Best of Best WordPress Tutorials of 2017 on WPBeginner

2017 is about to come to an end and what a great year it has been. We want to thank all of you for your continued support of WPBeginner over the past 8 years of our existence. To continue our tradition, in this article we will look back at 2017 to highlight the best of best WordPress tutorials on WPBeginner and share the success that our team had in 2017.

WPBeginner Recap 2017 by Syed Balkhi

2017 has been an amazing year for me both personally and professionally. WPBeginner website set new traffic records, our team grew to over 40 people, and our revenue from our premium WordPress plugins saw significant growth as well.

In last year’s recap, I set a goal that I wanted to reach 100,000 subscribers on YouTube by the end of 2017. We didn’t quite reach that milestone. At the time of writing this article, we have over 79,000 subscribers and over 10 million video views. I am proud that our videos have improved significantly, and we will be putting even more focus on videos in 2018. If you haven’t done so already, I would really appreciate it if you subscribe to our YouTube channel, so we can reach the 100,000 subscriber mark in 2018.

As for personal life, I’m really enjoying fatherhood. Solomon is 1 year old now, and he learned how to walk earlier this year. It’s been an amazing journey watching him grow and learn all sorts of new things. He has already been to two WordCamps. I think he was the youngest attendee at WordCamp U.S this year. Below is a picture of our family, since I know many of you often ask for it.

I took a complete break from writing on my personal blog, so I can spend maximum time with family. I have been clearing my tasks, so I can start blogging there again next year.

2017 was a great year for WPBeginner’s family of products.

Last year, we launched WPForms, with a goal to make the most beginner friendly WordPress contact form plugin. We have both the free version and premium version.

Thanks to your support, WPForms has taken the market by storm. It’s being used on over 800,000 websites now and has a 4.9 out of 5 star rating.

We completed the phase 1 revamp of MonsterInsights, the Google analytics plugin we acquired from Yoast last year. In phase 1, our goal was to add proper tracking to every area of your WordPress site and send that data to your Google Analytics. Our phase 2 update will be going out soon which will significantly improve the reporting dashboard. Our goal is to bring back helpful data inside WordPress dashboard to help you make data-driven decision.

Our flagship product, OptinMonster, continued to push the limits in 2017. We launched version 4.0 which came with powerful features like sub-accounts, user permission control, activity logs, custom branding and a new campaign creation workflow. We also added powerful targeting features like InactivitySensor, shareable MonsterLinks, campaign sound effects, and our native Shopify app. We also did a complete redesign of our website.

If you’re not using OptinMonster, then you’re losing subscribers every day. It is the one plugin that every website should have.

We also completely redesigned our corporate, Awesome Motive website. It’s really cool, you should check it out. We’re hiring for a lot of different positions, so don’t forget to browse our career page.

If you want to keep up with more than just WPBeginner, then you can always follow me on Twitter (@syedbalkhi) where I tweet about our other projects, marketing tips, and tons of other cool things.

Now let’s take a look at the best of WPBeginner in 2017.

Best of WPBeginner in 2017

We wrote many helpful WordPress tutorials through out 2017. Here are some of our favorites.

January

How to create your own customize short url for your blog – We started the year with a highly requested tutorial on how to create customized short URLs like wpbeg.in that we use.

How to do lead generation in WordPress like a pro – In this article, we discussed why lead generation is important and how you can totally do it on your own like an expert.

What are WordPress plugins? And how do they work? – In this beginner’s guide, we talked a bit about WordPress plugins. Targeted at absolute beginners, this article explains the concept of WordPress plugins as apps for your website and how they work by hooking into your WordPress.

How to add a customer reviews page in WordPress – In this article we show you the easiest way to add customer reviews and testimonials on your business website.

February

How to properly move from Weebly to WordPress – Before this article, it was quite painful to move a website from Weebly to WordPress. We decided to develop a handy tool that will allow you to easily export and import your Weebly site into WordPress. This article has step by step instructions on how to do it.

How to install Google Analytics in WordPress for beginners – Google Analytics is the best free analytics tool in the market. In this beginner’s guide, we showed you how to easily install Google Analytics in your WordPress site.

How to merge two WordPress sites together without losing SEO – Did you buy a new website or just want to merge two of your sites together to better focus? This step by step guide shows you how to properly merge two WordPress sites without losing SEO.

32 extremely useful tricks for the WordPress functions file – This article is the one you want to bookmark because it contains a lot of handy WordPress snippets to use in your functions.php file.

March

5 Best WordPress LMS plugins compared (pros and cons) – WordPress is widely used by people and organizations who want to sell courses or use WordPress as their Learning Management System or LMS. In this article, we compared the top WordPress LMS plugins with pros and cons.

How much does it really cost to build a WordPress website – We are often asked by users about how much would it cost them to build a WordPress site. In this detailed article, we break down the prices and tell you how much it would cost to build different types of WordPress sites and how to reduce your costs.

25 legit ways to make money online blogging with WordPress – Another one of the most requested tutorials of 2017. It’s not a get rich quick schemes type article. But if you’re willing to work hard, then this article shares some of the ways to make money blogging.

How to display the last updated date of your posts in WordPress – A lot of you have asked us how do we display the last updated date on our articles. This article shows you exactly how to do that.

April

5 Best WordPress membership plugins compared – There are many WordPress membership plugins in the market with similar features. In this article, we compared the top WordPress membership plugins to figure out how they stack up against each other.

28 most frequently asked questions by WordPress beginners – As the largest free WordPress resource site, we get a lot of questions from beginners. In this article, we answered some of the most frequently asked questions by WordPress beginners.

How to let users filter posts and pages in WordPress – This is a very sophisticated plugin tutorial that allows you to add neat sorting and filtering option your WordPress site.

How to add an author’s photo in WordPress – Want to add author bio and photo at the end of each post? This is the tutorial that you need. It’s simple and easy (no coding needed).

May

55+ Most Wanted WordPress Tips, Tricks, and Hacks – The best thing about WordPress is that it can be easily customized into doing different things. We compiled a mega list of the most useful WordPress tips, tricks, and hacks that you can try.

5 best WordPress firewall plugins compared – Firewall plugins for WordPress block bad bots, malware, and malicious attacks on your website. In this article, we compared the top 5 WordPress firewall plugins with their pros and cons.

25 Interesting facts about WordPress (infographic) – In this article, we researched and compiled a list of the most interesting facts about WordPress. We then created a beautiful infographic so that you can easily share them.

How to optimize your WordPress database with one click – Optimizing your database cleans up unwanted data which reduces database size and can improve overall website performance. This is a handy tutorial that you should use at least once a year.

June

How to track outbound links in WordPress – Many of our users wanted to know how to track outbound links on their websites. These are the links that take users away from your site. In this article, we showed you how to easily track outbound links in Wordpress using Google Analytics.

How WordPress actually works behind the scenes (infographic) – Curious about what goes on inside WordPress core when someone visits your website? In this article, we gave you a behind the scene tour of how WordPress works with a beautiful infographic.

How to add custom meta boxes in WordPress posts and post types – In this tutorial we showed how to create custom meta boxes to use in your WordPress posts and custom post types.

WordPress.com vs WordPress.org (Comparison Chart) – We updated a popular article on our site with a brand new infographic and comparison table.

How to add two-factor authentication in WordPress (for free) – You probably have already noticed that many popular sites offer two-factor authentication to improve security. This tutorial walks you through how to add it in WordPress.

July

How to easily add custom code in WordPress (without breaking your site) – Normally, users paste code snippets from web in their theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin. In this article, an easier method for beginners to easily add custom code in WordPress.

13 crucial WordPress maintenance tasks to perform regularly – As a self-hosted WordPress site owner, you are responsible for the maintenance of your website. In this article, we created a handy checklist of crucial maintenance tasks that you need to perform regularly.

10 best WordPress plugins for podcasters – WordPress is used by the top podcasters. In this article, we shared the best WordPress plugins for podcasters that will help you easily manage and grow your podcast.

12 signs that your WordPress site is hacked – We are often asked about what are some signs that indicate a WordPress site has been hacked. Here are 12 that you should watch out for.

August

How much does a custom WordPress theme cost? – Another one of the most often asked questions is how to get a custom WordPress theme and how much it would actually cost. In this article, we talk about the cost of getting a custom WordPress theme made specifically for your website.

How to manually update WordPress plugins via FTP – Sometimes you may not be able to update a WordPress plugin from the admin area, in that case you will need to use FTP to update it. In this step by step guide, we show you how to manually update WordPress plugins via FTP.

Best WordPress landing page plugins compared – Want to build custom landing pages for your marketing campaigns? In this article, we compared the top WordPress landing page plugins and their pros and cons.

How to style each post WordPress post differently – A handy resource for theme development when you want to style each post differently.

September

How to add a slide out contact form in WordPress – Slide out contact forms divert user’s attention to the contact with the slide in animation. It helps you generate more leads and sales. In this step by step guide, we showed you how to easily add a slide out contact form in WordPress.

7 Best WordPress CDN services (Compared) – Content delivery network or CDN help you serve static cache from different servers and locations. This boosts your site’s speed and decreases page load time. In this article, we have hand-picked the best CDN services that you can use with your WordPress site.

How to create a pay-per-view site with WordPress – Want to build a pay-per-view site to earn money from your content? In this guide, we show you how to easily create a pay per view site with WordPress.

How to find which WordPress theme a site is using – Often we get emails from readers asking us for help in finding the exact theme that a specific website is using. This article shows you how to easily find out which WordPress a specific website is using.

October

How to properly disable Google AMP in WordPress – In this article, we talk about how to and why you should disable Google AMP in WordPress.

Ultimate guide to creating a WordPress membership site – Want to a build a membership website but dont know where to start? In this step by step guide, we showed how to easily create a fully-functional WordPress membership website.

7 best WordPress ad management plugins and solutions – Many WordPress powered websites rely on advertising for revenue. In this article, we shared the top Wordpress ad management plugins and solutions that will help you maximize your ad revenue.

November

How to track user engagement in WordPress with Google Analytics – Want to learn how users spend their time while visiting your website? In this article, we showed how to track user engagement in Google Analytics.

Evolution of WordPress user interface (2003 – 2017) – Want to see how WordPress looked in its early days? In this article, we showed you how the WordPress user interface evolved over the years.

How to appear in Google Answer boxes with your Wordpress site – Google Answer boxes highlight the best answer to question in search results by putting it at top in an answer box. In this article, we talked about how you can improve your content to easily appear in Google answer boxes with your WordPress posts.

How to restrict media library access to user’s own uploads in WordPress – By default, WordPress allows authors to see all images on your site’s media library. This could be problematic if you invite a lot of guest authors. Here’s how to fix that.

December

How to add a mega menu on your WordPress site (step by step) – You might have seen popular sites like Buzzfeed, Starbucks, etc have interactive mega navigation menus on their sites. Here’s a tutorial how to add a mega menu on your website.

How to accept Bitcoin payments in WordPress – More and more ecommerce websites are now accepting Bitcoin payments along with traditional payment methods. In this article, we show you how to easily accept Bitcoin payments in WordPress.

How to use SMTP server to send WordPress emails – Many shared WordPress hosting providers don’t have their servers properly configured to send out WordPress emails. This troublesome as you may not be able to get important notifications or even password recovery emails. In this article, we show you how to use SMTP server to send WordPress emails.

How and why you should leave reviews on WordPress – Many WordPress plugins and themes need your encouragement to continue the project, particularly the free ones. In this article, we discussed how and why you should leave reviews on WordPress projects like plugins and themes.

These were some of the best WordPress tutorials on WPBeginner in 2017. We hope that you liked them.

We would like to thank all WPBeginner users, who visited our website, gave feedback, left comments, and shared it with others. We are truly very thankful. We look forward to add more useful WordPress tutorials in 2018.

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