the homepage, category, archive, and other pages.

You might choose to sticky your WordPress website‘s pillar articles, top products, announcements, or discount offers so that you get more eyes on them.

Sticky posts are powerful because as you create more content over time, your older articles get buried underneath the new blog posts. As a result, users may not be aware of your top articles and will have difficulty finding these posts on your site.

However, many website owners don’t know how to make the most of the sticky posts feature in WordPress. Here are some cool things you can do with sticky posts.

You can click the links below to jump ahead to any section you’re interested in:

• Display Sticky Posts as Recent Articles on Sidebar
• Sticky Posts for Categories
• Display the Latest Sticky Posts
• Sticky Posts for Custom Post Types
• How to Hide Sticky Posts From WordPress Loop
• Styling Sticky Posts in WordPress

1. Display Sticky Posts as Recent Articles on Sidebar

WordPress shows your sticky posts at the top of the blog post page on your website. However, you can also display them in your website sidebar as the most recent articles.

First, you’ll need to install and activate the Recent Posts Widget With Thumbnails plugin. If you need help, then please see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you can head to Appearance » Widgets from your WordPress admin panel. Next, you can click the ‘+’ sign and add the ‘Recent Posts With Thumbnails’ widget block.

In the widget block settings, you can enter a title such as ‘recent posts’ and choose the number of posts to display.

Next, scroll down to the ‘Sticky’ section in the widget settings. Here, you can enable the option to show only sticky posts as recent posts and keep them on top of the list.

When you’re done, simply click the ‘Update’ button.

Now visit your website to see posts you’ve marked as ‘sticky’ showing as recent articles in your sidebar.

2. Sticky Posts for Categories

By default, sticky posts only appear on your WordPress blog‘s front page. But what if you want to display featured content on your category archive pages?

You can do that by using the Sticky Posts – Switch plugin.

First, you’ll need to install and activate the Sticky Posts – Switch plugin. For more details, please see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you can go to Settings » Sticky Posts – Switch from the WordPress admin menu. Simply check the ‘Categories’ box under the ‘Categories Page’ heading to show sticky posts.

The plugin also adds a star icon on the Posts page in your WordPress dashboard.

This way, you can quickly make a post sticky by simply clicking the icon. You don’t have to open the content editor or view the quick edit settings.

For more detailed instructions, see our tutorial on how to add sticky posts for categories in WordPress.

3. Display the Latest Sticky Posts

Typically, sticky posts are used for featured posts to display your most prominent content.

After a while, your old featured posts disappear under the archives. You can bring back your old featured content to life by showing them on a custom archives page or anywhere else on your site.

We highly recommend that everyone use the WPCode plugin any time you need to deal with code snippets. Be sure to follow our guide on how to paste snippets from the web into WordPress.

If you’re an advanced user, you can also paste this code into your theme’s functions.php file. However, we do not recommend directly editing the theme files because the slightest mistake can break your site.

 function wpb_latest_sticky() {   /* Get all sticky posts */ $sticky = get_option( 'sticky_posts' );  /* Sort the stickies with the newest ones at the top */ rsort( $sticky );  /* Get the 5 newest stickies (change 5 for a different number) */ $sticky = array_slice( $sticky, 0, 5 );  /* Query sticky posts */ $the_query = new WP_Query( array( 'post__in' => $sticky, 'ignore_sticky_posts' => 1 ) ); // The Loop if ( $the_query->have_posts() ) { 	$return .= '<ul>'; 	while ( $the_query->have_posts() ) { 		$the_query->the_post(); 		$return .= '<li><a href="' .get_permalink(). '" title="'  . get_the_title() . '">' . get_the_title() . '</a><br />' . get_the_excerpt(). '</li>';  	} 	$return .= '</ul>';  } else { 	// no posts found } /* Restore original Post Data */ wp_reset_postdata();  return $return;   } add_shortcode('latest_stickies', 'wpb_latest_sticky'); 

After adding this code, simply add the shortcode [latest_stickies] wherever you want to display your latest sticky posts. For detailed instructions, visit our article on how to display the latest sticky post in WordPress.

4. Sticky Posts for Custom Post Types

Did you know that you can make custom post types sticky in WordPress?

Typically, the sticky post feature is only available for default WordPress posts, but this does not mean that you cannot add this feature for other post types.

Using the Sticky Posts – Switch plugin, you can stick custom post types to your site. First, you can install and activate the plugin. Please see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin if you need help.

Upon activation, simply go to Settings » Sticky Posts – Switch from your WordPress dashboard. Under the ‘Post type’ column, you will see a list of all custom post types you have created on your site.

Next, you can click the checkbox for the custom post type you want to make sticky. In this example, we mark our ‘Book Reviews’ post type to be sticky.

For more detailed instructions, check out our tutorial on how to add sticky posts in WordPress custom post types.

5. How to Hide Sticky Posts From WordPress Loop

When using sticky posts, you will notice that WordPress displays your articles at the top of all your WordPress posts by default.

To exclude sticky posts from the WordPress loop and appear at the top, all you have to do is enter the following custom code on your WordPress website.

 <?php   // The loop arguments $args = array(     'posts_per_page' => 10,     'post__not_in' => get_option( 'sticky_posts' ) // do not display the sticky posts at all. );   // The loop $the_query = new WP_Query($args); if ($the_query->have_posts()) {     while ($the_query->have_posts()) {         $the_query->the_post();            } } 

This code will completely exclude sticky posts from the loop. See our tutorial on how to exclude sticky posts from the WordPress loop for more detailed instructions.

6. Styling Sticky Posts in WordPress

Next, do you want to add custom styling to your sticky posts?

Many WordPress themes use post_class() functions to automatically add post classes for each post. If your theme is already using post_class() function, then you will see a ‘sticky class’ added to your sticky posts.

Now, you can use the.sticky CSS class in your WordPress theme. Here is some basic CSS to get you started:

 .sticky {  background-color:#ededed; border:1 px solid #f5f5f5; color:#272727; padding:5px; }   .sticky:before {   content: "Featured";   color: #FFF;   background: #f20000;   padding: 10px;   display: inline-block;   text-align: right;   float: right;   font-weight: bold;   text-transform: uppercase; } 

For more details, please see our guide on how to add custom CSS in WordPress.

We hope this article helped you learn some cool things to do with sticky posts on your WordPress site. You may also want to check out our guide on how to start an online store and the ultimate WordPress SEO guide for beginners.

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.