MainWP Blog - Tips & Tricks

Mailchimp is a solid provider for sending out email campaigns. Mailchimp recently made a change to expand out as a full service, all-in-one marketing platform, which means the pricing will increase, as Mailchimp will include the number of users who unsubscribed on a list to the total count. There is a solid alternative to Mailchimp, which also includes reasonable pricing at all list count levels, EmailOctopus. EmailOctopus uses AWS SES to send out emails, which means email campaigns are reliable Continue reading the post...

VaultPress is a backup plugin, built by Automattic. VaultPress can also cause the site installation to bloat the database for postmeta and option entries. Some of the examples of the bloat will be in these option names, created by the plugin; vaultpress vaultpress_allow_forwarded_for vaultpress_service_ips_external_cidr _vp_ai_ping _vp_config_post_meta_name_ignore _vp_config_should_ignore_files _vp_current_scan _vp_signatures The option name which can cause the most issues is _vp_ai_ping. On some sites, _vp_ai_ping  has entries which have been known to bloat the site’s options database table with 300-500MB of Continue reading the post...

iThemes Security plugin is an easy to use security plugin for your child sites. One of the lesser known things about iThemes Security is that the plugin includes a number of constants, which can be added to your child site’s wp-config.php file to set certain things on or off. MainWP has an amazing code snippets extension, which allows you to set constants from the MainWP Dashboard site. This means that any of these constants for iThemes Security plugin can easily Continue reading the post...

WordPress 5.2 introduced the new Site Health feature for checking the health of a site. There is already a plugin to remove the Site Health feature from WordPress core in version 5.2. It is already possible to set which of the Site Health tests you would like to enable on a site using the Site Health Tool Manager plugin. Site Health Settings You can deselect which tests you do not want to run in the site health checker. The MainWP Continue reading the post...

WooCommerce Admin is a feature plugin for WooCommerce, which uses React and the Gutenberg block editor to improve certain lacking core features, such as reporting and analytics in WooCommerce. Reporting in WooCommerce can be slow, as well as being MySQL resource heavy if you have high order levels on the site, whilst the WooCommerce Admin is a step in the right direction. Though the WooCommerce Admin has been in development for a number of months, the feature plugin is still Continue reading the post...

At some point, you may be tasked with setting up a feature on your child site for being able to sell event-related tickets directly. One solid plugin which can assist with creating events and tickets sold on your child site is called, aptly, Tickera. To set up Tickera, you will need to install the Tickera plugin on your child site. Once the plugin has been activated, it will walk you through the built-in setup wizard. The setup wizard is familiar Continue reading the post...

WordPress 5.2 introduced a fatal error recovery mode. A fatal error on a site would have normally resulted in a white screen of death, where the front-end of the site is white and would be the result of a fatal error conflict being caused by the active theme or one of the active plugins. The fatal error would have caused the sites wp-admin not be loadable. In WordPress 5.2, when a fatal error is detected, an email is sent to Continue reading the post...

If you have a child site which has post content and comments enabled, it is a fact of life that you will inevitably deal with spam comments. Luckily, there are a number of ways to deal with spam. Some of the plugin options include Akismet and  Antispam Bee. Antispam Bee Antispam Bee will add a setting section under Settings > Antispam Bee You can find more information about Antispam Bee on their docs. There is a bulk setting key for Continue reading the post...

WooCommerce is among the most widely used plugins in WordPress to enable eCommerce on a site. Since WooCommerce has filters, actions, and hooks, that means making site changes using code snippets is easy. Code snippets can easily be added on any connected child site using the MainWP Code Snippets extension. For example, if you do not have Add to Cart redirect enabled, the Continue Shopping link will redirect the customer back to the product that was added when clicked. In Continue reading the post...

Let’s face it, newsletters are great. They are a wonderful way to provide interesting content to subscribers on your child sites, spread the word on deals, and effectively message users. Email newsletters still work and are well worth taking the time to create and send. Use the server where your child sites are hosted for what it is meant for; Query the site database Render as PHP Generate the content Allow customers to purchase products Allow users to view a Continue reading the post...