In Part 1 of this tutorial series, we cover the basics of how to use WordPress widgets.
In this tutorial you are going to begin configuring various sidebar widgets in WordPress.
How To Configure Commonly-Used WordPress Blog Sidebar Widgets
By default, your site comes with a number of built-in widgets, such as widgets that let you display links to your site’s pages, recent posts, RSS feed content, add tag clouds, etc.
(In a default WordPress installation, your site comes with several preinstalled widgets)
How To Configure Widgets On Your Blog Sidebar Navigation Menu: Tutorial
In this tutorial series, we are going to add, configure and reorder s number of widgets, including:
- Add a clickable Contact Us graphic linking to your contact page.
- Adding a Categories section with a drop down menu.
- Add a Recent Posts section.
- Add a list of your site’s most important Pages.
- Display useful Links on your sidebar navigation menu.
- Displaying newsfeeds using an RSS Feed section.
- Adding a Tag Cloud.
- Configure how Archived Posts display on the sidebar section.
The Widgets area is located inside the administration area by going to Appearance > Widgets …
(WordPress Widgets Menu)
This loads the Widgets panel in your web browser …
(Widgets Panel)
Let’s begin configuring some widgets …
Adding Text Widgets
Text widgets are quite useful …
(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 can be used to add events, social media buttons, scripts and more to your site … just by typing in text or inserting HTML into the widget content area. You can also add an optional title in the Title field. Remember to save your settings …
(Text widgets are really useful!)
Example: Add A Help Button To Your Sidebar Area Using A Text Widget
For this example, we’ll set up a clickable contact button on the sidebar navigation menu that takes 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, create or source a graphic image that you will want your your visitors to click on …
We’ll set up a clickable button to display at the top of the sidebar navigation area like in the example shown below …
Step 1 – Upload your image.
To display the clickable button image on your site, the button image must be uploaded to your server. Upload the button graphic to a folder on your server and note the URL pointing to your image location.
E.g. …
http://www.yourdomain.com/images/supportbutton.jpg
You will need this information in Step 3.
In order for someone to go to your contact page when they click on the graphic button, you will need to either create a contact page, or have an existing destination page already set up (e.g. a helpdesk). We will then link your button graphic to this URL in Step 3 …
Step 2 – Create your contact page.
Create a contact page on your site and note its URL …
Step 3 – Compose your text widget code.
Don’t worry … this sounds a lot more technical than it is. In simple terms, we just need to create the instructions linking your button image to the destination URL.
Your instructions can be typed in a simple text editor 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 with the URL of your image location.
The image below shows the sections of the above sample code that you will need to replace with the actual contact details …
Replace the above URLs and then copy all of the above code to your clipboard when finished.
If you need help understanding basic HTML code, see this tutorial:
Go back into your Widgets area …
(Widgets Panel)
Step 4 – Add a Text widget.
Add a Text widget to your sidebar where you would like your button to display.
In the Available Widgets area, select the Text widget …
(WordPress text widget)
Drag the Text widget to your Active Widgets section and release it at the top of the Widget Area …
(Drag and drop your Text widget)
Step 5 – Configure the text 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 the save button …
Add a title to your widget if you want (e.g. “Need Help?”, “Get Support”, etc.) and paste the code with the correct destination URLs into the large text box, then click Save when done …
Note: Remember to test all URLs before pasting scripts into the Text Widget, or your clickable button will not work.
*** If using WordPress version pre-4.8 ***
If you’re adding text without 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’re typing in code like we’re doing in this tutorial).
Here is some text with Automatically add paragraphs box not checked …
(Automatically add paragraphs option not ticked)
Here is some text with Automatically add paragraphs option selected …
(Automatically add paragraphs option checked)
***
Step 6 – Refresh your web browser.
Once you have added your text widget and HTML content, go to the front end of your site and refresh the web browser. If all links have been entered correctly, then your clickable support button will display at the top of your sidebar menu …
(Clickable button widget on sidebar)
The above screenshot shows ’click for help’ button in the sidebar area of a brand new WordPress site.
Step 7 – Test the button.
The last step is to ensure that the links work. Test your button to make sure that your visitors will go to your contact page when they click on the button. If you are taken to the support page, then everything has been set up correctly …
(Test the text widget to ensure it works)
Text Widgets – Useful Tips:
If you want a new browser window to open up when visitors click on your support button (so they don’t leave the page they’re on), then change the code from this:
To this (i.e. add the part that says: target=”_blank” in the code):
When choosing images for your sidebar menu, make sure that the width of your image doesn’t exceed the width of your sidebar column, especially if you are using a non-responsive WordPress theme. As we’ve previously mentioned, some themes may display elements differently depending on their templates and their layout. Some sidebars may be too wide or too narrow. If the sidebar of your theme is narrower than the width of the button images, then you may have to either adjust the graphic size, or the column width to make the images display correctly on your theme.
(Make sure that the image width does not exceed the width of the sidebar column)
More Tips:
- If you don’t want the image to be centered in the sidebar, delete the <center> and </center> tags from the beginning and end of the line of code. The image will then be aligned to its default settings (normally left-aligned).
- Link the contact button to any URL you like (e.g. to an external link, contact form, forum, etc.) and change this anytime by editing the links inside the text widget.
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This is the end of part two of this tutorial about using WordPress widgets.
Click on this link to continue reading:
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