How To Protect Download Links On Your WordPress Site

If you are selling any digital products or services on your WordPress website, then you need to protect your download links from ordinary visitors. And if you are not doing anything like that, you still might want to protect your download links anyway.

Why? Glad you asked. Think about what you would do if you have published an e-book and want to sell it through your website. Or you may want to build up your e-mail subscriber list and as a benefit for the subscribers you want to provide a free virtual gift for them.

You will need to protect the download links in both cases. In this article, I will discuss two simple, easy methods of protecting download links of your WordPress-powered website.

I am going to discuss two WordPress plugins for protecting your download links. They are:

1. WordPress Download Manager (http://wordpress.org/plugins/download-manager/)
2. Easy Digital Downloads (http://wordpress.org/plugins/easy-digital-downloads/)

WordPress Download Manager

First of all, download and install WordPress Download Manager in your website. Once you have activated the plugin, you will notice a new menu titled ‘File Manager’ on your dashboard. To add a new file, go to File Manager > Add New File.

On the following page, you will find various settings for the new product. If you want to protect your download link, you have to set a password in the ‘Password’ section.

After providing the password and other necessary information, click the ‘Create Package’ button. Once you have clicked the button, your download package will be saved and ready for using wherever you need. A simple way would be to use it through the post editor.

Go to Posts > Add New. You will find a new icon along with the regular formatting options in the editor. Click on that button to open the ‘Download Controller.’ You can embed your download package to the post by using the controller.

Choose the options you need and once you are done, click the ‘Insert into post’ button. This will automatically paste the shortcode of the package in the post editor. Take care of your other formatting necessities and hit ‘Publish.’

That is it. You have successfully protected your download link with WordPress Download Manager.

Easy Digital Downloads

To protect your download links with Easy Digital Downloads, install and activate the plugin on your WordPress site. Go to your dashboard. You will notice a new menu item titled ‘Downloads’ in the menu. Go to Downloads > Add New to add a new download.

Provide the title and description of your product. Add tags, categories and a featured image according to your requirements. Set the download price in the ‘Download Prices’ section.

Next, we have to add the file(s). To do that, go to the ‘Download Files’ section. Click ‘Upload a file’ and you will have the regular insert media interface. Select your file and insert it into the post. You can also provide URLs to files hosted on other websites.

Once you have made the necessary changes, click ‘Publish’.

If you have followed my instructions, you have successfully created a protected downloadable product with Easy Digital Downloads. However, you will need to set up the payment method to complete the process.

Discussing the payment details are out of the scope of this article. But don’t let that despair you. Easy Digital Downloads has detailed documentation (http://easydigitaldownloads.com/documentation/) along with lots of video tutorials. If you follow them closely, you will be able to set up your online shop in no time.

So, that was two examples of simple but secure ways of protecting download links on your WordPress site. Let me know if you have any questions about any of them. I will be happy to guide you.