WordPress

Overview

The UniSignIn plugin connects a WordPress site to your UniSignIn account. It:

  • adds the UniSignIn tag to every page, so your experiences, such as access walls and sign-in buttons, show on the site;
  • keeps protected posts on your site until a reader has access, with Protected Content;
  • adds a Live Blog to the posts you choose;
  • shows UniSignIn Comments under your posts;
  • recommends more articles to read after each post;
  • lets editors send a newsletter from WordPress, with a UniSignIn email template;
  • logs readers who log in to WordPress into UniSignIn, and lets WordPress be your login page;
  • suggests titles and tags in the post editor, from Transfon Studio.

Install and activate the plugin, then open UniSignIn in the WordPress admin menu. The page has three tabs:

  • Home: turn on live blogs, comments, recommended articles, newsletters and AI tools, and open UniSignIn features such as access walls, newsletters, content lists and segments.
  • Settings: connect your site and enter keys, once.
  • Support: documentation, email support and answers to common questions.

Start with Connection on the Settings tab.

Connection

On the Settings tab:

SettingWhere to find it
LicenceYour project's licence, in its tag code.
Tag domainYour UniSignIn subdomain, or secure.signinservice.com.
API secret keyConnect > API Keys, see API Keys. Needed for newsletters and AI titles and tags.

Once the licence and tag domain are saved, the tag loads on every page. You don't need to add it to your theme.

Protected posts

Protected posts show everyone the first paragraphs, and at most half of a short post. The rest stays on your site and is only sent to readers who have access, through Protected Content. It isn't in the page, your feeds or the WordPress REST API.

  1. Create an Access Wall, for example a sign-up wall or a paywall, with Access set to Hard and Withhold the text on the server set to Yes.
  2. Show it on every protected post with an Orchestration whose condition is Meta property unisignin:protected equals yes. The plugin adds this to every protected post.
  3. In UniSignIn, go to Connect > Protected Content, and enter the address shown under Protected Content secret on the plugin's Settings tab.
  4. Copy the secret from Connect > Protected Content into Protected Content secret on the plugin's Settings tab, and set Paragraphs shown to how many paragraphs everyone can read. In posts written with the block editor, each block counts, such as an image or a heading.
  5. When editing a post or page, tick Protected in the UniSignIn box.

Readers see the wall where the text is cut, and the rest of the post once they have access. WordPress users who can edit a post always see it in full.

Posts marked Membership Only in version 1 of the plugin are protected in the same way.

Live blogs

Turn any post into a Live Blog for breaking news, matches and events.

  1. On the plugin's Home tab, turn on Live blogs.
  2. When editing the post, tick Live blog in the UniSignIn box, and choose a Layout: List or Cards.
  3. Update the post. The live feed shows after the post's text. To show it elsewhere in the post, put [unisignin_liveblog] there, with a Shortcode block in the block editor.
  4. Give each person who will post the Editor role in UniSignIn: go to Data Management > User Data, open their profile, click the edit icon and set Roles to Editor for the project, then save.
  5. The editor opens the post on your site, signed in to UniSignIn, and writes posts in the editor panel above the feed.

With WordPress logins turned on, editors who are logged in to WordPress are already signed in to UniSignIn on the post.

To show ads between live blog posts, set First ad after post and Then an ad every under Live blogs on the plugin's Settings tab, for example 3 and 5. Leave them empty for no ads. See Ads in Live Blog, Comments and Stories.

On a protected post, the live feed is visible to every reader; only the post's text is protected.

Comments

UniSignIn comments replace WordPress comments on your posts. Readers comment with their UniSignIn account, and you moderate in UniSignIn, see Comments. Keep Allow comments on for the post in WordPress: many themes only show their comments area, where UniSignIn comments and recommended articles go, when comments are allowed.

  1. On the plugin's Home tab, turn on Comments. Comments show under every post, where your theme shows its comments.
  2. To turn them off for one post, untick Comments in the post's UniSignIn box.

Where UniSignIn comments show, WordPress's own comment form and comments are hidden, so readers see one comment section. Posts with UniSignIn comments turned off keep their WordPress comments.

The comments work as they are. To set your own title, community guidelines or layout, create a Comment experience in UniSignIn and enter its ID as Comment experience ID on the plugin's Settings tab.

Recommended articles

Show a compact list of articles picked for each reader just above the comments, so they keep reading.

  1. Connect Transfon Studio for the project in UniSignIn.
  2. On the plugin's Home tab, turn on Recommended articles.

To show the list inside a post or page instead, put [unisignin_recommendations] where you want it, with a Shortcode block in the block editor. That post then shows it only there.

On a protected post, keep [unisignin_liveblog] and [unisignin_recommendations] in the paragraphs everyone can read.

Transfon Studio picks up each post when readers view it on your site's domain. It needs the post's title, image and published date: the plugin adds these tags when no SEO plugin such as Yoast does. Give each post a featured image, or set a site icon in WordPress, so every post has an image.

The list works as it is. To set its title, layout or number of articles, create a Recommendation experience in UniSignIn and enter its ID as Recommendation experience ID on the plugin's Settings tab.

Newsletters

Editors can send a newsletter from WordPress, now or at a set time, without opening UniSignIn. They pick a UniSignIn email template, fill in the parts it lets them change, such as the intro, update its articles, choose who gets it and send themselves a test first.

Set up

  1. In UniSignIn, create a Marketing email template, see Email Templates. On each block editors should fill in, such as the intro text or the article list, tick Editable when sending in the block's settings and give it a Label. See Editable when sending.
  2. Enter the API secret key on the plugin's Settings tab, see Connection.
  3. On the plugin's Home tab, turn on Newsletter.
  4. Optionally, under Newsletter on the Settings tab, choose a Default email template and a Default audience. The Newsletter page starts with them selected.

Only marketing templates with at least one block marked Editable when sending are offered in WordPress. The page is available to users who can edit other people's posts, such as Editors and Administrators.

Send a newsletter

  1. Go to Posts > Newsletter.
  2. Choose the Email template and enter the Subject.
  3. Fill in the template's editable fields. Leave a blank line between paragraphs; the template does the formatting. A field left empty keeps the template's own text, unless the template marks it Required.
  4. For an editable article list, update its items: search for articles to add, add a custom item with a title and an https:// link, pin an item at its position, move items up or down or remove them, then click Save list. Saving changes the content list in UniSignIn, so every email that uses it gets the same articles.
  5. Under Audience and time, choose Send to: a segment, or All subscribers. Choose Send now, or Schedule and a date and time. Times are in the site's timezone.
  6. Check the Preview on Desktop and Mobile, or click Open full size. Click Send test to me to receive it at your WordPress email address.
  7. Click Review and send, check the summary, then click Send.

The newsletter is sent as a UniSignIn campaign named after the subject and the editor, such as Tennis News Today (Jane via WordPress). Opens, clicks and unsubscribes show in Email Analytics.

Sent from WordPress

Sent from WordPress, under the form, lists the newsletters sent from the site, with when they were sent and their status. A scheduled newsletter can be cancelled there until it starts sending.

Troubleshooting

  • No templates have parts editable when sending: no marketing template for this project has a block marked Editable when sending. Mark one in UniSignIn and save the template.
  • A template you just saved doesn't appear: if the site is behind a CDN such as CloudFront or Cloudflare, make sure it doesn't cache /wp-json/ or /wp-admin/. A cached response can show an old template list for as long as the CDN keeps it.
  • UniSignIn could not do that: check the Licence, Tag domain and API secret key on the Settings tab. The API key must belong to the same organization as the licence.

WordPress logins

If your readers log in to WordPress, for example through a membership plugin, the plugin can log them into UniSignIn too. Their profile, segments and experiences then follow their WordPress account.

  1. In UniSignIn, create an SSO key pair in Connect > SSO Token.
  2. On the plugin's Settings tab, turn on Log WordPress users into UniSignIn and enter the SSO public key and SSO private key.

Readers are logged into UniSignIn on the next page they open, and logged out of it when they log out of WordPress. Their email, first name, last name and registration date are sent to UniSignIn.

Use WordPress as your login page

To send the login and sign-up buttons of your experiences to WordPress instead of the UniSignIn popup:

  1. Copy the address the plugin shows under the SSO keys, for example https://www.unisignin.com/?unis_login=1.
  2. In UniSignIn, go to Features > Account Center > Authentication, and under Login set Log in with to Your own login page, and enter that address as Login page URL. This needs a Super Administrator.

A reader who clicks Log in on an access wall goes to the WordPress login, and comes back to the article logged in. See Login options.

AI titles and tags

With Transfon Studio connected in UniSignIn, the plugin can suggest titles and tags while you write.

  1. In UniSignIn, connect Transfon Studio for the project and turn on Enable AI Title and Enable AI Tag, see Transfon Studio.
  2. Enter the API secret key on the plugin's Settings tab, and turn on AI titles and AI tags on its Home tab.

The buttons are in the UniSignIn AI box of the post editor, in both the classic and the block editor:

  • Suggest titles lists titles for the post. Click one to use it.
  • Add tags adds suggested tags to the post.

Both use the post's title and text, so write a title first.

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