Summary
RocketPost is a WordPress plugin and companion marketing site that I designed and built end-to-end. The plugin automates a full publishing workflow—discovering relevant news via RSS, rewriting for clarity and SEO, enriching links and media, then publishing on a recurring schedule. The site at RocketPost.pro promotes the product, handles licensing and downloads, and provides docs/FAQs.
Objectives
- Keep niche sites consistently updated without manual effort.
- Produce clean, credible, SEO-ready posts (not “spun” content).
- Give publishers granular control over sources, cadence, and output.
- Package the tool for commercial use with licensing, updates, and support.
Deliverables
- RocketPost WordPress Plugin (distributed as a ZIP, e.g., RocketPost-v2.5.x.zip)
- RocketPost.pro Website with landing pages, pricing, docs, and customer account area (license + downloads).
Advanced Plugin Features
1) Multi-Query News Sourcing
- Track multiple topics/keywords and RSS sources per site/category.
- De-duplicate by URL, title similarity, and content hash.
- Optional source allow/deny lists.
2) Smart Rewriting & SEO
- Rewrite for readability and consistency; auto-generate headings, summaries, and meta.
- Link Enrichment Toggle: choose Google Knowledge Graph, Bing, or Off to add authoritative internal/external links.
- Title sanitation to remove source suffixes (e.g., “— Travel Weekly”) and other brand artifacts; H1 guardrails.
- Automatic schema (JSON-LD Article), canonical URLs, and alt attributes.
3) Image Pipeline
- Pull featured images from RSS when present.
- Keyword-based Pexels fallback using the post headline as seed terms.
- Per-category default images with attribution and alt text.
- Optional WebP generation and size constraints to protect Core Web Vitals.
4) Workflow & Scheduling
- Recurring cadence in minutes (e.g., every 30 minutes).
- Per schedule action: Save as Draft or Publish Immediately.
- “Legacy controls” preserved for backward-compatible behavior.
- Robust logging (fetch, rewrite, publish) + manual re-run tools.
5) Admin UX
- Clean settings pages aligned with WordPress Admin patterns.
- Iconography and sectioned tabs (Sources, Rewriting, Images, Scheduling, Logs, Advanced).
- Inline help, sensible defaults, and safe-guarded actions (nonces + capability checks).
6) Licensing & Distribution
- Per-user activation code with license validation in the admin.
- Downloadable ZIP and in-plugin update checks.
- Customer account area on RocketPost.pro for license keys, downloads, and future updates (with email delivery of keys).
7) Performance & Reliability
- Batched network calls with timeouts and rate limiting.
- Transient caching of feeds and media lookups.
- Graceful error handling and retries to avoid missed cadences.
8) Security & Compliance
- Sanitization/escaping for all inputs/outputs.
- Capability checks on all admin actions; nonces on forms.
- Attribution handling for third-party images; opt-outs for specific sources.
Website (RocketPost.pro)
- Landing & Product Pages: clear value prop, feature highlights, image examples, and FAQs.
- Pricing & Checkout: concise plan comparison; immediate license delivery via email (with “check your junk” guidance).
- Docs/Support: quick-start, configuration guides (sources, rewriting, images, scheduling), and troubleshooting.
- Account Portal: access to license keys, downloadable ZIPs, and update history.
Results
- Reliable, hands-off publishing cadence across multiple sites.
- Higher baseline post quality (structure, links, media, and meta) with minimal oversight.
- Faster onboarding due to a clean admin UX and sensible defaults.
Maintenance & Roadmap
- Maintenance: ongoing compatibility with WP core/PHP; performance tuning; log clarity.
- Planned: per-site A/B settings, deeper analytics on post performance, additional media providers, and expanded schema types.