Social media are already an integral part of the marketing world. We can even say that they are an integral element of every brand strategy. If you don’t have any social media channels for your company or blog yet, you should think about different plugins, which will help you to share content. Remember however that it’s not good to create all possible social media accounts and just to have them. If you already have a social media account – use it to communicate with your potential customers, otherwise it doesn’t make any sense. Below I present you some plugins, which will help you to promote your blog in social media. And if you haven’t read a post about essential WordPress plugins I encourage you to read it. Don’t also install too many plugins, because it can slow down your site.

Free Social Media plugins

1.Simple Share Buttons Adder

Simple and easy-to-use plugin, which enables you to add basic share buttons to your posts or pages. The plugin is lightweight and doesn’t overload the site, so it’s surely one of  its main advantages.

2. WP Social Sharing

Another very easy-to-use plugin, which supports 6 social media networks (Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Xing). You can add here share buttons to posts, pages, media or custom post types. Additionally it’s responsive. What’s more you can set the text on buttons individually.

3. Custom Share Buttons with Floating Sidebar

Custom Share Buttons gives you a lot of possibilities. You can add buttons at the top or at the bottom of the text as well as on the right or on the left side of your blog. However the plugin has one disadvantage. The buttons don’t look well on mobile devices – you can turn it off in free version or buy paid version.

4. Shareaholic

It’s probably one of the most popular plugins for social media. It also gives you a lot of possibilities. The share buttons can be set: at the top of the site, at the bottom, on pages, in posts, on category pages and on main page. It’s also important that if we have an option “Recommended posts” in a free version, the ads will be displayed. If you don’t want it you can turn this option off. Paid version doesn’t contain ads and gives you more possibilities – additional statistics, support and history of shared posts.

5. AddToAny Share Buttons

It’s even more popular than the previous plugin. Its most important function is universal share button, which enables you to share content in almost every social media network, unless you limit it in the settings. Additionally you can send the content to e-mail. You also have here different styles and sizes and you can set share button in different locations. You can also integrate this plugin with Google Analytics.

6. Swifty Bar, sticky bar by WPGens

If you want to surprise your visitors with something different, this is an ideal option. Swifty Bar is an additional button, which appears at the bottom of the side. The button supports Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and Pinterest – you can freely configure them. Mobile version of the plugin is responsive, so it looks quite good. Additionally you can display here the author of the post and read progress bar. It’s an interesting solution and it’s worth checking 😉 .

7. AddThis

Another plugin, which can be integrated with many social media services. We can share here our content to over 200 of the most popular social media networks and bookmarking sites. It’s very interesting option and when we want to have the extended version of the plugin we can buy Pro version.  

8. OnePress Social Locker

If you create valuable content, you can use this plugin to lock this content. The visitor must share the post on Twitter, Facebook or Google+ in order to unlock your content. What’s more you can choose the location where information about locked content will be displayed – all you have to do is to use tags in a proper location. Additionally we have an access to statistics. You can also get paid version with more options.

9. Social Locker & Content Locker – Locker Cat

It’s very similar to the previous plugin, but it supports only Twitter and Facebook.

10. Social Media Flying Icons 

Thanks to that plugin you can add floating icons to your blog. They will follow user, when he will be scrolling the page. The plugin offers you different styles and enables you to choose the location where your icons will appear. The plugin is quite intuitive , however it can slow down your site in some cases.

11. Kiwi Social Share

The share buttons of this plugin look great. We can choose where to set them – before content, at the bottom of the content or both: at the top and at the bottom. The plugin supports Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Reddit, Pinterest, Google+ and e-mail. It’s very lightweight and what’s the most important it loads quickly on the page. I highly recommend it!

12. Microblog Poster – Auto Publish on Social Media

This plugin can support your blog and automatise (a little) sharing of your posts in other services. The plugin will automatically share your post on: Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Plurk, Delicious, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Blogger, Instapaper, VK, Xing, Pinterest, Flickr, WordPress blog.

Paid Social Media plugins

I’ve decided to divide these plugins into free and paid ones, because these paid plugins are more extended and it’s sometimes worth taking them into consideration.

13. Easy Social Share Buttons

Price: 19$

This plugin is a very good solution – except from share buttons, we can subscribe our visitors to e-mail list here. There are many visual versions of the plugin, so you will easily adjust it to the appearance of your blog.

The most important functionalities:

• Support of over 45 social networks (including WhatsApp, Telegram, Viber itd)
• Over 40 different templates
• Different kind of counters
• Additional pop-up window when you do something on your site
• The possibility of A/B testing
• The built-in option of e-mail subscription (it supports for example MailChimp)
• Optimized for mobile devices
• Statistics and optimization
• Single payment (update and 6-month support included)

14. Social Warfare

Price: 29$/135$/250$ per year depending on the plan

It’s a very user-friendly plugin. Adding beautiful share buttons is easy. The plugin provides you with many additional options, thanks to what you can encourage your visitors to take different actions and increase your social shares and traffic.

The most important functionalities:

• Support of popular social networks
• Many themes
• Advanced Pinterest service – the possibility of adding seperate pictures and “pin it” descriptions
• Fully mobile and responsive
• Tracking of shares in social media using UTM tracking code
• Optimized- the plugin works and loads quickly
• Additional fields with content to share it on Twitter
• The possibility of  locking the content – access to the content is possible only after sharing the post
• 45-day trial – if the plugin doesn’t fulfill your expectations, you can get a refund

15. Monarch

Price: 89$ per year or 249$ for unlimited access

It’s a very easy-to-use plugin, which has some additional, nice options.

The most important functionalities:

• Support of popular social networks
• Many options of displaying buttons (above, below, in both locations, on the right, on the left or following the user)
• The possibility of choosing limit number – when the limit is reached the number of shares is displayed
• Easy interface
• Buttons at the graphic materials
• The possibility of setting pop-up or additional pop-up sidebar (with different options – after some time passed, at the end of the post, after adding a comment, after scrolling the page, after payment or when you’re not active )
• Additional statistics

Summary

As you can see, both: free and paid plugins have advantages and disadvantages, everything depends on your needs. I recommend you to test some plugins and choose the best solution for your blog. If you know any other useful plugins, write them in the comments.