As we explain in this article, one of the many benefits of choosing the WordPress web publishing application for managing and growing a business online is that WordPress makes it very easy to add content, enhance your website, and reconfigure the layout of your site without web programming skills or knowledge required.
WordPress allows you to quickly and easily add, delete, and reconfigure content in your site’s sidebar navigation menu (or header and footer sections, depending on what theme you have installed) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site like:
- index of pages
- categories
- archived published posts
- menus displaying only selected pages
- links to resources
- most popular posts
- user comments
- clickable ads
- testimonials
- polls
- content from RSS feeds
- newsletter registration form
- product catalog images
- social media share buttons
- display widgets from other sites (e.g. Twitter)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(WordPress widgets help make managing and using WordPress easy)
To learn more about what widgets are, how widgets work and how using widgets can help you expand the functionality of your website, see this article:
In this tutorial series you are going to learn how to use and configure a number of frequently-used WordPress widgets.
Using Widgets In WordPress
The Basics
Before we start learning how to configure widgets, it helps to first explain some of the basic concepts about using widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widget-Ready Layouts
Many WordPress themes support widgets and provide widgetized areas in your theme’s layout where widgets can be added to, such as the sidebar section, header area, and footer sections. Depending on the theme installed on your site, widgets can also appear in the content area …
(Many WordPress themes offer users multiple widget sections)
These widgetized sections correspond to a feature inside your Widget panel called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
Widgets Panel
The Widgets area displays all the widgets that are currently available for use on your site.
The right-hand section of the screen displays the “active” widgets …
(Widgets can be activated or deactivated with drag and drop ease)
Available widgets can be made Active or Inactive by dragging & dropping items to different sections of the widgets panel.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like the sidebar, footer, etc. become active and available for use on your site.
Your Widgets screen also includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove widgets that you no longer want to actively display on your site. Inactive widgets do not lose their settings.
Rearrange Widgets Using Drag-And-Drop
You can easily insert, activate, deactivate, reorder and remove widgets by dragging and dropping items inside the Widgets section …
(Rearrange widgets on your WordPress site using drag & drop)
You can also easily reorder your theme’s layout by with drag and drop ease.
For example, in the image below, the widgets have already been configured to display things on your site like:
- An opt-in form,
- A click for support button, and
- ’Click to call’ feature from a widgetized plugin (i.e. a WordPress plugin with an accompanying widget) …
(Widgets control how certain features on your site appear)
Looking inside the Widget area, you would see that the front-end features appear on the site in the same order as their corresponding widgets were arranged in the active widget section …
Let’s now change the above widgets in the Active Widget Area using drag and drop …
(Drag and drop to rearrange widgets in the widget area)
The widget features have now been reordered in your sidebar navigation menu …
This instantly reorganizes the order of items in the sidebar.
Rearranging sidebar layout using widgets can help improve your site’s visitor experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ function (3) is now the first item on the sidebar, and the ‘contact us’ graphic button (2) is placed above the newsletter sign-up form (1) …
(Reorganize sidebar layout with widgets to improve your site’s visitor experience)
Removing Widgets From The WordPress Sidebar
Deleting widgets from the sidebar navigation menu is very easy.
For example, let’s show you how to remove the Search widget from the sidebar navigation menu …
(Search widget)
To delete a widget from an active Widget area, you can either expand the widget and click the Delete link …
(How to delete your widget)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets area and into the Inactive Widgets section …
(How to remove a WP widget)
Repeat this process for any other widgets you want removed from your sidebar navigation section. You can always reactivate a widget by dragging it back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Most widgets provide additional settings that allow you to further customize these. This includes making certain types of information hidden to your site visitors but visible to registered users, displaying additional forms, fields, or data, specifying dimensions of sidebar images, videos, etc.
Click on the little triangle in the corner of a widget to expand the item …
(Toggle to expand/collapse widget settings)
When the widget expands, you can change and save your settings, remove the widget from the “Active Widgets” section, close the widget, or click on the triangle to collapse the widget settings …
(Widget settings)
Some widgets may require or offer no customization, or they may only allow you to add an optional title …
(Some widgets give you little to no customizing options)
Theme Customizer
Depending on which WordPress theme you have installed on your site, you can also preview any changes live without actually making changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you are happy with what you have done before making any permanent changes to your website.
The ability to manage widgets from your own WP dashboard is a great feature of WordPress. You can work in preview mode inside the WordPress Theme Customizer screen (Appearance > Customize) and see how your widget content will appear prior to publishing any changes you’ve made (and avoid making mistakes), or change widgets on the fly using the Widget editor screen.
(preview widget changes in the Customize feature)
When viewing your site on the front-end just calick the Customize link in the toolbar …
(Toolbar Customize Link)
This brings you to the Customizer area in the back-end.
You can do several edits in preview mode (like inserting, deleting and moving widgets around), and it’s all done in real time. If you like what you have done, click the “Save and Publish” button and your changes will instantly become visible on the site’s frontend.
(Widget management – configure widgets on the fly!)
After saving the changes, WordPress will automatically update the widget settings and display your new configuration to your site visitors.
Since the theme you choose can affect how elements display on your site, we recommend that you install the theme first before configuring widgets.
Also, remember to use the WordPress Customizer to preview your changes. This saves you from having to keep two browsers open while you complete this tutorial (one to work in and one to check how the site is coming along).
Now that you know the basics of using widgets, let’s configure a number of commonly-used WordPress sidebar widgets.
***
This is the end of section one of this tutorial series on using WordPress widgets.
Click on this link to continue reading:
***
"Learning WordPress has been a huge stumbling block for me. I've been looking for something that covers absolutely everything but doesn't cost an arm and a leg. Thank you so much ... you have just provided me with what I have been looking for! Truly appreciated!" - Tanya
***