How to Add a Free Shipping Bar in WooCommerce

Do you offer free shipping on your WooCommerce store?

Offering free shipping is a proven way to reduce cart abandonment and increase overall sales conversion. The challenge is that most store owners fail to clearly highlight the free shipping offer.

In this article, we’ll teach you how to add a free shipping bar in WooCommerce to boost sales.

Adding a Free Shipping Bar in WooCommmerce

Shipping costs are one of the top reasons behind abandoned cart sales. Many online stores deal with this by offering free shipping.

Letting customers know about your free shipping offer is a great way to boost sales from your online store.

Here’s an example of a free shipping bar. It’s a prominent website element that stays at the top of the screen as the user scrolls down:

As you can see, the example store above is encouraging users to spend a certain amount to get free shipping. This is a great to boost cart order value and over sales volume.

You can enable incentivized free shipping by using the Advanced Coupon plugin for WooCommerce.

Regardless of how you enable free shipping, properly highlighting it on your site is key, and that’s where a free shipping bar comes in.

To create the shipping bar, we’ll be using OptinMonster. It’s a powerful tool for creating all types of WordPress popups.

Creating an OptinMonster Account and Connecting WordPress

First, you’ll need to visit the OptinMonster website and sign up for an account.

Note: OptinMonster was co-created by Syed Balkhi, WPBeginner’s founder. It’s an extremely popular optin tool that we use here on WPBeginner and we highly recommend it.

After you’ve signed up for OptinMonster, the next step is to install and activate the free OptinMonster plugin for WordPress. If you’re not sure how, check out our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

This plugin connects the OptinMonster app to your WordPress site. After activating it, click on the OptinMonster menu in your WordPress dashboard. Then, click the ‘Connect Your Account’ button and connect WordPress to your OptinMonster account.

Creating The Free Shipping Bar for WooCommerce

Now, you can create your free shipping bar. First, go to the OptinMonster page in your WordPress dashboard and then click the ‘Create New Campaign’ button on the top right.

This will take you to the OptinMonster campaign builder where you need to select ‘Floating Bar’ as your campaign type.

Next, scroll down and choose your campaign template. OptinMonster has a great range of professional templates to choose from. We’re going to use the Alert template for our WooCommerce free shipping bar.

Bring your mouse cursor over the template and click the ‘Use Template’ button:

OptinMonster will now prompt you to name your campaign. You can use any name that you like here.

You can also choose which website(s) you want to run the campaign on. OptinMonster should have added your website here for you.

Once you’re ready, click the Start Building button.

You’ll then see the OptinMonster builder interface. It’ll look like this:

By default, the floating bar will stick to the bottom of the screen. If you want it at the top of the screen instead, that’s easy to change.

Simply click on Floating Settings in the left-hand menu. Then, turn on the ‘Load Floating Bar at Top of Page?’ option.

To change the text in the bar, simply click on it. The text editor will open up on the left-hand side of your screen.

You can customize the text as needed. You can also change the font style, color, font size, and more. The preview of your campaign will automatically update to show how it’ll look live.

Here, we’ve changed the text and the font. We’ve also slightly increased the font size:

You can change the button on your free shipping bar, too. Simply click on the button, and the settings will open up in the left hand panel. You can change the text of the button there.

To direct customers to a page on your website about free shipping, click on the Action tab. Then, enter the correct Redirect URL:

If you want to use a different color for your free shipping bar, that’s easy too. First, click on the Home button to return to the main design settings:

Then, you can go to Optin Settings » Optin View Styles to change the color of your optin.

After you click in the Background Color box, you can select a new color. You can either enter the hex code or use the color picker. We’ve chosen green for ours:

Once you’re happy with your free shipping bar, click the Save button on the top right.

Next, you’ll need to select the display rules which controls who should see the free shipping bar on your site. Simply click on the Display Rules tab at the top of your screen.

By default, OptinMonster displays your floating bar after the user has been on any page of your site for 5 seconds.

You may want to have your free shipping bar load instantly. To do this, simply remove this rule. Click the minus icon on the right hand side to do so:

Now, you should be left with the rule ‘Current URL path is any page.’

The final step is to put your campaign live on your site. Click the Publish tab at the top of the screen. While you’re building your campaign, it’s paused by default. You can switch it on here.

To put your free shipping bar on your WordPress site, go to OptinMonster » Campaigns in your WordPress dashboard. Click the Refresh Campaigns button to see your free shipping bar campaign listed here.

Now, you can visit your site and see your free shipping bar live:

We hope this article helped you learn how to add a free shipping bar in WooCommerce. You might also want to check out our list of the best WooCommerce plugins for your online store, and our comparison of the best business phone services with smart call routing features.

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.

The post How to Add a Free Shipping Bar in WooCommerce appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 06, 2020 at 04:23PM

WPBeginner Turns 11 Years Old – Reflections and Updates (+ Giveaway)

Today is July 4th which means WPBeginner is officially 11 years old. We’ve come a long way

Like every year, I want to take a few minutes and do a quick recap of all the major things happening in business as well as my personal life.

Bonus: I’m also doing a Website Toolkit giveaway which includes a Macbook Air, Free domain + Hosting, and my favorite premium WordPress plugins.

Since this is a long article, you can easily skip to the section you’re most interested in:

• Personal Updates
• WPBeginner Updates
• Product Updates
• Birthday Giveaway
• Giving Back (Opportunity)

WPBeginner Story

I started using WordPress when I was 16 years old and started WPBeginner at age 19 with a single mission: make WordPress easy for beginners.

Since then WPBeginner has become the largest free WordPress resource site for beginners.

For those of you who’re new, you can read the full WPBeginner story on our about page and use the Start Here page to get the most out of WPBeginner.

Personal Updates

My son, Solomon, is now 3.5 years old. He’s growing up fast, and he now even suggests keywords that I should mention in my email newsletters to WPBeginner audience.

Since the last WPBeginner anniversary post, we travelled to Turkey, Germany, Austria, Bahamas, Pakistan, Mexico, and several places in US.

Of course all of our travels came to a stop in February due to COVID-19. We’ve been staying home and spending a lot of family time.

I’ve also been working a lot during this lockdown – focusing on creating more content as well as revamping various product features.

If you didn’t get a chance to read my 2019 recap, I highly recommend checking it out on my personal blog where I share lessons learned from last year.

WPBeginner Updates

Thanks to our awesome community, WPBeginner has continued to grow in double-digit (year over year). Aside from tons of amazing WordPress tutorials on our blog, there have been several notable updates from last year, that I’d like to highlight.

1. We launched Three New Free Business Tools

Since last year, we have launched 3 new free business tools to help you do more with WordPress.

The first is a smart business name generator to help you find brandable company name ideas with available domains, so you can start your online business idea.

The second is a WordPress theme detector that helps you find out what WordPress theme your competitor’s website is using. Simply put, if you have ever wondered what WordPress theme a website is using, this tool can help you find that.

Last but not least, we launched a free WordPress Call Button plugin to help you easily add a click to call button on your website.

2. WPBeginner Engage Facebook Group is now Over 48,000 Members

To celebrate our 10th anniversary, we launched the WPBeginner Engage Facebook group to offer WordPress help for non-techy users.

This was something that a lot of you had been asking for, and I’m extremely pleased with the progress thus far. We now have over 48,000+ members in our Facebook group, and I believe it’s now the largest WordPress user group on Facebook.

For those of you who’re not members yet, the goal of this group is to share and learn WordPress tips while getting to know other motivated website owners like yourself.

Aside from peer-to-peer support and knowledge sharing, we also do monthly giveaways, have exclusive video content from myself, and our WPBeginner experts are also there answering questions (for free).

What are you waiting for? Go ahead and join the WPBeginner Facebook Group. I look forward to connecting with you

3. WPBeginner YouTube Channel Now Has 191,000+ subscribers

Our WPBeginner YouTube channel passed 191,000+ subscribers, and I believe we will pass 200k goal by end of this year.

We have hundreds of free WordPress video tutorials, and we have also been creating a lot of YouTube exclusive content.

For example, you can watch our playlists to learn how to Make Money Online, learn WordPress SEO, and more.

We are also doing monthly State of WPBeginner videos where we share what’s happening in the WordPress ecosystem, summary of Awesome Motive products, and more.

Also I’m personally making more appearances on the channel in the interview style videos.

If you’ve not subscribed to our YouTube channel yet, it’d mean the world to me if you can subscribe and hit the bell button, so we can pass the 200,000 goal.

4. We switched our WordPress hosting to SiteGround (Google Cloud)

Last year, I was extremely excited about our private cloud hosting platform that we built, but it led to many complexities.

That’s why earlier this year, we switched WPBeginner hosting to SiteGround Enterprise (which is powered by Google Cloud).

I wrote about 6 reasons why we switched to SiteGround.

If you’re looking to switch hosts, I highly recommend SiteGround – their customer service and new tech platform is really robust.

5. New Acquisitions & Investments (All in One SEO, Smash Balloon, & more)

As you know, two years ago I created the WPBeginner growth fund to invest in WordPress focused companies.

This past year, I’m proud to welcome the following companies to our family of products:

All in One SEO Pack is the original WordPress SEO plugin used by over 2 million websites. In January, we acquired AIOSEO to bring it under the Awesome Motive umbrella, and I’m working with the team to build tons of amazing SEO features to help you rank higher.

If you’re looking for a SEO plugin, try AIOSEO – there’s a free version available here as well.

Smash Balloon offers the most popular social media feeds plugin for WordPress. Over 1.3 million websites use Smash Balloon plugins to display their social media content.

If you’re looking to create and display custom Instagram photo feeds, Facebook feeds, Twitter feeds, and YouTube feeds, then there’s no better plugin that Smash Balloon. There’s a free version for all four plugins that you can try.

I also invested in Rymera Web, the parent company behind Wholesale Suite and Advanced Coupons for WooCommerce. These are extremely useful plugins for WooCommerce store owners.

Product Updates

One of the questions that I often get asked via our contact form is what is WPBeginner’s income, and how does WPBeginner make money by giving away all WordPress tutorials for free.

Well, we make money indirectly through our suite of premium WordPress plugins that are now running on over 15 million websites.

WPForms

WPForms is our drag & drop WordPress form builder plugin that’s now being used by over 3 million websites.

Since last July, WPForms has launched numerous exciting features including integrations for Authorize.net (payment forms), ActiveCampaign (CRM), WPML (translations), smart access controls (security), and improved Entry management.

Aside from that, they also added many powerful form fields like multiple file uploads, number slider, text limits, improved reCAPTCHA, etc.

You can download the free version of WPForms or get WPForms Pro to unlock even more powerful features.

MonsterInsights

MonsterInsights is the most popular WordPress analytics plugin. Over 2 million website owners use MonsterInsights to see the stats that matter right inside the WordPress dashboard.

Since last July, MonsterInsights has added smart analytics features such as Email Summaries, PDF export for reports, smart date range, multi-site network wizard, improved Pretty Links integration, and more.

You can download the free version of MonsterInsights or get MonsterInsights Pro to unlock more powerful features.

WP Mail SMTP

WP Mail SMTP is the most popular SMTP plugin for WordPress. Now over 1 million website owners use this plugin to fix the WordPress not sending email issue.

It’s a must have plugin on all our websites. Simply put, this plugin fixes WordPress email deliverability issues by letting you send emails using Amazon SES, MailGun, G Suite, and other more reliable email platforms.

We launched the premium version last year to add smart features like Email Logs, Email Control, Pro integrations, and a White Glove Setup for business owners.

You can download the free version of WP Mail SMTP or get WP Mail SMTP Pro to unlock more powerful features.

OptinMonster

OptinMonster is the best WordPress plugin to convert website visitors into subscribers and customers.

Simply put, it helps you get more email subscribers.

This year we added several exciting features into OptinMonster including: new personalization workflow, A/B testing for campaign types, mobile exit-intent, new integrations for email providers, and more.

OptinMonster truly is the #1 most powerful conversion optimization toolkit in the world. It will help you instantly boost leads and grow revenue by converting and monetizing your existing website traffic.

This is my not-so secret website tool that I use on all our websites because it just works!

RafflePress

RafflePress is the best WordPress giveaway and contest plugin. It’s a new product that we launched last year to unlock viral growth on our sites.

We’ve been using it on WPBeginner and our products to grow our email list, increase engagement, and generate more sales.

RafflePress helps you turn your visitors into brand ambassadors. As a result, you get more website traffic, email
subscribers, and social media engagement FASTER without buying any paid ads!

You can download the free version of RafflePress or get RafflePress Pro to unlock more powerful features.

WPBeginner Birthday Giveaway

To celebrate the 11th birthday of WPBeginner, we are offering an Ultimate Website Toolkit to one lucky reader.

The prize includes a Macbook Air, free domain + 1 year GoGeek hosting from SiteGround, 1 hour Zoom call with Syed (me), and pro licenses to all our premium WordPress plugins: WPForms, OptinMonster, MonsterInsights, WP Mail SMTP, SeedProd, RafflePress, TrustPulse, All in One SEO, Smash Balloon, MemberPress, Affiliate Royale, Thirsty Affiliates, Pretty Links, Formidable Forms, Wholesale Suite, and Advanced Coupons for WooCommerce.

Winners will be chosen randomly using a random generator script.

All you have to do is enter the giveaway using the widget below:

* No purchase is required to enter this giveaway.

Giving Back (Opportunity)

As you know that WPBeginner is a 100% free resource, and I don’t really ask for much in return. Your kindness and generosity in supporting our premium WordPress plugins make this business sustainable for us.

A big priority for Amanda and I is to help others, and we do a ton through our Balkhi Foundation.

Since it’s our family foundation, we don’t ask for donations there. However if you’ve ever found WPBeginner to be helpful and want to give back, then I would appreciate you supporting some of my favorite charities below:

• Animal Welfare Institute
• Cancer Research Institute
• Environment: The Conservation Fund or National Park Foundation
• Hunger: Action Against Hunger or No Kid Hungry

Thank You Everyone

I want to say thank you to everyone who has supported us in this journey. I really do appreciate all of your retweets, personal emails, content suggestions, and the in-person hugs / interactions at the events.

You all are AMAZING and without you, there is no WPBeginner.

I look forward to another solid year ahead of us.

Syed Balkhi
Founder of WPBeginner

P.S. We’re hiring for several roles as our company grows. If you or someone you know would be interested in being part of our fast-growing team, then please apply here.

The post WPBeginner Turns 11 Years Old – Reflections and Updates (+ Giveaway) appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 04, 2020 at 06:31PM

7 Best Instagram Plugins for WordPress (Easy to Use)

Are you looking for the best Instagram plugins for WordPress?

Whether you want to display your Instagram photo feed, create an Instagram slider, add the Instagram icon with a link to your profile, or create an Instagram giveaway to grow your followers, this list is for you.

In this article, we’ve hand-picked the best Instagram plugins for WordPress to help you increase your followers and boost engagement.

1. Instagram Feed Pro

Instagram Feed Pro from Smash Balloon is the best Instagram feed plugin in the market. Over 1.3 million websites use the plugin to create custom Instagram photo feeds.

There is a free version of the plugin that lets easily create a custom Instagram social photo feed.

The free version comes with a lot of features built-in, but you can upgrade to the Pro version to unlock additional features like multiple layout choices: masonry grid, horizontal layout, carousel, and more.

You can also use the Pro version to display several different Instagram feeds on your site from multiple sources including #hashtag feeds. It also letsy ou create shoppable feeds and has lightbox popup option with built-in social sharing buttons.

You can easily add your Instagram feed to any post or page using the block editor or a sidebar widget. The plugin also supports Instagram stories and brings them to your WordPress site.

By far the best part about Smash Balloon’s Instagram plugin is their smart feed cache and backup functionality. This allows you to show Instagram photos on your site without slowing your site down, and your photos will show even if Instagram API goes down (which is a huge benefit).

For detailed instructions, see our guide on how to create custom Instagram photo feeds in WordPress (step by step).

2. RafflePress

RafflePress is a giveaway and rewards plugin for WordPress. You can integrate it with Instagram to grow your followers.

With RafflePress, it’s incredibly easy to set up a contest that prompts your visitors to take specific actions using Instagram. That might mean visiting your Instagram profile or viewing one of your Instagram posts.

Of course, you can also use RafflePress to get users to take other actions too.

For example, you could run a RafflePress giveaway or contest for your Instagram followers where they need to visit a specific page of your website. You could even ask them to join your email list in order to enter.

RafflePress is extremely to use and it’s by far the most feature-rich giveaway and contest plugin for WordPress. You can try the free version of RafflePress plugin to get started.

3. Revive Old Posts

Revive Old Posts is a social media scheduling plugin. It lets you easily share both old and new content on social networks, including Instagram.

You can set a custom schedule for your social media posts. If you don’t want to share all your posts, you can leave out content on your blog by setting a date range or by excluding certain categories or tags.

This plugin also has the ability to share photos from your media library on Instagram. You can even share new posts the moment they’re published and add custom UTM tags to your Instagram posts.

There is a free version of the plugin, too, but that only lets you share content on Facebook pages and Twitter.

4. Envira Gallery

Envira Gallery is a fast and easy to use WordPress photo gallery plugin.

It lets you create advanced photo and video galleries in WordPress with features like albums, lightbox popups, pagination, tagging, and more.

Envira comes with an Instagram Addon that lets you import your Instagram images into WordPress, so you can add it alongside your other photo galleries.

It’s up to you whether you want to bring the images onto your blog and have them open in a lightbox, or whether you want the images to link to your Instagram posts.

5. Soliloquy

Soliloquy is a very beginner friendly WordPress slider plugin that you can use to create responsive photo and video sliders.

It comes with a Dynamic slider addon that lets you add Instagram photos along with your featured blog post thumbnails, testimonials, and others in a single slider.

You can determine exactly what content from Instagram you want to use on your slider. For instance, you could include only photos with specific tags.

You can also control the speed of your sliders and tweak lots of other settings to match your website layout.

6. 10Web Social Photo Feed

10Web Social Photo Feed is quick to set up and lets you add Instagram feeds to any of your posts or pages. With the free version, you can choose from thumbnail images or regular sized ones. The premium version offers more options.

You can use 10Web Social Photo Feed to display your Instagram posts in your WordPress sidebar. There’s a built-in widget for this, making it easy and straightforward.

The free version lets you include single feeds from your Instagram account or from a specified hashtag. With the premium version, you can create mixed feeds from multiple hashtags.

The support team is helpful and quick to get back to queries, even from free users.

7. Simple Social Icons

Simple Social Icons lets you add social media icons in a sidebar widget. These icons have links to your profile on Instagram and other social networks. They make it very easy for your readers to find and follow you there.

Simple Social Icons is a very straightforward plugin that takes just moments to set up. It’s completely free, too.

With this plugin, you can customize the style and color of your icons and choose how to align them. Note that you can’t add more icons or change the order unless you use a filter.

We hope this article helped you find the best Instagram plugins for WordPress. You may also want to see our list of the must have WordPress plugins and our guide on how to increase your blog traffic.

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.

The post 7 Best Instagram Plugins for WordPress (Easy to Use) appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 03, 2020 at 05:00PM

How to Create a Secure Contact Form in WordPress

Do you want to create a secure form in WordPress?

Forms allow users to submit information on your website. However, they can also be used by hackers to steal information, attack websites, and install malicious code.

In this article, we will show you how to create a secure contact form in WordPress. We’ll explain how to ensure secure WordPress form submissions on your site.

Here is a summary of what we’ll cover in this article.

• What you need to secure WordPress forms
• Creating a secure contact form in WordPress
• Securing WordPress contact form email notifications
• Securing WordPress forms against spam and DDoS attacks
• Restricting WordPress form access (password protected, members only, and more)
• Keeping your WordPress site secure

What You Need to Secure WordPress Forms?

To make your WordPress contact form secure, you need two things.

• A secure WordPress contact form plugin
• A secure WordPress hosting environment

Let’s start with the form plugin.

1. Choosing a Secure Contact Form Plugin

A secure contact form plugin allows you to save form entries securely on your website. It also allows you to use secure email methods to deliver your form notifications.

We recommend using WPForms, which is the best WordPress contact form plugin on the market.

It comes with a tons of powerful features to secure WordPress forms and protect your website from spam, hacking, and data theft.

There is also a free version available called WPForms Lite. It is equally secure but has limited features.

2. Choosing a Secure Hosting Platform

Choosing the right WordPress hosting is crucial for the security of your website and your contact forms.

We recommend using Bluehost. They are one of the largest hosting companies in the world and officially recommended WordPress hosting provider.

More importantly, they are offering WPBeginner users free domain and SSL certificate (you’ll need it for better WordPress form security).

You can also use other popular WordPress hosting companies like SiteGround, WP Engine, HostGator, etc because they all offer free SSL.

What is SSL? And why do you need it to secure WordPress forms?

SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer. It switches your WordPress site from HTTP to HTTPs (secure HTTP). You’ll notice a padlock icon next to your website indicating that it is using SSL protocol to transfer data.

SSL protects your information by encrypting the data transfer between a user’s browser and the website. This adds WordPress form encryption support which makes it harder for hackers to steal data.

For more details, see our article on how to get a free SSL certificate for your website.

That being said, now let’s take a look at how to create a secure contact form in WordPress.

Creating a Secure Contact Form in WordPress

Creating a secure WordPress contact form is easy if you already checked the above-mentioned requirements. See our tutorial on how to quickly add a contact form in WordPress if you haven’t already done so.

Next, is to add more security layers to your WordPress contact form. This helps you keep form data safe and also helps you reduce spam and improve your website performance.

The following are some of the most common ways someone can steal information or abuse your WordPress forms.

First, they can sniff the information as it is submitted by a form. You can address this by using a secure WordPress hosting platform and enabling SSL encryption on your website.

The next part is when your WordPress form sends notification emails. Business email services are not part of WordPress, and if you are not properly sending those emails, then they can be insecure.

Lastly, your WordPress forms can be abused to send spam messages and DDoS attacks. If you are using a custom WordPress login form, then hackers can use brute force attacks to login to your WordPress site.

Now let’s address each one of them to make your WordPress forms more secure.

Securing WordPress Contact Form Email Notifications

As we mentioned earlier, insecure emails can be spied upon and are unsafe. There are two ways you can handle form notification emails.

1. Don’t send form data via email notifications

The first thing you would want to consider is not sending form data via emails.

For instance, when someone submits your contact form, you only get an email alert that someone has submitted form and not the form data itself.

WPForms comes with a built-in entry management system that stores your form data in your WordPress database. You can simply go to WPForms » Entries page to view all form submissions.

Note: You’ll need to upgrade to the paid version of WPForms for entry management features.

2. Send secure WordPress form notification emails

For some users, sending form notification emails is necessary for their business.

For instance, if you have an online order form, a donations form, or a payment form, then you may need to send email notifications to your users.

For this, you need to set up a proper SMTP service to securely send emails.

SMTP stands for Secure Mail Transfer Protocol. It is the industry standard to securely send emails on the internet.

We recommend using G Suite which allows you to create a professional business email address. Powered by Google, it allows you to use the familiar Gmail interface to send and receive emails.

However, if you’ll be sending a lot of emails, then we recommend using Sendinblue, Amazon SES, or any of the reliable SMTP service providers.

Next, you need to connect your email service to WordPress so that all your WordPress form notifications are sent using your secure email connection.

To do that, you need to install and activate the WP Mail SMTP plugin. It works with any SMTP email service and allows you to easily send WordPress emails securely.

For detailed instructions, see our guide on how to set up WP Mail SMTP in WordPress.

Securing WordPress Forms Against Spam and DDoS Attacks

Your website forms are publicly accessible. This means anyone can access and fill them. We’ll cover restricting form access to specific users in the next step, but for this step we will address public forms.

When your form is accessible by anyone on the internet, it can become a target for spammers and hackers. While spammers try to use your form for fraudulent activities, hackers may try to use it to gain access to your website or even bring it down.

Luckily, WPForms comes with several spam-prevention features. It also automatically enables honeypot anti-spam technique on all forms.

Honeypot basically obscures form fields from automated spambots. However, it is not the most effective way to protect online forms.

If you suspect that your forms are abused or under attack, then you can deploy the following spam protection tools.

1. Enable Google reCAPTCHA in Your Forms

WPForms comes with Google reCAPTCHA support. Simply go to WPForms » Settings page and click on the reCAPTCHA tab.

Google offers three types of reCAPTCHA tools. We recommend using checkbox reCAPTCHA v2 because it is more user-friendly.

You’ll need site key and secret key to enable reCAPTCHA on your site. Simply go to the reCAPTCHA website and click on the ‘Admin Console’ button at the top.

Next, you can go ahead and your website details. Provide a label for your site and then choose reCAPTCHA v2 with ‘I am not a robot’ checkbox.

Click on the Submit button to continue and you’ll see the API keys.

Go ahead and copy these keys and paste them in WPForms settings page. Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save Settings’ button to store your changes.

You can now edit your form and add the reCAPTCHA field to your form.

You’ll see a notification that reCAPTCHA is now enabled for your form. You can go ahead and save your form.

If you haven’t already added form to your website, then you can simply edit the post or page where you want to display the form and add the WPForms block to the content area.

Simply select your form in the drop down menu and WPForms will load a preview of your form. You can now save your post or page and visit it in a new browser tab to see your form with the reCAPTCHA field in action.

2. Enable Custom Captcha for Your WordPress Forms

If you don’t want to use Google reCAPTCHA, then you can use your own math quiz or questions with WPForms Custom Captcha addon.

Note: You’ll need pro version of the plugin to access custom captcha addon.

Simply head over to WPForms » Addons page to install and activate the Custom Captcha addon.

After that, you can edit your contact form and add the Captcha field to your form.

By default, it adds a random math question. You can change that to add your own custom captcha by changing the captcha type to text.

You can now save your form, and it to a post or page using the WPForms block.

You can now visit your post or page to see the custom captcha in action.

Restricting WordPress Forms Access to Certain Users

Another way to protect your WordPress forms is to restrict access to logged-in members, or through a unique form password.

WPForms comes with a Form Locker addon that lets you enable various form permissions and access control rules.

With form locker you can:

• Password Protect Forms – this requires users to enter a password to submit the form. This added protection helps decrease the number of unwanted form submission.
• Close Form Submissions After Specific Date / Time – this is great for any kind of application forms or other time-sensitive forms.
• Limit the number of total submissions – this is great for contests or giveaways. Once the max number of entries are in, the WPForms will automatically close the form.
• Limit one entry per person – if you want to avoid duplicate submissions, then you will love this option. This is very useful for scholarship applications, giveaways, etc.
• Restrict Forms to Members Only – you can restrict your forms to logged-in users of your WordPress site. This is great for membership sites or businesses who want to restrict support to paid customers only.

You can access the Form Locker settings inside the Form Builder Settings panel:

Keeping Your WordPress Site Secure

The security of your WordPress forms depends on the security of your entire WordPress website. With some simple steps, you can strengthen your WordPress website security.

We recommend using Sucuri, as the best WordPress security plugin on the market. It comes with a website firewall that blocks any suspicious activity even before it reaches your website.

For more practical tips, see our complete WordPress security guide for beginners.

We hope this article helped you create a secure contact form in WordPress. You may also want to see our guide on how to create an email newsletter and our list of must have WordPress plugins.

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.

The post How to Create a Secure Contact Form in WordPress appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 02, 2020 at 05:23PM

How to Setup Delivery Time Slots in WooCommerce (Step by Step)

Have you ever needed to set up delivery time slots for your online store?

Creating delivery time slots allows you to keep up with customer demand for more convenient delivery. At the same time, it also allows you to create a more manageable schedule to match your delivery capacity.

In this guide, we’ll share our step by step process on how to easily set up delivery time slots in WooCommerce.

What are Delivery Slots and Why Set Them up in WooCommerce?

Delivery slots allow customers on an online store to select a specific time and date ‘slots’ for delivery.

This convenient delivery model allows customers to know exactly when they’re going to receive their goods, which in turn increases customer satisfaction and confidence in your brand.

For store owners, offering specific delivery time slots for customers can drastically reduce non-deliveries. As a result, you can save money on delivery costs and make your store more profitable.

On a smaller scale, offering delivery or collection slots to customers allows store owners to manage their schedule and optimize delivery times. They can complete more orders quickly and deliver them on-time.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at how to easily add delivery or collection time slots in WooCommerce.

Creating Delivery Time Slots in WooCommerce

For this tutorial, we’ll be using the WooCommerce Delivery Slots plugin. It is a powerful plugin that adds the essential date and time-based features to the default WooCommerce delivery functionality.

First, you need to install and activate the WooCommerce Delivery Slots plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you need to visit WooCommerce » Delivery Slots page in your WordPress dashboard.

Next, you need to select the General Settings tab. From here you can change where to display the date and time fields and which shipping methods to offer.

After that, switch to the Date Settings tab. On this screen, you can select the days of the week you’ll be offering delivery slots. You’ll also be able to add a maximum number of orders per day, set additional fees for same-day or next-day delivery, and more.

Now you can switch to the Time Settings tab to create your delivery time slots.

Make sure to ‘Enable Time Slots’ is checked and scroll down to the ‘Time Slot Configuration’ section to customize.

Here you’ll be able to fill the Slot Duration and Slot Frequency fields to dynamically generate slots. You can also leave them empty to create a single time slot.

For this tutorial, we’re creating time slots every 30 minutes from 6 am – 10 am every day of the week. We’re also creating premium time slots every 30 minutes from 10 am – 12 p.m noon on Thursdays and Fridays which costs an extra fee.

Tip: WooCommerce Delivery Slots allows you to fully customize your time slots, so you can add additional fees for certain slots, offer slots only for specific shipping methods, and set the maximum number of orders per slot.

Once you’re done creating your delivery time slots, go ahead and click Save Changes.

On the checkout page, your customers will now be able to select a delivery date and time slot to suit them.

Once the customer has selected their time slot and purchased their items, they’ll be presented with an ‘Order received’ page after checkout.

This page contains a confirmation of their order, and the time slot they selected which will also be confirmed in their order email.

Tip: Make sure your WooCommerce email notifications are working. See our guide on how to fix WordPress not sending emails issue to set up and test your email notifications.

As the store owner, you will be able to see the selected delivery date in the orders overview and details. You can also go to WooCommerce » Delivery Slots » Deliveries page to see all deliveries.

Creating a Reservation Table in WooCommerce

The WooCommerce Delivery Slots plugin also allows you to enable delivery reservation. This enables customers to reserve a delivery slot in advance.

Simply go to WooCommerce » Delivery Slots page and switch to the ‘Reservation Table’ tab.

From here you’ll be able to adjust the settings for your table including setting limits on how long a reservation lasts before a purchase is made and changing its style to suit your store.

Once happy, click Save Changes and copy the shortcode [jckwds] at the top of this settings page.

You can now add this shortcode to any page in your site to allow customers to reserve their delivery time slot before purchase.

We hope this article helped you learn how to easily set up delivery time slots in WooCommerce. You might also like our list of the best WooCommerce plugins for your store and best email marketing services to grow your sales.

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The post How to Setup Delivery Time Slots in WooCommerce (Step by Step) appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 01, 2020 at 05:00PM