In Part 1 of this step-by-step tutorial series, we explained the basics of how to use WordPress widgets.
In this tutorial we are going to show you how to configure a number of frequently-used widgets in WordPress.
How To Configure Sidebar Widgets
By default, your site comes with a number of preinstalled active widgets, such as widgets that let you display links to your pages, recent posts, newsfeeds, add search features, etc.
(By default, your site comes with several active widgets)
Adding Widgets To Your WordPress Sidebar: Step-By-Step Tutorial
In this step-by-step tutorial series, you will add, configure and reorder s number of WordPress widgets, including:
- Add a clickable Support image linking visitors to your support page.
- Adding a Categories section with a drop down menu.
- Adding a Recent Posts section.
- Adding a list of your site’s Pages.
- Display useful Links on the sidebar.
- Add an RSS Feed section.
- Adding a Tag Cloud.
- Configure how your Archived Posts display on the sidebar.
The Widgets screen is located inside the WP admin area and can be accessed from the admin menu by going to Appearance > Widgets …
(Widgets Menu)
This brings up the Widgets panel into your browser window …
(Widgets Panel)
Let’s begin configuring your sidebar widgets …
Add A Text Widget
Text widgets are incredibly versatile …
(Text widget)
Rich Text Widget
From version 4.8 onward, WordPress has added native rich-text editing capabilities to text widgets …
(Rich Text Widget)
This lets you quickly and easily format text, create lists, add emphasis, and insert links into your sidebar text …
(Format text easily with the new text widget)
A text widget lets you insert just about anything you want into your sidebar navigation area or other widget sections, such as lists of favorite items, maps and directions, scripts and more to your site … simply by typing in text or adding HTML into the content area. You can also give the widget a title. Remember to save your settings …
(Text widgets are really versatile!)
Example: Add A Help Button To Your Sidebar Area Using A Text Widget
For this example, we’ll set up a clickable help button on your sidebar that will take your visitors to a page on your site (or an external site, e.g. a helpdesk) where they can contact you for help and support.
First, you will need to create or source a “help button” graphic image that visitors can click on …
We’ll set up the clickable Help button to display at the top of the sidebar like in the example shown below …
Step 1 – Upload your image.
To display the clickable image on your site, the button image must be uploaded to your server. Upload your button image to your server and note the path to your image location.
For example …
http://www.yourdomain.com/images/supportbutton.jpg
This information will be required in Step 3.
In order for visitors to be taken to the contact page when the support button gets clicked, either create a contact page, or have an existing destination page already set up (e.g. a helpdesk). We will then link the button image to this URL in Step 3 …
Step 2 – Create the destination page.
Create a contact page on your site and note down its URL …
Step 3 – Create your text widget code.
If you’re not a technical-minded person, don’t worry … this sounds a lot more technical than it is. In simple terms, we just need to create the instructions for your clickable button.
Your instructions can be composed in a plain text file and should look something like this …
- Replace “http://www.yourdomain.com/contact-us” in the code above with the URL of your contact page location.
- Replace “http://yourimagelocation.com/img/supportbutton.jpg” in the code above with the URL of your image location.
The screenshot below shows the sections of the above sample code that you need to replace with your actual web addresses …
Replace the above URLs and then copy the above code to your clipboard when finished.
If you need help understanding basic HTML code, see this tutorial:
Next, go back into your Widgets area …
(Widgets Panel)
Step 4 – Add a Text widget.
Add a Text widget to your sidebar in the location where the clickable button should display.
In the Available Widgets area, find a Text widget …
(Text widget)
Drag the Text widget to the Active Widgets section and release it at the very top of the Widget Area …
(Drag and drop your Text widget)
Step 5 – Configure your widget.
Click on the Text widget title bar to configure the widget settings. Paste the code with the URLs to your contact page and graphic button into the text widget content area and click save …
Add a title section to your widget if you want (e.g. “Need Help?”, “Support”, etc.) and paste the code with the correct destination links into the text area, then click Save when done …
Note: Remember to test your contact page and button image URLs before pasting scripts into your Text Widget, or the button won’t work.
*** If using WordPress version pre-4.8 ***
If you’re adding text with no formatting tags, you may want to tick the Automatically add paragraphs box to wrap each block of text in paragraphs (note: not required if you paste in formatted HTML content like we’re doing in this tutorial).
Here is some text with Automatically add paragraphs box unchecked …
(Automatically add paragraphs option not ticked)
Here is some text with Automatically add paragraphs box ticked …
(Automatically add paragraphs box checked)
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Step 6 – Refresh the browser.
Once you have added the text widget and formatted content, visit your site and refresh the web browser. If you have entered all of the links correctly, then the support button should display in the sidebar menu …
(Clickable button widget on blog sidebar)
The screenshot above shows a clickable button in the sidebar of a brand new WordPress site.
Step 7 – Test your button.
The last step is to ensure that your links work. Test the button to make sure that visitors will go to your help page when they click on the graphic image. If you are taken directly to your support page, then the text widget has been set up correctly …
(Test the text widget)
Text Widgets – Useful Tips:
If you want a new window to open up when visitors go to the contact page (so they don’t leave the page they’re on), then change the code from this:
To this (i.e. include the section containing target=”_blank” in the text widget code):
When choosing images for your sidebar navigation menu, make sure that the width of your image does not exceed the width of the sidebar column, especially if you are using a non-responsive WordPress theme. Note that some themes can display different column widths depending on their templates and layout. Some sidebars may be wider or narrower. If the sidebar of your theme is narrower than the width of your graphic images, then you may have to either adjust the graphic size, or the width of your sidebar column to make graphics display correctly on your sidebar section.
(Adjust column width or reduce image size)
Additional Tips:
- If you don’t want your image to be centered inside your sidebar, delete the <center> and </center> tags from the beginning and end of the line of code. The image will then be left-aligned.
- Link the contact button to any URL you want (e.g. to an external site, helpdesk, FAQ page, etc.) and change this anytime by replacing the content inside your text widget.
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This is the end of section 2 of this tutorial.
Click here to view the rest of this tutorial:
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"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group