The search engines may bring you a visitor based upon a single post from your site that get their attention. However, to turn that single visit into a lifetime visitor, you need them to peruse your site a little bit. Do not forget that the visitor has likely clicked your site in the search results but likely does not even know the URL that they have come to. The better the search engines do their job, the less and less that visitors even realize the sites they are on.
The faster and faster that people surf the internet means that they are less likely to do more than simply visit a site and never remember that site later. Related posts can change that. When a visitor comes and reads the content of one post, they will see others that are related and they just may spend some more time on your site. The key is to take that one visitor, during that one visit and get them to remember your site.
1. Related Posts
This is a simple plugin that is simply called “related posts”. To get the best out of this plugin, use at least one image on each post. That is always a good idea anyway as it helps to make your site more exciting for its visitors. Those images will appear across the bottom of each post a snippet of the related post and, of course, a link to the post.
This plugin is easy to use and requires almost no configuration. You will find the effect very pleasing and just may see an increase in the amount of time that a person spends on your site. It can be used with an E-Commerce framework to suggest related items, such as a game for the game system that the buyer is getting. It is quick and easy to use and will start to work a few miracles on your site.
2. Related Post via Categories
This is a nice related posts plugin because it gives you a little more control over the content that is displayed. It used the category that the original post was created in to help create the list of related posts. There are a few settings that you can tweak to make this process a little more efficient, but by itself it is a great plugin.
Depending on the format of your site, you can use the category function to specially tailor each and every post to relate to a family of others. It is easy and most people have the entire process up and running within a few minutes. Those that want even more control can sit and take their time to create the perfect little web ring of posts right within the same site.
3. CP Related Posts
This is a nice plugin that gives you a great amount of control over which posts are related to which. You can choose category, content or a host of other points to create the relationships from. You can have this up and running inside of five minutes, but with a little more effort the whole system will be making connections that are very relevant.
This is best when used in bulk, but you can tweak each individual post and that is one of the best parts of the system. You can set up the overall process and then you can remove one post directly from the system or you can change the way that one post or another connects to the rest of the posts. It is easy once you get the hang of it and it can make it a lot easier to have related posts that are not “hard wired” to other post.
Combine this with the right search plugin and you can remove a post completely from the system of relationships and search. This is nice for keeping a set of in house posts that only certain readers will need without the need for messing with permissions and user groups.