In Part 1 of this tutorial series, we explained how to use WordPress widgets and in Part 2, you learned how to configure a text widget.
In this tutorial we will continue configuring other widgets.
Adding Categories To The Sidebar Menu
Now that you have set up a text widget containing a support button, let’s configure a widget for your Post Categories.
By default, the Categories widget already displays on the sidebar. All you need to do, therefore, is place the widget wherever you want your post categories to display by clicking and dragging it on your sidebar widget area …
(Categories widget)
Before adding a Categories widget to your sidebar area, we first recommend setting up your post categories inside the WordPress dashboard …
(WordPress Post Categories)
Note: We are currently putting together tutorials on using WordPress categories.
Let’s configure your Categories widget settings as described below:
- In Title: type something that visitors will understand, like “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- If you plan to have several categories, check Display as dropdown (this significantly reduces the size of the widget content by displaying all categories inside a drop-down menu). If you plan to publish posts under a few categories only, then leave the Display as dropdown box unchecked. (2)
- You can leave the remaining options unchecked, or see the additional notes on configuring the Categories widget below.
- Click Save when finished …
(WordPress Categories widget settings)
Click Visit Site or reload the page to see how your content 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, enable the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add A Recent Posts Section
The Recent Posts widget is added to your sidebar menu by default. All you need to do is configure this widget.
Click on your Recent Posts widget title bar to configure its settings …
(Recent Posts widget)
There is not much to configure. You can add a widget title, select the number of posts to display and display post dates. If you want to use the default setting for Number of posts to show, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise change the number of posts and click Save when done …
(Recent Posts widget settings)
Your most recent posts will appear on the sidebar …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget on blog sidebar)
For a step-by-step tutorial about how to create and edit a WordPress Post, go here: How To Create A Post In WordPress
Add A Pages Widget To Your Blog Sidebar Area
Next, let’s add a widget to your sidebar area to display page links.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your widget area …
(Adding a Pages widget to the sidebar menu)
The Pages widget allows you to configure the following options:
- Title: Add a title to the widget (e.g. “Useful Information“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or by page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Use this setting to prevent pages from showing on the sidebar (3) …
(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 in the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – sorting options)
To prevent certain pages from displaying to visitors, simply enter their Page Ids separated by commas into the Exclude field …
(Pages Widget settings – exclude pages by ID)
For a step-by-step tutorial on how to find a WordPress post or page ID, go here: How To Locate The Page Or Post ID In WordPress
Click the Save button when finished and click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize the widget.
Links to your blog’s pages will now appear on the sidebar navigation menu …
(WordPress Pages Widget on sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to the sidebar navigation area. This is useful if you want to display different page groups on your sidebar (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Display Links On Your Sidebar
Next, we’ll add a Links widget to the sidebar.
Before adding a Links widget to the sidebar area, we recommend setting up your Links section inside your WordPress dashboard first …
(WordPress Links section)
Note: Setting up the WordPress Links feature will be covered in separate tutorials.
To add the widget, find a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Links Widget)
Drag the widget 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 the sidebar area …
(WordPress Links Widget Settings)
You can add as many separate ‘Link Widgets’ to the sidebar 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 Links Widgets To The 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 …
(Links added to WordPress sidebar section)
As the above example shows, you can display specific links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple link lists to your sidebar section.
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This is the end of section three of this tutorial about how to use Widgets.
To view the rest of this tutorial, click here:
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"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now