wiki/knowledge/website/wordpress-plugin-cleanup.md · 824 words · 2026-04-05
When Asymmetric takes over a site built or partially built by another developer, the plugin stack is often a liability: redundant tools, non-standard form plugins, missing SEO configuration, and unoptimized images. A consistent remediation process reduces instability and brings the site in line with our standards.
The Problem with Inherited Sites
Inherited sites tend to accumulate technical debt in predictable ways:
- Mixed plugin stacks — previous developers install whatever they know; our standards don't apply
- Duplicate tooling — multiple tag manager accounts, competing SEO plugins, redundant caching layers
- Non-standard forms — WP Forms, Ninja Forms, Contact Form 7 instead of Gravity Forms
- Missing SEO fundamentals — no sitemap, no canonical tags, no alt text, broken internal links
- Orphaned content — old pages left live after new ones are created, creating duplicate content and crawl confusion
"It's like you slept with your sister. It's a mess." — Mark Hope, re: Cordwainer's plugin situation
The Cordwainer site is a concrete example: inherited from a previous developer with no alt text on ~800 images, WP Forms throughout, a non-standard SEO plugin, and two separate Google Tag Manager accounts firing simultaneously.
1. Audit the Plugin Stack
- Inventory all active and inactive plugins
- Flag anything that duplicates functionality (two SEO plugins, two form systems, two caching plugins)
- Identify plugins with no clear owner or purpose — remove them
- Check for multiple Tag Manager or Analytics accounts; consolidate to one
Asymmetric's standard is [1]. If the site is running Rank Math, All in One SEO, or another non-standard tool:
- Install the standard plugin
- Migrate settings (title templates, meta descriptions, canonical rules)
- Deactivate and remove the old plugin
- Verify sitemap is generated and submitted to Google Search Console
A missing sitemap is a critical failure: Google will only crawl the homepage and miss all deep content. This was the root cause of Aviary's indexing problems — the site had been live for months with no sitemap, so Google treated it as a single-page site. See [2] for detail.
WP Forms and similar plugins are not our standard. All client sites should use Gravity Forms.
Migration steps:
1. Inventory all forms on the site (check pages, posts, and widget areas)
2. Recreate each form in Gravity Forms, preserving field names and notification logic
3. Replace shortcodes/blocks on each page
4. Test submission and email delivery
5. Deactivate and remove WP Forms
This is a developer task (Eshok handles this at Asymmetric). It should be prioritized early in any site takeover — form failures are client-visible and damage trust.
4. Image Optimization
- Run all images through a compression plugin (Smush or equivalent)
- Audit for missing alt text — bulk alt text tools can handle large libraries (800+ images on Cordwainer were addressed this way)
- Check for oversized images being scaled down in CSS rather than at the source
5. Canonical and Crawl Health
Inherited sites frequently have canonical issues from page migrations where old URLs were left live:
- Run a full site audit (Ahrefs, Screaming Frog, or equivalent)
- Identify pages with no canonical set, self-referencing canonicals pointing to wrong URLs, and orphan pages (no internal links pointing to them)
- Fix or redirect old pages; don't leave them live alongside new versions
- Set up instant indexing to accelerate Google's re-crawl after fixes
6. Final Verification
Before considering the cleanup complete:
- [ ] Single SEO plugin active, sitemap submitted
- [ ] All forms rebuilt in Gravity Forms, WP Forms removed
- [ ] Images compressed, alt text complete
- [ ] No duplicate Tag Manager / Analytics accounts
- [ ] Canonical tags correct on all key pages
- [ ] Orphan pages either linked internally or redirected
- [ ] Site health score reviewed in audit tool
Scope and Framing
Plugin cleanup on an inherited site is not glamorous work, but it is billable and necessary. When scoping:
- Don't underestimate form migration — each form needs to be rebuilt and tested, not just swapped
- Image alt text at scale takes real time; 800 images is a half-day task minimum
- Canonical cleanup can surface cascading errors — fixing one set of issues often reveals another layer underneath (as with Aviary, where fixing the sitemap exposed canonical errors that had been invisible)
If a client's site is too far gone to remediate efficiently, a full rebuild in Elementor on a clean WordPress install may be faster and produce a better result. See [3].