As a regular wordpress user, I like to look at the plugins available to improve my websites appearance, functionality and interaction with either myself, the admin or the end user.

So what I have done is a brief overview of the top 5 plugins that I and many others use, in which I would highly recommend to other wordpress users or people who are looking to move from other CMS systems such as Joomla or Blogspot.

Contact Form 7

This is a perfect solution for any type of form that you wish to use on a website, whether the contact form is to be used for a survey, competition, quiz or maybe something else creative.

It is easy to add the plugin to any page or post, whilst in the back end of the website you have the functionality to have so many features by generating additional tags.

The standard html code that you place on your post or page is [contact-form-7 404 "Not Found"].

The plugin to date has had over 4.9 million downloads (28th October 2011).

Login Lockdown

There are many ways to hack WordPress websites, however if you use login lockdown, this service gives you that little bit extra in security.

In the settings of the plugin you are able to change the maximum number of login retries, logout length and so much more.

The plugin will record the IP address and timestamp of every single attempted login, giving you, the administrator knowledge if people are trying to gain access to your website.

Thus far the plugin has been downloaded 120,000 times (28th October 2011).

WP DB Backup

A key plugin you should have installed on your website, so it can automatically backup your database either to a selected email address, to your computer or a location on your server.

Occasionally you may encounter issues with your website, that mean you need to go back to an older database. For example if your database either gets deleted, hacked or riddled with 3rd party links.

WP DB Backup has been downloaded 1.1 million times (28th October 2011).

Sexy Bookmarks

A wonderful plugin that allows readers of your pages or posts to share with their own readers, it is a perfect way to get your content out there.

In the settings you have option of choosing which social websites it can be linked from, for example you would ideally want people to share it through Digg, Reddit, Twitter, Facebook. In total there are 86 possible places to share your content at.

There are many other services out there, that does the exact same job as Sexy Bookmarks, such as Sociable.

An incredible total of 1.3 millions downloads has occurred for the plugin Sexy Bookmarks

WP Polls

Building a community on your website is one of the key factors if you want it to be successful and one of getting repeat visitors is to interact with them.

One plugin that will help in this is WP Polls, a plugin that will allow you to easily create, manage >and edit polls. This plugin will let you add as many polls as you wish to a page with it’s easy interface.

In the plugins settings, you are able to change it’s look with it’s easy to manage interface or if you fancy hard-coding css then you are able to do that in the plugin settings.

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