Ask any seasoned web designer what is one of the most important elements of building and running a site and you’ll no doubt get the same answer across the board: think mobile first. Indeed, experts now estimate that the vast majority of users access the web on a smartphone, tablet or the like, rather than a standard desktop or laptop computer.
But, as important as it is to have a mobile-friendly site, it’s equally important in today’s world that a site owner or administrator also be able to manage that site in a mobile manner. After all, running a site—a successful site—takes a lot of time: there’s a constant need to make updates, post new content, respond to user comments and more, and our present go-go climate doesn’t allow for as much static and dedicated “office” time as it did in the past.
So how do you manage your WordPress site via your smartphone or tablet while sitting in your car or your favorite coffee shop or even while you’re on vacation? Simple: you grab an app that lets you take (most of) your admin capabilities with you wherever you go. Here are some good ones to check out.
- Of course, the first place you should start is with the WordPress mobile app for iOS or Android. From here you can do virtually everything you need for your site directly from a phone or tablet, such as compose posts, upload photos, edit pages, manage comments, track stories and even get analytical information on your traffic and site activity. And it works seamlessly whether you’re on a self-hosted WordPress site or working via WordPress.com.
- For those who run an e-commerce site, nothing is more important that staying on top of sales, dealing with customers and solving problems on the fly. WooCommerce, which is consistently touted as one of the best e-tail plugins available for WordPress sites—allows you to keep tabs on your online store’s performance, especially new orders and sales, and the interface is easy to use and highly intuitive.
- Pingdom is great if you don’t need to be making changes to your site on a daily basis. The uptime monitoring service keeps a close eye on your site status, and it shoots you an alert if there’s a problem so you can get online and solve the issue quickly.
- For those dedicated social media bloggers who generate content ahead of time, Buffer gives you the ability to create a schedule for the posts to go live. You can also view all the posts you have lined up as well as check which ones have been shared. And should inspiration strike you when you’re away from your computer, you can also add new content right from your smartphone.
- Anyone who has ever tried to compose long articles on a mobile device no doubt got frustrated: the screen is small, it’s difficult to navigate around etc. The IA Writer app helps by displaying an easy-to-see user interface that’s streamlined and doesn’t contain a lot of clutter. And it connects directly to your WordPress site so you can publish posts from anywhere.
