In Part 1 of this tutorial series, we explained how to use WordPress widgets and in Part Two, we explained how to configure a text widget.
In this tutorial you will learn how to configure other commonly-used sidebar widgets.
How To Add Post Categories
Now that you have configure a text widget containing a support button, let’s configure Categories.
The Categories widget displays on your sidebar area by default. All you have to do, therefore, is place this widget wherever you want your post categories to display by clicking and dragging it in the sidebar area …
(Categories widget)
Before adding a Categories widget to your sidebar, you should first configure your categories inside the dashboard …
(Post Categories)
Note: How to configure WordPress categories will be explained in other tutorials.
Configure your Categories widget settings as described below:
- In Title: type something that will make sense to visitors, for example, “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- Check Display as dropdown if you plan to use many categories (this significantly reduces the length of your content by displaying all categories inside a drop-down menu). Leave the box unchecked if you want a list of all categories to display on your sidebar section. (2)
- You can leave the default settings for the remaining options, or see the additional notes on configuring the Categories widget below.
- Click Save to update your settings …
(Configuring a WordPress Categories widget)
Click Visit Site or reload your page to see how your Categories widget will look to site visitors …
(WordPress Categories widget added to sidebar)
Tips:
- Change the default Uncategorized post category to something more meaningful.
- If you use nested categories on your site, you may want to check the Show hierarchy option, otherwise leave this box unticked.
- To display the number of posts published in each category on your site, tick the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add A Recent Posts Widget
The Recent Posts widget typically appears on your sidebar by default. All you need to do is configure your widget.
Click on the Recent Posts title bar to configure its settings …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget)
There is really not much to set up here. You can add a title, select the number of posts to display and display post dates. If you’re happy with the default Number of posts to show setting, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise change the number of posts and click Save …
(Recent Posts widget settings)
The most recent number of posts you have specified will be listed on the sidebar area …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget added to sidebar)
How to create WordPress Posts is covered here: How To Create A New WP Post
Add A Pages Widget
Next, we’ll add a widget to your sidebar navigation menu for listing pages.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your widget area …
(Inserting a Pages widget into your sidebar navigation area)
The Pages widget allows you to configure the following settings:
- Title: Add a title to display above your links (e.g. “Useful Information“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Use this setting to hide pages on the sidebar (3) …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings)
By default, pages will be listed by title in alphabetical order. If you want to display pages using another option, then select a different method from the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(Pages Widget settings – sort options)
To exclude certain pages from showing on your widget, type in the Page Ids for the pages you want to exclude separated by commas into the Exclude field of the Pages widget …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – exclude pages)
We provide a step-by-step tutorial on how to find a WordPress page ID here: How To Locate The Unique ID Of Any WordPress Post Or Page
Click the Save button when done and then click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize your widget.
Links to your blog’s main pages will now show on the sidebar navigation area …
(WordPress Pages Widget on blog sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to your sidebar. This is useful if you would like to display separate page groups on your sidebar (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Display Links On The WordPress Blog Sidebar
Next, we’ll add a widget to your sidebar navigation section for displaying external links (e.g. to useful resources, affiliate links, etc).
Before adding a Links widget to the sidebar navigation area, we recommend configuring your Links feature first …
(WordPress Links screen)
Note: We plan to provide a tutorial about how to set up and use the Links feature in WordPress.
To add the widget, select a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(WordPress Links Widget)
Drag it to your sidebar …
(Making Links Widget active)
The widget offers a number of configurable options, including the ability to specify what information to show about your links and how many links you want to display on your sidebar navigation section …
(Links Widget Settings)
You can add as many separate ‘Link Widgets’ to your sidebar menu as you want. As you will see in a moment, this lets you create and display specific lists of links on your site …
(Add Multiple WordPress Links Widgets To Your Sidebar)
You can sort links by Link title, Link rating, Link ID, or display links in Random order …
(WordPress Links widget: ‘Sort by:’ drop-down menu)
You can also create and display a list of items for a specific category, by selecting a link category from the ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu …
( WordPress Links widget: ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu)
When you have finished configuring the Links Widget, click the Save button. Your widget will display immediately on the sidebar …
(External links added to sidebar navigation section)
As the above example shows, you can display specific external links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple lists of links to your sidebar menu.
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This is the end of section 3 of this series of tutorials.
To keep reading, click here:
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