Description
RelayCard automatically injects image-dominant related post cards inside your content — heading-aware, config-driven, and designed to look like premium editorial ad units.
RelayCard places cards inside your content at heading boundaries — after enough context has been built, before the next section begins. Cards only fire when a post has a featured image, keeping quality consistent.
Features:
- Image-dominant by design — the image stops the scroll, the title closes the click
- Heading-aware injection — counts H2/H3/H4s and scales card placement automatically. Short posts get 1 card, long posts get 2. Nothing gets forced.
- 5 card styles — Split, Overlay, Cinematic, Minimal, Story
- 3 font categories — Sans-serif, Monospace, Script
- 3 image ratio presets — 50/50, 60/40, 70/30
- AI hook title generation — optional BYOK (Gemini, ChatGPT, Claude). Rewrites post titles into punchy hook titles automatically.
- Card title custom field — override the title per post with your own hook
- SEO plugin aware — detects RankMath, Yoast, AIOSEO titles automatically
- Live admin preview — see your card render in real time before saving
- Zero setup friction — CSS auto-enqueues on activation, no shortcodes needed
- Featured images required — cards only fire when a post has a featured image, keeping quality high
Card Title Priority Stack:
1. card_title custom field (manual override)
2. SEO plugin title (RankMath Yoast AIOSEO)
3. AI generated hook title (optional, BYOK)
4. Post title (always available fallback)
Card Styles:
* Split — image left, text right. Classic editorial card.
* Overlay — full bleed image with gradient overlay and title on top. High visual impact.
* Cinematic — wide image, centered title overlay. Maximum eye candy.
* Minimal — no image, styled text card with accent border. Clean and fast.
* Story — image top, text below. Mobile-first vertical layout.
AI Hook Title Generation (optional):
Bring your own API key from any of these providers:
* Gemini (Google AI Studio — free tier available)
* ChatGPT (OpenAI)
* Claude (Anthropic)
No key required. Cards work without AI. AI just makes the titles punchier.
External Services
This plugin optionally connects to third-party AI providers to generate suggested card titles. This feature is only activated when you enter an API key in the plugin settings and manually trigger title generation. No data is sent automatically.
Anthropic (Claude)
Used for AI title generation when an Anthropic API key is provided.
Data sent: post title, post excerpt.
* Service: https://www.anthropic.com
* Terms of Service: https://www.anthropic.com/legal/consumer-terms
* Privacy Policy: https://www.anthropic.com/legal/privacy
OpenAI (ChatGPT)
Used for AI title generation when an OpenAI API key is provided.
Data sent: post title, post excerpt.
* Service: https://openai.com
* Terms of Service: https://openai.com/policies/terms-of-use
* Privacy Policy: https://openai.com/policies/privacy-policy
Google Gemini
Used for AI title generation when a Google Gemini API key is provided.
Data sent: post title, post excerpt.
* Service: https://ai.google.dev
* Terms of Service: https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/terms
* Privacy Policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy
Installation
- Upload the
relaycardfolder to/wp-content/plugins/ - Activate the plugin through the Plugins screen in WordPress
- Go to Settings RelayCard to configure your card style, colors, and optional AI title generation
- Cards will automatically appear in single posts with 4 or more headings and featured images
FAQ
-
Does RelayCard work without AI?
-
Yes. AI hook title generation is completely optional. Cards fire on all qualifying posts using the post title (or SEO title if a plugin is detected) as the card title.
-
What counts as a qualifying post?
-
A post must have at least 4 headings (H2, H3, or H4) and a featured image for cards to fire. Posts with fewer headings or no featured image are skipped.
-
How many cards appear per post?
-
Posts with 4-5 headings get 1 card. Posts with 6 or more headings get 2 cards. The plugin scales automatically — nothing is hardcoded.
-
Where exactly do the cards inject?
-
Cards inject before trigger headings — not after them. This means the card acts as a visual break between sections, not a disruption right after a heading. Mid-content, between sections, exactly where a reader pauses.
-
Can I set a custom title per card?
-
Yes. Add a custom field named
card_titleto any post. That value takes priority over everything else including AI generation. -
Which SEO plugins does RelayCard detect?
-
RankMath, Yoast SEO, and All in One SEO (AIOSEO) — checked in that order.
-
Will RelayCard slow down my site?
-
No. The related posts query uses
no_found_rowsandignore_sticky_postsfor performance. CSS is only enqueued on single post pages. AI title generation uses a short 8-second timeout and fails gracefully with no impact on page load. -
Does RelayCard add nofollow to links?
-
Cards link to your own posts — these are internal links and do not need nofollow. The attribution link to engineeredai.net is a standard dofollow link.
-
Can I remove the attribution?
-
The attribution (
// built with RelayCard — engineeredai.net) is present on the free version and cannot be removed. It is minimal, monospace, and low-opacity — most readers won’t notice it. A premium version with attribution removal may be available in the future.
Reviews
There are no reviews for this plugin.
Contributors & Developers
“RelayCard — Inline Related Post Cards” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.
Contributors
Translate “RelayCard — Inline Related Post Cards” into your language.
Interested in development?
Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.
Changelog
1.0.0
- Initial release
- 5 card styles: Split, Overlay, Cinematic, Minimal, Story
- Heading-aware automatic injection (H2/H3/H4)
- Dynamic card count: 1 card for 4-5 headings, 2 cards for 6+
- Card title priority stack: custom field SEO plugin AI post title
- AI hook title generation: Gemini, ChatGPT, Claude (BYOK)
- 3 font categories: Sans-serif, Monospace, Script
- 3 image ratio presets: 50/50, 60/40, 70/30
- Accent color picker
- Live admin preview panel
- CSS auto-enqueued on single posts only
- SEO plugin detection: RankMath, Yoast, AIOSEO
- Attribution: // built with RelayCard — engineeredai.net
1.0.1
- Updated enqueue styles