In Part 1 of this tutorial series, we explained how to use WordPress widgets and in Part Two, we explained how to configure text widgets.
In this section you will configure other frequently-used blog widgets.
Add Post Categories To Your Blog Sidebar
Now that you have set up a text widget containing a clickable support button, let’s configure a widget to display your Categories.
By default, the Categories widget displays on your sidebar. All you have to do, therefore, is place this widget wherever you want your categories to display by clicking and dragging it in your sidebar area …
(Post Categories widget)
Before adding a Categories widget to the sidebar, you should first configure your Categoriessection inside your dashboard …
(WordPress Categories)
Note: We are currently putting together tutorials on how to use WordPress post categories.
Let’s configure the Categories widget settings as shown below:
- In Title: type something that your visitors will understand, for example, “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- If you plan to have several categories, check Display as dropdown (this significantly reduces the size of your content by displaying all categories inside a drop-down menu). Leave the box unticked if you want a list of all categories to display on your sidebar menu. (2)
- You can leave the other options unticked, or see the additional notes on configuring the Categories widget below.
- Click Save when done …
(Configuring a Categories widget)
Click Visit Site or refresh the page to see how your sidebar categories will look to your blog readers …
(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 box, otherwise leave this section as is.
- To display the number of posts published in each category, enable the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add Recent Posts
The Recent Posts widget normally displays on your sidebar navigation section by default. All you need to do is configure the widget.
Click on the Recent Posts title bar to display the configuration settings …
(Recent Posts widget)
There is really very little to set up here. You can add a widget 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 enter the number of posts to show and click Save …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget settings)
The number of posts you’ve specified will display on the sidebar …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget displayed on sidebar section)
We provide a tutorial on how to create posts in WordPress here: How To Create A New WordPress Post
Add Links To Your Site’s Main Pages
Next, let’s add a widget to your sidebar to display the pages you select.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(WordPress Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your sidebar widget area …
(Adding a Pages widget to the sidebar)
The Pages widget lets you configure the following options:
- Title: Add a title to display above your links (e.g. “Site Information“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Hide selected pages on your sidebar navigation section (3) …
(Pages Widget settings)
By default, pages will be listed by title in alphabetical order. If you want to display pages using one of the other options, then choose a different method in the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – sorting options)
To prevent pages from showing in your widget, enter their Page Ids separated by commas into the Exclude field of the Pages widget …
(Pages Widget settings – exclude pages)
We provide a tutorial on how to find a post or page ID in WordPress here: How To Locate The WordPress Post Or Page ID
Click the Save button when done and click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize the widget.
Links to the site’s pages will now display on your sidebar menu …
(WordPress Pages Widget on blog sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to your sidebar area. This is useful if you need to display different groups of pages on the sidebar area (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Display Links On Your Blog Sidebar
Now, we’ll add a widget to display external links on your sidebar.
Before adding a Links widget to your sidebar area, we recommend setting up the Links feature inside your WP dashboard first …
(WordPress Links screen)
Note: We plan to create separate tutorials on configuring and using Links.
To add the widget, find a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Links Widget)
Drag it to your active area …
(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 …
(Links Widget Settings)
You can add as many separate ‘Link Widgets’ to your sidebar navigation section 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 …
(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 …
( Links widget: ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu)
When you have finished configuring the Links Widget, click the Save button …
(External links added to WordPress sidebar)
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 link lists to your sidebar.
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This is the end of part 3 of this series of tutorials.
To continue reading, click here:
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